Trương Vĩnh Lễ
# Trương Vĩnh Lễ

Trương Vĩnh Lễ (13 May 1914 – 23 October 2011) was a South Vietnamese politician who served as the first and sole President of the National Assembly of the Republic of Vietnam during the First Republic from 1955 until the 1963 coup which lead to the overthrow and assassination of South Vietnam's President Ngô Đình Diệm. After Diệm's overthrow, he had his assets frozen by the new government of General Dương Văn Minh.

## Biography

He was born on 13 May 1914 in Sóc Trăng, Cochinchina, French Indochina. He comes from a Catholic family of Vietnamese scholars with careers in academia, journalism, and publishing. He is also the great-grandson of a known Vietnamese scholar Trương Vĩnh Ký, commonly known as Pétrus Ký. He graduated from university with degrees in politics, economics, and business management.

### Career

Under the First Republic, he served as a member of the National Assembly representing units 4 and 5 in Gia Dinh province as a member of the Citizen Service Group. He initially filed to run in the 1971 South Vietnamese presidential election with Vice President Nguyễn Cao Kỳ but later withdrew.

