Nguyễn Tiến Dĩnh, former Vice Minister of Home Affairs, speaks to the newspaper Kinh tế & Đô thị (Economic and Urban Affairs) on demands for future government officials.

What are the most important criteria in fostering future government officials in Việt Nam?

The Ministry of Home Affairs is developing a plan on training for future government officials and will submit it to the government soon. This idea has already been touched upon in our Law on Cadres and Civil Servants.

However, in the past few years, it was only applied for positions not higher than department director general. In this proposal, we want it to be applied to the position of Deputy Minister.

With lessons learned from the last few years, most newly-promoted senior Government officials have gained high appraisal from colleagues in their offices.

However, I worry about how lessons they had acquired in a probationary period will be applied. Legally speaking, during the training period, they should be assigned tasks which they will have to deal with in the future. For example, if anyone is selected to be future deputy minister of a ministry, they must be assigned with certain tasks for their subordinates. This is the only way they can learn from their successes.

Under the new proposal, those who did not accomplish will be erased from the list of candidates for promotion.  Do you agree?

I can’t agree more! If someone doesn’t meet the performance requirements in the period of probation, their names should be crossed out from the candidate list of future leaders. Under current regulations, during the probation period, the candidates can make decisions – but they should bear responsibility for their decisions. Of course, in such cases, their supervisors also have to bear responsibility for their subordinates. That’s why we need a specific mechanism on how to handle these incidents.

The proposal has three essential issues in the personnel work, namely: personnel planning – practice- and selection of the best candidate for the position. How should the proposal be developed?

There is an issue we need to look at carefully, as if in the probation period someone has accomplished their assignments, should we test that candidate or not? This remains a question without an answer. As the candidate, they have already passed the test for the position as the department director general or deputy director general. And now they have completed a period of at least two or three years as a practitioner for the position as a deputy minister. Will they have to sit for a test for that position? In my opinion, we don’t need such a test. If they have met all requirement conditions to be promoted to the position of deputy minister, just give it to them.

In what direction the proposal should be revised?

The draft proposal should collect comments/suggestions from government agencies, localities and experts.

The proposal is a big policy so it needs comprehensive study toward the objective of having a good contingent of public employees who will devote their hearts and minds for the success of the nation’s administrative reform and the building of Vietnamese State of construction, development, modernisation and transparency. — VNS