Viet Nam
About Viet Nam
Parliamentary Development
Constitutionally, Viet Nam’s National Assembly is the “highest organ of state power” and the highest-level representative body of the people. It can draw up, adopt, and amend the constitution and make and amend laws. But the Vietnamese Communist Party controls the executive and electoral processes. It also has the responsibility to legislate and implement state plans and budgets. Traditionally seen as a” rubber stamp,” in recent years the National Assembly has become more active, holding Ministers more accountable and amending legislation. As a result, both the National Assembly and provincial People’s Councils have worked to keep pace with their increasing roles and responsibilities assigned by new laws to gradually build a state ruled by law. As a result, the National Assembly has a much larger constitutional role than ever before, particularly in law-making and oversight. The Parliament is increasingly aware of and ready to tackle crosscutting issues such as the achievement of the MDGs, gender equality and promoting policies for the poor. The National Assembly’s increasing power can be seen in its use of non confidence votes, the increased quality of Q&A sessions, and the passing of a law creating an independent national auditing body.
But there are still challenges:
1- Representation: lack of effective mechanisms and procedures for MPs to productively reach and interact with their constituencies ensuring their interest and voices are properly heard.
2- Oversight: Insufficient skills of MPs in understanding, analyzing, questioning and overseeing critically important issues proposed/presented/implemented by the executive agencies.
3- Law-making: Lack of tools and methodology to improve the assessment of the impact of proposed/enforced legislation and other parliamentary decisions, leading to focus on routine and technical details in reviewing legal draft bills instead of paying attention to key policy issues. Insufficient skills/attention to crosscutting issues such as equality, distribution, disparity, HIV/AIDS and environmental concerns in reviewing draft bills.
4- Weak capacity of people’s councils. PCs remain ineffective and inefficient in many ways, making it difficult for them to play a checks and balances role at sub-national levels. PCs must as more than a stamp on decisions already taken by people’s committees.
UNDP: Supporting participation and strengthening institutions
Since the mid-1990s, UNDP has been supporting the National Assembly and Provincial People's Councils. The focus is now on sharing knowledge and networking for improved parliamentary practices; enhancing the capacities of deputies, especially women and those new to the post. This includes ongoing work with the Office of the National Assembly and the National Assembly’s Committee for Budget and Economic Affairs.
Key groups of interventions include:
a) Improving training and learning opportunities in response to the specific needs of Deputies to the National Assembly and People’s Councils;
b) Strengthening capacities for legislative research and appraisal and effective oversight by selected committees of the National Assembly;
c) Strengthening capacities of People’s Councils to perform the duties entrusted to them as part of the ongoing decentralization process; and
d) Establishing a partnership mechanism for enhanced policy dialogue and resource coordination with the National Assembly and PCs.
