At the National Assembly Q&A session on June 15, Minister Dung claimed responsibility for the weaknesses in the management of public investment and the inadequacies in the implementation of the Public Investment Law that has caused the slow disbursement of public investment.
Giving an additional explanation for Minister Dung, Deputy PM, Vuong Dinh Hue said, although the disbursement of public investment in 2016 and in the first five months of 2017 was higher than the same period in previous years, public investment has yet to be fully disbursed as estimated.
"The Government takes responsibility towards the National Assembly to do better in the future," said the Deputy PM. He admitted that slow disbursement of public investment is "one of the causes of unsuccessful economic growth", combined with ineffective use of capital.
Hue affirmed that the Prime Minister and the Government have made every effort in order to accelerate the disbursement of public investment. The disbursement rate in the last five months of 2016 was seven times higher than the rate in the first seven months of 2016. In 2017, the disbursement rate in the first five months has reached 24.7% of the plan, up nearly 4% over the same period last year. However, this result is still considered slow, he added.
The Deputy PM noted that the Government has worked out some specific solutions to this problem, such as requiring ministries and local authorities to continue inviting bids for construction projects, promoting decentralisation, accelerating land clearance, reviewing the inadequacies in guiding legal documents and applying disciplinary measures on officials causing slow disbursement, among others.
Nevertheless, the Government expects more regular attention and supervision from the NA, the Deputy PM said.
Explaining for the delay in disbursement of public investment, Deputy PM Hue identified two reasons, he said that one of the goals of the Public Investment Law is to avoid losses and over-diversification, therefore several regulations in the law are impeding the disbursement.
In addition, the decentralisation from ministries to local branches and governments is limited, also resulting in the slow progress of investment disbursement.
The deputy PM also confirmed the harassment and irresponsibility of certain public officials in the process of public investment disbursement.
At the same time, ministries are taking time to scrutinize priorities to cut down public project items and subprojects, thus slowing down the disbursement progress, He noted.
