Prime Minister Nguyễn Xuân Phúc meets with voters in Hải Phòng City on Tuesday. — VNA/VNS Photo Thống Nhất

HẢI PHÒNG — The coronavirus pandemic, Việt Nam’s socio-economic performance, and corruption issues were the top of voters’ concerns at a meeting chaired by Prime Minister Nguyễn Xuân Phúc in Hải Phòng City on Tuesday.

The meeting was the second time the PM had met with voters from the Bạch Đằng club, a 40-year-old social association of retired Government officials, military officers and civilians.

Vũ Long, former editor-in-chief of Hải Phòng newspaper, lauded the Government’s balancing act of fighting the COVID-19 pandemic in tandem with ensuring socio-economic goals.

“Hải Phòng voters are happy the country has contained the disease, while the economy has rebounded. Our nine-month GDP growth this year reached 2.12 per cent, albeit quite low compared to previous years, but that makes us the country with the second fastest growth in Asia-Pacific,” Long said, urging the Government and National Assembly to focus more on ensuring equality as well.

Nguyễn Điền, another voter, expressed concerns over signs of moral decline in parts of society – including the Government, asking for more “robust and determined measures” to reinforce morality in society.

Nguyễn Bỉnh Doãn, former director of Hải Phòng police, highly appreciated the approach of “no forbidden zones” to deal with corruption, which he said was crucial to restoring public trust in the legal system and the Party.

However, Doãn noted that people were still dissatisfied with the slow and ineffective progress to recover and returning assets obtained through corruption.

Responding to concerns about the pandemic and the economic situation, PM Phúc said the Government would continue to reopen step-by-step in a controlled manner and would not allow the virus to spread in the community.

In the months ahead, the Government would do more to ensure its stimulus package was distributed faster to people and businesses in need.

“You comrades also raised the issue of socio-cultural development, especially the issue of social ethics, which is a very important issue. The downside of the market economy is rich and poor discrimination, moral degradation, criminal gangs, drug issues, and so on,” PM Phúc said, emphasising that economic development went hand in hand with cultural development, and that more efforts and time should be expended on this issue.

Responding to concerns regarding recent scandals over the inflated prices of medical equipment after the private sector was allowed to invest in and co-operate with State hospitals and health centres, PM Phúc said that the policy to open up to non-State investments was necessary but transparency was also critical and all wrongdoings would be severely punished.

PM Phúc said he had directed agencies to make public the price of imported equipment and other forms of price and quality monitoring to ensure the policy was not criminally exploited to take advantage of patients.

During the meeting, PM Phúc also informed voters about the upcoming National Assembly plenary meeting, which will take place in two sittings from October 20-27 and November 2-17. — VNS