Some issues need special attention in personnel preparation for the 13th National Party Congress

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1. Position, meaning and importance of Congress personnel preparation work

As we know, in any revolutionary stage, in any field or locality, cadres always play a decisive role; cadre work is not only the key step in Party building but also an important link in all Party activities, the decisive factor in the success or failure of the revolution. It is not by chance that Uncle Ho began preparing to establish the Party by training and educating cadres. He affirmed: "Cadres are the root of all work. All success or failure depends on good or bad cadres"; "Cadre training is the root work of the Party".

In the process of leading the revolution, our Party has always affirmed that personnel work is subject to the provisions of political guidelines and serves political tasks; therefore, along with preparing political guidelines, we must actively prepare and implement organizational guidelines and personnel strategies. Currently, along with preparing and conducting Party congresses at all levels, our Party is preparing for the 13th National Congress of the Party, scheduled to be held in the first quarter of 2021.

At the 8th Conference (October 2018), the Central Executive Committee decided to establish 5 sub-committees to prepare for the 13th National Party Congress (Documents Sub-committee, Socio-Economic Sub-committee, Party Charter Sub-committee, Personnel Sub-committee and Organization Sub-committee serving the Congress). On May 30, 2019, the Politburo issued Directive No. 35 on Party congresses at all levels towards the 13th National Party Congress. The two most important contents of each Party Congress are discussing and deciding on the Party's political guidelines and tasks (abbreviated as approving documents) and electing the Party's leadership bodies (abbreviated as personnel work). These two contents are closely related to each other, both must be well prepared, especially the preparation of Congress personnel has an extremely important position and significance, being a factor ensuring the success of the Congress and the successful implementation of the Congress's resolutions.

When it comes to preparing personnel for the 13th National Party Congress, we are talking about preparing personnel for the Party Central Committee, the Politburo, the Secretariat, and key leaders of the Party and the State. The Central Committee is the highest leadership body between two Party Congresses, the combat staff, the political leadership nucleus, and the center of solidarity and high unity of the entire Party and the entire nation. This is a team of strategic-level cadres, the quintessence of the Party, requiring true steadfastness, sufficient mettle, qualities, intelligence, and high prestige to solve strategic-level tasks, promptly, correctly, and effectively handle complex situations related to the cause of building, developing, and protecting the country, and the survival of the regime. Reality shows that in any circumstance, especially at decisive or historical turning points, the fate of the country depends entirely on the team of strategic-level cadres. (Lenin once said: "Give me an organization of revolutionaries, and I will turn Russia upside down.") The collapse of the socialist regime in the Soviet Union and some Eastern European countries was due to many reasons, among which a very important reason was the wrong selection and arrangement of a number of strategic leaders, especially at the highest level. It is necessary to affirm and deeply understand the position and significance of this extremely important work, not simply for organizing a Party Congress, but this is a work of strategic significance closely linked to the fate of the Party, the survival of the regime and the development of the country.

General Secretary and President Nguyen Phu Trong chaired the Politburo meeting.

After nearly 35 years of implementing the renovation process and after more than 20 years of implementing the Resolution of the 8th Central Committee on cadre strategy, the cadre team at all levels in our country has grown and developed in many aspects, with increasingly improved quality, gradually meeting the requirements of the period of promoting industrialization, modernization of the country and international integration; the structure, age, gender, ethnicity, profession, and field of work are more balanced and reasonable; the source of cadre planning increasingly meets the requirements, basically ensuring the transition and succession between generations.

In general, our cadres have a firm ideological stance, political will, ethics, a simple and exemplary lifestyle, a sense of organization and discipline, and are always self-cultivated and trained; their qualifications and abilities are improved, and they strive to complete assigned tasks. Many cadres are dynamic, creative, adaptable to the integration trend, and capable of working in an international environment. The majority of leaders of the Party, State, Fatherland Front and socio-political organizations at all levels have capacity, qualities and prestige. Strategic cadres have political will, are steadfast in Marxism-Leninism, Ho Chi Minh thought, are steadfast in the goals and ideals of national independence and socialism, have innovative thinking, and are capable of formulating guidelines and policies and leading and directing their implementation. Most leaders of the armed forces are trained and tested through practice, are loyal to the Party, and are ready to fight and sacrifice for the Fatherland and the people. Many scientists are enthusiastic and passionate about research, making positive contributions to the country's development. Some leaders and economic managers adapt quickly to the market mechanism and open integration, organizing production and business more and more effectively.

