The case involving violations at the second facilities of Bach Mai Hospital and Viet Duc Hospital, with the involvement of former Minister of Health Nguyen Thi Kim Tien, is exposing a painful reality in public investment in Vietnam.
It is the situation in which management officials compete to churn out “phantom projects” for illicit gain. According to informed sources, behind the trillion-dong mega-projects that have been “left to soak” year after year is an ecosystem of compromise and profiteering governed by “unwritten rules.”
According to denunciations from contractors in the case of the second facilities of Bach Mai and Viet Duc hospitals, the practice of hinting at kickbacks amounting to 5% of the value of advances and payments has become a kind of unwritten norm.
Observers say this is precisely the core driver pushing ministries, sectors, and localities to aggressively “pull strings” to obtain project approval at any cost—regardless of real demand or feasibility.
If a project’s total budget is 100 billion VND, the interest group may care only about the 5 billion VND “kickback” to pocket privately. As for the remaining 95 billion VND from the state budget—money that ultimately comes from taxpayers—even if it is wasted, lost, or turns into a pile of scrap metal after a few years, they do not care.
What’s more, when a project stalls, applying for additional funding opens up a new 5% “bonus.” This is why waste can sometimes devastate a nation even more terribly than corruption—because it destroys the effectiveness of society’s resources on a broad scale.
Public opinion is now questioning the role of the councils and agencies responsible for evaluating effectiveness and appraising investments. Why do these “pie-in-the-sky” projects so easily pass through the many layers of control in the state apparatus, only to become abandoned works?
If there is no strict mechanism to hold accountable those leaders who sign off on “drawing up projects” to collect commissions, then waste will remain a never-ending “national scourge.”
Hong Linh – Thoibao.de
