VietNamNet Bridge – Tran Hung, vice chairman and general secretary of the Vietnam Advertising Association (VAA), has complained that too many business conditions have hit enterprises in the sector.

Illustrative image -- File photo

Hung told a conference in Hanoi on Wednesday (May 13) that business conditions can be found not only in the Advertising Law, decrees and circulars but also in documents issued by the agencies overseeing the industry.

For example, Article 19 of the law states that the Government regulates the content of advertising but its guidance decree requires that advertising can only be licensed when it is certified by competent agencies of the sectors of health, industry and trade.

“The requirement was abolished in the past but it has re-surfaced,” Hung said, adding the condition is against the law.

Hung said the VAA has learned that the Ministry of Health has insisted on retaining the condition as it wants the health of people to be protected.

Currently, the content of all billboards must be approved by competent agencies, Hung told the conference organized by the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI) to introduce the revised Enterprise Law with effect from July this year.   

Lawyer Tran Huu Huynh of VCCI, who chaired the conference, asked Hung why advertising firms have not taken legal actions against administration agencies for their requests running counter to the law. Hung said they did not want to take risks since they still replied on them to get advertising licenses.

The view was also shared by representatives of other business associations at the conference.

Hung said the VAA has reported unreasonable conditions to the Government, relevant ministries and agencies and the National Assembly more than two years after the law took effect. However, few agencies have responded to the association so far.

Nguyen Dinh Cung, president of the Central Institute for Economic Management (CIEM), said the business conditions not provided in the Enterprise Law would be nullified from July 1 this year.

All the legal business conditions are clarified in almost 900 pages of the law, said Cung, who joined the process of drafting the law. Therefore, some 6,000 business conditions illegally contained in documents of ministries, local governments and agencies will be made invalid from July 1 when the revised investment and enterprise laws come into force.

Cung called for enterprises to read through the conditions and do all what is not banned by the Enterprise Law. “You should sue the agencies that impose fines on what you do in compliance with the law,” he said.

Lawyer Ngo Viet Hoa from law firm Russin & Vecchi, said despite Cung’s encouragement, enterprises would find it hard to sue State agencies.

Lawyer Tran Vu Hai said the Ministry of Finance once issued a document violating the Enterprise Law and his agency wrote to the ministry asking for clarification or it would sue the ministry. However, the ministry just promised to review the document.

Earlier this year, Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung requested ministries and local governments take punitive measures against agencies and officials that had illegally issued business conditions beyond their authority in a move to improve the country’s business environment.

The Government leader wanted ministries and local authorities to name the violators and report to him this quarter. He also told them to stop regulating conditional business sectors and setting business conditions.

The 2013 Constitution states that people are allowed to do business in the areas that are not banned by law. The revised Investment Law outlines six forbidden and 267 conditional business areas, compared to nearly 400 conditional business sectors regulated in many legal documents earlier.

The law states that business and investment conditions should be contained in laws, ordinances and decrees. Ministries, local authorities and individuals are prohibited to issue investment and business conditions.

SGT