According to a survey by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and the Vietnam Fatherland Front Central Committee, the quality of public services in HCM City, Da Nang and Thua Thien-Hue city is the best while that of Yen Bai and Kon Tum is at the bottom.

The UNDP and Vietnam Fatherland Front Central Committee on March 31 announced the result of the survey on public service quality at provincial level, which is called PAPI index.

The survey was conducted with 5,568 participants of all social classes from 30 provinces and cities in Vietnam.

From June to October 2010, survey staffs met with participants, who were selected randomly, to ask them about their experience with public agencies and administrative reforms.

Questions were very specific, for example: do you know about formalities to get a land use right certificate (red book), do administrative officials explain and instruct you to fulfill formalities? Etc.

The answers from 5,568 people were analyzed to assess six aspects.

1/ The participants’ understanding about policies and the positions of grassroots officials as village and street officials, who are nearest to them, whether they directly elected these officials, etc.

2/ Whether the participants know information about their community, for example the number of poor families, the spending of their commune or ward, the local government’s land use plans, etc. This shows the people’s interest in the local government and the local government’s supply of information to local people.

3/Whether participants’ questions to the local government are answered and answered thoroughly or not.

4/ Whether participants have to give money under the table when they perform administrative procedures or not.

5/ The satisfaction of participants over popular administrative formalities like notarization, getting red books and construction licenses.

6/ However, administration is not only formalities but also healthcare, education, housing, security, etc. public services that the state is responsible to supply. This is also assessed by the survey.

Finally, HCM City, the central city of Da Nang and the central province of Thua Thien Hue have the highest PAPI indexes while the northern province of Yen Bai and the Central Highlands province of Kon Tum have the lowest indexes.

Hanoi and some big provinces and cities like Binh Phuoc, Dong Nai and Vinh Long in the south, Hai Phong and Phu Tho in the north do not have high PAPI.

Thuy Chung