Trieu Tai Vinh, then-Party Secretary of Ha Giang Province in northern Vietnam

The Party Central Committee’s Inspection Commission released their conclusions on Monday after its meeting, held in the capital city of Hanoi from December 4 to 6.

The commission found that the 51-year-old Vinh must be held accountable for the violations and shortcomings in his leadership, inspection, oversight and management of violations in the examination, as he was the leader of the province’s Party standing board.

He is currently a member of the Party Central Committee and a deputy head of the Central Economic Commission.

Meanwhile, the province’s chairman and deputy Party chief, Nguyen Van Son, must also bear responsibility as the head of the local government.

Family members of both Vinh and Son had used their connections to alter the scores of some candidates, including Vinh’s daughter, according to the chief regulator.

Therefore, the duo failed to set a good example as public officials and Party members, especially among key cadres.

Taking into account the context, nature, extent and consequences of their violations, the commission decided to reprimand the provincial chairman Son and urged the Politburo to take disciplinary action against Vinh.

His daughter, Trieu Ngoc M., had scored 6 in Mathematics, 7.5 in Literature and 8 in English rather than the respective scores of 9.4, 7.5 and 10 listed in the first score announcement, according to Tuoi Tre newspaper.

In October this year, Vinh’s younger sister, Trieu Thi Giang, deputy head of the external economic relations division at the Ha Giang Department of Planning and Investment, was reprimanded by the provincial Party Inspection Committee for manipulating others to raise the scores of her niece.

His wife, Pham Thi Ha, deputy director of the provincial Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, was warned by the local inspection committee to thoroughly review and learn from her experience, for letting her sister-in-law meddle in the organization of the examination.

The exam scam, which took place in the northern upland provinces of Ha Giang, Hoa Binh and Son La, has already seen numerous officials arrested or disciplined for their involvement.

In October, four former senior educators and one ex-police officer in Ha Giang were imprisoned, with one- to eight-year sentences, for abusing their power for personal gain.

Nguyen Thanh Hoai, former head of the Testing and Quality Assurance Division, under the Ha Giang Department of Education and Training, received the longest jail term of eight years. Meanwhile, his deputy, Vu Trong Luong, was sentenced to seven years behind bars.

Investigations revealed that Luong had intervened in the results of 309 test sheets belonging to 107 students, to increase their scores. Some students ended up with results more than 20 points higher than they had earned.

The 2018 national high school examination was taken by 5,400 candidates in Ha Giang, with three of them ranking among the top 11 test-takers nationwide. For the physics test, 65 students scored nine or higher, accounting for 67% of the country’s total. The abnormal results triggered social uproar, according to the Vietnam News Agency. SGT

Thanh Thom

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