Meeting the "skillful" village chief in Tan Yen parish

In 2010, Mr. Nguyen Van Nguyen was trusted by the people of hamlet 11, Nghi Dien commune, and elected as hamlet chief. Before taking this job, he encountered many difficulties. His wife, children, and relatives only wanted him to focus on the family economy, because "carrying the prison and the village's goods" would take a lot of time, work, and sometimes have to endure "rumors" from the public. At first, that also distracted him. But he thought, the Party cell had mobilized and the people trusted him, so he had to work hard.

Mr. Nguyen Van Nguyen - a parishioner of Tan Yen Parish (Nghi Dien - Nghi Loc), the hamlet chief shared: "When the people trust and elect me as hamlet chief, I must not let them down. To do so, I must sacrifice my time, try to learn, and worry about the activities of the hamlet and commune to meet the requirements of the task." Photo: Nhat Tuan

When he started working as the village chief, Mr. Nguyen spent a lot of time getting used to the new job. At that time, most of the village roads and the yard of the village cultural house were muddy during the rainy season. He thought that the immediate thing to do was to raise the yard of the cultural house to create favorable conditions for people to meet.

After asking for the policy of the Party cell and the Front Committee of the hamlet, he mobilized his friends to support 3 million VND to help the hamlet fill the soil to raise the yard of the hamlet's cultural house. Then, he advised the Front Committee to mobilize each person to contribute 30,000 VND to have funds to pour concrete on the newly built yard.

Tan Yen Parish. Source: giaoxugiaohovietnam

In 2012, Hamlet 11 and other residential areas in Nghi Dien commune implemented land consolidation according to Directive 08 of the Provincial Party Committee. This was considered a big challenge for the new hamlet chief.

Most of the fields in hamlet 11 are uneven fields, which originally had only 8 small, narrow internal roads. According to the conversion plan, the number of roads must be tripled, with 5-meter wide roads and irrigation ditches on both sides. In other words, each sao of field must contribute 46m²along with 215,000 VND to consolidate land and exchange plots. Many people do not agree because they are afraid to contribute. They think that the fields can still be produced as they are, so why convert them and waste land and money?

Through many neighborhood meetings and private meetings, Mr. Nguyen analyzed the benefits of land consolidation for all people to understand. During the campaign, he used successes in other localities in the district to prove it to people to make them more confident. Thanks to that, after only 3 months of implementation, all 30 hectares of land in neighborhood 11 had completed land consolidation according to plan.

The next big difficulty that he also skillfully mobilized successfully was to deploy the construction of rural roads according to NTM standards in 2016. Just like the previous land conversion campaign, he also had to work with the Village Front Committee to do ideological work to get people to agree with the policy.

His family was also the first household to donate land to open a road with an area of ​​30m2. His campaign and the Front Committee of the hamlet were successful. More than 1,600m2 of garden and residential land were donated by the people in the hamlet, creating a vibrant atmosphere in the community.

The difficulty is not over yet. That is the stage of mobilizing financial contributions to pour concrete roadbeds according to NTM standards. Mr. Nguyen Van Xuan - a resident of Hamlet 11, Nghi Dien Commune said: "At first, there were many opposing opinions. But Mr. Nguyen and the Hamlet Front Committee analyzed, publicized the volume of materials, the contribution level per person for each road, and came up with a construction plan with people's supervision, and finally the people agreed."

The intra-village roads of hamlet 11, Nghi Dien commune have been rebuilt according to new rural standards. Photo: Nhat Tuan

Thanks to skillful mobilization of the people, taking advantage of the voices of the parish officials, Tan Yen Parish and receiving partial financial support from the Commune People's Committee, Mr. Nguyen has successfully built a rural concrete road that meets the new rural standards. Currently, more than half of the total 1,600m of cleared and expanded road has been concreted. The small, narrow, muddy village roads of the past have now been replaced by flat, high concrete roads, convenient for travel. The face of the countryside from the fields to the residential areas has become more prosperous.

15 years ago, Hamlet 11 was the poorest residential area in Nghi Dien commune, but now it has become better off. Most of the residents in Hamlet 11 are Catholics. In recent years, the hamlet has always been one of the leading units in all local movements. Contributing to that achievement is the role of Hamlet Chief Nguyen Van Nguyen.

Along with his “religious” duties and fulfilling his duty as a follower of God, Mr. Nguyen also took good care of “worldly” affairs. As the village chief, he was always close to the people, understood the people, and spent a lot of time on work to mobilize the people to actively and effectively carry out local emulation movements. With such valuable qualities, village chief Nguyen Van Nguyen deserves the name that the people gave him: “Mr. Nguyen is good at mass mobilization”.

Comrade Nguyen Huu Tho - Standing Deputy Secretary of the Party Committee, Head of the mass mobilization bloc of Nghi Dien commune said: "Mr. Nguyen is a person who works wholeheartedly for the people, for the movement of the hamlet and the locality. He always maintains solidarity and unity in the hamlet Front Working Committee; between the hamlet chief and the secretary, head of the Front Working Committee and members of the political system.

In particular, he has created a good relationship with the Pastoral Council of Tan Yen Parish to do a good job of propaganda and mobilizing parishioners to live a good life and a good religion. The commune's mass mobilization bloc has taken the model from hamlet 11 to expand the movement to other hamlets in the locality.