On the fringes of the seminar, Government Chief Inspector Tran Van Truyen told the media that the fight against corruption will bring about better results only after high ranking officials show a high sense of responsibility towards their work.

“Administrative reform is considered the key to implementing corruption prevention measures effectively,” said Mr Truyen. “Once administrative procedures are clear and transparent to businesses and people, they will make an important contribution to cleaning up corruption.”

Mathieu Salomon, an anti-corruption advisor to the Swedish Embassy in Hanoi, emphasised the importance of recruiting qualified staff which, he said, will have a direct impact on the anti-corruption fight in Vietnam.

Meanwhile, Jairo Acuna Alfaro, an advisor on administrative reform and corruption prevention to the United Nations Development Programme in Vietnam, insisted that Vietnam adopt a more pragmatic approach to reforming public affairs and consider the current state of its economic development as well as the capacity of its human resources. He called for improving the efficiency of administration performance and public services in the future.

At the seminar, international specialists shared the view that if State agencies fail to recruit qualified staff, most of them will not be able to work in a professional manner. As a result, this will hinder the Government’s efforts to push through administrative reform and combat corruption.   

The fight goes on

According to Chief Inspector Truyen, inspectors have uncovered many cases of wrong use and management of land and misappropriation of State property in different forms.  

PhD Do Gia Thu, head of the legal department under the Government Inspectorate quoted statistics from the Inspectorate’s Anti-corruption Agency, saying that inspectors have conducted 2,355 inspections so far this year. They ordered the defenders to return VND797 billion and 46.1 ha of misused land to the State. They also submitted the dossiers of 16 other cases to the investigation agency and proposed fining 59 collectives and 263 individuals.

In the review period, 117 cases involving 280 persons have been taken to court on corruption charges. The grassroots investigation agencies have also completed their procedures and handed out the dossiers of 61 cases involving 144 persons to the People’s Procuracy. A total of VND33.6 billion has been refunded to the State budget.

According to PhD Thu, the fight against corruption has made some progress since the beginning of 2008, giving impetus to Vietnam to go ahead with stronger determination.  

A rough ride ahead

Chief Inspector Truyen said that fighting corruption should be carried out not only in State agencies but also in the private sector. Several businesses try every means to bribe high ranking officials.

He warned that unless there were effective measures to overcome the weaknesses in economic management, corruption would take root and become more complicated. This would hinder the establishment of a transparent and competitive business environment as well as reducing the competitiveness of the national economy. 

Inspectors are only entitled to inspect, review and make recommendations without actually having any authority to deal with corruption cases. In fact, many of their conclusions have not received prompt response from the relevant agencies.

“Perhaps inspectors are not authorised to deal with these cases, but their conclusions and recommendations should be seriously taken into account,” said Mr Truyen. “This also requires inspectors to be firm and fair all the time.”

The Government Inspectorate is amending the Inspection Law to help the relevant agencies legally deal with the inspectors’ conclusions. For instance, the law will set a time limit for relevant agencies to deal with the inspectors’ conclusions. If they fail to do this, the fines will be applied to the relevant agencies. In some cases, they will face accountability charges if they fail to follow the inspectors’ conclusions and recommendations.