Ca Mau Province, which is situated in the southernmost part of the Homeland and surrounded by water on three sides with a long coast (254km2) and large sea (80,000km2), is a major fishing ground of the whole country. Especially, the Province has groups of islands such as Hon Khoai, Hon Chuoi, Hon Buong and Hon Da Bac, which are bordered with the international maritime routes, making suitable conditions for trading and boosting the socio-economic development of the province. However, beside the advantages, in the province and the Southwest waters, there have still existed many potentially factors of instability; types of crimes, especially drug-related crimes, smugglings and trade frauds, tend to increase; hostile forces have strengthened their devastating activities in all fields; climate change, environmental pollution, natural disasters and diseases have occurred complicatedly, seriously affecting people’s life and the Province’s military and defence work.
Closely following the functions and tasks, in recent years, the Provincial Military Party Committee and Command have proactively advised the Provincial Party Committee, People’s Council and People’s Committee to grasp and seriously implement documents by the Party, State, Defence Ministry and Military Region on military and defence work, building and activities of the defence zones; led and directed the armed forces to well carry out the local military and defence work; built comprehensively strong “exemplary and typical” offices and units being ready to receive and successfully accomplish all assigned tasks. From the reality, the Provincial armed forces have drawn some experiences and effective solutions as follow:
Well implementing the advising function has helped the Province decide their leading, directing and organising guidelines and solutions to military and defence tasks. Annually, the Provincial Military Party Committee and Command proactively issue documents on leading and directing the state management of defence in each level; issue the decisions to strengthen the organisation and working regulations for the Steering Committee on the defence zone exercises; decisions on assigning the targets of training, instructing and improving defence knowledge for all participants, etc., at the same time, coordinate with departments, agencies and unions to advise the Provincial Party Committee in their leadership, direction and guidelines for all levels to effectively implement the documents from the seniors on the military and defence tasks; bring into play the core role in advising, developing the socio-economy and consolidating the security and defence; strictly and legally build and manage the defence buildings and military areas. Together, they advise and direct all-levels functional offices to guide and examine each department, agency and locality in their grasping, leading and implementing this important task in their directly-belonged party committees. Hence, all departments, agencies, unions and localities have seriously grasped all documents; built programs, plans and implemented the military and defence tasks closely with their functions and tasks; projects supporting military and defence tasks have been invested, bringing about practical results; the working relationships and the mechanism of leadership, operation and command in executing this task has been concretised closely, unanimously and synchronously, proving the strength of the political system and the whole people.
The education and improvement of defence and security knowledge for all subjects and the whole people have been concerned and drastically directed by the Provincial Military Party Committee and Command, making many active changes. Accordingly, the military agencies at all levels have proactively proposed to the same-level people’s committees to regularly strengthen and improve the effectiveness of activities by the Council for defence and security education, and the solutions to promote the propaganda and dissemination of defence and security knowledge for the whole people with comprehensive contents, focuses and plentiful, creative and suitable forms. Beside sending Class -1 and 2 cadres to attend training classes held by the Ministry and the 9th Military Region; opening training classes for other subjects due to the Government’s rules and the Ministry’s circulars, all localities have coordinated with functional offices to open training classes for dignitaries, sub-dignitaries of religions, enterprise owners, boat owners, heads of fishing households, etc., in which, priorities are given to leading cadres, the ones doing important tasks, at seas or in islands, or cadres in planning sources of localities and units. At the same time, the localities have coordinated with the Provincial Radio-Television, Ca Mau Newspaper to create the columns of National Defence; Ca Mau Security, and For the sovereignty over border security with plentiful contents and forms. Districts and cities have created the propaganda column in the broadcasting system and the information portal to completely and comprehensively reflect the military and defence contents in the localities. The Councils of defence and security education in districts and cities have built special subjects on all-people defence and security education in the radios (04 times per month with 10 minutes each), propagandising the laws, ordinances, social lives, examples of good people and work who have been taking part in socio-economic development, doing the military and defence tasks, protecting security and order, preventing crimes, etc. Localities have integrated the propaganda and dissemination contents of defence and security into the activities of celebrating the traditional days of localities, units, Army and national holidays, Tet, etc., the Party’s and State’s political events, through which, to help the whole people be vigilant over sabotage plots of the hostile forces; strengthen the trust and responsibility in building the all-people national defence, firmly protecting the sovereignty, airspace, seas and islands to contribute to the stability of political security, social order and safety at grassroots level, making the premises for the fast and sustainable socio-economic development.
