Hope the Government will crack down on bribery and kickbacks

Chairman of the Association of Small and Medium Enterprises Nguyen Van Than suggested that the Government join hands with the business community to combat bribery and kickbacks, otherwise this disease will destroy the ethics of business development.

Sharing before the 2017 Prime Minister's Dialogue with Enterprises conference taking place today, the Chairman of the Vietnam Association of Small and Medium Enterprises affirmed that the effect from the previous dialogue was very good.

Chairman of Vietnam Association of Small and Medium Enterprises Nguyen Van Than

Immediately after the first dialogue, the Prime Minister gathered opinions and answered all basic questions of businesses.

The recommendations of enterprises have been compiled and included in Resolution 35. Currently, some areas such as customs, taxes, and administrative procedures have improved a lot. The troubles, annoyances, and arrogance in administrative agencies are gradually changing.

Negative factors, including unofficial costs, have also decreased a lot but are still a pressing problem for businesses today.

"I hope that in this dialogue, the Prime Minister and the Government will take stronger actions," Mr. Than shared.

Representing the small and medium enterprise community, what wishes will you convey to the Government in this dialogue?

My wish is to convey the issue of business costs, including both official and unofficial costs. Specifically, how high are official costs and why are they high, why are unofficial costs allowed to exist and the causes. This is an issue that I am very passionate about talking about in this dialogue conference.

This is not only a pressing issue for small and medium enterprises but also for other enterprises, including large enterprises and FDI enterprises.

This creates higher product costs, making the market less competitive. While customers want to buy good products at guaranteed prices, high costs lead to high prices, making it harder for people to buy.

Especially in the near future, when we deeply integrate and apply FTA conditions, FDI enterprises and foreign enterprises importing cheap products and having high prices for their own products will be very dangerous and will easily die at home.

There are many complaints! Sometimes businesses also take the initiative to grease the wheels to get things done. That is not positive. In the story of grease, there are two things that happen. One is that state officials pressure businesses to have something to produce documents for them, many times because the work needs to be done on time, businesses also take the initiative to grease the wheels to get things done quickly even though they know they are violating the law.

But there are also cases where businesses proactively grease the wheels because of poor capacity, wanting to take advantage of relationships, and take advantage of this and that to get the job done.

Building policies, institutions and business culture

According to you, what should be done to overcome this situation?

This definitely requires the Government to take action, even though it is difficult. The Government and the business community must work together to build policies, institutions, and business culture. That means we must work in two directions to fight this disease.

The government must come up with solutions to reduce unnecessary procedures and unnecessary costs. This year must be lower than last year, next year must be lower than the year before. We are not extreme in saying that we must reduce immediately, but we must do it gradually.

The business community must also commit to not creating conditions for informal costs to exist. It must accompany the Government in building a culture of law compliance, a culture that does not create conditions for bad things, bribery, and saying no to negativity.

Now, the Government and the business community need to research and come up with solutions to prevent this as soon as possible. Otherwise, this disease will destroy the ethics of business development and affect growth.

Discipline must be tightened with civil servants and public employees. Anyone who violates the law must be punished severely and anyone who does well will be rewarded.

On the contrary, businesses must comply with the law. If anyone does not comply with the law, they must be punished. There is no such thing as someone who is wrong or not, someone who is positive or not, they are all the same. From there, there is a situation where negative people are successful and vice versa.

According to Vietnamnet