A young woman who accompanied a disabled male TikToker to two pho restaurants in Hanoi, where where the man claimed to have initially faced refusal of service and later experienced verbal abuse, has confirmed that they are willing to take full responsibility for their account before the law. 

The woman, named Ly, told Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper that she visited the two pho restaurants with V.M.L., who was in a wheelchair.

“Before publicizing the story on social media, we were aware that we would have to take responsibility for it before the law, so we would not speak at random,” Ly said. 

She added that the account received mixed opinions, so she expected the Hanoi Department of Information and Communications to quickly issue results of their verification of the case.

She and her boyfriend are willing to have CCTV footage at the pho restaurants checked.

Ly reported that she and L. would work with the Hanoi Department of Information and Communications and early give details of the story on their social media accounts.

A chicken pho eatery on Nam Ngu Street in Hanoi, which was believed to be involved in the story, on Monday publicized the CCTV footage of the case.

According to the footage, when L. and his girlfriend entered the diner, the owner and an employee paved the way for the two customers as the entrance is narrow, less than one meter wide. L. then sat behind the owner.

After they finished their meal, the eatery’s employee helped push his wheelchair outside.

Earlier, L. wrote on his Facebook account with nearly 150,000 followers that he and his girlfriend visited a pho restaurant in Hanoi.

As he was born paralytic, he has to use a wheelchair.

When they asked an employee of the restaurant to help carry L. and his wheelchair over a three-step staircase, the employee refused and said that “our restaurant has no staff to carry someone like you."

They later reached another pho eatery, also a place they visited before. Due to the narrow space, L. had to slightly squeeze into the owner’s area. 

They said the owner stood up and scolded her staff, “Who accepted this kind of people?”

After an employee answered that L. often sat there whenever he arrived at the eatery, she unpleasantly said that she could not work and had to stand, L. wrote.

L. shared that “the food stuck in my throat, it's hard to swallow,” adding that he is used to this type of situation but tears started to well in his girlfriend’s eyes.

His post attracted more than 47,000 reactions and 20,000 comments and shares.

Meanwhile, the owner of the chicken pho eatery on Nam Ngu Street affirmed that she had not refused the guests, and had never said, “Who accepted this kind of people?”

She recounted that on the morning of Friday last week, L. and his girlfriend visited the restaurant. As the eatery’s entrance is narrow and it was raining at the time, she invited the two guests to sit at a coffee shop opposite her eatery and then asked her staff to bring pho to them.

“However, he still wanted to sit at our restaurant, so we welcomed them normally,” she recalled, noting that L. and his friend sat at a table behind the owner and next to the chicken weighing area.

An employee reminded L. not to sit there next time. 

“He smiled and ate [pho] normally, but then posted a status on social network implying that we despised him, which is not true.”

A representative of the Hanoi Department of Information and Communications told Tuoi Tre that the agency is in the process of verifying the story.

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