Nghe An province reduces 1,600 villages after 3 years of merger
After the merger, the scale of villages, hamlets, and residential groups became larger, and the leader was no longer simply the person who "beats gongs and drums" or guards the village gate as before.
The whole political system got involved
In 2016, Thanh Hoa province had nearly 6,000 villages, residential groups and more than 35,000 part-time workers. This is also the province with the largest number of villages, residential groups and part-time workers in the country.
Realizing that the merger will create larger villages and hamlets, on the one hand, save budget expenditures and create resources to focus on investment and development.However, the merger needs to take into account the capacity and the treatment of this staff. If the effectiveness and efficiency of State management are not effective, then after the merger, it will just be empty numbers.
|
| People are worried that after the merger, much infrastructure will be wasted. |
Six years ago, Quang Vinh commune, Quang Xuong district, now Quang Vinh ward, Sam Son city, Thanh Hoa province, attracted the attention of the whole country because it had 500 cadres. Implementing the policy of reform, merging and holding concurrent positions of leaders, Quang Vinh commune now has only 58 cadres. Mr. Tran Van Hung - Secretary of Quang Vinh ward Party Committee affirmed that the initial goal of merging and streamlining has been completed.
“In addition to streamlining the payroll and unifying, the ward is determined to further reduce the transfer of part-time ward staff to perform the positions of Secretary and Ward Chief. One is to increase the sense of responsibility, and two is to convey policies and guidelines to the grassroots more quickly,” said Mr. Tran Van Hung.
From the problem of streamlining the apparatus in Quang Vinh, it is not difficult to realize that every year this locality has saved a large amount of money for the State budget, more importantly, it has limited unnecessary contributions to the people. Besides the effectiveness and efficiency of State management, the initial results show that streamlining the apparatus has cut down many contacts and procedures.
Determining the merger and unification of leaders is difficult and requires careful preparation. The entire political system of Thanh Hoa province, from the province to the villages, has joined in decisively.
The most obvious result is that from 5,971 villages (hamlets), residential groups with 35,143 non-professional workers (in 2016), up to now, the merger has reduced to about 4,400 villages, a decrease of nearly 1,600 villages.
Mr. Tran Duy Binh - Secretary of Ha Trung District Party Committee admitted that there were difficulties at first but received consensus from cadres, party members and people.
According to him, the achievement of such results was due to the promotion of propaganda work, creating consensus, especially among cadres, civil servants and the people. For places with difficulties, it is necessary to do a good job of ideological work so that cadres and party members can clearly understand, on that basis, implement the merger plan. Therefore, after the merger, the grassroots apparatus began to operate more synchronously, although there were difficulties at the beginning, but they will be overcome step by step.
The role of the head of the facility
There are not many places that can do it like Thanh Hoa, and even in Thanh Hoa, the quantity has only decreased but the quality has not been proven, the effectiveness and efficiency of State management has not been confirmed. The problem after the merger is the capacity and qualifications of grassroots cadres.
 |
| A corner of Thanh Hoa city today. |
The scale of villages, hamlets, and residential groups is larger, with more roles and responsibilities. The head of the village or hamlet is not simply the person who beats the gong, beats the cymbal, and guards the village gate like before, but needs to have capacity, be comprehensive, and especially advise superiors in planning and investing in the socio-economic development of their locality.
Mr. Le Van Tien - Party Secretary of Luong Son commune, Thuong Xuan district said that along with merger and unification, it is necessary to evaluate and correctly recognize the role of grassroots leaders.
“At first, there were many difficulties, both in leadership and management, but the point of view of perfecting unification is to determine roles and positions, to consider capabilities to arrange them appropriately. After several months of implementation, we saw that people agreed to unification, which was possible, but there were also comrades with limited leadership and management capacity, not comprehensive,” said Mr. Le Van Tien.
After the merger, the scale of the villages and hamlets became larger, requiring the cadres to be changed in a more professional direction, on the one hand conveying the Party and State's policies to the people but also requiring the ability to analyze policies from the grassroots reality, thereby promptly advising superiors. To do this, village and hamlet cadres must be trained and educated more systematically, in a practical direction in management and operation at the grassroots level, "speaking must have books, reporting must have evidence" and not be like "a loudspeaker".
Thus, it can be said that, in order for the merger of villages and hamlets to bring about practical results, Thanh Hoa needs to have timely policies to encourage village and hamlet cadres, placing their interests on par with their roles and responsibilities. Without thoroughly resolving this issue, thousands of village and hamlet cadres in Thanh Hoa will still be just people who "eat at home and carry the gold of the whole village". Thus, it is difficult to talk about the effectiveness and efficiency of State management at the grassroots level./.