However, it is also necessary to see that our current cadre team is large but not really strong; the situation of both surplus and shortage of cadres still occurs in many places; the connection between levels and sectors is still limited. The proportion of young cadres, female cadres, and cadres from ethnic minorities has not reached the desired target. There is a lack of good leaders, managers, scientists and leading experts in many fields. The capacity of the cadre team is not comprehensive, there are still limitations and weaknesses; many cadres, including high-ranking cadres, lack professionalism, work not in accordance with their expertise and strengths; foreign language proficiency, communication skills and ability to work in an international environment are still limited. Many young cadres lack courage and are afraid of training. A number of cadres have faded ideals, lost will, worked superficially, were afraid of difficulties and hardships, and some have even degraded in political ideology, ethics, and lifestyle, showing signs of "self-evolution" and "self-transformation". Some leaders and managers, including high-ranking officials, lack exemplary behavior, have low prestige, their qualities and abilities are not up to the task, they violate working principles and regulations, talk a lot but do little, talk does not match their actions, are bureaucratic, distant from the people, individualistic, involved in corruption, waste, negativity, and group interests. Many state-owned enterprise managers lack self-cultivation, training, and Party spirit, take advantage of loopholes in mechanisms, policies, and laws, intentionally violate and profit, causing large losses of State capital and assets, causing serious consequences, and have been subject to Party discipline and legal sanctions. Since the beginning of the 12th tenure, the Central Executive Committee, the Politburo, the Secretariat, and the Central Inspection Commission have had to discipline nearly 100 senior officials under the Central Committee's management; some officials have been criminally prosecuted. The situation of running for positions, running for power, running for planning, running for rotation, running for votes, running for degrees, running for rewards, running for titles, running for crimes..., including for high-ranking officials, although it has been prevented, has not been completely pushed back. Whatever work we do, whatever position we hold, we only consider the benefits and benefits for ourselves and our families first, forgetting integrity and honor.

It must be affirmed that the maturity, growth and development of the cadre team over the past decades is the leading factor in determining the great achievements of historical significance in the cause of innovation, construction and protection of the Fatherland; our country has never had such a foundation, potential, position and prestige as today. However, the shortcomings and weaknesses of a part of the cadre team and the limitations and inadequacies in cadre work are also an important reason why the country's development is not commensurate with our potential, strengths and aspirations, and has weakened the people's trust in the Party and the State. The current situation of the cadre team, especially strategic-level cadres, as mentioned above, has a certain impact on the preparation of personnel for the 13th National Party Congress.

General Secretary and President Nguyen Phu Trong speaks at the meeting of the Personnel Subcommittee of the 13th National Party Congress. Photo: Tri Dung/VNA

2. Requirements for personnel work of the 13th Congress

The 13th National Party Congress is a very important political event. The Congress is taking place at a time when our country has gone through 35 years of carrying out the renovation process, 30 years of implementing the Platform for national construction in the transitional period to socialism (1991 Platform), including 10 years of implementing the Platform (supplemented and developed in 2011) and 10 years of implementing the Socio-Economic Development Strategy 2011 - 2020, towards the 100th anniversary of the Party's founding in 2030 and the 100th anniversary of the country's founding in 2045. The 13th Congress will be a very important milestone, with the meaning of orienting the future, encouraging and motivating the entire Party, the entire people and the entire army to continue to comprehensively and synchronously promote the renovation process, bringing the country to develop rapidly and sustainably for the goal of a rich people, a strong country, democracy, fairness, civilization, and steady steps towards socialism.

