Tu Son is an area enriched in revolutionary traditions, a land with a long history of civilisation, a place of Ly dynasty and many revolutionary leaders of the Communist Party of Viet Nam such as General Secretary Nguyen Van Cu, Revolutionist Ngo Gia Tu, National Assembly Chairman Le Quang Dao, etc. These are important premises for Tu Son city to gain stable development and set the target of building the city towards civilisation, modernisation and regional identities, striving to be a class-2 urban area when Bac Ninh becomes one of the municipalities in 2025.

Enlisting ceremony held by Tu Son city

To make this target come true, together with enhancing the socio-economic development, Tu Son has paid attention to well doing the local military and defence tasks, of which, annual selecting and calling citizens for the military service (military recruitment) are key factors. With the spirit of “being attentive, synchronous, drastic, and bringing into play the general power of the whole political system”, the military recruitment has regularly received much leadership and direction from the party committees, governments, agencies and unions with many practical and effective solutions. As a result, the City has frequently completed 100% of the targets of military recruitment with high quality, which has been highly appreciated by the receiving units and  Military Region 1. Especially, in 2022, the City was awarded a Certificate of Merit by the Military Region for the excellent achievement in military recruitment. From the past military recruitment, the City has drawn some experience as follows:

First, appreciating the leadership and direction by the party committees and governments, attaching the responsibility of leaders of local offices, organisations, party committees and governments to the military recruitment. Presently, the “all-round” military recruitment requires a great responsibility of the whole local political system, especially the roles of all-level party committees, governments, military agencies and councils. On clearly understanding this, the City has seriously grasped and implemented the Law on Military Service, the directions and instructions by the Military Region 1, Provincial People’s Committee and Provincial Council of Military Service on military recruitment. Annually, the City Party Committee issues the leading resolutions, the City People’s Committee builds documents on guiding the military recruitment and detailed plans, at the same time, attentively strengthens and effectively brings into play the activities of all-level councils of military service, councils of recruitment; checks and completes the regulations of acting and coordinating among functional offices in the military recruitment, etc., assuring the seriousness, unity, and effectiveness. In the implementation, the City has brought into play the key role of the Military Command – The Standing Unit of the City Military Service Council in its advising, guiding, directing and organising; the role of the Fatherland Front, departments, agencies, unions, especially the people’s supervision of the military recruitment; regularly directed wards to intensely disseminate and grasp the military recruitment contents to each party cell and branch, street, and unitedly implement under the principle of the Party leading, the governments managing, the military service councils advising and the military agencies being as the centres of coordination; taking the results of military recruitment as one of the criteria to assess the accomplishment of political tasks of wards, streets and all-level leading cadres.

Chairman of Tu Son's People Committee encourages new recruits

As Tu Son is a young city which has fast urbanisation, a dense population, busy trading and services, and many traditional craft villages, the side effects of the market economy have seriously affected a large part of young people at the age of military service, making them fearful of difficulties and hardship. Besides, in recent years, hostile and reactionary forces have taken advantage of several violations of military discipline to distort the work of military recruitment, creating a psychological effect of “families not encouraging their offspring to join the army”, etc., which makes difficulties for the military recruitment. In that reality, the City has actively reformed and improved the quality of propaganda and education to raise the awareness and responsibility for the whole people, especially, for all-level party committees, governments and military service councils of this work. To make this happen, the City has mobilised the engagement of the whole political system, brought into play the roles of agencies, unions and socio-political organisations to join the dissemination, propaganda and education with various forms in both off-peak and peak time of the “military recruitment season”. The propaganda contents have been mainly about the Law on Military Service; citizens’ rights and duties on the task of safeguarding the Fatherland; revolutionary traditions of Tu Son, etc. To gain good results, the City has paid attention to bringing into play the roles of the mass media and social networks combined with propagandising the military recruitment in activities of the party cells, socio-political organisations and the mass unions. Noticeably, the City has recently organised many seminars and exchanges between veterans and new enlistees with the topic of “Continuing the traditions of the homeland”, talks of “Forever shining the qualities of “Uncle Ho’s Soldiers”, “The youth with the cause of building and safeguarding the Fatherland” between the youth and the historical witnesses, veterans, local leaders, etc. Through these activities, young people at the age of military service and enlistees have been shared by ex-servicemen and veterans with revolutionary traditions, combat morale, Military’s discipline and manners, information regarding the regulations and policies on themselves and their families when they are on and after their military service. Together, the City has resolutely directed to seriously punish any cases of avoiding the military service or violating the Law on Military Service under the view of “no exception”. With such general solutions, the awareness and responsibility of the party committees, governments and the people of the task of military recruitment, especially of families having young people at the age of military service have been significantly changed. Each family and citizen have well understood that doing military service is an honour, pride and great responsibility; hence, they feel self-aware and dedicated to joining the military. In 2023, the City had 171 citizens who were voluntary to join the military (accounting for 77.7% of the recruitment target); 53 of them had tertiary level, 48 of them were trained with knowledge of the Party.

