Vietnam elects assembly members

By BEN STOCKING, AP
Sun May 20

HANOI, Vietnam - Voters went to the polls Sunday to elect new members
to
Vietnam's National Assembly ‹ a body with a growing influence over
government policy ‹ in a Communist Party-controlled election.

Once considered a rubber-stamp for the executive branch, the 500-member
National Assembly has started to assert itself more in recent years.
Its
members have begun aggressively questioning government ministers, and
they
carefully review drafts of laws submitted by government agencies.

The assembly has made a priority of cracking down on corruption, which
is
widespread in Vietnam.

Eighty-three percent of the candidates are party members and all the
nonparty candidates have been screened by the Fatherland Front, a
powerful
party umbrella organization.

Although 30 self-nominated candidates are running, no other political
parties are allowed to participate.

"The National Assembly is increasingly exerting its influence over
government policy," said Jonathan Pincus, chief economist with the

United Nations Development Program in Hanoi. "But the election itself
is not
an important milestone in the process of political change."

Despite gains being made by the assembly, the center of power in
Vietnam
remains with the executive branch, which the Communist Party controls.

Hanoi voter Truong Van Truong, 60, said he hoped the new assembly would
take
tougher steps to curb corruption.

"Authorities have talked a lot about the fight against corruption,"
Truong
said, after casting his ballot. "We want to see deeds, not words."

Voters in each assembly district choose two to three candidates from
four to
five on their ballot. Voting is mandatory, so turnout is generally
high.

But family members often cast ballots on one another's behalf, so many
voters participate without going to the polls.

"I have never voted in my life," said Nguyen Hoang Yen, 36, of Hanoi.
"Usually my father goes to vote for the four people in my family."

While many ordinary citizens seem more focused on work and family than
politics, the government has been doing its best to get them
interested.

The streets of Hanoi have been adorned with red flags and banners
exhorting
voters to select candidates with "good morals and talent" and reminding
them
that voting is "the right and responsibility of each citizen."

During the past few weeks, people have been awakened by loudspeakers
blaring
patriotic songs and announcers reading candidate biographies.

This is Vietnam's 12th National Assembly election; members serve
five-year
terms.

Ninety percent of the current assembly seats are occupied by Communist
Party
members. Authorities have said they want nonparty members to occupy
more
than 10 percent of the new assembly.

Initially, 238 "self-nominated" candidates ‹ those not officially
endorsed
by the Communist Party ‹ sought to run.

But all candidates had to go through three rounds of screening by the
party's Fatherland Front. Only 30 of them made it through the screening
process.