Our Party Congress takes place in the context of rapid, complex and unpredictable developments in the world and region. Peace, cooperation and development remain the major trends; however, traditional and non-traditional security threats and climate change are increasingly severe. The fourth industrial revolution, the strong development of the knowledge economy, digital economy and the trend of internationalization of human resources are both opportunities and challenges for our country. Domestically, the process of innovation and international integration is increasingly going into depth, the overall strength and prestige, and international position of Vietnam are increasingly enhanced, creating a premise for the country to develop rapidly and sustainably. However, the revolutionary cause of our Party and people still faces many difficulties and challenges; The four dangers (falling further behind economically; deviating from socialism; corruption and bureaucracy; "peaceful evolution") that our Party has pointed out still exist and are more severe; the political security, order and social safety situation still has potential factors that can easily cause instability. The sabotage of hostile and reactionary forces is increasingly sophisticated, dangerous and complicated in the conditions of market economic development, open integration, the explosion of the global information and communication system, cyber warfare, etc. This is also the time of generational transition from the generation of cadres born, raised, trained and matured during the years of resistance, mainly trained domestically and in former socialist countries, to the generation of cadres born, raised and matured in peace and trained from many sources and many countries with different political regimes.

The ideological situation in the Party and the mood among the people, besides the positive aspects, also have worrying manifestations. In particular, the degradation of political ideology, morality, and lifestyle; bureaucracy, corruption, and negativity among a number of cadres, Party members, and civil servants have only begun to be prevented and pushed back. The above situation shows that the upcoming tasks of the entire Party are very heavy. To solve the important issues of the country in the coming time, the Politburo and the Central Executive Committee must prepare well to present to the Congress for discussion and decision on the personnel of the 13th Central Committee, ensuring the success of the Congress and victory in the implementation of the Congress Resolution. This is an extremely important task. This is also an issue that receives deep and legitimate attention from the entire Party and the entire people. Almost everywhere we go, we see cadres, party members and people showing interest and somewhat wondering, worrying, asking: How will our Party plan to select and arrange the team of leaders (Central Executive Committee, Politburo, Secretariat, especially key cadres) to be capable of shouldering the great revolutionary tasks assigned by history? Bad, opportunistic and hostile elements are also taking this opportunity to find every way to distort, spread information, influence and divide us internally in order to sabotage our personnel work in particular and our Party building work in general, which is very insidious and dangerous. Obviously, the personnel work of the Congress is extremely important but also extremely complicated, difficult, and heavy, requiring the Central Executive Committee, the Politburo, the Secretariat, and the entire political system to work with a very high sense of responsibility, with great determination and effort, in a truly fair, objective, and scientific way, putting the interests of the nation, the Party, and the people above all else.

3. Content, method, and implementation

To prepare personnel for the 13th National Party Congress, the most important issue is to correctly identify the requirements for building the Central Executive Committee, whose core is the Politburo, the Secretariat, and key leaders of the Party. Should the building of the 13th Central Executive Committee ensure the following requirements:

- The 13th Central Executive Committee must be a truly united, clean, strong collective, highly unified in will and action, with firm political will, pure moral qualities, steadfast in the goals of national independence and socialism; have strategic vision; have intelligence, innovative and creative thinking; represent the entire Party in terms of fighting spirit and discipline; be closely attached to the people, gather solidarity and unity within the entire Party and the entire people; have enough prestige and capacity to lead the country in the new development stage.

- On the basis of ensuring standards, the 13th Central Executive Committee needs to have a reasonable number and structure to ensure comprehensive leadership, increase the number of Party Central Committee members in important positions, areas and fields of work. Ensure inheritance, stability, innovation and continuous development.

- The introduction of personnel, in general, must be based on planning; uphold principles, regulations, and rules, promote responsibility, democracy, publicity, transparency, and objectivity in evaluating, introducing, and selecting personnel to participate in the Central Executive Committee, the Politburo, the Secretariat, and key leadership positions of the Party and State in the coming term. Take political qualities, ethics, lifestyle, qualifications in all aspects, prestige, and work efficiency as the basis and basic criteria for evaluating, selecting, and assigning appropriate personnel to the job. Fight against manifestations of opportunism, ambition for power, personal, local, factional, and group interest movements, etc.; be vigilant against plots and tricks to sabotage and cause internal disturbances by hostile forces.

