Public investment, land law, food safety highlighted at People's Council meeting

In her opening speech, Chairwoman of the HCMC People’s Council Nguyen Thi Le emphasized the need to expedite the disbursement of public investment, which has been identified as a major factor hindering project progress. She urged members of the HCMC People’s Council to carefully discuss and contribute constructive ideas in order to ensure the adoption of effective resolutions that align with the city's realities.

Vice Chairman Duong Ngoc Hai of the HCMC People’s Committee then reported the socio-economic status of the city until now, with several impressive achievements in accelerating key projects compared to this time last year.

However, due to problems in land clearance and resettlement plans, it is still impossible to speed up public investment disbursement for many traffic projects, leading to negatives in attracting foreign investments (a drop of 19.5 percent), as stated by Deputy Head Nguyen Van Dat of the Legal Affairs Committee (under the HCMC People’s Council).

Concurring with this view, Deputy Secretary Le Thi Ngoc Thanh of the Party Committee of the HCMC Department of Transport Party Committee suggested identifying specific projects facing public investment capital disbursement issues and determining the root causes, along with pinpointing the responsibilities of relevant agencies, units, and individuals.

Director of the HCMC Planning and Investment Department Le Thi Huynh Mai informed that her organization is working with project investors for specific solutions, including forming special task forces for addressing arisen problems, to boost the progress of slow projects.

With several new legal regulations scheduled to take effect by the end of the year, HCMC People’s Council deputy Tang Huu Phong, Deputy Head of the HCMC Party Committee's Propaganda and Education Board, proposed intensifying communication efforts to garner high public consensus and ensure the swift implementation of these laws.

Particularly, Chief Inspector of HCMC Tran Van Bay raised his concern over which land price rates should be applied from August 1, 2024 to January 1, 2026, when the official land price rates of the 2024 Land Law come into effect. Only by making clear of this content can land-related papers of individuals and businesses be processed successfully during this transition time, leading to better fulfillment of land clearance tasks.

In response, Director of the HCMC Department of Natural Resources and Environment Nguyen Toan Thang explained that the early effective date of the 2024 Land Law has prompted not only HCMC but also other provinces and cities nationwide to adjust their implementation plans for more effective law adoption. Therefore, his department is working with relevant government agencies to urgently develop and introduce a suitable land price list for this special time by August 1.

Vice Chairman Duong Ngoc Hai then stressed that until the end of this year, the HCMC People’s Committee is going to accelerate key projects, striving to achieve an overall capital disbursement rate of over 95 percent of the set goal.

In addition, HCMC plans to focus on removing obstacles and carrying out mechanisms and policies in line with Resolution 98/2023/QH15 of the National Assembly. Simultaneously, the city will organize the development of guiding documents for the implementation of the 2024 Land Law for the effective management and use of resources, especially land ones.

On the first day of the 17^th session, the HCMC People’s Council passed a resolution to dismiss from office two members of the HCMC People's Committee for the 2021-2026 tenure, namely Dang Minh Dat (former Chief Inspector of HCMC) and Le Duy Minh (former Director of the HCMC Department of Finance), while assigning Tran Van Bay and Nguyen Hoang Hai to fill in the two above positions, respectively.

Nguyen Thi Nga was elected to the position of Deputy Head of the Culture and Social Affairs Committee and Pham Thi Thanh Huong to the position of Deputy Head of the Urban Committee (both under the HCMC People's Council).

Remarkably, this session marked the first time the HCMC People's Council has utilized artificial intelligence (AI) to review draft resolutions. The software supporting the operations of the HCMC People's Council is currently in its first phase of implementation within the project to build a virtual assistant to serve HCMC officials and leaders, which is being implemented by the HCMC Department of Information and Communications in collaboration with other agencies.