Recently, officials and people in general have been very interested in and have confidence in the establishment of the Central and Provincial Steering Committees on Anti-Corruption and Negative Practices. Regarding this issue, Comrade Ho Le Ngoc - Member of the Standing Committee, Head of the Provincial Party Committee's Internal Affairs Committee, Deputy Head of the Provincial Steering Committee on Anti-Corruption and Negative Practices took the time to have an interview with Nghe An Newspaper.
PV: Dear comrade, the establishment of the Provincial Steering Committee on anti-corruption and negativity in the recent past has received the consensus and support of society. Most cadres, party members and people believe in the Party's leadership in this work, however, not everyone understands the necessity of establishing the Provincial Steering Committee. Through Nghe An Newspaper, can you clarify this issue?
Comrade Ho Le Ngoc:There are four reasons to see that the establishment of a provincial Steering Committee on anti-corruption and negativity is extremely necessary.
The first basis is based on the successes of the organizational model and the results of the activities of the Central Steering Committee on Anti-Corruption and Negative Matters. Through the media, anyone can see that since the Central Steering Committee was established, under the Politburo, with the General Secretary as Head of the Steering Committee, the work of anti-corruption and negative matters has been led, directed and implemented resolutely, persistently, synchronously, comprehensively, methodically, in-depth, with very high political determination, achieving many very important results, creating strong changes in the awareness and actions of the entire political system and the people, leaving a good impression, spreading strongly throughout society. Corruption and negativity have been gradually controlled, prevented, and tended to decrease, contributing to cleaning up the Party and State apparatus, strengthening the trust of cadres, Party members and people, enhancing Vietnam's position and prestige in the international arena, creating new motivation and momentum for the entire Party and people to successfully implement the Party's Resolutions.
The second basis is based on the current situation of leadership and direction of provincial and municipal Party Committees and the results of anti-corruption and negativity in localities. That does not mean that provincial and municipal Party Committees across the country have not paid attention to the fight against corruption and negativity; the results of this work in localities are still ineffective. On the contrary, it affirms that since implementing the Conclusion of the 5th Central Conference of the 11th tenure, provincial and municipal Party Committees, including Nghe An Provincial Party Committee, have paid attention to, directly led and directed the fight against corruption and negativity, helping this work become more systematic and effective.
However, in addition to the achieved results, the work of anti-corruption and negativity in some localities, ministries and branches has not yet had clear changes; there is still a situation of "hot above, cold below"; the work of preventing corruption in some places is still formal. The detection and handling of corruption and negativity is still limited, especially the self-inspection, self-detection and handling of corruption and negativity within agencies and units is still weak; the situation of harassment and negativity, especially "petty corruption" in public administrative services has not been pushed back; the rate of recovery of corrupt assets is not high. Corruption and negativity in some fields and areas is still serious and complicated, with increasingly sophisticated manifestations, causing outrage in society.
Analyzing the shortcomings and limitations, there are many causes, the main cause of which is the lack of a strong enough advisory and directing agency to coordinate synchronously, unify and promote the role and responsibility of functional agencies in performing the task of preventing and combating corruption and negativity at the local level.
The third basis is based on the actual needs of localities in leading, directing and organizing the implementation of anti-corruption and negative work. A sufficient example to demonstrate this is that when the Central Government developed the Project to establish a Provincial Steering Committee, during the process of collecting comments and completing the draft Project, not only the Central Committees, Ministries and Branches but all 63/63 Provincial and Municipal Party Committees across the country proposed to establish a Provincial Steering Committee.
The fourth basis is the requirements of the tasks of anti-corruption and negativity in the coming time. In the recent period, the Central Executive Committee, the Politburo, the Secretariat and the General Secretary, Head of the Central Steering Committee have directed many new and breakthrough policies and solutions on anti-corruption and negativity. In particular, linking anti-corruption with preventing and combating negativity, focusing on the degradation of political ideology, ethics, and lifestyle among cadres, party members, civil servants, and public employees; strengthening control of power, anti-corruption and negativity in agencies with anti-corruption and negativity functions; perfecting the organizational apparatus to improve the capacity and operational efficiency of anti-corruption and negativity functional agencies; continue to promote and create stronger changes in detecting and handling corruption and negativity at the local and grassroots levels... From there, it is required that the tasks of anti-corruption and negativity work in the coming time must be led, directed and implemented resolutely, uniformly and synchronously from the central to local levels in order to complete the set goals and tasks.
Therefore, the establishment of a provincial Steering Committee is extremely necessary to overcome shortcomings and limitations in anti-corruption and negativity work in the past; and to improve the effectiveness of anti-corruption and negativity work in the coming time.
PV: So what are the specific functions and tasks of the Provincial Steering Committee, sir?
Comrade Ho Le Ngoc:In terms of function, the Provincial Steering Committee was established by the Provincial Party Committee Standing Committee and is responsible to the Provincial Party Committee Standing Committee and the Central Steering Committee for directing, coordinating, urging, inspecting and supervising the work of preventing and combating corruption and negative acts in the province. In terms of scope, the Provincial Steering Committee directs the work of preventing and combating corruption and negative acts, focusing on the degradation of political ideology, ethics and lifestyle among cadres, party members, civil servants and public employees, first of all, leaders and managers at all levels in the locality; at the same time, directly directs the handling of complicated corruption and negative cases and incidents that are of public concern occurring in the locality according to the Party's regulations and the State's laws.
