Previously, to prepare for each session, staff of the Office of the National Assembly Delegation and the People's Council of Nghe An province had to work day and night to prepare the printing and photocopying of hundreds of sets of documents to provide to delegates and guests attending the session. "Each time we had to transport documents to the meeting place to distribute to delegates, we had to use a car, which was costly, time-consuming, and cumbersome," said Bui Duy Son, Chief of Office of the National Assembly Delegation and the People's Council of Nghe An province.
Based on the method and model of organizing paperless sessions of the National Assembly, after a period of preparation, from the 5th session (March 2022), the 18th term People's Council of Nghe An province has operated the "Paperless Session", marking a new step forward in the form of organizing sessions. Provincial People's Council delegates are given a separate account to access documents, use the "Paperless Session" software including utilities: Meeting agenda, meeting documents, connecting to the voting system, list of delegates, notes, notifications and asking for opinions, registering to speak and debate. Invited guests can refer to the meeting documents on the "Nghe An Provincial People's Delegates" website at http://dbndnghean.vn or access them by scanning the QR code posted on the table at the meeting location.
Mr. Hoang Manh Ha - Nghi Loc District Delegation Group said: Transferring the entire program and meeting documents to the data system and arranging them scientifically according to the meeting management script helps delegates easily follow the content of the meeting chair as well as the documents in the system. The software system is connected to the internet, so during the process of researching documents and developments at the meeting, delegates can immediately look up information, such as legal regulations related to the basis for issuing resolutions to deeply understand and firmly grasp the issues they will participate in, while increasing the publicity and transparency of activities, creating a serious, modern and professional atmosphere at the meeting.
On the other hand, according to the leader of the Office of the National Assembly Delegation and the People's Council of Nghe An province, the application of the "Paperless Session" software is also a form of monitoring the activities of the Provincial People's Council delegates at the session through roll call with one click on the system and the participation in giving opinions at the session in the form of comments on documents or direct speeches are all saved, convenient for the Office in monitoring, evaluating and classifying the quality of delegates during the year. In addition, the monitoring and editing of draft reports and resolutions submitted at the session by the session secretary and the Office is fast, convenient and highly accurate.
Digital transformation is receiving special attention from the Government in the 4.0 industrial revolution. At the provincial level, the Standing Committee of the Provincial Party Committee and the Executive Committee of the Nghe An Provincial Party Committee have also identified digital transformation as a breakthrough solution in administrative reform in the 2021-2030 period. In response to that requirement, the Standing Committee of the Provincial People's Council has identified promoting the application of information technology and comprehensively implementing digital transformation in many activities of elected agencies as one of the key tasks in 2022 and the entire 2021-2026 term. Up to now, the Provincial People's Council has been assessed as one of the pioneers in digital transformation in Nghe An. In addition to the "Paperless Session", digital transformation has been deployed in the activities of elected agencies, such as: 100% of documents of Provincial People's Council sessions are digitized and transferred to the database system; application of software for managing documents and digital signatures; Regularly update the content of responses to voters' petitions from all levels, sectors and activities of the National Assembly Delegation and Provincial People's Council on the electronic information page "Nghe An Provincial People's Delegation".
The Standing Committee of Nghe An Provincial People's Council is also actively directing the development of software and a database system to monitor and synthesize the results of handling recommendations after supervision, conclusions of questioning and explanations of the Provincial People's Council; the results of handling voters' recommendations, petitions, complaints and denunciations of citizens sent to the Office of the National Assembly Delegation and the Provincial People's Council; and monitoring the assessment of the quality of activities of Provincial People's Council delegates.
In each session of the Provincial People's Council, the question and answer session is carefully prepared by the Standing Committee of the Nghe An Provincial People's Council in selecting the content and form of questions and answers, especially hot and urgent issues that voters in the province are interested in.
For example, at the 11th session of the 18th Provincial People's Council held in mid-December 2022, with the viewpoint "Safety of people's lives and property is above all, first of all", once again the management and operation of irrigation and hydroelectric reservoirs during the rainy and flood season; the work of preventing and overcoming the consequences of natural disasters were selected for questioning. Because looking back at 2022, natural disasters had an extremely heavy impact on Nghe An province with 9 heat waves; 23 hailstorms, localized heavy rains; 5 widespread heavy rains; storm No. 4 alone, flash floods in early October 2022 killed 8 people; total damage was estimated at about 1,000 billion VND, accounting for more than 1/20 of Nghe An's annual budget revenue.
