National conference to deploy administrative unit arrangement on April 16

At the March work briefing, deploying tasks for the second quarter and April held on the afternoon of April 1, Minister of Home Affairs Pham Thi Thanh Tra said that according to the roadmap, the Government Party Committee will report to the Central Executive Committee at the 11th conference to approve the project to merge provinces and communes, not organizing at the district level. The conference on April 16 will also determine tasks related to the rearrangement of the Fatherland Front, socio-political organizations, courts and procuracies.

According to Minister Pham Thi Thanh Tra, from May 1, provinces and cities across the country will begin sending their reorganization plans to the Ministry of Home Affairs for consideration by the National Assembly Standing Committee and the National Assembly. The Ministry of Home Affairs will support ministries and branches in adjusting legal documents to suit the two-tier local government model.

The Ministry aims to submit to the National Assembly Standing Committee the work related to the merger of provinces and communes and the organization of two-level local governments before June 30. "July 1 is the milestone for commune-level governments to begin operating, and August 30 is the time when the entire political system, after being rearranged and reorganized, will officially come into synchronous operation," Minister Tra affirmed.

The Minister also requested units to quickly complete the list of decrees that need to be amended to ensure the effective operation of the two-level local government as well as decentralization and delegation of power. Each unit should increase the application of artificial intelligence combined with manual measures to review legal documents that need to be adjusted and supplemented and submit them for early promulgation after the amended Constitution and the Law on Organization of Local Government are passed by the National Assembly.

In addition, the minister also proposed reviewing policies related to allowances, special allowances, and regional minimum wages to propose amendments to specific decrees, especially in the context of restructuring provincial-level administrative units and reorganizing commune-level units.

Previously, on March 28 in Da Nang, General Secretary To Lam informed that the Central Committee would meet and calculate plans to streamline the apparatus in early April. According to the initial plan, the whole country will have about 34 provinces and cities after the current 63 provinces and cities are rearranged; there will be no more district-level administrative units; and about 5,000 commune-level administrative units will be merged.

According to the draft Resolution of the National Assembly Standing Committee, drafted by the Ministry of Home Affairs, 11 provincial-level administrative units are expected to maintain their current status, including Hanoi, Hue, Lai Chau, Dien Bien, Son La, Cao Bang, Lang Son, Quang Ninh, Thanh Hoa, Nghe An and Ha Tinh. The remaining 52 localities, including the four centrally-run cities of Ho Chi Minh City, Hai Phong, Da Nang and Can Tho, are subject to restructuring.