Party newspapers must be important information channels of "Party's will and people's hearts"

Editor's note:Holding key leadership positions in the province, as Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee and now as a member of the Party Central Committee, Secretary of the Provincial Party Committee, Comrade Phan Dinh Trac has paid special attention to the activities and development of the provincial party newspaper. On the occasion of Nghe An Newspaper's 50th anniversary of establishment and growth, the Provincial Party Secretary wrote an important article in the special issue "Welcoming the 50th anniversary of Nghe An Newspaper's establishment".

Since the day Uncle Ho published the first issue of Thanh Nien newspaper (June 21, 1925) until now, the Vietnamese revolutionary press has had over 86 years of building, fighting and growing. In Nghe An, since 1929, there has been the Bonshevik newspaper - the newspaper of the Central Indochina Communist Party. In 1930, the Nghe An Do newspaper of the Nghe An Provincial Party Committee was born on the peak day of the Nghe Tinh Soviet movement (September 12, 1930)... On November 10, 1961, the Nghe An Provincial Party Committee decided to establish Nghe An Newspaper with the motto of "The voice of the Party, government and people of Nghe An". The very early appearance of revolutionary newspapers associated with the periods of revolutionary movement in our province shows that, in any time, condition, or circumstance, the Party Committee, government, and people of Nghe An always clearly recognize the important role, nature, and position of the press on the political and ideological front, always considering the party newspaper as an effective propaganda tool and a sharp weapon of struggle in the cause of building, protecting, and developing the homeland and country.

The Party Committee, government and people of Nghe An highly appreciate the great contributions of Nghe An Newspaper to the cause of socio-economic development and the building of the political system of the province over the past 50 years. With the function of "Collective propagandist, collective organizer, collective agitator", Nghe An Newspaper is truly an important information channel of "Party's will, people's heart". On the one hand, the newspaper has thoroughly grasped and disseminated the Party's guidelines, policies and guidelines, the State's laws, contributing to making people understand the management and operation of governments at all levels in all fields; on the other hand, it reflects the diverse reality, thoughts, aspirations and proposals, recommendations, and multi-dimensional critical opinions of all classes of people on issues taking place in life and on government activities, contributing to building a clean and strong Party and political system. The newspaper always pays attention to discovering, disseminating, and encouraging new factors, advanced models, and patriotic emulation movements in all areas of life; fighting against negative behaviors, corruption, false and destructive arguments, contributing to protecting the Party's guidelines and viewpoints and the State's laws.

Comrade Phan Dinh Trac visited the printing and film developing line
at Nghe An Newspaper Office. Photo: Sy Minh

The staff, reporters and editors have a strong political stance, are carefully trained and selected, have a good sense of organization and discipline, and always uphold the social responsibility and professional ethics of journalists. In recent years, the collective of staff, reporters and editors of the Newspaper have made great efforts, strived, united, innovated activities, improved the quality of the newspaper in both content and form; opened many new columns; presented in a lively and attractive way; solved problems thoroughly and effectively, closely following the breath of life. In addition to closely following reality to reflect the issues of "people's hearts", propaganda work on the Party's guidelines and policies, the State's laws and the activities of the political system has been presented in a more vivid and convincing way. With increasingly rich, diverse and practical information content on the newspaper, Nghe An newspaper has truly become spiritual food, an important bridge between the Party Committee, the government and the people, contributing practically to improving the effectiveness of the Party's leadership and the management and operation of the government at all levels.

Along with focusing on political tasks, cadres and reporters of Nghe An Newspaper also actively and effectively participate in charity, social activities, and gratitude activities such as: supporting Vietnamese Heroic Mothers, visiting and encouraging families with meritorious services, families affected by natural disasters, etc. These activities not only contribute to enhancing the prestige of the party newspaper, but also increase people's trust in the Party and State, contributing to hunger eradication and poverty reduction in the whole province.

Nghe An Newspaper is considered one of the top 5 newspapers among 63 local party newspapers in the country. From publishing 2 issues a week when it was first established, Nghe An Newspaper has now published a Daily Newspaper (5 issues a week) with a circulation of 11,000 copies/issue, ranking first among the party newspapers in the Central and Central Highlands provinces. Notably, since October 1, 2011, Nghe An Daily Newspaper has increased to 6 pages and printed in 4 vivid colors. The number of visits to Nghe An Electronic Newspaper has increased from 7,000 - 8,000 visits/day when it first started operating, to 9,000 - 10,000 visits/day in 2010, and now reaches over 15,000 visits/day.

In addition to the achievements, Nghe An Newspaper still has shortcomings and limitations that need to be overcome. The number of publications has not met the requirements of cadres, party members and people; the number of newspapers distributed on the market is still too small, not reaching other localities across the country. Although the form and content of the newspaper have been innovated, they are still not really diverse and attractive, there are not many articles summarizing practices, analyzing and commenting sharply, and convincingly orienting public opinion. Nghe An Electronic Newspaper is also limited and monotonous in its presentation, the transmission system is outdated, not meeting the requirements of updating information...

Comrade Tran Hong Chau presented the 2010 Press Awards to journalists.

Faced with the need for innovation, to be worthy of being the newspaper trusted by the Party Committee and people of the province, in the coming time, the collective of cadres, reporters and employees of Nghe An Newspaper must unite, strive even harder, and focus on performing well the following tasks:

First: Continue to perform well the role of the main force on the ideological front and take the lead in updating information and orienting public opinion. The extremely important task of party newspapers is to be proactive in always mastering the information battlefield, not leaving any loopholes for disturbing and distorted information, proactively fighting against false and destructive arguments of bad elements; be quick and take the lead in detecting and reflecting the true nature of practical life issues that are being raised, thoroughly explaining the issues according to the motto "fight to build", with pure motives, for stability and development, thereby contributing to providing appropriate solutions and solutions to problems, creating attraction to orient public opinion. Party journalists must know how to breathe into journalistic works the vitality of guidelines, policies, laws and the breath of people's lives.

Second: Focus on improving and enhancing the quality of both printed and electronic publications. Innovate more and more strongly in terms of facilities, technical means and publishing processes in a modern, professional and economical direction to reach the model of "Paperless Editorial Office". Invest more in Party building content, building a strong political system. Increase the political, cultural, persuasive and attractiveness of each article. Issue new publications, but do not deviate from the main task and do not affect the quality of main publications. In particular, we must strive to cover all daily newspapers in the week to meet the demand for timely, quick and accurate information in the new situation.

Third: Strengthen propaganda and encourage the entire Party, people and army to successfully implement the Resolution of the 11th National Party Congress and the Resolution of the 17th National Party Congress of the Provincial Party Committee. Continue to widely propagate the implementation of the task of "Studying and following the moral example of Ho Chi Minh".

Fourth: Promote the publication work, ensure that 100% of Party cells and Party committees in the whole province have Party newspapers, advise the Provincial Party Committee to expand the target audience of newspapers, have solutions to increase the number of newspapers distributed to the market, and rapidly increase the number of visits to Nghe An Electronic Newspaper.

Fifth: Do a good job of planning, training, fostering, and arranging the use of staff and reporters, ensuring high quality, capacity, and professionalism. Build mechanisms and policies to create a democratic, fair, transparent, healthy, cultural, and professional working environment. Improve material and spiritual life, ensuring that party journalists can make a living from their profession, feel secure in their commitment, enthusiasm, passion, and dedication to their profession. Strengthen solidarity and unity within the agency to build Nghe An Newspaper into a model editorial office, a strong and comprehensive party agency.

Phan Dinh Trac -Member of the Party Central Committee, Secretary of the Provincial Party Committee