VietNamNet Bridge – “The government will consider law amendment and banking reforms to make public government officials’ incomes,” said chief government inspector TranVan Truyen in regards to the Corruption Prevention Strategy, announced by the government on Tuesday.

Chief Government Inspector Tran Van Truyen.

What are the main points of the government’s strategy for combating corruption to 2020?

Preventive measures are the major content of the strategy against corruption, emphasising two issues: the transparency and supervision of explanations. The government will boost the transparency of policies, budget, information about the operations of the government apparatus. State agencies and officials have to explain issues that are social concerns, for example management of public assets and state employees’ incomes.

The government will also consider amending some regulations, for instance the Law on Inspection will give power to some agencies to employ special measures to investigate corruption.

When will government employees’ incomes be disclosed?

Income disclosure is the fundamental goal of fighting corruption but implementation depends on the conditions of each country, in which the financial control system is the legal basis.

In Vietnam cash transactions are so popular that open incomes are always modest. If we demand income disclosure immediately, it is just formalism. When incomes are regulated through the banking system, income disclosure is possible.

In addition, the constitution stipulates that we don’t need to declare some kinds of personal assets. We will have to amend the constitution and laws so people can oversee the assets and incomes of state officials.

Some say it is necessary to give more power to central and local steering boards for combating corruption. What does the new strategy say about this?

Our policy is that fighting corruption must bring into play social strength; the entire political system must be involved, particularly party cells and top officials.

The mission of steering boards for fighting corruption is coordinating anti-corruption activities, not directly solving specific cases. In the strategy, the government plans to strengthen these boards, not give power to them.

Which fields will be the focus for fighting corruption in the next few years?

In the near future, inspectors will focus on land management, finance and banking, credit, equitisation of economic groups and corporations.

In the first phase, the government will look into public assets, and then the private sector. For example, private firms that may bribe state employees.

A Japanese newspaper reported that Japan’s PCI company bribed a Vietnamese official in HCM City with $820,000. How about international cooperation to fight corruption?

Vietnam plans to sign the UN Convention against Corruption. This convention will give us many things to do, including cooperation and interdependence in various fields, including judiciary cooperation.

Vietnam has signed judiciary interdependence agreements with some countries and recently some of them have asked Vietnam to help them investigate corruption-related crimes.

(Source: VNE)