Advancements in Local Anti-Corruption Initiatives and E-Governance

The 15th edition of the Vietnam Provincial Governance and Public Administration Performance Index (PAPI), a collaborative effort between the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and associated agencies, was recently published. The report reveals that citizens commend the strides made in anti-corruption initiatives and the implementation of e-governance. However, they perceive a lack of publicity and transparency in local decision-making processes. In the previous year, the primary concerns of citizens were the state of the economy and household prosperity.

UNDP Resident Representative in Vietnam Ramla Khalidi delivers the opening remarks at the launch ceremony of the 2023 PAPI report

PAPI provides a measurement across eight key dimensions: local-level participation; transparency and publicity in local decision making; vertical accountability to citizens; control of corruption in the public sector; public administrative procedures; public service delivery environmental governance; and e-government.

“Publicity and transparency in local decision making” tends to decline

Since its debut 15 years ago, a record 19,536 respondents from across the country participated in the 2023 PAPI survey. Control of Corruption in the Public Sector and E-Governance were the key PAPI dimensions to register progress relative to 2021 and 2022. On the contrary, Transparency and Publicity in Local Decision-Making saw a drop. The remaining five dimensions, including Participation at Local Levels, Vertical Accountability to Citizens, Public Administrative Procedures, Public Service Delivery, and Environmental Governance, saw little change relative to the last two years.

The improvement in citizen perceptions on control of corruption at the local level rose only modestly, from 6.71 points in 2022 to 6.77 in 2023. The slight improvement, however, also aligned with citizen rankings of national issues of high concern that would need to be resolved in the coming time. Corruption dropped from being the fifth national issue of greatest anxiety for citizens in 2022 to the sixth in 2023.

Transparency and publicity in local decision making is important to prevent corruption in the public sector as citizens can only perform “check and oversight” and hold local officials accountable if they have access to accurate information. Concerningly, up to 23 provinces in 2023 saw significant year-on-year declines in scores compared to 2021, especially in transparency around commune budgets and expenditure. While 43-46% of respondents across provinces confirmed that commune budget and expenditure worksheets were publicly available between 2018 and 2022, this dropped to 39% in 2023, the lowest since 2016. Similarly, transparency and publicity in poverty lists also dropped, part of an evident decline since 2019.

Another highlight of the PAPI Report 2023 was that access to the internet and access to provincial e-governance portals both rose relative to 2020. While nearly 80% of PAPI survey respondents in 2023 had internet access at home, the results also highlighted digital divides. Access to the internet varied across gender, living areas, ethnicity and migrant status.

Besides, findings showed that a majority of citizens have not used online public services. In 2023, just 8.3% and 7.6% of respondents used the National Public Service Portal or the Provincial Public Service Portal nationwide, respectively. A reason for the limited users is privacy concerns, as stated by one-third of users.

These findings underlined the need for substantial improvements to make services more accessible, user-friendly, convenient and inclusive for all citizen users. A practical measure is to design a single-device approach to online public service portals, so users can access them from anywhere with smartphones. Addressing citizens’ privacy concerns is also important.

An Giang province makes great efforts in improving administrative reforms, serving as a magnet for investment and a catalyst for socio-economic advancement

Poverty, employment and economic growth - Greatest concerns of citizens

PAPI 2023 stated that the top three issues of greatest concern to citizens were poverty (22.39% of total respondents), employment (12.79%) and economic growth (9.2%). These results suggest widespread economic anxiety among citizens in the past year.

Madam Deirdre Ní Fhallúin, Irish Ambassador to Vietnam, said: “Poverty/hunger and employment remain key issues of concern for citizens under the latest PAPI 2023 survey. It is more important than ever that all members of society - especially ethnic minorities and rural communities - benefit from Vietnam’s rapid socioeconomic development, to ensure no one is left behind.”

Compared to 2022, concerns over jobs and employment saw the biggest rise (+2.7%), followed by income (+1.3%). Concerns about livelihoods continued a trend evident since 2017 as the most prominent cluster of citizen concerns demanded State attention.

This trend was further reflected by the highest percentage of PAPI respondents (26%) since 2011 reporting their household economic situation was worse than five years ago (except for the COVID-19 impacted year of 2021). Citizens applied the same pessimism to Vietnam’s overall economic situation, with 54.4% of respondents - nearly 12% less than in 2022 - appraising the national economy as “good.” A prominent economic concern was electricity grid pressures with respondents reporting an increase in power outages from 63.5% in 2022 to 70.1% in 2023, or an increase of nearly 7%. Provinces surrounding Hanoi and the Mekong Delta were particularly impacted.

Livelihood was also a prominent factor driving migration within Vietnam. In 2023, the proportion of citizens went to other localities in search of better jobs (21.8%), being the second biggest motivation to migrate in 2023 following reuniting with family (40.68%). The third most cited reason for migration is deteriorating environmental conditions, an important result given that Vietnam is one of the world’s most vulnerable countries to climate change. This concern was particularly prominent among respondents from the Mekong River Delta, a hotspot of migration, especially to Ho Chi Minh City. More than twice as many respondents from Mekong Delta provinces reported that their agricultural fields experienced salinization as compared to other localities.

According to the report, as Vietnam moves forward in its ambitious energy transition and efforts to mitigate the impacts of climate change on society, authorities, from central to local levels, need to pay increasing attention to citizen concerns related to the environment, climate change and access to affordable energy.

By Quynh Chi, Vietnam Business Forum