Opening of the 9th Conference of the 13th Party Central Committee

General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong chaired and delivered the opening speech at the Conference.

Politburo member and Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh chaired the opening session.

At the 9th Conference of the 13th Party Central Committee, the Central Committee will discuss the following contents: Outlines of documents to be submitted to the 14th Party Congress; preparations for directing the conduct of Party congresses at all levels towards the 14th Party Congress and a number of other important issues.

Prepare outlines of documents to be submitted to the 14th National Party Congress

Speaking at the opening of the Conference, General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong stated that, as planned, the 14th National Congress of the Party will take place in early 2026, after exactly one 5-year term of the entire Party, people and army striving to implement the Resolution of the 13th National Party Congress, the 10-year Socio-Economic Development Strategy 2021-2030 and our country has gone through 40 years of renovation, 50 years of completely liberating the South and reunifying the country and towards the 100th anniversary of our Party's founding. This will be a major political event, a very important milestone on the path of prosperous and everlasting development of our country and our people; encourage, cheer, motivate, and orient our entire Party, people, and army to be proud and confident under the glorious flag of the Party, to continue to firmly adhere to the goal of national independence and socialism, to comprehensively and synchronously promote the renovation process, to rapidly and sustainably develop the country, to firmly defend the Fatherland, to build an increasingly rich, democratic, prosperous, civilized, and happy Vietnam; to strive to successfully achieve the goals by 2030 when our Party turns 100 years old and by 2045 when the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, now the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, turns 100 years old.

General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong said that in the past time, implementing the Resolution of the 8th Central Conference of the 13th Party Congress, the Socio-Economic Subcommittee and the Party Charter Subcommittee urgently and seriously prepared the draft outline of the Political Report, the Socio-Economic Report, the Report on Party Building and Implementation of the Party Charter; and asked for the Politburo's opinion to continue to complete it to submit to the Central Committee for consideration and comments at this Conference.

General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong requested that the Central Committee spend time carefully studying the documents, discussing and giving opinions on the specific proposals stated in the Reports and draft Report Outlines, first of all on the following issues: Themes and mottos of the Congress; titles of the Political Report, Socio-Economic Report, Report on Party Building and Implementation of the Party Charter; structure and major contents of the report outlines, especially major issues that need to be focused on and clarified in the process of developing the documents mentioned in the draft Detailed Outline of the Political Report and the Report of the Document Subcommittee.

During the discussion, General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong noted that it is necessary to clarify the nature, objectives, requirements and scope of each report and the relationship between the reports. The Political Report is the central document of the Congress, with the task of continuing to concretize the Party Platform to lead the entire Party, the entire people and the entire army to build and defend the Fatherland in the new term. The content of the Political Report must be highly general in terms of issues related to the Party's viewpoints, guidelines, policies and strategies in all areas of social life.

Regarding the Socio-Economic Report, the Report on Party Building and Implementation of the Party Charter, there must be conformity and consistency with the viewpoints and major orientations stated in the Political Report, but not overlap with the Political Report. In particular, the Report on Party Building and Implementation of the Party Charter needs to clarify the theoretical and practical basis for supplementing and amending the Party Charter (if any) and developing a draft of a new Party Charter to be submitted to the 14th Congress for consideration and decision.

The outline of the documents presented at this Conference only sets out the orientation, is open in nature with many different options for the Central Committee to give opinions and guidance, and select one step, then continue to research and prepare according to the process, through discussion steps at Party congresses at all levels, and finally the Central Committee will decide to submit to the National Congress of the Party.

As for the structure of the reports, it should be decided early at this Conference, in order to complete the draft outline and compile the detailed content. The writing style should also be innovated to be vivid, concise, easy to understand, easy to remember, and easy to implement.

Orientation to prepare for Party Congresses at all levels towards the 14th National Congress of the Party

Regarding the orientation for preparing for Party Congresses at all levels towards the 14th National Congress of the Party, General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong stated that in order to unify leadership and direction in the preparation and conduct of Party Congresses at all levels towards the 14th National Congress of the Party, the Politburo needs to issue a Directive on this issue. This is an important task, ensuring the success of Party Congresses at all levels and contributing to the success of the 14th National Congress of the Party, and needs to be commented on by the Central Committee.

Recently, the Politburo has directed the summary of the implementation of Directive No. 35-CT/TW, dated May 30, 2019 of the 13th Politburo on this issue; affirmed that the results and lessons learned need to be inherited and promoted; at the same time, pointed out the limitations and shortcomings that need to be learned from and promptly adjusted. On that basis, a new draft Directive was drafted and submitted to the Central Executive Committee for comments to complete before promulgation.

General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong suggested that the Central Committee pay attention to discussing specifically the Submission and the draft Directive, focusing on clarifying the purposes, requirements, and contents of Party Congresses at all levels and the work of preparing personnel and electing Party Committees, especially regarding the structure and number of Party Committees of provinces and centrally-run cities; the proportion of young cadres, female cadres, and ethnic minority cadres of provincial and municipal Party Committees; standards and ages for participating in provincial and municipal Party Committees (re-election age and first-time participation in Party Committees when the retirement age has been raised to 60 for women and 62 for men); on Party Committee elections and election of delegates to attend Party Congresses at higher levels...

The agenda of this Central Conference is of great significance to the completion of the political tasks of the 13th Party Central Committee in preparing documents for the 14th National Party Congress and directing the preparation of Party Congresses at all levels towards the 14th National Party Congress. General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong requested the Central Committee to promote intelligence and sense of responsibility, focus on research, thorough discussion, and give opinions to complete reports and projects and consider and decide at the end of the session.

According to the program, the Conference will work until May 18.