Pot-bellied, short, or abusive traffic policemen will be barred from working on the streets of Vietnam’s
capital and assigned desk jobs instead as Hanoi police try to clean up their unsavory image.
The city’s traffic police are following the worst offenders closely and compiling lists of those to be
reassigned. All police on traffic duty will be made to carry a book on the code of conduct to remind them
how to behave, the official Tien Phong (Vanguard) newspaper said.
Tempers often flare in the city of 7 million famous for constant streams of motorcycles and sometimes
haphazard driving. Complaints have mounted about the conduct of traffic police, including allegations of
corruption and abusive behavior.
Crackdowns on overweight policemen have taken place in Thailand, Pakistan, Britain, Indonesia and the
Philippines in recent years. Several of those countries ordered officers to get fit and lose weight before
they could return to work.
I-Word Understanding
Pot bellied ?having a excess of visceral fat belly.
Worst Offenders ? least good law breaker.
Flare- burn with a sudden intensity
Haphazard – lacking any obvious principle of organization
Crackdowns – severe measures against undesirable or illegal people or behavior
II-Have your say
1. In Vietnam, Philippines and Thailand, there are many law enforcers who are more than
chubby,many are downright fat. It had been concluded that they are incompetent and incapable of
chasing criminals.
2. In March 2011, a Hong Kong inquest has criticised Philippine officials for their slow response to
a Manila bus hijacking that left eight tourists from the city dead. Philippine officials left to dine at
a restaurant even after hijacker fired warning shots.
3. On the face of it at least, Japan’s police are the most brilliant law enforcers in world history,
individually, many Japanese police officers are honest and dedicated according to New York
times.
173 Vietnam capital to reassign obese, rude traffic cops: paper