Members of the 13th Central Executive Committee must truly be exemplary comrades of the Party in terms of political mettle, moral qualities and working capacity; ensure general standards for cadres, with special attention paid to the following issues:

+ Have a deep patriotism, have a strong political stance, be steadfast in the goal of national independence and socialism; be absolutely loyal to Marxism-Leninism, Ho Chi Minh thought, the Party's Platform and guidelines, the State's Constitution and the interests of the nation. Have a high fighting spirit, be exemplary in implementing the Party's principles and discipline, the State's laws; dare to think, dare to speak, dare to do, dare to take responsibility; match words with actions, be closely attached to the people, dare to face difficulties and challenges, and be resolute in action.

+ Possess moral qualities and a pure, exemplary lifestyle, trusted by cadres, party members and the people. Have a high sense of responsibility, enthusiasm and dedication to work; not be corrupt, bureaucratic, opportunistic, selfish, power-hungry and resolutely fight against negative manifestations, bureaucracy and corruption; do not let spouses, children and relatives take advantage of their positions for personal gain. Be conscious of maintaining solidarity and unity within the Party, be exemplary in implementing the assignment and organizational and disciplinary principles of the Party, especially the principles of democratic centralism, self-criticism and criticism; be fair and just in evaluating and using cadres.

+ Have intelligence, vision, strategic thinking and relatively comprehensive knowledge to participate in planning guidelines, policies and collective leadership of the Central Executive Committee. Have the capacity to concretize and lead, direct and organize the successful implementation of the Party's guidelines, policies and tasks, the country's development strategy in the new period in the assigned field and area of ​​work; through practice, clearly demonstrate that one has a strong political stance, is absolutely loyal to the Fatherland, the Party and the people, has the capacity to be creative, enthusiastic, works effectively, has specific and clear "products"; dares to think, dares to speak, dares to do, dares to take responsibility; unites, gathers and promotes the team of cadres in the assigned field and area. Has awareness, responsibility and the ability to participate in discussions and contribute to the common decisions of the Central Executive Committee; is healthy enough to complete the task.

In short, one must have both Virtue and Talent, in which Virtue is the root ("one Heart is worth three Talents").

Resolutely not to miss out on those who are truly virtuous, talented, and qualified; at the same time, not to allow into the 13th Central Executive Committee those who have one of the following shortcomings: (1) Lack of political will; not steadfast in the Party's line and viewpoint; showing signs of political opportunism, ambition for power, flattery, lobbying, corruption, bureaucracy, localism, lobbying for personal, factional, and group interests; lacking political views, not defending what is right, not fighting what is wrong; (2) Violating the principle of democratic centralism, demagogy, authoritarianism, and arbitrariness; not being fair and just in evaluating and using cadres, suppressing those who are outspoken in fighting and criticizing; (3) Letting serious internal disunity or allowing corruption, loss, and major negative incidents to occur in localities, agencies, and units; (4) Not willing to study and learn; being conservative, stagnant, working ineffectively, talking a lot but doing little, saying things that do not match what they do; Poor sense of discipline, failure to comply with the organization's mobilization and assignment, reduced prestige; (5) Dishonest declaration of assets, showing signs of getting rich quickly, having many houses, many lands, many other assets without clearly explaining the origin; oneself or spouse, children have an exemplary lifestyle, taking advantage of power to gain illegal profits; (6) Violating regulations on political history or current politics.

Along with clearly defining and mastering the requirements and standards for Central Executive Committee members, it is necessary to calculate and clearly stipulate the structure and number of the Central Executive Committee, and properly resolve the relationship between quantity and quality. This is also an issue that is always of concern in the process of preparing personnel at each Congress. The common and consistent viewpoint at the Congresses is: On the basis of ensuring standards, the Central Executive Committee needs to have a reasonable structure to ensure comprehensive leadership, inheritance and development; but it is not necessary that any field or industry must have people participating in the Central Executive Committee if they do not meet the standards; do not lower the standards because of the structure. Introduce for election as official Central Committee members for comrades who meet the standards and conditions to be assigned to be in charge of the fields of Party work, government work, Front work, socio-political organizations, important State agencies at the central and local levels and the armed forces. Party committees at the Central level and some ministries, branches and localities in important positions, areas and fields need to increase the number of Central Party Committee members.

