National Assembly deputies are continuing to debate a plan to hold an annual vote of confidence in senior officials in order to improve accountability.
NA may hold annual vote of confidence in senior officials
The plan suggests that any official that fails in a vote of confidence by NA deputies for two consecutive polls may be forced to resignation.
At a meeting on April 27 to discuss the plan, Le Thi Nga, Vice Chairwoman of the NA’s Justice Committee, said, “the NA’s vote of confidence in senior officials has been passed and should be implemented as soon as possible. However, the votes should be held for officials ranging from a ministerial level and upwards.”
As a result, those officials subject to the voting may include the State President, Vice State President, NA’s Chairman and Vice chairman, members of the NA’s Standing Committee, the Prime Minister and other cabinet members, the Tribunal President of People’s Supreme Court, Director of People’s Supreme Procuracy, the State Auditor General, ministers, and officials of NA agencies.
Under the plan, the NA’s Standing Committee should take responsibility to clarify the titles of those subjected to vote and the voting procedures with the results submitted to the NA for consideration at the year-end’s meeting.
According to Nga, the procedures should be as simple as possible in order to ensure their feasibility. Before the voting, each official should map out their own action plan and deliver it to the NA, which will be used a reference for NA decisions.
She said that it would be not really suitable to carry out the voting annually. This was because an official’s term often lasted for five years, and taking a vote after just a year would be unfair as they had too little time in a job to make an impact.
She recommended that the voting be conducted from the second year of officials’ term, adding that a warning should be applied to officials who failed to receive a majority of votes in two consecutive polls, instead of immediate dismissal.
NA deputy from the central province of Thanh Hoa Le Nam worried that if an official polled particularly badly in their first year in office their prestige would be seriously damaged, which could have knock on effects in future ballots. The solution in this case was to encourage him to resign immediately, he proposed.
NA Pham Van Tan, from Nghe An Province, said more efforts should be made to clarify the schedule for the voting and the time the NA would have to consider dismissals and resignations in cases where an official lost two consecutive no-confidence ballots.