12th Party Congress: Strengthening the building of a clean and strong Party

12th PARTY CONGRESS

Time:January 21 to 28, 2016

Location:Hanoi capital

Number of delegates attending the Congress:1,510

Number of party members in the country:4.5 million

Congress elected

- General Secretary:ComradeNguyen Phu Trong.

- Central Executive Committee:180 official members and 20 alternate members

- Politburo:19 Members

GENERAL CONTEXT

- In the world, peace and development cooperation are the major trends. However, the world and regional situations have many very complicated developments; the world economy is recovering slowly; political crises are occurring in many places and countries; competition in many aspects is increasingly fierce between major countries in the region; the situation in the East Sea has many complicated developments.

The world economy is recovering slowly, unevenly and with many difficulties.

- Domestically, after 30 years of carrying out the renovation process, 5 years of implementing the Platform for national construction in the transitional period to socialism (supplemented and developed in 2011) and the Socio-Economic Development Strategy 2011-2020, our country has achieved many great and historic achievements, affirming that the Party's renovation policy is correct and creative; our country's path to socialism is consistent with Vietnam's reality and the development trend of history.

However, innovation is not yet synchronous and comprehensive. Some socio-economic targets have not been achieved; many targets and criteria in the goal of striving to basically become a modern industrialized country by 2020 have not been achieved.

The state of political ideology, morality and lifestyle degradation of a significant number of cadres and party members, and bureaucracy, corruption and waste have not been pushed back.

STRENGTHENING THE BUILDING OF A CLEAN AND STRONG PARTY

With the theme "Strengthening the building of a clean and strong Party; promoting the strength of the entire nation and socialist democracy; comprehensively and synchronously promoting the renovation process; firmly protecting the Fatherland, maintaining a peaceful and stable environment; striving to soon turn our country into a basically modern industrialized country", the Congress discussed and agreed on a general assessment of the implementation results of the Resolution of the 11th Congress, the socio-economic development tasks for the 5 years 2011-2015 and looking back at 30 years of renovation.

The Congress unanimously agreed that in the 2016-2020 term, it will focus on leading and directing the effective implementation of the following key tasks:

- Strengthen Party building and rectification; prevent and repel the degradation of political ideology, ethics, lifestyle, and manifestations of "self-evolution" and "self-transformation" within the Party. Focus on building a contingent of cadres, especially strategic-level cadres, with sufficient capacity, qualities and prestige, equal to the task.

- Build a streamlined, effective and efficient organizational structure for the entire political system; step up the fight against corruption, waste and bureaucracy.

- Focus on implementing solutions to improve growth quality, labor productivity and competitiveness of the economy. Continue to effectively implement three strategic breakthroughs (perfecting the socialist-oriented market economic institution; fundamentally and comprehensively innovating education, training, and developing human resources, especially high-quality human resources; building a synchronous infrastructure system), comprehensively and synchronously restructuring the economy in association with innovation of the growth model; promoting industrialization and modernization of the country, focusing on industrialization and modernization of agriculture and rural areas in association with building new rural areas. Focus on effectively solving the problems of restructuring state-owned enterprises, restructuring the state budget, handling bad debts and ensuring public debt safety.

- Resolutely and persistently fight to firmly protect the independence, sovereignty, unity and territorial integrity of the Fatherland; maintain a peaceful and stable environment for national development; ensure national security, maintain social order and safety. Expand and deepen foreign relations; take advantage of opportunities, overcome challenges, effectively implement international integration in new conditions, continue to enhance the country's position and prestige in the international arena.

- Attract and promote all resources and creativity of the people. Take care to improve material and spiritual life, effectively solve urgent problems; strengthen social development management, ensure social security, human security; ensure social security, improve social welfare and sustainable poverty reduction. Promote people's mastery, promote the strength of great national unity.

The Congress elected the 12th Party Central Committee, consisting of 180 official members and 20 alternate members. At the first meeting, the Central Committee elected a Politburo of 19 members and a Secretariat of 3 members. Comrade Nguyen Phu Trong was re-elected as General Secretary of the Party.

At the 6th Central Conference of the 12th tenure, held from October 4 to 11, 2017, two comrades were elected to the Secretariat. At the 7th Central Conference of the 12th tenure, held from May 7 to 12, 2018, two comrades were elected to the Secretariat.

DOMESTIC EVENTS

- March 28 to April 1, 2015: Vietnam successfully organized the 132nd Inter-Parliamentary Union Assembly (IPU-132).

- July 6-10, 2015: General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong visited the United States of America. This was the first official visit by the General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam to the United States.

- 2015: Vietnam completed negotiations on four free trade agreements (FTAs) with the Eurasian Economic Union, the European Union, South Korea and the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), bringing the total number of FTAs ​​that Vietnam participates in to 14.

- April 2016: A serious environmental incident occurred along the coast of four central provinces of Vietnam (Ha Tinh, Quang Binh, Quang Tri, Thua Thien-Hue).

- May 15, 2016: The Politburo issued Directive 05-CT/TW on promoting studying and following Ho Chi Minh's ideology, morality and lifestyle.

- May 23-25, 2016: President of the United States of America Barack Obama officially visited Vietnam.

- October 30, 2016: The Party Central Committee issued Resolution No. 04/NQ-TW on strengthening Party building and rectification; preventing and repelling ideological, political, moral, and lifestyle degradation, and manifestations of "self-evolution" and "self-transformation" within the Party.

- December 1, 2016: UNESCO recognized "The practice of worshipping the Mother Goddesses of the Vietnamese people" as an Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.

INTERNATIONAL EVENTS

- July 14, 2015: Iran and the P5+1 group (including the US, Russia, China, France, UK and Germany) signed a historic nuclear agreement, called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

- July 20, 2015: The US and Cuba officially reopened embassies in each country's capital.

- December 12, 2015: Approval of the Paris Agreement on climate change at the COP21 Conference (with 195 countries attending). The Agreement took effect in November 2016.

- December 31, 2015: ASEAN Community was officially established with 3 main pillars: Political-Security Community, Economic Community, Socio-Cultural Community.

- 2015: China made many moves to heat up the situation in the East Sea, such as illegally building artificial islands in Vietnam's Hoang Sa and Truong Sa archipelagos.

- 2015: Waves of migrants from Middle Eastern and North African countries poured into Europe.

- 2015: Many bloody shootings in Paris, France: at the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo (January 7, 2015); 7 consecutive shootings and terrorist bombings (November 13, 2015).

- April 3, 2016: The world's largest leak of confidential documents, called the "Panama Papers", was simultaneously published, causing a global shock.

- June 23, 2016: Britain held a referendum with the majority of voters choosing to leave the European Union (EU).

- July 12, 2016: The final international ruling on the Philippines' lawsuit against China stated: "There is no legal basis for China to claim historical rights in the East Sea and the so-called "nine-dash line" drawn by China is contrary to UNCLOS".

- November 8, 2016: Billionaire Donald Trump won an overwhelming victory in the US presidential election.

- November 25, 2016: Cuban revolutionary leader Fidel Castro passed away at the age of 90.

- 2016: Many terrorist attacks and shootings in Europe left hundreds dead and injured: in Brussels, Belgium (March 22, 2016); in Nice, France (July 14, 2016); in Berlin, Germany (December 19, 2016)