Biography
Ngo (pronounced no) was born in South Vietnam to wealthy parents and following university became a school teacher. Following the fall of Saigon and the end of the Vietnam War, his family had their assetts confiscated and Ngo made several unsuccessful attempts to flee the country and was jailed several times. In January 1981 he made his thirteenth attempt which was successful and he arrived in Australia via Malaysia as a refugee in 1982. On 8 October 1987, he was elected to the Fairfield Council making him the first Vietnamese born Australian to enter local government. The following year he partnered Rodney Adler to set up Asia Press Pty Ltd which published Dan Viet, a Vietnamese language newspaper. As a City Councillor, Ngo worked to help members of the Vietnamese community and after arranging for Adler to invest $1 million, led the redevelopment of the local community centre, the Mekong Club. He was subsequently asked to be the clubs honorary president. In 1990 Ngo was elected deputy Mayor of Fairfield. In 1991, Ngo stood as an independent for the seat of Cabramatta which he lost to Labor's John Newman.
After his friend and council ally, Nick Lalich approached Federal MP Ted Grace for Ngo to join the ALP, Grace arranged a meeting with Senator Graham Richardson and Leo McLeay, Federal MP for Watson and Speaker of the House of Representatives, who decided that if promoted to be a member of Legislative Council (MLC), Ngo could be a potential "counter" to the Liberal party's Asian MLC Helen Sham-Ho. He was invited to join the Australian Labor Party (ALP) and the dormant Canley Vale branch of the ALP was re-activated which, although Ngo agreed not to challenge Newman for preselection, put him in direct competition with Newman who ran the Canley Heights branch.
Read more about this topic: Phuong Ngo
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