Must immediately give up the idea of ​​'landing' to avoid responsibility

Recently, society has witnessed many cases of “soft landings”, and there is even the idea that “landing” will be over and the matter will be avoided, evading responsibility. Professor of Law Nguyen Van Nam discussed this issue with the press.

Professor of Law Nguyen Van Nam - Photo: HUU KHOA

Loyalty to the Party is not enough

* In your opinion, what fundamental solutions are needed to prevent the recurrence of the situation of running for positions to shirk responsibility?

- How to prevent the recurrence of the situation of appointing incompetent officials and the situation of running for positions to shirk responsibility is a big problem. In the current situation, it is very difficult to successfully prevent such situations.

But there must be fundamental changes, more drastic measures to start a permanent process with the aim of completely preventing these situations. Just sincere and determined implementation will regain the people's trust.

In any social system, the appointment of people in authority is always likely to be incorrect because both the appointer and the appointee tend to abuse their authority. And so people have also found basic principles that can minimize errors.

First, the principle of authority must be linked to responsibility. Authority is given only to fulfill tasks and responsibilities. The person with the authority to appoint must be the one who takes full responsibility for the appointment decision.

Currently, to appoint officials at all levels, there are two systems and two processes that are closely intertwined: the government's personnel organization system and the Party's personnel organization system. The government signs the appointment decision, but the opinion of the Party organization is the final decision.

* It is understandable that the mechanism for appointing officials has many loopholes. In your opinion, what solutions are needed to plug these loopholes?

- The regulations and procedures for appointing officials of the government and the Party are not wrong. But from practice, it is shown that there are still many loopholes. The interweaving and simultaneous use of two systems has many loopholes, creating more loopholes. Therefore, the most fundamental thing to do is to unify the Party and the government in personnel work.

Another fundamental issue that needs to be addressed immediately is to amend the principles and criteria for appointment: when the Trinh Xuan Thanh case was discovered, the Hau Giang Provincial Party Committee immediately conducted an assessment. The first important assessment criterion is loyalty to the Party.

The report of Hau Giang Provincial Party Committee affirmed that Mr. Thanh has a firm political stance and ideology, and strictly follows the Party's policies and guidelines. Currently, this is also the most important principle and criterion for appointing officials.

But for a government official, the most important principle and criteria for appointment are loyalty to the country and the people.

When asked why he chose Mr. Vu Quang Hai (son of former Minister of Industry and Trade Vu Huy Hoang) for the position of business leader, a company leader very innocently answered that when there were two candidates of equal talent and virtue, but one was the son of a leader, of course he had to choose the son of a leader!

This is also an unwritten rule in the current work of receiving officials. We should learn from developed countries and enact laws prohibiting family members and relatives of government officials from working in areas that are directly or indirectly influenced by that official.

What to do about “uncovered” cases?

* Public opinion says that the discovery of a few individuals like the recent one is a good thing, but what about the many other cases that have not been exposed?

- Timely detection of unsuitable officials and officials also plays an important role in helping the personnel organization to quickly correct mistakes, limit damage and learn from experience. To do that, it is necessary to have legal criteria to objectively evaluate officials. Unfortunately, we do not yet have all these criteria.

The Anti-Corruption Law and the Asset Declaration Law are appropriate tools to help detect problematic civil servants, but they still have many shortcomings. We should quickly absorb the opinions of legal experts and the people to amend and supplement these two laws.

* So how to prevent weak officials from infiltrating and climbing high?

- The handling of violations due to wrongful appointments must follow the principle: the person with the right to appoint must be responsible for his or her decision. Until the unification of the Party and the government in personnel work is achieved, relevant Party agencies and organizations still need to courageously take responsibility before the people.

Disciplinary action should not only be taken within the Party against Party officials involved in wrong appointments, but should be announced to the people.

In the long term, we need to aim for the legal system to strictly and effectively handle cases of wrongful appointments and taking advantage of loopholes in the system for personal gain, without needing leadership direction.

A series of recent cases show that investigation and handling only truly begin when there is direct direction from the Prime Minister or General Secretary.

This makes many people think that: a) the legal system, the investigation agencies, and the case-solving agencies can only really get involved if they are allowed by the Party and Government leaders; b) the investigation agencies can be stopped if they know how to run to the right door and the right person; and c) if they try to prolong the time, they will escape, the case will sink because the leaders do not have enough time to solve all similar cases.

For those who intentionally lobby for appointments, in addition to being dealt with as a violation of the law, there should be additional provisions prohibiting them from holding positions for a certain period of time. The determination of the highest leaders of the Party and the government is to resolve the matter thoroughly, clarify where the violations are and who is responsible.

The whole country hopes that from now on, controlling and effectively handling personnel work will become a daily task for the entire political system. To do so, many adjustments and loopholes need to be made.

Should enact "law of immunity"

TIn fact, there are many cases where an official who makes a mistake in one place is transferred to another place with an even higher position. Legal regulations on this matter are also insufficient and unclear for similar cases.

Therefore, it is necessary to clearly define the responsibilities of officials for the tasks they have undertaken. We should learn from developed countries to enact laws on exemption from liability.

For example, if there is an exemption law, the PVC Board of Directors will have to thoroughly review Mr. Thanh's responsibilities and performance at PVC. If it finds it completely good, the Board will decide to completely exempt Mr. Thanh from any responsibility during his time working at PVC.

With such a decision, if Mr. Thanh causes any loss, the PVC board of directors will be responsible. Only when the officer has such a decision to absolve him of responsibility, will the organization consider appointing him to another position.

Encourage the detection of irregular appointments

Officials and people should be encouraged to detect cases of unusual appointments of officials.

To do that, it is possible to issue regulations allowing officials and civil servants in the same agency or sector to have the right to officially complain (as an administrative complaint) about an appointment decision that they find unusual.

Citizens have the right to report cases of officials showing unusual behavior to the government agency that is above the level of the agency that manages that official. Within a specified period of time, this agency must respond to the citizens.

According to Tuoi Tre