Prime Minister's working group and determination to eliminate the 'longest road'

In just a short time, the Prime Minister's Working Group has inspected 6 units and all emerging issues will be reported at the upcoming regular Government meeting.

On September 26, the Prime Minister's Working Group inspected the Hanoi People's Committee on the implementation of tasks assigned by the Government and the Prime Minister since the beginning of the year. Previously, immediately after Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc signed the decision to establish the Working Group on August 19, the Working Group inspected the Ministry of Planning and Investment, the Ministry of Finance, the Government Office, the Government Inspectorate, and the Electricity Corporation.

The monitoring and urging of tasks has been carried out since 2014 according to Decision No. 42 of the Prime Minister. In 2016 alone, as of August 31, the Government assigned 6,272 tasks to ministries, agencies and localities. Of these, 2,723 tasks were due for completion, 2,501 tasks were completed (accounting for 91.8%), and 222 tasks were overdue but not completed (8.2%).

Thus, over the years, the situation has changed very positively when the number of overdue tasks has gradually decreased (in 2013 it was 43.9%, in 2014 it was 40%, in 2015 it was 21%, in the first 8 months of 2016 it was 8.2%).

The Prime Minister's working group worked with the Government Office on September 22, 2016. Photo: VGP

However, in the early stages of implementing Regulation 42, there has not been a comprehensive and complete assessment of the quality of the implementation of tasks, only stopping at the level of statistical data, and difficulties and obstacles in the implementation of tasks have not been discovered and resolved in a timely manner. Therefore, the Government Office has advised, proposed, and submitted to the Prime Minister the establishment of a Working Group to inspect the implementation of tasks assigned by the Government and the Prime Minister.

As affirmed by the Head of the Working Group, Minister and Head of the Government Office Mai Tien Dung when inspecting the units, the spirit of the Working Group is "impartial", extremely open, transparent and objective. The inspected agencies must clearly state the delays and shortcomings in performing the tasks, explain the specific causes and make a commitment to the completion deadline.

For example, at the Hanoi People's Committee, the Prime Minister's Working Group "questioned" thoroughly a recent case that received much attention, which was the handling of violations at the 8B Le Truc building. Team leader Mai Tien Dung frankly pointed out that "we must come up with a comprehensive plan to cut the height of this project, with a final completion date. Saying that floors are being cut now and that the height will be handled in 2017 is not good. Don't let people misunderstand."

Previously, at the Government Inspectorate, talking about the reasons for the delay in many tasks, Team Leader Mai Tien Dung emphasized that the Government Inspectorate had made a cursory assessment of the subjective reasons, citing too many objective reasons and the most important reason was the delay in internal administrative procedures, specifically the establishment of inspection teams was too slow compared to the Prime Minister's request. "Must change the working style" was the request of the Working Group to the Government Inspectorate.

At the Ministry of Planning and Investment, the Working Group clearly stated the Prime Minister's opinion reminding the Ministry that besides drastic innovation actions, there is still the mindset of pulling authority to itself, the mechanism of asking for and giving... The Ministry of Finance was reminded by the Prime Minister about the situation of Secretaries and Chairmen of provinces and cities coming to the Ministry to request low budget estimates.

Notably, although the Head of the Working Group is the Minister and Head of the Government Office, the Government Office is also one of the first places to be inspected. During the inspection, the Government Office also had to admit its mistakes in cases where the staff assigned tasks to the wrong unit, the deadline for completion was unreasonable, "assigned tasks on the 23rd but required a report on the 24th", the situation where there were contents that were not classified as confidential but the documents were still stamped confidential...

In fact, during the inspections, some units asked the press to "consider" reporting on the grounds of "sensitivity", but the Minister, Head of the Government Office, and Head of the Working Group immediately responded and emphasized that except for content that was marked confidential, the press was requested to make public all delayed tasks, causes, and responsibilities to the public.

The Prime Minister's working group worked with the Hanoi People's Committee on September 26, 2016. Photo: VGP

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc has repeatedly pledged to the people his determination to build an honest, creative, and action-oriented government, a government that sets an example for society in terms of matching words with actions, and his determination to “eliminate the longest path from words to actions”. As economic expert Pham Chi Lan commented, the Prime Minister is trying to shake up the apparatus with the hope that the entire administrative system will move together.

The working group was established by the Prime Minister with the above objectives in mind. Through 6 inspections at 6 agencies, not only were a series of issues and incidents "dug up" by the working group, but many ministries, branches and localities also had strong changes in awareness and action, and administrative discipline and order were tightened.

In the coming time, the Prime Minister's Working Group will continue to establish inspection teams for ministries, agencies and localities that still have many outstanding tasks. Obviously, this is a very new job and it is inevitable that there will be conflicts, but all for the common goal. The number of 222 outstanding tasks is not large, but they are often difficult and complicated tasks, and are of great interest to the people and public opinion. Public opinion and the people expect the situation to change more strongly and clearly, so that ministries, agencies and localities can carry out their assigned tasks thoroughly, fully, seriously, promptly and with quality, ending the situation of "shooting in the air" in direction and administration.

According to Chinhphu.vn