Tighten asset declaration to prevent corruption from the root

At the discussion session on the morning of November 5, National Assembly delegates from Group 6 (from Lang Son, Dong Nai and Thua Thien-Hue) said that the amendment of the Law on Anti-Corruption this time is not only to improve legislative techniques but also to strengthen people's trust in the Party and State's determination to fight corruption. To do that, the regulations on asset declaration, income control and power supervision need to be more specific, clear and feasible than at present.

Delegate Nguyen Thi Suu ( Hue City) commented that the current Law has made many advances, but practice shows that there are still gaps in controlling conflicts of interest, responsibility of leaders and transparency of assets and income. She suggested clarifying the concept of "conflict of interest" to avoid the situation where officials are both managers and beneficiaries in public service activities.

According to the delegate, declaring assets electronically is in line with the current trend, but there must be a mechanism to protect personal information and specific regulations on handling unusual asset discrepancies. “Declaration without independent supervision and data connectivity can easily become a formality,” she emphasized.

Delegates also proposed increasing the responsibility of leaders to set an example and clarifying the criteria for handling corruption in agencies, avoiding the "gray zone" between administrative and criminal handling.

From practical requirements, delegates said that publicity and transparency are effective tools to prevent corruption. Accordingly, applying technology to budget management, public investment supervision and bidding will help minimize the opportunity for negative occurrences.

Delegates also proposed increasing the role of the Government Inspectorate , the Fatherland Front, socio-political organizations and the press in monitoring and criticizing. “Not only handling violations but also building a culture of integrity among officials,” a delegate emphasized.

Siết chặt kê khai tài sản để ngăn tham nhũng từ gốc- Ảnh 1. — National Assembly Delegate Phan Viet Luong (Dong Nai) spoke at the discussion group 6 on the morning of November 5.

Contributing to Clause 1, Point a, Article 35 of the draft Law, delegate Phan Viet Luong (Dong Nai) assessed that specifying the scope of assets that must be declared is an important step forward. However, he was concerned about the wording of “construction works and other assets attached to land” because it was unclear whether the works must be owned by the declarant or not. The delegate suggested making amendments to avoid overlap and ensure transparency in application.

Regarding the threshold for asset declaration, raising the threshold from 50 million VND to 150 million VND is considered appropriate, but according to delegate Luong, a higher threshold can be considered to accurately reflect the current income of many officials. A threshold that is too low can easily lead to widespread declaration, which is time-consuming and ineffective.

Regarding Article 40 on monitoring asset fluctuations, the delegate pointed out the unreasonableness of the declaration threshold being from 150 million VND but only when detecting fluctuations of 1 billion VND or more is verification required. “The gap between these two levels is too large and it is easy to miss small but frequent fluctuations,” the delegate analyzed, and at the same time suggested that verification should be carried out immediately when there are signs of incorrect declaration from the 150 million VND level.

Regarding the application of technology, delegate Phan Viet Luong emphasized that digital transformation is a mandatory trend to reduce administrative procedures, save costs and increase transparency. However, the current draft Law only stops at guiding words such as "promote, strengthen", without specific requirements.

He proposed adding a unified electronic declaration mechanism and building a centralized database on assets and income, allowing control agencies to easily compare and detect irregularities. This will be an important foundation for preventing corruption early and from afar.

Center for Science and Technology Communication

Source: https://mst.gov.vn/siet-chat-ke-khai-tai-san-de-ngan-tham-nhung-tu-goc-197251116161008164.htm