The final farewell....

Nguyen had a final, emotional visit with his mother Kim, twin brother Khoa and lawyers on Thursday.

Nguyen was not allowed to receive a final hug from his mother or brother, but the three were allowed to hold hands for the last time.

Nguyen will be woken in his death row cell before dawn on Friday morning.

Handcuffed, he will take the short walk from his cell to the gallows, where a trapdoor will spring open at 6am (9am AEDT).

At the same moment, at Melbourne's St Ignatius Catholic Church, where Nguyen and his brother once went to school, the bell will ring out 25 times, once for every year of the dead man's life.

Within hours of the hanging, Nguyen's body will be returned to his family, and flown back to Melbourne for his funeral, expected to be held at the end of next week.

Long-time family friend Father Peter Hansen will preside over the bilingual requiem mass at Melbourne's St Patrick's Catholic Cathedral, the Daily Telegraph reported.

Nguyen's mother Kim began making funeral arrangements two weeks ago before flying to Singapore to visit her son, the paper said.

Ninety minutes after the dawn execution, Nguyen's body will be collected from Changi Prison. - Yahoo News AU Dec 02 2005, Friday, 12.35am


COMMENTS: -

I have come to terms that nothing is going to stop the government from hanging this man. Even though I still do not fully agree with the state’s decision, I do understand that the rule of law is absolute and should be upheld. I am utterly disappointed but not surprised.

Once again I would like to restate my personal opposition to the capital punishment and my hope that it would be abolished in the state one day. The basis overwhelmingly of my opposition to capital punishment is recognition that the law is not infallible, it can make mistakes. How than can we be absolutely sure when we sentence an individual to death?

In a sense, I am only human to be more affected by Nguyen's case due to the simple reason that this guy has shown remorse and has shown great progress to a complete transformation according to his prison wardens and supervisors. Why than are we executing someone totally capable to rehabilitated?

Secondly, if the state is dead-set in executing him, why than imprisoned him for a period of 2 years before meting out the sentence? Why are we giving him dual punishment for his crime? Where is the fairness? In this case scenario, the punishment is certainly disproportionate to the crime.

Obviously as a human being, you can't help but feel more strongly about particular cases than you do about others. I mean obviously if Saddam Hussein is sentenced to death, I don't know that I'm going to think the same about that as I've thought about Van Nguyen. Now people say that's hypocritical - no it's not hypocritical, it's just human.

However what I cannot comprehend and understand is this nation’s ‘clinical" response to the pleas by the mother of Nguyen Tuong Van to hug her son for a last time before his execution. I am disappointed that the government decided not to grant mother and son a final hug. Is this something really very hard to ask for? Where is the compassion? Is it really true we are without a heart? Do we rule with an iron-fist?

Apparently the prison ministry offered an official statement that the prison has a general policy not to allow any physical contact between criminals and loved ones before hanging. But in this special case, they are allowing a small concession for Nguyen and Mum to hold hands before he is hanged. Honestly I think this is dumb and ridiculous.

‘Like many jurisdiction that authorize capital punishment, Singapore does not allow ‘contact’ visits between prisoners and family members. Such encounters can be traumatic and are likely to destablise the prisoners and their family members,’ the ministry noted to the media.

How can we remotely explain the logic of this reasoning? It sounds so impersonal that I feel that this is a computer generated response. Even a computer has feelings and knows how to rearrange its format and font size and style to reflect the somberness of the occasion but sadly I don’t see that coming from the state.

Don’t even bring me there…I sympathize with the mom right this moment the pain and anguish that she is suffering is something that I will never understand but what I do know is that 25 years of bringing up my son, raising, feeding, caring and loving him, and not even a final goodbye hug.

In response to our state’s reply, this is what I have got to say. I think that Nguyen’s mom will suffer even more emotional distress from not having the peace in her heart that she has given her son a proper final farewell. She will be crying for years and feeling sad and dejected in her heart that she is not able to have physical contact with her son for a very last time.

Is it just me or do all of you sense an injustice sufficing here? Talk about compassion and human dignity. I don’t know where to begin and where to end.

I am saddened.

I don’t wish to comment anymore…..


"Violence as a way of achieving justice is both impractical and immoral. It is impractical because it is a descending spiral ending in destruction for all. It is immoral because it seeks to humiliate the opponent rather than win his understanding. It seeks to annihilate rather than to convert." - Martin Luther King, Jr.