In the structure of the 13th Central Executive Committee, it is necessary to pay attention to ensuring a reasonable proportion of young cadres, female cadres, cadres from ethnic minorities; a number of scientists, artists, leaders of some large State corporations and groups who are qualified and eligible to participate in the Central Executive Committee. Drawing on experience from previous terms, determining the number of members of the 13th Central Executive Committee should be based mainly on the requirements, tasks and demands of the situation, based on the requirements of comprehensive leadership for the areas and fields of work, especially ensuring quality and standards, not purely chasing quantity.

General Secretary and President Nguyen Phu Trong chairs the National Cadre Conference. Photo: VNA

4. Our responsibilities

At the 8th Central Conference of the 12th tenure (October 2018), the Central Executive Committee decided to establish the Personnel Subcommittee of the 13th Congress. The Central Party Secretariat decided to establish the Personnel Subcommittee's Support Group. The Personnel Subcommittee issued regulations on the functions, tasks, powers, principles, regimes and working style of the Personnel Subcommittee and the Support Group. However, to do this important work well, in terms of ideology, guiding principles, methods and approaches, it is necessary to pay attention to the following issues:

- The work of preparing personnel for the 13th National Party Congress is not only the task of the Personnel Subcommittee, the Politburo, the Secretariat, and the Central Executive Committee, but also an important task of the entire political system, of Party committees, Party organizations, agencies, units, and localities. Personnel work must be done well from Party congresses at all levels to contribute to preparing personnel for the 13th National Party Congress. Party committees, Party organizations, agencies, and units, especially the leaders and those in places where there are cadres participating in the planning of strategic-level cadres recommended to join the 13th Central Executive Committee, must be responsible to the Personnel Subcommittee, the Politburo, and the Central Executive Committee for the personnel they propose and recommend.

- Relevant agencies and organizations, first of all the Politburo and the Central Executive Committee, must work hard to prepare, must determine that this is an especially important task, a "key" task of "key", related to the survival of the Party, the fate of the regime, the development and strength of the country. Each agency, locality, and each cadre directly involved in the preparation work must fully and deeply perceive their responsibilities, wholeheartedly and wholeheartedly take care of the common work, must put the interests of the Party, the country, and the people above all, first. It is necessary to summarize, draw experiences, point out the advantages, results as well as shortcomings and limitations of previous terms, especially the recent XII term, to have more basis to propose directions, requirements, and tasks for building the cadre team of this XIII term.

- Cadre work in general and congress personnel work in particular have special significance as mentioned above, but are also extremely complicated and difficult, because they are related to people, they are "human work". And as for people, as the Russian writer Maxim Gorky said: "Human, how proud those two words sound!". But people also have all sorts of unhealthy defects, which are very delicate and sensitive to say (how to comment and evaluate each other? especially talking about each other's weaknesses and shortcomings; where to arrange and assign them? related to honor, regime, enjoyment policies, high and low positions, benefits, salaries... how to compare with others?... ("Losing ten thousand heavens is not as good as losing to a friend by a cup", "A piece of food is a miserable piece, losing a piece of food turns the liver upside down"!) are extremely complicated and sensitive, very easily causing problems and torment), causing disunity. Therefore, the personnel work of the Congress must be carried out according to a strict, scientific and consistent process, ensuring true fairness, transparency and objectivity, especially "having a discerning eye" in evaluating, introducing and selecting; taking the criteria of political qualities, ethics, lifestyle and work efficiency, personal and family prestige as the main measure ("Praise for a discerning eye, a hero guessing in the middle of the world who is old!"). It must be based on clearly defining standards and criteria to correctly evaluate cadres, select the right people, arrange the right work, assign the right place, create a team, a collective that is truly "in tune", united, unified and powerful. To do so, it is necessary to truly promote democracy in discovering and introducing personnel, along with clearly defining the authority and responsibility of the collective and individuals involved and strictly implementing the principle of democratic centralism, promoting the role and responsibility of the Party Committee, Party organization and the leader. Oppose localism, cronyism, cronyism, and group interests; avoid simplistic, arbitrary, and unprincipled ways of doing things. We must take all measures to resolutely not put into leadership positions those who are unworthy or unqualified, especially those who have made mistakes or have degraded their qualities and ethics, are involved in corruption, seeking positions and power, are arrogant, patriarchal, flatter superiors, bully subordinates, cover up criminals, cause disunity, and negatively affect the Party's reputation. Allowing such people to enter leadership positions is a disaster for the Party, creating conditions for them to harm the country and people even more.

