Deeply imbued with President Ho Chi Minh’s thought on the aspiration for innovation and creativity, the entire Party, people, and armed forces of Vietnam are currently mobilising all resources to carry out the most fundamental tasks to bring the country into a new era - the era of national rise.

Need for a firm belief and strong political stance

President Ho Chi Minh was the most proactive revolutionary leader, a true pioneer in the implementation of three fundamental forms of liberation: national liberation, social-class liberation, and human liberation. He believed that national independence, freedom, happiness for the people, and the progress of humanity, as he declared, were all he needed and all he desired; a commitment embodied in his words: “I devote my entire life to my people”, spoken to a Cuban Granma newspaper reporter just two months before his passing. At the beginning of 1946, he expressed his “burning desire, the ultimate desire, which was to see our country completely independent, our people fully free, and for everyone to have enough food, clothing, and access to education”. In his testament, he wrote his “last wish”: “Our entire Party and people unite and strive to build a peaceful, unified, independent, democratic, and prosperous Vietnam, and to make a worthy contribution to the world’s revolutionary cause”.

President Ho Chi Minh was a revolutionary who had full confidence in himself, because he had a strong political stance and intellectual capacity, eager to learn, and always innovative and creative. He always believed in the ultimate victory of the Vietnamese revolution, regardless of how difficult the circumstances might be. That belief was scientifically grounded in his deep understanding of Marxism-Leninism, which he creatively applied and developed in accordance with Vietnam’s specific conditions. He believed that socialism-communism was the society that all nations in the world, including Vietnam, would inevitably reach. He also had unwavering faith in the strength of the Vietnamese nation, a nation rich in patriotic and revolutionary tradition, always willing to follow the Party in the struggle for national independence, freedom, and happiness. Even in his final Testament, before departing this life, President Ho Chi Minh still had a strong belief in the victory of the Vietnamese revolution and the global revolutionary movement.

President Ho Chi Minh visited Thai Nguyen Steel Complex in 1964 (A file photo)

In the current period, our entire Party, people, and armed forces must demonstrate the faith, aspiration, and political determination that President Ho Chi Minh entrusted. Only by transforming that belief and aspiration into reality with a strong political will, can we achieve the goals set out by the 13th National Congress of the Party: by 2030, to become a developing country with modern industry and upper-middle income; and by 2045, to become a developed, high-income nation. President Ho Chi Minh once expressed his desire for the Vietnamese nation to ascend to the glorious stage of history and stand shoulder to shoulder with the major countries of the five continents. Will this wish be fulfilled in the coming decades? That aspiration and belief must be translated into revolutionary action across all levels, sectors, and fields. In 2025, in particular, we must resolutely strive for an economic growth rate of over 8%, aiming for double-digit growth in subsequent years. This requires a determination based on the unity in consensus, in unison, and in the will across the entire Party, people, and military; strengthening the great national unity bloc, with even greater emphasis on combining national strength with the strength of the era. All resources must be mobilised to fulfill the most fundamental tasks: economic development and ecological environmental protection as central missions; Party building and political system consolidation as key tasks, with “cadre work as the key of the key”; culture as the foundation of society; and national defence, security, and diplomacy as essential and regular duties. More attention must be placed on breakthrough solutions in development: breakthrough in institutional reform, resolving bottlenecks, with institutional bottlenecks seen as “the bottleneck of bottleneck”; building and developing human resources; and improving infrastructure systems. Without aspiration, without belief, there can be no innovation or creativity, and it will only be aspiration, it will only be an unrealistic belief leading to voluntaristic thinking and action. Therefore, words must go with actions. We must overcome the situation of saying much but doing little, speaking well but performing poorly, speaking but not doing, saying one thing but doing another - a topic that President Ho Chi Minh has long raised as “the qualities of a revolutionary” in his work The Revolutionary Path (1927): “What you say must be done”, and as he said to the intellectual and wealthy delegates of Thanh Hoa province on 20 February 1947: “Roll up your sleeves and get to work”. That determination in our country today must be a continuation of the determination that President Ho Chi Minh had shown in the national liberation revolution. That was when President Ho Chi Minh was seriously ill in late July 1945, he told Comrade Vo Nguyen Giap: “Now that the favourable opportunity has arrived, even if it means burning down the entire Truong Son range, we must resolutely fight for independence”. It was the iron determination to liberate the South and reunify the country: “As long as there is a single invader on our land, we must continue fighting to drive them away”. It was the spirit of: “Nothing is difficult/As long as we are steadfast/Digging mountains and filling seas/Determination will make it happen”. Today, in the nearly 40-year journey of renovation, we must remain steadfast in our resolve to lead the Vietnamese nation forward faster and more firmly, to soon escape the low-middle income trap, to overcome the risk of falling further and further behind other countries in the region and the world. The Vietnamese people will never accept to stand behind the development rankings among advanced nations, absolutely not, and we will certainly not miss the historic opportunities to cross the threshold of backwardness, especially in the face of the profound transformations brought by the Fourth Industrial Revolution, digital transformation, and artificial intelligence.

In the new era, in applying Ho Chi Minh’s ideology on the aspiration for innovation and creativity, a key solution is to reorganise the political system’s organisational structure.

On 25 October 2017, the 6th Plenary Session (12th tenure) issued Resolution No. 18-NQ/TW on “Issues on continuing renovation and streamlining of the political system’s organisational structure to ensure its effectiveness and efficiency”. Since then, implementation efforts have been underway. However, there remains a noticeable gap between what has been done and what is required, indicating that this remains a pressing issue. In discussing renovation of the Party’s leadership methods, one approach that has been highlighted is leading through the issuance of resolutions. That is correct, but not sufficient. It now needs to be added another essential component: “leading the successful implementation of resolutions” into a more complete content: “The Party leads by issuing resolutions and leading the successful implementation of resolutions”.

