National great unity is a treasured tradition of our nation, symbolising the Vietnamese people’s willpower, faith, and strength, playing a decisive role in every victory of our revolutionary cause. Hence, our Party and President Ho Chi Minh have always placed considerable weight on tapping the national great unity bloc strength as an important, consistent strategy and major lesson of the Vietnamese revolution.

When he was alive, President Ho Chi Minh was always interested in the issue of ethnicity and the building of a great unity bloc among people from all walks of life and within the entire society. According to the President, the greatest strength of the Vietnamese revolution lies in the people, and uniting the people will enable us to possess the invincible strength. He added that “Nothing in the sky is more precious than the people. In the world, nothing is more powerful than the united force of the people”; “Unity, unity, great unity. Success, success, great success”. Inheriting and bringing into play national tradition, applying and creatively developing Marxism - Leninism and Ho Chi Minh’s thought on the issues of ethnicity and national great unity, since its inception, our Party has attached special importance to building and considering the national great unity bloc as the foundation for developing and making the people’s armed forces, particularly the Vietnam People’s Army (VPA) capable of playing a core role in the struggle for national independence and unification as well as for Fatherland construction and protection.

A gathering of the people of Saigon on 25 August 1945 (file photo)

In the past 95 years, under the Party’s leadership, with its role and glorious mission, the Vietnam Fatherland Front (VFF) has always well performed its function as the political base of the people’s administration and the representative for the people’s rights and legitimate benefits, rallying the people, building up the entire nation’s great unity, exercising democracy, arousing patriotism among all social strata, bringing into play the strength of national great unity, contributing to leading the Vietnamese revolution to countless victories. In the struggle for national independence (1930 - 1945), the VFF gathered people from all walks of life, promoting the tradition of national great unity, standing shoulder to shoulder with the people’s armed forces to rise up and successfully conduct the General Uprising to gain national independence and establish the Democratic Republic of Vietnam - the first people’s democratic state in Southeast Asia. In the two resistance wars against the French and the US, social strata, ethnic groups, religions, and patriotic and progressive intellectuals always remained united in providing shelter and enthusiastic support for the people’s armed forces, especially the VPA to create immense, invincible strength against the enemy, gloriously fulfilling the national liberation revolution, unifying the country.

In the cause of national renovation and development, the VFF, other political - social organisations, and mass organisations have continued to promote their core role in encouraging and gathering people from all walks of life, thereby creating an increasingly strong consensus within the entire society. At the same time, the VFF has renewed the content and methods of its operation, widely and deeply executing emulation movements and campaigns, keeping a close watch on situational developments at grass-roots level, diversifying forms of encouraging the people, taking the people’s benefits and legitimate benefits as the centrepiece of its activities, thus making contributions to fostering socio-economic development, increasing the country’s potential and synergy, handling complex issues on defence and security in each area. The VFF has effectively performed its role as the representative for the people’s rights and legitimate benefits, proactively taking part in supervision, social criticism, and the anti-corruption campaign, acting as the bridge between the Party, the State, and the people, uniting the Vietnamese people with the people around the world, creating a great source of strength for defence consolidation and national construction and protection.

However, some party committees, party organisations, cadres, and party members have yet to be sufficiently aware of the importance of the national great unity bloc strength; they have yet to arouse the people’s great potential in socio-economic development, defence consolidation, and Fatherland protection; some sectors and localities’ concretisation of the Party’s lines and the State’s laws and policies on this work has yet to be opportune; there have been several weaknesses in realising the motto “people know, people discuss, people do, people inspect, people supervise, people benefit”.

Currently, rapid, unpredictable global and regional changes, armed conflicts, local wars, and non-traditional security challenges are making far-reaching impacts on the development of many countries, including Vietnam. Domestically, in nearly 40 years of national renovation, we have obtained many historic achievements, but faced a lot of difficulties and challenges; hostile forces continue to step up their sabotage strategy against our Party, State, and VPA, undermining our national great unity bloc and military - civilian solidarity, negatively impacting on socio-economic development, defence - security consolidation, and Fatherland protection. To meet the increasingly high requirements of national defence and protection and achieve the goal of turning Vietnam into a high-income developed country by mid-21^st century, sectors, forces, the entire political system, and all people should bring into play the national great unity strength, via synchronous, drastic measures, with a focus on the following.

