Gov’t sets up steering committee for reorganization of local administrative units

The committee shall be led by Standing Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Hoa Binh who will be assisted by Minister of Home Affairs Pham Thi Thanh Tra and Minister-Chairman of the Government Office Tran Van Son as the committee's deputy heads.

Members of the committee include the Mininister of Justice, Minister of Finance, Minister of Agriculture and Environment, Minister of Culture-Sports and Tourism, Minister of Science and Technology, Minister of Education and Training, Minister of Health, and Minister of Ethnic Minorities and Religions.

The committee is an inter-disciplinary agency responsible for assisting the Prime Minister in studying, directing and coordinating in resolving issues related to reorganization of administrative units at all levels and formulation of two-tier local administration model.

The committee shall put foward to the Prime Minister major orientations and solutions to reorganize administrative units at all levels and formulate two-tier local administration model.

On March 11, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh presided over the Government Party Committee's meeting to discuss a draft plan on reorganization of local administrative units.

Addressing the meeting, Pham stressed that the reorganization of local administrative units targets to create new development space and bring into full play of unique advantages of each locality.

Local administrations will be reorganized into two levels (provincial and grassroots levels) instead of current three levels (provincial, district and communal levels) and merged, to create a two-tier local governance to ensure streamlined, efficient and effective operations.

With this plan, the number of provinces and centrally-run cities will reduce by about 50 percent while the number of grassroots-level administrative units will reduce by 60-70 percent.

At present, Viet Nam is devided into 63 provinces and centrally-run cities with 705 districts and 10,595 communes/wards.

The draft plan will be submitted to the Politburo and the Secretariat prior to March 27, 2025 and to the Party Central Committee before April 7, 2025 for consideration and approval./.