Former South Vietnamese Prime Minister Candidate's Ashes Laid in Falls Church

By Darien Bates

In December of 1971, during the height of the Vietnam War, Professor Nguyen Van Bong, a South Vietnamese intellectual and co-founder of the Progressive Nationalist Movement was murdered on the streets of Saigon, his car blown up by a man who passed on a motorcycle and attached a bomb to it. The attack was the second attempt on Bong’s life by the communist government of North Vietnam.

The day before, Bong, an opponent of both the South Vietnamese ruling party and the North Vietnamese communists, had been tapped by President Nguyen Van Thieu to serve as South Vietnam’s new prime minister. There were hopes he had the ability to find an end to the war that would leave South Vietnam as an independent country.

Last Saturday, almost 34 years after his murder, Professor Bong was honored and his ashes re-buried in the Buddhist Gardens at the National Memorial Cemetery. Over 100 guests, including his wife Jackie Bong-Wright, members of his family, former students and public officials, attended the ceremony to remember his life of service.

Though born poor, Bong studied on scholarship in Paris receiving doctorate degrees in constitutional law and political science from the Sorbonne. He later wrote law books and was highly regarded among the professional classes of Vietnam and the U.S. government.

After his death Professor Bong was buried in Saigon and a monument was erected in his memory, the massive funeral drawing thousands.

After U.S. troops pulled out of Vietnam in 1975, surrendering the country to the North Vietnamese government, the monument and grave site were left uncared for and fell into disrepair until recently. Then Thu Cuc, Bong’s sister-in-law, brought his ashes to the United States and his family, now residing in Falls Church.

The family came to Falls Church when Bong’s widow married U.S. diplomat Lacy Wright in 1976, and have lived here since. Their children, whom Wright adopted after their marriage, attended J.E.B. Stuart High School.

Jackie Bong-Wright has continued the social activism her husband was known for. She found a home for her talents in the Northern Virginia area.

In 1981 she was the founder of the Indochinese Refugee Social Services, which resettled the boat people of that era, earning her recognition by the U.S.-Asia Institute as one of 10 outstanding Asian-Americans in the United States of 1981. Later, she was awarded the keys to the city of Kingston, Jamaica for her social work there.

She is now President and CEO of the Vietnamese-American Voters Association. Her autobiography, Autumn Cloud, was published by Capital Books, Inc., in 2001.