General Secretary of the Party To Lam and high ranking leaders of the Party and the State performed ribbon-cutting ceremony to inaugurate the Statute "Uncle Ho visiting hometown"

We must begin with a mindset of proactivity and positivity, which is opposed to passivity, negativity, group interests, and individualism. Reorganising the political system’s organisational structure inevitably leads to streamlining the apparatus, reducing the number of staff, and reducing the number of leadership “seats”. This directly affects the interests of each individual and unit. Positions and power may be diminished or lost, resulting in a reduction of group and individual benefits, most notably, material interests. It is unrealistic to expect that individuals would adopt a proactive and positive attitude from the beginning. Enlightenment is a process. At first, there is no self-awareness, then gradually, people become more aware of their responsibilities, rights and obligations towards the political and social organisation. That enlightenment, as President Ho Chi Minh pointed out, is to put the interests of the Party, the Fatherland, the revolution and the people first. It is the process of transformation from being unself-conscious, not proactive, and inactive to being self-conscious, proactive, and active. This reflects the restrain of individualism, which President Ho Chi Minh considered a very toxic virus that causes people to degenerate and become corrupt.

The current requirements for reorganising the political system’s organisational structure is to proceed at a fast and urgent pace, while ensuring effectiveness and efficiency, meeting the criteria of elite - compact - strong organisational structure. The ultimate goals that our Party has clearly defined include:  (1). Streamlining the organisational structure so that the system may soar higher, advance further, and grow stronger. (2). Enhancing the overall performance and operational effectiveness of the entire political system. (3). Ensuring that all components of the political system have clearly defined functions, with no overlap or redundancy. Urgent, high speed, but must be cautious, reasonable, and guard against “haste makes waste”. In reality, more than seven years have passed since the implementation of Resolution No. 18-NQ/TW, it cannot be delayed any longer, so we must “run and queue at the same time”, should not hesitate when many issues are “ripe”, including the merger of provincial-level administrative units, disorganisation of district-level organisations, and merger of commune-level organisations. After a period of time, there must be periodic reviews and assessments to draw lessons, what is effective and reasonable should be maintained and promoted; what is unsuitable must be continued to supplement and adjust. In practice, each country has its own model of organisational structure and a staffing level suited to its specific conditions. We must neither allow nor accept a cumbersome apparatus with an excessive proportion of public servants. Speaking of the new era, the era of a nation rising, we must strive to make our country a strong and prosperous one, standing shoulder to shoulder with the powers of the five continents in the world, just as the wish of our beloved President Ho Chi Minh and the burning aspiration of the Vietnamese people. Achieving rapid and sustainable development - that is the command of life and also the urgent requirement in applying and creatively developing Ho Chi Minh’s ideology on innovation and creativity.

Creatively applying and developing Ho Chi Minh’s ideology on Party building to ensure the success of innovation and creativity in the new era

The correct leadership of the Party is the foremost factor determining every victory of the Vietnamese revolution. This has been consistently proven both in theory and in practice over the 90 years since the Party was founded and developed. As the founder and leader of the Party, President Ho Chi Minh always placed special emphasis on Party building, so that our Party could live up to the trust of the people and lead the entire nation toward socialist development. Ho Chi Minh’s ideology, crystallised from all of his viewpoints on Party building, is an invaluable asset of the Vietnamese revolution and has always been the flag guiding our Party in the new era as the ideological foundation and compass for the actions of the Vietnamese revolution, together with Marxism-Leninism.

To ensure the success of innovation and creativity in the new era, the Party must correctly and accurately set out the national development strategy and lead the entire Party, the people and the army to successfully implement that strategy. This imperative will surely be reflected in the documents of the upcoming 14th National Party Congress - a congress that will mark the beginning of a new era, the era of national development; a congress that will demonstrate the Party’s high sense of responsibility, firm political stance, political determination with a sharp intelligence, and deeply attach to the people, the one that will lead the country in creating breakthroughs, achieving remarkable victories on the path toward the goal of a prosperous people, a strong, democratic, fairness, and civilised nation.

To achieve that goal, the Party must remain clean and strong. Historical experience shows that throughout the revolutionary process, the Party has always encountered obstacles and challenges, even obstacles that come from inside of the Party (such as “self-evolution” and “self-transformation”), but thanks to its tradition of unity to overcome difficulties, its steadfastness and intellect, and the unwavering support of the people and the armed forces, the Party has always successfully fulfilled its mission. Therefore, the Party’s purity and strength are the essential conditions for creatively applying and developing Ho Chi Minh’s ideology and transforming his aspiration for innovation and creativity into reality. With all of the above, in accordance with Ho Chi Minh’s thought, if we want to turn the aspiration for development in innovation and creativity into reality to achieve the goal of national development set by the Party, we must start from the Party itself. The aspiration for innovation and creativity in the new era of the nation must be transformed into the action of all Party organisations, cadres, Party members, of the entire people and army.

President Ho Chi Minh is a man of the times. He always goes ahead, goes with the times, and with important events of the country and the world, in other words, he never stays behind. More than ever, as we enter a new era of national development, we can sense that our country’s opportunity has arrived: with the right time, favourable conditions, and the harmony of the people, we are equipped with the momentum, the positioning, and the strength to grow faster and more sustainably than ever before. Isn’t this the very message conveyed by the life and legacy of President Ho Chi Minh, whose 135th birth anniversary (19 May 1890 - 19 May 2025) is being solemnly commemorated by the entire Party, people, and armed forces of Vietnam?

Prof., Dr. MACH QUANG THANG