Together with well doing the propaganda and education, the City has directed all wards to strictly register and manage the sources of young people at the age of military service. In recent years, the rate of citizens being students at universities and colleges who are exempted from military service has been much increasing. Meanwhile, the movement of registration of military service between universities and localities has not been strictly done. In addition, the registration of temporary residence and absence which has been done online through the public service portal has presently not synchronous with the movement of military service registration, etc., leading to the fact that parts of citizens who are to do the military service do not belong to the military recruitment source managed by the localities and functional agencies. This has created a “hole” for some citizens to “bend the rules” and not to do military service. To solve this problem, the councils of military recruitment at all levels have attentively advised the party committees and governments to bring into play the roles and responsibilities of the Military, Public security, Justice and Health agencies in the 1^st registration of military service and the supplementary registration for people graduating from universities and colleges and returning to their residential places in order to strictly manage the source of citizens being ready for military service. The City has regularly re-examined the stages and steps of the military recruitment to timely discover and solve any arising problems, creating justice in implementing the duty of safeguarding the Fatherland, at the same time, publicly announced the lists of enlistment, citizens being delayed or exempted from the military service for the people’s supervision, and assigned the wards, streets and members of the military service councils to well manage the military recruitment sources.

Being “slow but sure” in recruitment, the City has directed all wards to strictly follow steps of the military recruitment process, pay attention to improving the quality of preselection and medical check, assuring the objectivity, democracy and proper procedure. Together with carefully considering and evaluating the standards of politics, morality, knowledge, etc., the City Military Service Council has attentively directed and guided the wards to strengthen the health check councils and establish the ward-level health check teams and the City supervision team to direct and supervise the initial health checks; organised the retraining on specific knowledge, instructions on health check procedure, specific health requirements for each type of military units; requested the Provincial General Hospital to increase doctors and modern medical facilities to localities for further health checks, making sure the objective and accurate health evaluation and classification. In the implementation, the City Military Service Council has assigned supervisors to make strict inspection; established specialised teams to make detailed conclusions, check and assess any suspicions, etc. in order to prevent any behaviours leading to wrong health results, and not allow any citizens who do not have right health conditions to join the military, which affects the  recruitment work of the City. After the health check, the City has strictly managed the numbers of enlistees to reduce any intentional violations of the health standards; coordinated with the receiving units to check the records and finalise the troop numbers and hand over closely, quickly and in accordance with the regulations.

With the motto of being “stable from the rear, steady in the front”, the City has effectively led and directed the policies regarding welfare of military families and the social policies towards families having in-service people to create the motivation and encourage the youth to delicately, voluntarily join the military, and feel secure to do their duties. Together, the City has proactively coordinated with agencies and enterprises within the city to promise to employ the citizens after their finishing military service; give priorities over selecting, training and creating sources of cadres for localities and at grassroots levels.

The above results and experience are important foundations for Tu Son city to continue to select and call citizens for the military service in  time to come, actively contributing to the cause of building the Military, strengthening the national defence and safeguarding the Fatherland in the new situation.

HOANG BA HUY, Chairman of the City People’s Committee