The Provincial Steering Committee has 9 tasks., can be divided into 3 groups. The first group includes the tasks of ensuring that the Party's policies and the State's laws and policies on anti-corruption and negativity; the conclusions and directions of the Central Steering Committee in general and the conclusions and recommendations of competent agencies at the Central level related to anti-corruption and negativity work at the local level in particular are seriously and promptly implemented.
The second group is the tasks inherited from valuable experiences, good lessons in leadership and direction of the Central Steering Committee to promote, improve efficiency, create stronger changes in the work of detecting and handling corruption and negativity in the locality. Specifically, the task of directing Party committees and Party organizations under the Provincial Party Committee to lead and direct the work of inspection, supervision, investigation, prosecution, trial, and execution of sentences in anti-corruption and negativity according to the Party's regulations and the State's laws. Directing, urging, inspecting, and supervising Party committees, Party organizations and functional agencies in inspecting, inspecting, handling cases, prosecuting, investigating, prosecuting, trying, and executing sentences of complicated corruption and negativity cases that are of public concern occurring in the locality. Direct, urge, inspect and supervise Party committees and Party organizations under the Provincial Party Committee and Party committee members and Party members with authority in handling complaints and denunciations about corruption and negative acts and handling information about corruption and negative cases discovered, provided and recommended by individuals and organizations...
In the third group, there are tasks focusing on preventing corruption and negativity and summarizing, evaluating and drawing experience from the practical activities of the Steering Committee. In the work of preventing corruption and negativity, the Steering Committee will focus on directing the work of informing, propagating, disseminating and thoroughly understanding the Party's policies and regulations and the State's laws on anti-corruption and negativity; as well as the results of inspection, examination, audit, discipline, handling of cases, prosecution, investigation, prosecution and trial of corruption and negativity cases...
PV: Reality shows that preventing and combating corruption and negativity is an extremely difficult, complicated and sensitive task. So what is the Provincial Steering Committee's viewpoint on such complicated and sensitive cases, comrade?
Comrade Ho Le Ngoc:The Party's viewpoint and the direction of General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong in the work of preventing and combating corruption and negativity are "no forbidden zones, no exceptions, no privileges, regardless of who the person is". At the Conference to disseminate the establishment of the Provincial Steering Committee on preventing and combating corruption and negativity held on August 8, 2022, the Provincial Party Secretary, Head of the Provincial Steering Committee, gave a very important speech. In the speech, the Provincial Party Secretary mentioned this direction of the General Secretary twice. It can be affirmed that the words of General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong "no forbidden zones, no exceptions, no privileges, regardless of who the person is" are the guiding principle for the Provincial Steering Committee to carry out the task of directing Party committees and organizations at all levels to lead and direct the work of inspection, supervision, investigation, prosecution, trial, and execution of judgments in preventing and combating corruption and negativity. Only by strictly implementing this direction of General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong can we continue to create a new shift in the awareness and actions of Party committees, leaders, cadres and Party members in the work of preventing and combating corruption and negativity; only then can we contribute to maintaining political stability, creating a favorable environment and conditions for socio-economic development, and strengthening the trust of cadres, Party members and People in the Party, the State and local Party committees and authorities.
PV: There is a content that the press is very interested in, and I hope you will clarify it. That is, what direction has the Provincial Steering Committee taken to promote the role of press and media agencies in the work of preventing and combating corruption and negativity, sir?
Comrade Ho Le Ngoc:On August 17, the Central Steering Committee on Anti-Corruption and Negative Actions held its 22nd meeting to review and evaluate the results of activities in the first 6 months of the year and determine tasks for the last months of 2022. Among the key tasks outlined by General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong in his concluding speech at this meeting, he mentioned and directed the need to promote the role of the press and media. Specifically, General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong emphasized: "Further promote the role of the press and media in preventing and combating corruption and negative actions. The press not only propagates and educates but also actively fights, contributes to deterring and preventing negative acts of corruption". Through this statement by the General Secretary, we can clearly see how important the role of the press and media is in preventing and combating corruption and negative actions.
The Provincial Party Committee, before the establishment of the Provincial Steering Committee, also highly appreciated the role of the press and media. It is seen that the press and media have been actively participating in propaganda and education work to raise awareness, spirit, consciousness, ethics, build integrity, fight against corruption and degeneration among cadres, party members and the people; besides, they have actively contributed to discovering and bringing to light many cases of corruption and negativity.
Therefore, immediately after establishing the Provincial Steering Committee on anti-corruption and anti-negativity, promoting the role of the press is identified as a very important task. To promote the role of the press, the Steering Committee will direct relevant agencies to provide information and make it public to the press according to regulations. This is a very necessary task, which will overcome the situation of one-way information and inaccurate information; at the same time, it will promote the role of the press in orienting public opinion so that people can better understand the determination to prevent corruption and negativity of the Party, the State and the province, contributing to strengthening the trust of cadres, party members and people.
In addition, provide the press with information about good people and good deeds to spread, thereby encouraging cadres, party members and people to more actively participate in the work of preventing corruption and negativity...
PV: Thank you very much, comrade!