Picturing HCMC's Future
Can leaders overcome the spending problem?
Good afternoon! Hello to all new readers, and welcome to the Vietnam Weekly, written by reporter Mike Tatarski. Today’s edition is the latest in a series of deep dives on Ho Chi Minh City, with a focus on the much-hyped Resolution 98 and how city leaders envision the future.
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On to the news.
On August 1, Resolution 98 came into force for Ho Chi Minh City.
It covers issues including “investment management, finance, budget, urban management, natural resources and environment, priority industries to attract strategic investors, science-technology management, [and] innovation…”
There are also provisions for Thủ Đức City, which has thus far been a fairly disastrous experiment in urban administration.
The National Assembly-approved legislation replaces Resolution 54, which was introduced in 2017 to give HCMC more financial and decision-making autonomy from the central government.
That resolution failed. While the pandemic hammered the city particularly hard, it’s abundantly clear that Vietnam’s economic engine is struggling (as covered here numerous times in the past): infrastructure development is abysmal, the housing market is entirely focused on high-end projects, climate risks are increasing, and general urban management is poor.
Resolution 98, meanwhile, has been pitched as a solution to many of these issues, particularly when it comes to infrastructure investment.
Last month, Secretary of the HCMC Party Committee Nguyễn Văn Nên compared the legislation to a ship, saying “Now all the work is ready, the ship is fully loaded and ready to speed up.”
A meeting of the municipal People’s Council, meanwhile passed several specific mechanisms related to Resolution 98 that, among other things, increased the salary of many city workers and settled on the build-operate-transfer (BOT) model for five key traffic projects.
So with Resolution 98 acting as, um, the wind in HCMC’s sails (to continue this odd metaphor), what do officials have in mind for the city’s future?