The hidden corner of 'colluding' to share with each other?

Mr. Truong Quang Nghia, in his new position as Secretary of the Da Nang City Party Committee, recently shared some noteworthy information about a “hot” issue that every citizen is interested in: BOT – an important content managed by the Ministry of Transport, where Mr. Nghia was the “commander” just a short time ago.

Sharing his thoughts during the meeting with voters, Mr. Nghia said: “After summarizing and re-evaluating the BOT projects, there are two major things I decided to do during my time as Minister of Transport: temporarily suspending the BOT projects to review and make final accounts. From the final accounts, some problems of BOT will be revealed, whose project, yours or mine.”

Mr. Nghia's statement was in response to a voter's question: "Are there group interests in BOT?" This voter also quoted another person's comment, betting that "without group interests (in BOT), I would die immediately."

These are indeed straightforward questions and very… honest answers! Specifically, Mr. Nghia said: “The shortcomings in implementing BOT projects stem from the haste of the Ministry of Transport, from the movement, from building personal images. And I always say that there are issues of personal interests involved.”

The new Secretary of the Da Nang City Party Committee, former Minister Nghia firmly asserted: there are negative factors, “private interests”, “yours” and “my” factors in BOT projects. And he also said clearly that BOT projects mainly “catch thieves with bare hands” – borrowing money from banks, not necessarily mobilizing social resources as the good policy of this form.

What could be sadder than a former industry leader being forced to "pull up his shirt" to expose the division of labor that happened in the "old place, old house" like that!

Being the Minister of Transport for just over a year, no matter what, Mr. Nghia is partly responsible for the negative aspects of the industry he manages. And when he is not afraid to tell the people directly that the transport industry has negative aspects, and then when he leaves and hands over the work to his successor, the situation still cannot be “eliminated”, then we can see how terrible the power of “interest groups” is!?

Again, when he was still the Minister, Mr. Nghia also had many statements related to this long story:

On April 14, 2016, answering the press after taking office as Minister of Transport, Mr. Truong Quang Nghia said: "In investment work, we will maintain the principle that spending every penny of the people's money must be considered." Then, in June 2016, when working with the leaders of Da Nang City, he declared: "The implementation of BOT focuses on new roads, avoiding single roads, avoiding BOT routes where people have no other choice."

Frankly speaking, there is nothing new about those contents. That idea appeared 22 years ago (or more) under the Prime Minister Vo Van Kiet. Deputy Prime Minister Phan Van Khai at that time rejected the proposal of a group of investors from Dubai to build Highway 5 Hanoi - Hai Phong under the BOT form and only agreed if the BOT project was built parallel to Highway 5 to ensure that people have a choice.

However, being a leader who thinks about the responsibility for people's wallets like former Minister Truong Quang Nghia is already very valuable! It's just a pity that, in reality, according to the comments of the leader of the State Audit, "most national highways and bridges have become the sole route for BOT investors, not allowing people to choose alternative routes. The project becomes a monopoly and the investor has the exclusive right to collect money". The distance between toll stations on the same route according to regulations must be at least 70km, but up to 33/88 toll stations do not ensure the distance.

From a good policy, BOT has become the backyard of a group of “public servants”, a piece of profit cake for all parties to take while the people “bend their backs” to bear the fees. However, who are the interest groups, who are the “big brothers”, who are the “little brothers”, the people really need a clearer and more fair answer.

BOT – that is just one aspect of the policy. How many other hidden aspects, how many other policies, do they join hands to share?

According to Dan Tri