Inadequacies in community investment supervision

(Baonghean) In recent times, community investment monitoring (CIM) activities in the province have achieved many results, contributing to combating negativity, waste, and loss of resources, preventing infringement of community interests, and promoting people's ownership. However, in reality, the activities of the CIM Board still face some difficulties and obstacles.

Difficult to access project documents

Some voters said that: currently, supervision of construction works and projects funded by the people or local capital is quite good, but community supervision of projects invested by the State or designated contractors is still facing difficulties. The main reason is that project management boards and contractors have not provided necessary documents and records in a timely manner, especially projects related to transportation and irrigation. Some investors and construction contractors do not want to notify the design estimates, plans, progress or seek to change the type of materials to reduce construction costs.

Mr. Nguyen Trung Chien - Chairman of the Vietnam Fatherland Front Committee and Mr. Thai Ba Thinh - Vice Chairman of the Vietnam Fatherland Front, Head of the People's Inspection Committee and Community Investment Supervisor of Do Luong Town said: "Almost all projects with State investment capital, the local Community Investment Supervisory Board is not allowed to participate. For example, the project to move and upgrade Cau Dau dike on the Ta Lam dike route, a critical belt protecting 415 households, with more than 1,600 people in Do Luong Town, with a total investment of over 100 billion VND, invested by the District People's Committee, we only know that there is a policy like that, but we do not know the specific details...".



Road construction in Hung Thong commune (Hung Nguyen). Photo: Phan Toan.

In Nam Hung commune (Nam Dan), some officials and voters said that currently, the community investment supervision activities for projects with State capital or projects assigned by superiors are only formalities on paper and have not yet been put into practice. For example, in the area, there are 2 projects invested by the District People's Committee, which are the Thuyen Thung Lake project in Bac Son hamlet (worth 400 million VND) and the Nam Lac Bridge project in Hung Thanh hamlet (worth 300 million VND) which started construction in 2011. "The locality only knows the start date, but all related documents and procedures are not known, and they are not allowed to participate in supervision."

Similarly, in Nam Thai commune (Nam Dan), there are also some projects such as: Upgrading and repairing Hong Thai dam (phase 1: 400 million VND, phase 2: 750 million VND) or Phuong Hoang dike worth 4.2 billion VND, the local community investment supervision board is not allowed to participate in supervision... There are even projects where the local government does not know who the investor is, some projects are almost completed before seeing an official dispatch requesting the commune to participate in community investment supervision or when encountering difficulties in site clearance, only then requesting coordination. According to the opinions of some local leaders and people, the Community Supervision Board is the "eyes and ears" of the people, elected by the people. Therefore, to promote democracy and limit loss and waste, all work should be known, discussed, and inspected by the people. All large and small projects should be supervised by the local authorities and the people to ensure the quality of the project. In reality, there have been some traffic and irrigation projects that have experienced subsidence and subsidence after completion and put into use. People have made suggestions about the quality and have had to be repaired.

Limited budget, limited capacity

It is easy to see that the activities of the Community Monitoring Boards have contributed to limiting waste and loss of State money, but the budget for activities is very limited (only 2 million VND/year), so although they are very dedicated and responsible for their work, the inspection and supervision activities also face many difficulties. A member of the Hoa Son Commune Community Monitoring Board (Anh Son) gave an example: "If in a year, the locality has 10 projects that need to be monitored, the amount of 2 million VND divided for each project is 200,000 VND. The Monitoring Board has 7 members like that, each member monitors 10 days, each day only gets 2,800 VND...".

In addition, the qualifications of the supervisors are also questionable, because most of the members of the Supervisory Board are elected from the villages, so their capacity and professional qualifications are somewhat limited.

Meanwhile, according to the Regulations on Community Investment Supervision, the scope of community supervision is very broad. The Community Supervision Board must participate in many stages such as assessing the suitability of investment decisions; related investment plans in the area; assessing the compliance with regulations of investors; detecting acts that harm the interests of the community; monitoring and evaluating the effectiveness of the project, detecting acts that cause waste and loss of capital and assets of the project; monitoring and checking compliance with technical procedures, regulations, acceptance results and final settlement of works; making recommendations to competent authorities if violations are detected... To perform these tasks well, especially to detect violations, requires members of the Community Supervision Board to have capacity, qualifications, strong will, dare to take responsibility before the people, propose objective and honest recommendations that are both principled and constructive.

However, many supervisors admitted that they encountered many difficulties when participating in supervising the design, construction, and cost estimates of the project... because they lacked professional knowledge, so they only supervised in a "visual" way. Therefore, according to Mr. Nguyen Ba Minh - Head of the People's Inspectorate and Community Investment Supervisor of Nam Hung Commune (Nam Dan), members of the community supervision board need to be equipped with knowledge and skills in a systematic manner through training and coaching programs, along with strengthening equipment and ensuring funding for supervision work so that this activity can be truly effective, contributing to ensuring investment activities are in accordance with planning and in line with socio-economic development goals.

Khanh Ly