We must check, supervise, and urge regularly. The way to do it is to be careful, to complete each step, each stage, following a strict process; to do it firmly, to do the Central Executive Committee personnel first, then the Politburo and Secretariat personnel, and finally the key leadership personnel. If there are stages that need to be done at the same time, they must also be considered closely, firmly, to ensure synchronization and science. We must prepare very carefully, very thoughtfully, and carefully, to avoid mistakes as much as possible.

- The members of the Personnel Subcommittee and the Subcommittee's Support Team, more than anyone else, must firmly grasp and master the functions, tasks, powers and strictly comply with the principles, regimes, regulations and working style. In the process of advising on the development and implementation of the personnel introduction process, synthesizing the results of personnel introduction and performing other tasks under the direction of the Central Committee and the Politburo, the members of the Subcommittee and the Support Team must be truly trustworthy, absolutely loyal, honest, transparent, impartial, objective, and especially very alert and perceptive ("don't see a chicken as a crow", "don't see red as ripe", don't just see "the appearance on the outside, it covers up the sloppiness inside")...; absolutely maintain principles, working relationships, and closely coordinate with relevant agencies and individuals; combat negative manifestations right in responsible cadres, Congress delegates and members of the Subcommittee and Working Group. In particular, there must be strict and synchronous regulations and rules to ensure the correct implementation of the principles of democratic centralism, objectivity and impartiality under the leadership of the Party (Central Party Executive Committee, Politburo, Secretariat, Congress Presidium).

- It is also necessary to add that, in the process of selecting, arranging, and assigning specific personnel, it is necessary to unify the viewpoint of not being too perfectionist, not being too absolute. Our ancestors have a saying: "No one is perfect", everyone has strengths and weaknesses ("A gem still has flaws, you and I"). The important thing is to know how to distinguish and accurately assess the nature and extent of those strengths and weaknesses so as not to choose the wrong person and to have a way to arrange and assign personnel appropriately to promote the strengths, limit the weaknesses of each member, complement each other, create a strong team, a relatively complete leadership group, without causing harm to the interests of the Party, the nation, and the collective. Our principle is "collective leadership", "collective leadership", "collective leadership". We must take care to build, cultivate, supplement, and support each other so that each person can perfect himself, promote his good side, and overcome his weak side; so that when each individual stands in the same collective, that collective becomes more perfect, more comprehensive, and stronger; and each individual also becomes better, and can develop more of his qualities and abilities. Avoid the situation of "crabs relying on their claws, fish relying on their fins", being arrogant, looking down on others, and not coordinating and cooperating well. Our goal, our responsibility, is to build a strong Central Executive Committee, a strong Politburo, a strong Secretariat, truly united and highly unified around the leader to be able to shoulder the glorious but very heavy responsibility of leading the completion of its historical mission and political tasks, organizing the entire Party, the entire army, and the entire people to strive, overcome all difficulties and hardships, and build our Party to be increasingly clean and strong; our country to develop more and more; Our people are increasingly prosperous and happy, worthy of the trust and expectations of the entire Party and people./.

Nguyen Phu Trong

General Secretary of the Central Executive Committee of the Communist Party of Vietnam

President of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam

Head of the 13th Party Congress Personnel Subcommittee