Lawmakers express their concerns over several issues plaguing the Vietnamese society in current times including corruption, solutions to immigration, addressing child abuse and school violence in the morning session of the ongoing National Assembly (NA)’s plenary meeting on May 26.

Anti-corruption drive

National Assembly deputy Phan Thị Mỹ Dung from Long An Province. 

Phan Thị Mỹ Dung, NA deputy from Mekong Delta province of Long An, said the constituents are worried about ‘rampant corruption’ that stains every level of administration, causing severe losses to the State and the public.

In recent times, the campaign against corruption has witnessed positive improvements, showing solid commitments of the Party and the Government, Mỹ Dung said.

However, corruption remains a long-standing issue that has not been repelled, punishments given to certain crooked officials were not stern enough while asset recovery results are “woefully insufficient,” she added.

“My voters are mostly a farmer who have to brave the harsh weather, saving up on every little money they earn that could easily be wiped out in an unpredictable natural disaster or a plague. With a lowly salary of VNĐ1.3 million (US$57) a month, public officials at the rural localities are still committed to carry out their duties to help the Government in poverty reduction and building new rural areas. It’s understandable why they could not but feel bitter hearing of corruption cases and loss-making projects where trillions of đồng went up in smoke,” Dung said.

Other lawmakers shared Dung’s sentiment and urged for the passing of the amended Law on Anti-corruption in the 6th plenary meeting to be implemented in real life as quick as possible.

Child abuse and school violence

NA deputies also expressed their concerns over ‘conscience rousing’ issue of child abuse in kindergarten schools that have recently surfaced on the media.

“The public’s anger and pain was palpable, when outrageous video clips recording forceful feeding or physical violence against ‘rowdy’ small children make the rounds in social media,” Dương Minh Tuấn, NA deputy from southern province of Bà Rịa – Vũng Tàu, said.

Tuấn said on average there were 1,600 cases of student fights (both within and outside their schools’ premises), which translates to five cases a day, not to mention other unreported incidents.

“The thing worth mention is the indifference from other students when seeing their peers engaged in a fight, they mostly just stand aside, either recording or cheering on instead of breaking up the fight,” he said.

School violence and child abuse is getting “more complicated in nature, scale, and form” and quickly becoming a haunting concern for families and the society in general.

Lawmakers urged concerned agencies to have a ‘precision prescription’ to deal with this plaguing issue. More interaction and exchanges between schools and parents, between schools and authorities are needed to prevent and root out such phenomena.

Lưu Bình Nhưỡng, NA deputy from Bến Tre Province, called upon the Government to implement better policies to deal with immigration of ethnic minority population from northern mountainous region to Central Highlands.

“For livelihood reasons, they have to leave their ancestors’ land to go to Central Highlands, damaging the forests to make farmlands. But they are not illegal loggers. They also don’t have any personal identification papers with them, meaning they can’t receive social benefits, their children won’t be able to go schools.”

“Therefore, I urge the National Assembly and the Government to consider their situation and have proper policies for the immigrants,” Nhưỡng said.

Another topic that was heavily debated at the meeting was the controversial trial looking into the medical incident at Hoà Bình General Hospital last year resulting in the death of eight dialysis patients.

Also at the meeting, lawmakers have also discussed measures to ensure stable macro-economic development, reasonable distribution of resources for investment, protection and conservation of natural and cultural heritages, and increased management of social media including issuing harsher mechanisms to punish those spreading misinformation, fake news. — VNS