USAID pledges to help Vietnam in civil judgment enforcement

David Anderson, director of the USAID’s state administration project, said at a workshop in Hanoi on June 4 that the agency has cooperated with the Ministry of Justice and other ministries, agencies and businesses of Vietnam to complete a legal framework for business activities.

Such efforts paid off, he said, citing the World Bank’s Doing Business report which showed Vietnam jumped 14 places in the business environment rankings in 2017 compared with the previous year. 

However, there remains much work to do to raise the efficiency of the settlement of contract disputes, including civil judgment enforcement, the official noted. 

Other delegates at the workshop pointed out bottlenecks in regulations and administrative procedures in civil judgment enforcement. 

Le Thi Kim Dung from the General Department of Civil Judgment Enforcement under the Justice Ministry mentioned sluggish settlement of complaints and prolonged enforcement due to inadequate legal documents. 

Given this, she suggested issuing more legal documents to enable executors and judgment enforcement agencies to participate in or access information about the judgment process, making enforcement work easier. 

Lawyer Nguyen Hung Quang underlined the need to clearly stipulate administrative procedures in civil judgment enforcement to save time and money. 

He said performing administrative procedures online will improve efficiency and be welcomed by citizens and businesses. 

Many experts at the workshop proposed clarifying the responsibility of agencies and organisations to coordinate in implementing the requests of civil judgment agencies, revising relevant legal regulations and popularising laws. 

According to Nguyen Van Son, deputy head of the General Department of Civil Judgment Enforcement, between October 2017 and March 2018, some 635,198 civil cases were brought to court, an increase of 8.82 percent year-on-year.