It's unacceptable when officials commit wrongdoings but their leaders remain unpunished.

We place a lot of emphasis on the responsibility of leaders, but no one has been held accountable for wrongdoings within their party organization or locality.

Inspection and supervision are considered one of the important "weapons" for the Party to control state power, fulfill its leadership function, and prevent the deviation of power. Looking directly at the truth, the Party's top leader, General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong, assessed that, alongside positive changes, the work of inspection, supervision, and Party discipline still falls short of requirements, remaining perfunctory, formalistic, and lacking decisiveness.

At the briefing conference organized by the Propaganda Department in early September on the Party's inspection and supervision work, the results of the 2016 review and the first six months of 2017 showed that some local Inspection Committees did not conduct inspections of subordinate organizations and Party members suspected of violations.

Commenting on these results, in an interview with a VOV reporter, Mr. Ha Quoc Tri, a member of the Central Inspection Committee, stated that some local inspection agencies lacked initiative, were hesitant, reluctant, evasive, afraid of confrontation, and did not dare to conduct inspections when there were signs of violations. A single Party organization might not have any violations during a certain period, but if many Party organizations and many cadres and Party members show no signs of violations, something is amiss.

"The documents of the 12th Party Congress and the Resolution of the 4th Central Committee of the 12th term have noted that the situation of violations by cadres and Party members in the past period has not only not decreased but has also tended to increase, and in some aspects has become more complex and serious. Therefore, the inspection results of some provinces and cities are inappropriate," Mr. Tri emphasized.

Associate Professor Dr. Nguyen Trong Phuc, former Director of the Institute of Party History.

Inspection is leadership.

So what are the reasons why the Party's inspection and supervision are not yet strong enough, and why there is still a tendency to avoid responsibility, be hesitant, and lack initiative?

Associate Professor Dr. Nguyen Trong Phuc, former Director of the Institute of Party History, who also previously worked in Party inspection, believes that this is due to the fact that Party inspection work at all levels has not been given due importance and has not been recognized as a key aspect of the Party's leadership. The outdated mindset that Party inspection agencies only intervene when incidents occur has been slow to change, causing us to "chase" after wrongdoings instead of identifying and "grasping" the specific origins and roots of these violations.

While inspection and supervision should be a regular activity of the Party organization, not just of the Party's inspection agency, it is also the responsibility of Party committees, standing committees, Party organizations, and individual cadres and Party members. The Party has affirmed that "leadership without inspection is tantamount to no leadership." This understanding must be thoroughly understood from the central to the local level: inspection is leadership.

Furthermore, according to Associate Professor Dr. Nguyen Trong Phuc, there is confusion in distinguishing between the manifestations of weaknesses in Party inspection work at all levels, especially at the grassroots level, and the causes leading to those weaknesses. Specifically, when an incident occurs, a clear and serious assessment is needed to correctly evaluate the extent of the mistakes and shortcomings, the negative impact, both within the Party and in society, and how it affects the people's trust. This is to avoid concealing shortcomings, glossing over issues, "maintaining harmony at all costs," or downplaying the severity of violations during the investigation and handling of the case.

After clearly identifying and accurately assessing the violations, we must then look for the causes that led to them. This includes identifying the inherent reasons of the individuals involved, why they committed the violations, including issues related to their mindset, Party principles, training, self-cultivation, and sense of responsibility; only then can we consider the causes related to the management of the Party organization and the inspection and supervision work of specialized agencies, what we call "power control." Poor power control will lead to violations. From these general causes, we then delve into the causes of each specific case, and from there, we can assign responsibility in the spirit of the Central Committee Resolution No. 4 of the 11th Party Congress, which is the responsibility of the leader.

Recently, we have emphasized the responsibility of leaders, but through a few incidents here and there, it seems that leaders are "unjustified," with no leader being held accountable for violations within their party organization or locality. Meanwhile, as the Party affirms, "a leader who doesn't inspect is no leader at all." If you are entrusted with the responsibility of leading a local party committee or agency, and you remain "unjustified" when violations occur within your locality or agency, it is unacceptable. This implies that you have failed to inspect and control the work within your locality or agency.

We can't keep "chasing" after wrongdoing forever.

It can be said that the recent decisive and forceful actions of the Central Inspection Committee have shown that when the Party's inspection agency truly gets involved, is truly competent and responsible, then no matter how complex or sophisticated the violations are, they will certainly be detected, putting an end to the situation of "chasing after" the wrongdoings.

However, to prevent wrongdoing, the key issue remains the oversight of power – a crucial measure to tighten Party discipline, as General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong metaphorically put it, "to confine power within the cage of mechanisms and laws."

"Under the conditions of a ruling party, Party discipline must be upheld. In reality, in many localities and grassroots levels, Party discipline is lax, making it difficult to understand or know what cadres and subordinates are doing, how they are doing it, whether it's good or bad, and to control them. In my opinion, this is a concrete approach, and we can absolutely achieve it by tightening power according to the Party's prescribed discipline," Mr. Phuc stated.

To tighten Party discipline, Mr. Phuc suggested improving the quality of Party organization activities and Party committee meetings, starting from the grassroots level. Members of each branch must monitor each other, and all activities within the Party organization and grassroots units must be transparent for collective oversight. During this process, Party committee and government officials must personally conduct self-inspections, rather than simply delegating the task to inspection agencies. Only then can the quality and effectiveness of the Party's inspection and supervision work be improved, effectively preventing and deterring wrongdoing. In particular, addressing the consequences should not be considered an achievement; Party committees, governments, and Party organizations should feel ashamed when having to deal with errant officials. Only then can the Party become stronger.

According to VOV