Building the potentials in the defence zones has been defined by the Province as the especially important and main point of the local military and defence work. In order to gain effectiveness in building the political-spiritual potentials, the Provincial Military Command has advised the local party committees and governments to strengthen and improve the quality and effectiveness of the political system at all levels, in which, to focus on building and consolidating the grassroots party organisations and governments; building the comprehensively strong armed forces and socio-political unions; promoted the implementation of socio-cultural goals; ensured the policies for the revolutionary contributors; prevented and remedied the consequences of natural disasters to strengthen the people’s trust in all-level party committees and governments, build the strong “people’s hearts and minds posture”. Regarding the socio-economic development, it needs to give priorities to develop the maritime economy connected with the protection of security, sovereignty over seas and islands; build the coastal areas into “open economic zones” towards the seas, gradually build these areas into the dynamic economic areas with highly developed industries, services and some other new industries; advise the Province to make projects on building the residential areas in the sea borders to deploy new forces in these localities; promote afforestation and the development of infrastructure such as transport networks, ports, etc. for the economic growth connected with building the battle bases, logistic bases and defence structures, at the same time, give financial support, organise fleets to help fishermen in their fishing and taking part in protecting the security and sovereignty of seas and islands. On building the military and security potentials, the Province has attentively proved the core roles of the armed forces; directed the consolidation of organisation and staff of the police and military units properly and suitably with their functions and tasks; enhanced the training, improved the general quality and combat readiness for the armed forces to be the main forces in timely and properly solving security-defence incidents and situations, avoiding the unexpected and “hot spots” in the localities to contribute to creating the favourable conditions for the Province to develop the socio-economy fast and sustainably, creating sources of materials, sciences and techniques to build stable defence zones in the strategic direction of the Military Region.
Building the strong armed forces is the solution deciding the effectiveness of the military and defence work in the localities. In order to gain achievements, the Provincial Military Command has focused on leading and directing the construction of the “elite, compact and strong” armed forces, in which, prioritised the construction of permanent forces and the forces doing mobile or combat-ready tasks which play as the core in coordinating with other forces to investigate and effectively solve all raising situations, maintain the political security, social order and safety; led the way in preventing and remedying the consequences of natural disasters, doing the search and rescue. The permanent forces, which have been strengthened according to the Ministry’s organisational chart, need to bring into play their key role in advising, coordinating, guiding and implementing the military and defence work. The reserved have been registered, managed, arranged and organised correctly in all localities, reaching 99.91% (over 15% of them are party members); closely managed and regularly checked and re-examined to be ready for any tasks. The militia accounting for 1.32% of the total population (26.68% of them are party members) have been acting effectively. Cadres of communal military commands have been trained to meet the demands for the defence and security tasks at grassroots level, which has been developed in both quality and quantity. In order to improve the combat readiness of the armed forces, the military organs at all levels have regularly trained and improved the ability and skills of training for grassroots-level cadres; trained correctly with enough contents and time, increased the practice training, handling weapons and equipment in the service; closely combined the combat training with search and rescue, etc. to be ready for successfully solve all situations of defence and security.
Together with the above solutions, the Provincial armed forces have thoroughly fulfilled the task of service selection and enlistment; coordinated with other forces to maintain the political security, social order and safety in the localities; well ensured the logistics for all tasks, especially the ones of combat readiness in the defence zones; effectively carried out the military policies and the ones for the military rear, etc. in order to successfully accomplish the local military and defence tasks, well respond to the requirements and tasks of building and protecting the Homeland in the new situation.
Senior Colonel NGUYEN VAN HUNG, Member of the Provincial Party Committee Standing Commission, Commander of the Provincial Military Command