National Assembly Delegate Tells Two Stories About Insensitive, Mechanical Officials

On the morning of October 29, the National Assembly discussed socio-economic issues in the hall. Referring to the great revolution of restructuring the apparatus, delegate Tran Huu Hau (Tay Ninh delegation) assessed that in a short time, we have reorganized the entire political system and administrative units.

This has demonstrated great determination, creative thinking and strong, synchronous participation of the entire system... However, Mr. Hau said that "there are still many invisible and visible obstacles" hindering this effort.

Delegate Tran Huu Hau ( Tay Ninh delegation)

PHOTO: GIA HAN

The former Chairman of the People's Committee of Tay Ninh City (old) shared a story from more than 10 years ago when he took up his position. Visiting an "important and sensitive" room, he saw on the desk of a young official many files that had been processed but had not been signed or had been signed by the leaders but had not yet been returned to the people and businesses.

"I asked why, and was very surprised when he replied, 'It's not the transfer date yet. When I just returned to the room, I collected the documents and transferred them right away. But many colleagues looked at me as if I had fallen from the sky with suspicious eyes. When I found out, I found out that they thought there was 'something behind it' that's why they did it so quickly and enthusiastically," said delegate Hau.

Recalling the story of the young female cadre, the Tay Ninh delegation expressed concern about the situation of "good people who do not dare to do good deeds". If the apparatus cannot distinguish between good and bad workers, then that apparatus has made serious mistakes, certainly bringing about stagnation and negativity.

At that time, despite many difficulties, he said that the locality had made efforts to apply information technology, publicizing the work handling process of cadres and civil servants. From there, people, businesses and colleagues and leaders could clearly see how each cadre handled the work, and had sufficient information to evaluate the cadres.

Delegate Tran Huu Hau also highly appreciated the "three public" action motto that General Secretary To Lam directed: publicizing progress, publicizing responsibilities and publicizing results so that people and society can monitor and accompany each other.

"If we do these three public things well, along with the implementation of the National Public Service Portal, the software for assigning tasks and evaluating cadres that are being deployed and completed, we will have good tools for cadres to strive to do their jobs better. Those who are not good or weak will strive to improve," said Mr. Hau.

Prime Minister talks with National Assembly deputies

PHOTO: GIA HAN

The second story he mentioned is a leading enterprise in the cashew industry with many companies in localities, exporting over 160 million USD in the first 9 months of the year. From 2022, due to the impact of Covid-19, the enterprise requested and was approved to temporarily suspend the operation of a restaurant business.

However, after integration, the tax industry's software detected that a subsidiary had stopped operating, so it warned of risks to all other companies. As a result, local tax authorities did not accept the issuance of invoices, causing businesses to "spend a lot of effort and time explaining, even asking for intervention".

"During this peak period, companies in the system export 1 million USD per day. The flow of goods and cash flow stagnates, the daily losses are not small, including huge invisible losses such as reputation for delivery progress and suspicion of problems in tax operations," Mr. Hau said.

"In reality, insensitive civil servants who only follow regulations like robots have caused great damage to businesses, people and the country," said Mr. Hau. The two stories above show that organizational innovation, institutional reform and digital transformation, along with great work, will create great changes.