Vietnamese Bawean

The Vietnamese Bawean are a group of Bawean living in Vietnam, with most of them living in Ho Chi Minh City. As of 2015, their population numbered around 400 people. They trace their ancestry from Bawean Island in Indonesia.^[2]

History

The Bawean people are known as reliable sea nomads, they can be found in almost several places in Southeast Asia.^[1] The initial arrival of the Bawean people in Vietnam itself, starting in the 1800s, started with hundreds of people of Bawean descent who migrated since the Dutch colonial era in Indonesia, most of them at that time inhabited Ho Chi Minh City.^[3] This Vietnamese citizen of Bawean descent mostly lives around the Al-Rahim Mosque in District 1 of Ho Chi Minh.^[2]

According to the narrative of a Bawean figure in Vietnam and the leader of the Al-Rahim Mosque, Haji Ally, he followed his parents to Ho Chi Minh during the Dutch colonial period in Indonesia, at that time he was only 11 years old. There is no definite record of when the Bawean people first arrived in Vietnam. However, people who have a tradition of migrating are thought to have left their hometowns during the Dutch colonial era. In addition to Vietnam, there are also those who go to Singapore and Malaysia. At that time Vietnam was still in the France colony. The Bawean people in Vietnam then built the Al-Rahim Mosque using wooden building materials. The mosque is one of the oldest mosques in Vietnam which was built in 1885.^[2]

A researcher of the Bawean people in Vietnam, Malte Stokhof, said the Bawean people left their area of origin for various reasons. Stokhof said, "According to their stories, their presence in Vietnam was due to several reasons. The main thing was to avoid the repressive Dutch colonial government, carry out the tradition of migrating and on the way to go hajj, they then stop in Singapore to work to increase the fare to the holy land Mecca".^[2]

Some of the migrants from Bawean then chose to live in Singapore and some continued their journey to Mecca. Stokhof says Bawean people who travel via the Mekong River work with traders from China and then look for work when arriving in Ho Chi Minh.^[2]

Society and citizenship

There is no definite data regarding the number of descendants and people of Bawean origin in Vietnam. However, Haji Ally estimates around 400 people in 2015. Of these, almost none of them master the Indonesian or Bawean languages, and even the traditions from the region of origin are currently not being carried on. Haji Ally said, "Everyday we use Vietnamese, only the elderly can speak Malay. There are also young people who can speak Indonesian because they study there".^[2]

The descendants of Bawean in Vietnam had difficulty managing their citizenship identity. Almost all of the Bawean descendants who live in Vietnam do not have identity as Indonesian citizens because they arrived in the country when Indonesia was not yet independent. This nationality issue arose after South Vietnam supported by United States was defeated by North Vietnam in 1975. Changes in the political and security situation in Vietnam make Bawean descendants in Ho Chi Minh feel worried, especially since many of them also work with the US.^[2]

Malte Stokhof said a number of Bawean descendants in Vietnam were trying to return home, but were hampered by paperwork and lost contact with their families back home. Stokhof said, "Most of them do not have documents and cannot return to Indonesia. Those who manage to contact their relatives can return to Bawean, but there were very few of them because the means of communication were very limited at that time".^[2]

Stokhof said that even Bawean people who have documents issued by the French colonial government are experiencing difficulties. In the document they are referred to as Malays. Then Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Vietnam said they were Ma'alay which means Malaysian citizens. Furthermore, they also went to representatives of the Malaysian government, but were refused because they were also not citizens there. Finally they returned to the office of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Vietnam and finally offered to become citizens of Vietnam. However, the problem reappears when it comes to including ethnicity. Stokhof said, "When they said they were from the Bawean people, unknown in Vietnam, they were offered to list them as ethnic Cham because they were both Muslims. But because they are not Cham people, they also refuse, finally after a long discussion in the ethnic column on the identity card the Bawean people are called Indonesian, even though it's not a tribe but the name of the country of origin".^[2]

References

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