Donors at the meeting said that Vietnam had established special legal institutions but was still not doing enough work to combat graft, while a Finish Embassy representative pointed out the potential conflict of interest of appointing provincial mayors as chairs of their anti-corruption steering committees.

In addition media agencies in Vietnam have limited access to information in order to combat corruption, international delegates said.

“In recent years, Vietnam has made progress… and there are now pockets of excellence within the state media.

But myriad problems persist which, if not tackled, will severely reduce the media’s ability to combat corruption,” former journalist and Senior International Consultant Catherine McKinley said.

She said these problems included: inconsistent and poorly implemented legislation, a shortage of financing options, outdated and poorly resourced training facilities.”

However, the Government Inspectorate Chief Tran Van Truyen said the assessment that anticorruption in Vietnam is slacking up is due to a lack of information.

He said the anti-corruption steering committees were conducting investigations more thoroughly, which was why they were handling fewer cases.

He stated that no one, no matter how high the position, was immune to investigation and the law.

Vietnam will soon list categories of classified information - with only national security-related documents to be kept secret, Truyen said.

The government is also focusing on intensifying asset disclosure, making information, policies and administrative procedures more transparent, and improving the media’s role in the fight, he noted.

East-West Highway corruption probe

The country’s international image has been damaged by the case of a Ho Chi Minh City official who allegedly received bribes from executives of Japan’s Pacific Consultants International (PCI), the office manager of the Central Anti-Corruption Steering Committee, Vu Tien Chien, told reporters on the sideline of the meeting.

Last week, HCMC authorities suspended Huynh Ngoc Si, deputy head of the Department of Transport and chief of the East-West Highway and HCMC Water Environment Project while they investigate claims made in a Tokyo court that Si had taken more than US$2 million in bribes from PCI in exchange for helping the firm win consulting contracts in the highway project.

The government is actively tackling the case in an unbiased manner according to Vietnamese and international laws, Chien said, adding that the Central Anti-Corruption Steering Committee is closely following the case.

World Bank warning

In related news the World Bank (WB) would stop lending money to Vietnam if it discovered any wrongdoings regarding official development assistance (ODA) funding, the acting Country Director of the World Bank in Vietnam, Martin Rama warned Friday at a press briefing about the Consultative Group Meeting slated for December 4-5 in Hanoi.

WB has committed to offer more assistance to Vietnam, Rama said.

Early this year, Vietnam was put on the list of five developing countries with low incomes which will annually receive WB preferential loans of $1.5 billion over the next three years, the WB country director said.

Reported by Bao Van