Minister of Transport Dinh La Thang: Hope people will share...

Minister of Transport Dinh La Thang affirmed that the current solutions to prevent traffic congestion and reduce traffic accidents that the Ministry is coordinating with relevant sectors and localities to implement are only to concretize the content of the Government's Resolutions and are not an initiative of the Ministry of Transport.

During his nearly 10-minute speech at the National Assembly this morning, Minister of Transport Dinh La Thang repeatedly hoped to receive support and sympathy from National Assembly deputies as well as voters and people regarding the solutions to combat traffic congestion and reduce traffic accidents that the Ministry is implementing in the spirit of the Government's resolutions issued over the years to address this problem.

Minister of Transport Dinh La Thang - Photo: Ngoc Thang

The Minister also affirmed that the solutions to prevent traffic jams and reduce accidents that the Ministry is coordinating with relevant ministries, branches and localities, especially Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City at present, including the solution to change working hours, "are not yet an initiative of the transport sector" but in fact all of those solutions have been stated in the Directive of the Central Executive Committee and the Government's resolutions from 2002 to present.

“Changing working hours has really caused disruption and affected some people. We also hope that people, voters, and National Assembly members will share, because to achieve a bigger goal, even a very small part must share… We can sacrifice a small part of ourselves, but we will gain something bigger for the whole country, for the whole community, and in that gain, the people themselves will also benefit,” the Minister called.

Mr. Thang also expressed his belief that "with the entire political system participating and the people agreeing to implement, it is certain that controlling and minimizing traffic accidents and traffic congestion in large cities will be possible."

Don't worry too much about public debt.

Finance Minister Vuong Dinh Hue emphasized this at the socio-economic discussion session this morning, October 28, after many National Assembly deputies expressed concerns about the safety of Vietnam's public debt.
Although in the Socio-Economic Plan Report, the Government affirmed that public debt would be kept at a safe level with an estimated figure of about 54.6% by the end of this year, and by 2015 it would be about 60-65% of GDP, the issue of public debt safety still makes National Assembly deputies worried.

Having spoken at the group when discussing the implementation of the socio-economic tasks in 2011 and the plan for 2012, in today's meeting hall, Deputy Tran Hoang Ngan (HCMC) continued to emphasize the issue of Vietnam's public debt safety and gave a warning: reality shows that many European countries 2-3 years ago declared debt safety but are now standing on the brink of a public debt crisis.

This delegate proposed that the financial sector needs to maintain iron discipline in managing budget expenditures, especially in public debt management.

To reassure the delegates, Minister Vuong Dinh Hue spoke at the meeting hall this morning, adding that public debt as of December 31, 2012 will be about 58.4% of GDP. "This index is calculated based on the expected growth scenario of 6%. If the growth scenario reaches 6.5%, this public debt ratio will decrease significantly," said the Minister.

One of the criteria to evaluate the safety of public debt is to consider the debt structure. Regarding this aspect, Mr. Hue said that in the public debt structure of Vietnam, ODA loans account for 74%, preferential loans 19%, and commercial loans only account for 7%. Moreover, the ODA loan period is still long, and the interest rate is low.

Although affirming that Vietnam's public debt is still within the safe threshold by citing specific figures on the debt ratio and the interest rate to be paid on each loan annually, the Minister of Finance also said, "The Government has also calculated that the debt structure has and will change when ODA and incentives are gradually decreasing and commercial loans are tending to increase, because we have been included in the list of countries at the middle income threshold."

According to the Minister, the Ministry of Finance is currently developing a public debt management strategy until 2020 to submit to the Government, at the same time as developing a medium-term plan and a specific project to implement the public debt management strategy when approved.

Agreeing with the opinions of the Deputies, the most important issue in public debt is not how much debt is borrowed but the ability to repay the debt, the Minister said "according to international practice, the safe debt repayment level is no more than 30% of total budget revenue, then we can only use the remaining space of 14-16%. Therefore, the Government also correctly perceives that the important thing is how to borrow, how to use it effectively and how to repay the debt".

"We are not optimistic, but we should not worry too much about public debt," the Minister reassured, and at the same time proposed that the National Assembly maintain the public debt ratio as presented in the 5-year plan, with national debt not exceeding 50%, government debt not exceeding 53% and public debt around 60-65%.

(According to Thanh Nien)