Vietnamese parliament approves prime minister's streamlined cabinet

Aug 2, 2007, 9:56 GMT

Hanoi - Vietnam's National Assembly approved Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung's new-look cabinet Thursday in a long-planned move to streamline the government and promote younger officials in the communist country.

The cabinet reshuffle - approved by the Communist Party Central Committee last month - reduces the number of ministries by four to 22, restructures several portfolios and adds two new deputy prime ministers for a total of five.

'It's good. I think it will be very good,' a confident-looking Dung said as the parliament votes were being tallied. Results later showed the cabinet approved by margins of up to 95 per cent.

Dung later pledged in a speech his new government would decentralize power, 'push back bureaucracy, corruption and wastefulness' and 'create a favourable environment to ensure high economic growth.'

The two new deputy prime ministers - current Minister of Education Nguyen Thien Nhan, 54, and Hoang Trung Hai, 48, now minister of industry - are notable for their relative youth and for being educated in the West.

Both are considered close to Dung, and his success in promoting them appears a sign of the prime minister's influence within the party since he was elevated at last year's 10th Communist Party Congress, said Carl Thayer, a political analyst who lectures at Australian National Defence Academy.

Thayer said that 45 per cent the 22-member cabinet were only elected to the Central Committee during last year's Party Congress, representing fresh blood in party and government leadership.

'It is these individuals who can be expected to spearhead Prime Minister Dung's reform programme over the next four years,' Thayer said.

Among the reorganized portfolios is a new Ministry of Information and Communications, reflecting Dung's emphasis on reaching out to Vietnam's younger, internet-savvy population.

The Information and Communications minister is Le Doan Hop, previously head of the former Ministry of Culture and Information, which was in charge of state censorship activities.

'Hop's retention means that censorship will continue and it will be more sophisticated,' Thayer said.

The reshuffle also merges Ministry of Fisheries with the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, with Harvard-educated Cao Duc Phat, previously agriculture minister, in charge.

The ministries of Industry and Trade would also be merged, with Vu Huy Hoang, previously the party chief of Lang Son province, as minister.

Three ministries and committees would be combined into a new Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism headed by Hoang Tuan Anh, previously general director of Vietnam Tourism Administration.

While the largest government restructuring in years, the cabinet reshuffle still represents only incremental change - some reformers reportedly sought to cut the number of ministries to 12 or 13 - and reflects the caution of the Communist Party's consensus-based internal debate.

'While Dung has been given the authority to select his own leadership team, it is clear that vested interests have created enough friction to prevent too great an alteration to the status quo and to limit the scope of restructuring,' Thayer said.

Vietnam's economy has been booming for the last five years, with GDP growth at 8.2 per cent and foreign investment nearly doubling to 10.8 billion dollars last year.

The rapid growth is a result of 20-year-old economic reforms that have been speeded up with the entry of Vietnam into the World Trade Organization.

Economic change appears to be gaining speed, but political reform is slower.

The Communist Party still holds absolute power and nearly a dozen dissidents who attempted to form opposition parties were jailed in a political crackdown earlier this year.

The National Assembly, while increasingly becoming a forum for open debate and occasional criticism, still rarely contradicts the wishes of the Party Central Committee, which hammers out consensus among various factions behind closed doors then sends decisions to the parliament for approval.