At the above meeting, under the chairman's direction, following the principle of "1 minute question, 3 minutes answer", 12 delegates of the Provincial People's Council asked questions, focusing on many contents related to the field of the Vice Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee Nguyen Van De in charge. Through questioning and answering questions, many urgent issues were dissected and clarified such as: The number of degraded reservoirs and irrigation dams is high, with high risk of insecurity. Lack of monitoring equipment, lack of modern forecasting equipment; inadequate reservoir operation monitoring system and safety warning information system for reservoirs, dams and downstream areas; no flood maps have been built; lack of record storage system, database... Flood discharge operations at some large hydroelectric and irrigation reservoirs lack close coordination with local authorities, information and propaganda work for people has not received due attention, leading to the situation where people are still passive and do not have access to information; Funding for disaster recovery is still limited…
With the viewpoint that "the selected issues for questioning must be correct and accurate, timely, and associated with promoting the accountability of competent authorities", since the beginning of the 2021-2026 term, Nghe An Provincial People's Council has organized 6 questioning sessions on urgent and prominent issues of interest to voters and society, including: State management of minerals in the province; Implementation of policies to support workers and employers facing difficulties due to the Covid-19 pandemic and job creation for workers in Nghe An province due to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic; Results of the implementation of Resolution No. 11/NQ-CP dated January 30, 2022 of the Government on the Socio-Economic Recovery and Development Program and the implementation of Resolution No. 43/2022/QH15 of the National Assembly on fiscal and monetary policies to support the Socio-Economic Recovery and Development Program and social security work; Work of establishing and managing construction planning and managing construction order; Work of preventing and overcoming consequences of natural disasters, especially the effects of floods; work of managing and operating irrigation and hydroelectric reservoirs during the rainy and flood season; The arrangement of counterpart funds of the province to implement programs, projects and investment policies in ethnic minority areas according to the prescribed structure of each program, project and policy to promote all resources to invest in ethnic minority areas for rapid and sustainable development.
Vice Chairman of the Standing Committee of the People's Council of Nghe An province Nguyen Nam Dinh said: The Standing Committee of the Provincial People's Council coordinated with the Provincial People's Committee and the Provincial Vietnam Fatherland Front Committee to discuss, select and agree on the content of the questioning, and forward it to the Provincial People's Committee. On that basis, the Provincial People's Committee assigned organizations and individuals to prepare and directly answer; issued a notice of conclusion for the Provincial People's Committee and related organizations and individuals to implement, and reported the results to the Standing Committee of the Provincial People's Council for monitoring and supervision. The questioning and answering sessions were innovated in the direction of enhancing dialogue and debate, not avoiding complicated issues; the questioning questions were concise, specific, clear, close to reality, people's lives and voters' aspirations. The agencies answering the questions were open-minded, seriously acknowledging the current situation of limitations, weaknesses and responsibilities in the management of the sectors and fields under their charge, and at the same time, proposed a roadmap to overcome, correct and improve. For issues and contents related to the responsibilities of many sectors, the chair allows written responses and sends them to the Standing Committee of the People's Council after the end of the session for synthesis and continued supervision of the implementation of promises made to voters.
Through following the meetings reported live on social media platforms and publications of Nghe An Newspaper as well as Nghe An Television, voter Lo Van Thanh in Chau Thang commune, Quy Chau district highly appreciated the decisive, flexible, and especially scientific management of the meeting chair, contributing to raising the awareness and responsibility of the provincial People's Council delegates and guest delegates from provincial departments, branches and sectors at the meetings.
At each regular session, the Standing Committee of the Nghe An Provincial People's Council announces on the province's mass media the "Hotline" phone numbers to receive voters' suggestions and feedback. Comments directly sent to the "Hotline" are announced right at the session. Urgent issues that can be answered immediately are requested by the session chair to be answered immediately by relevant departments and branches, so that voters can follow through live reporting channels. The remaining comments are compiled and sent to the relevant agencies for resolution and specific responses are requested.
Through 4 regular sessions of the 2021-2026 term, the People's Council of Nghe An province received 233 opinions, recommendations and proposals from voters through the "Hotline" at the session. Based on the opinions of voters, the Standing Committee of the Provincial People's Council issued documents to departments, branches and localities to resolve according to their authority, with the resolution and response results reaching 100%.
Expressing her joy that the issue she reported to the “Hotline” was promptly resolved, Ms. Tran Thi Thanh, in Tan Phuc block, Hung Phuc ward (Vinh city) said that when she called the “Hotline” to report that the land of the old Green Park Company had become a garbage collection site, causing environmental pollution, immediately after that, the People's Committee of Hung Phuc ward worked with Nghe An Urban Environment Company to handle the issue.
Voter Nguyen Van Duc - Chairman of the Veterans Association of Hoang Mai town commented: "The meeting chair publicly informed the opinions and recommendations of voters at the meeting and they were transmitted to the mass media, which is very meaningful. From that publicity, all levels and sectors grasp the issues raised by voters; at the same time, this is also a "channel" for voters and people to exercise their supervisory role over the activities of elected bodies as well as functional agencies".
It can be said that with innovative solutions, improving the quality of meetings of the People's Council of Nghe An province has brought a "new wind", the liveliness of regular and thematic meetings, contributing to the role of elected representatives of the provincial People's Council and the provincial People's Council delegates, at the same time, increasing the accountability, transparency and responsibility of State management agencies, thereby improving the effectiveness of local governance.