Ministry of Finance reviews headquarters to avoid administrative unit rearrangement

(Chinhphu.vn) - After a series of press reports on the situation of abandoned headquarters in 3 central provinces, the Ministry of Finance has stepped in to review, clarify problems and propose solutions to completely handle the waste of public assets.

The Ministry of Finance has stepped in to review, point out problems and propose solutions to completely handle the waste of public assets.

On May 20, Minister of Finance Nguyen Van Thang reported to National Assembly Chairman Tran Thanh Man on the content related to Tien Phong Newspaper's reflection on May 6, 2025 on the redundant headquarters of Thanh Hoa, Ha Tinh , and Nghe An provinces.

Problems from the early stages of administrative unit arrangement

After Tien Phong Newspaper reported on May 6, 2025 about a series of abandoned commune and district headquarters in Thanh Hoa, Nghe An , and Ha Tinh provinces, the Ministry of Finance quickly took action to inspect and review the entire process of handling surplus public assets from the restructuring of commune and district-level administrative units in the 2019-2021 period.

In fact, the abandoned headquarters mentioned in the article is not a new phenomenon. In fact, when many communes and districts were merged, many headquarters were no longer functional. However, due to the lack of a synchronous legal framework and related regulations at that time, the handling of these assets was confusing.

On the side of the Ministry of Finance, after receiving the information, this agency quickly issued a document requesting local Departments of Finance, especially the Department of Finance of Ha Tinh, to coordinate with relevant agencies to urgently report to the Provincial People's Committee. At the same time, the Ministry also requested to report specific problems for joint coordination to resolve.

The Department of Public Asset Management (Ministry of Finance) also had direct discussions with the leaders of the Finance Departments of the three localities to verify the information and assess the current situation. The results showed that the press's reflection was accurate, and this was a real problem arising from the initial stage of administrative unit arrangement.

It is worth noting that since that period, the system of legal documents has been updated and significantly improved. The 2024 Land Law, along with many other amended laws such as the State Budget Law, the Law on Management and Use of Public Assets, etc., have made fundamental adjustments. Decrees such as 114/2024/ND-CP, 03/2025/ND-CP, 50/2025/ND-CP have also specified decentralization and delegation of authority, increasing local initiative in handling surplus public housing and land.

In particular, Minister Nguyen Van Thang said: Many new contents have been added to remove previous barriers: allowing not to rearrange public assets if they are subject to land recovery under the Land Law; prioritizing the conversion of functions to serve public purposes such as education, health, culture; empowering proactively the land fund development organization and the local housing business management organization...

However, the Ministry of Finance admitted that there are still significant obstacles in the implementation process. In addition to the large number of surplus headquarters arising, the adjustment of land use planning, land use planning, and construction planning in many localities is still slow. In addition, some agencies and units have not been resolute in implementing the handling, causing the progress to stagnate.

Synchronize policies and resolutely implement them to avoid wasting public assets.

Not only stopping at issuing legal documents, the Ministry of Finance has recently strengthened guidance, direction and management to overcome the situation of abandoned and ineffectively used headquarters.

Accordingly, the Prime Minister has issued many directives such as Directive 40/CT-TTg dated October 24, 2024 on strengthening the management of public assets at associations; Directive 47/CT-TTg dated December 24, 2024 on handling houses and land at state-owned enterprises. In particular, Official Dispatch 125/CD-TTg dated December 1, 2024 on practicing thrift and combating waste has created a legal corridor for ministries, branches and localities to implement synchronously.

On the part of the Ministry of Finance, documents such as Official Dispatch 2950/BTC-QLCS (March 11, 2025), Official Dispatch 2454/BTC-QLCS (February 28, 2025) and Official Dispatch 4891/BTC-QLCS (April 15, 2025) have provided specific guidance on the plan for arranging, organizing and handling surplus houses and land. In particular, it emphasizes the priority of converting the purpose of use to serve the public or assigning it to functional units for effective management, leasing and exploitation.

A notable step is the online conference between the Ministry of Finance and ministries, branches and localities, to grasp the reality and disseminate instructions on handling public assets after administrative reorganization. This conference also contributes to "decoding" existing problems at the grassroots level, while emphasizing the specific responsibilities of each organization and individual in handling public assets.

Along with the above measures, the leader of the Ministry of Finance said: This agency also introduced a mechanism to inspect, check and monitor the implementation of the plan to handle unused headquarters. Localities are required to regularly update the situation of public houses and lands being used for the wrong purpose, used ineffectively or left empty to include in the general handling plan. Clearly defining the progress and implementation time of each stage, linked to the responsibility of individuals and units is a new point in the direction and operation.

Thanks to the close coordination from the central to local levels, up to now, legal regulations and guiding documents have been relatively complete to implement the arrangement, placement and handling of public assets arising after the streamlining of the apparatus. This is the basis for thoroughly handling the situation of abandoned headquarters, which has been a "bottleneck" that has caused public outrage in recent times.

Mr. Minh

Source: https://baochinhphu.vn/bo-tai-chinh-ra-soat-cac-tru-so-de-khong-sau-sap-xep-don-vi-hanh-chinh-102250520125020966.htm