First of all, enhancing propagation and education work to raise awareness and a sense of responsibility among sectors, political system, and all people towards the importance of exploiting the national great unity strength in Fatherland construction and protection. Unity is a precious tradition of the Vietnamese people; in any circumstances or periods, Vietnamese citizens always demonstrate their patriotism and hatred towards foreign invaders as well as their benevolence, unity, compassion, and mutual support as their way of life. Thus, it is extremely necessary to focus on building, consolidating, and promoting the national great unity bloc, especially in defence consolidation and Fatherland protection as it is a major source of strength for leading our revolution to success and for the country’s rapid, sustainable development. To that end, all-level party committees and party organisations, particularly the VFF should closely cooperate with all-level military agencies to step up propagation and education work relating to the importance of gathering the people and promoting the national great unity strength to the country’s national renovation, construction, and protection, rendering all citizens fully aware of hostile forces’ plots and artifices of undermining our national great unity bloc and military - civilian solidarity. Doing so will help cement the faith of sectors, political system, cadres, party members, and all people in our Party and nation’s revolutionary cause as well as bring into play the tradition and strength of great national unity in Fatherland construction and protection.

Comrade Do Van Chien gives presents to households in difficulty in Dinh Cao commune, Phu Cu district, Hung Yen province (photo: mattran.org.vn)

To achieve effectiveness in this regard, all-level party committees and party organisations should renew and diversify forms of propagation and education in accordance with each organisation, office, unit, locality, and group of citizens. It is essential to bring into play mass media, types of culture, and arts in propagation work, and ensure the synchronicity between internal information and external information. The propagation of national great unity tradition should be closely combined with the dissemination of the Party’s lines and the State’s laws and policies, particularly on defence consolidation and Fatherland protection; priority should be given to disseminating Vietnam's achievements, image, and people. Moreover, it is vital to heighten a sense of responsibility among party committees, cadres, and party members and promote the role of religious dignitaries and persons with great prestige within ethnic minority groups in encouraging the people to take part in building and making all-people national defence, postures of all-people national defence and people’s security, and defensive zones increasingly strong for the sake of Fatherland protection in the new situation.

Second, maintaining the Party’s leadership role, encouraging the VFF’s core role, enhancing coordination between the VFF and the VPA in building and bringing into play the national great unity strength. The 13^th National Party Congress confirmed: the Party’s leadership is the flag that rallies the national great unity strength. The Party exercises its leadership via lines and resolutions based on which the State opportunely promulgates proper policies and laws to encourage all social strata and forces to bring into play their patriotism and dynamism in emulation movements, the building of the Party and political system, socio-economic development, and Fatherland protection. While maintaining its leadership over the political system, the Party is part of the system; hence, the Party cannot stand outside the system to exercise its leadership over the VFF, it must seek support and consensus from the people via democratic consultation to successfully perform all revolutionary missions. For that reason, all-level party committees and party organisations should strengthen their leadership over the building of unity as a firm foundation for fostering unity within the political system and consolidating the national great unity bloc, while regularly renewing and improving their leadership method in the new situation, maintaining the Party’s leadership role in building and promoting the national great unity strength. In the new era, it is necessary to cement the close-knit bond between the Party and the people, unceasingly strengthen the people’s faith in the Party’s leadership, and rely on the people to build the Party. It is essential to continue to complete the mechanism of “Party’s leadership, State’s management, and people’s mastery” in tandem with the motto “people know, people discuss, people do, people inspect, people supervise, people benefit”.

