Relieve a former top official in Ho Chi Minh City

Politburo strips Le Thanh Hai of 2010-15 title as Ho Chi Minh City Party secretary

Party General Secretary and State President Nguyen Phu Trong chaired a Politburo and Secretariat meeting in Hanoi on Friday, March 20.

Meeting attendees concluded that the Standing Board of the Ho Chi Minh City Party Committee in the 2010-15 tenure had compromised the principle of democratic centralism, lacked responsibility, relaxed leadership requirements, and allowed wrongdoings to go on in the development of the Thu Thiem New Urban Area.

The Secretariat thus decided to warn the Standing Board of the Ho Chi Minh City Party Committee in the 2010-15 tenure.

Disciplinary action for urban planning violations

Le Thanh Hai, 69, and several other former officials, including Le Hoang Quan, former deputy chief of the city’s party unit for the 2010-2015 term, committed several violations in planning the Thu Thiem Urban Area in HCMC’s District 2.

Hai, who served as Secretary of the HCMC Party Committee from 2005 to 2015, and former member of the Politburo, has to take main responsibility for the violations, the Party Central Inspection Committee, Vietnam’s top watchdog, announced at a Wednesday meeting.

Violations around compensation and resettlement in Thu Thiem have made headlines in the country since 2018.

The Thu Thiem New Urban Area is envisaged as one of the biggest international financial and commercial centers in Southeast Asia.

To develop the megaproject, HCMC spent 10 years relocating 15,000 households, paying out nearly VND30 trillion ($1.32 billion) in compensation.

However, the project has been caught up in a relocation scandal as more than 100 affected families said their houses were not included in the demolition list according to the original planning map drawn up in 1996 and approved by the prime minister.

According to the party inspectors, the Standing Committee of HCMC Party under the leadership of Hai had violated the principle of democratic centralism and working regulations, broken working regulations, and been irresponsible and negligent in leading, managing, inspecting and supervising, resulting in serious mistakes in the planning of Thu Thiem area.

The violations committed by Hai and the others had spoiled the Communist Party’s reputation, caused public distress and significant losses to the state, and negatively impacted on socio-economic development, including the lives of citizens in the planned area.

The violations, therefore, deserve disciplinary action, the inspectors said.

Therefore the Politburo stripped Hai of his title as the secretary of the Ho Chi Minh City Party Committee in the 2010-15 term.