All-level VFFs should effectively collaborate with sectors and forces in uniting social strata and typical individuals, promoting the working class’ vanguard role, arousing great potential of peasants, intellectuals, and labourers, making them steadfast in the socialist goal and ideal. All-level VFFs should frequently cooperate with all-level military agencies and units in encouraging the people to effectively implement the Party’s lines and the State’s laws and policies on protecting the Fatherland and building the people’s armed forces and the VPA. Due attention should be paid to proactively taking part in people-to-people diplomacy, resolutely defending the country’s independence, sovereignty, and political - social stability, and building an increasingly prosperous, happy Vietnam. Besides, the VFF should maintain close coordination between its member organisations in carrying out supervision and social criticism, particularly over the issues of national strategy, independence, sovereignty, and territorial integrity, promoting the VPA’s role in combating wrong, hostile viewpoints and plots to undermine our military - civilian solidarity, and maintaining the Party’s leadership in the entire society.

Third, protecting and taking care of the people’s legitimate benefits, with a view to serving the people, improving the people’s life, and creating immense strength in Fatherland construction and protection. In the process of leadership over the revolution, our Party’s benefits are the same to those of the people; the people are the centre and subject in all Party lines; all efforts made by the Party, State, and entire political system have real meaning only when the people have a wealthy, happy life. This is a matter of central importance to bringing into play the people’s great potential for our revolutionary cause. Therefore, the VFF and its member organisations should closely work with sectors, localities, and the armed forces to design programs and plans on raising the people’s living standards, particularly in the areas mainly inhabited by ethnic minorities or religious people, the isolated, remote, border, sea, island areas, and the revolutionary base areas. They should opportunely recommend local party committees and authorities to mobilise social resources for helping people in difficulty, the vulnerable, families under preferential policy, and persons with meritorious services to the revolution, with a view to “leaving no one behind”. They should actively collect public opinions, act as a reliable crutch for the people, and cooperate with local party committees and authorities and the armed forces in dealing with the people’s problems. Consideration should be given to encouraging the people to participate in well performing local military - defence tasks, while the people’s great potential and resources should be exploited to consolidate national defence and firmly protect the Fatherland in any circumstances.

Fourth, renewing the content and methods of operation of the VFF in a “practical, effective” manner to contribute to building and protecting the Fatherland in the new situation. Under the motto “when the people are in difficulty, the Front is ready to provide support”, all-level VFFs should promote their role in executing campaigns and the Patriotic Emulation Movement in an effective, practical way. Due regard should be paid to building a firm “posture of people’s hearts and minds” and robust all-people national defence, arousing and promoting patriotism and national pride, cementing the people’s faith in the Party, State, and VPA, creating a consensus across the entire VPA about national defence consolidation and Fatherland protection in the new situation.

When encouraging and rallying the people, all-level VFFs should diversify their methods and forms, becoming a forum of the masses where social strata, ethnic groups, religions, and Vietnamese people abroad could share information, express their opinions and aspirations, and recommend solutions to our Party and State to bring into play resources for successfully fulfilling the task of protecting the Fatherland “early and from afar”. Great value should be attached to gathering top scientists and experts, typical individuals from social strata, ethnic groups, religions, and overseas Vietnamese communities, promoting their responsibility for the cause of Fatherland construction and protection. Emphasis should be placed on building a contingent of VFF cadres with great enthusiasm, responsibility, and dedication for serving the people and striving for the people’s well-being and freedom; cadres of all-level VFFs must “respect people, stay close to the people, understand the people, and heighten a sense of responsibility for the people”, acting as shining examples for the people to rely on.

Under the sound leadership of the Party, with efforts made by all-level VFFs, patriotic tradition, national pride, and the spirit of compassion, we believe that our national great unity bloc will forever endure and develop to create a huge source of strength for the country’s development, demonstrate the people’s willpower, faith, and power for Fatherland protection, usher our country into a new era - the era of the nation’s rise.

DO VAN CHIEN

Member of the Politburo

Secretary of the Party Central Committee

President of the VFF Central Committee