The Ho Chi Minh City Real Estate Association (HoREA) has just issued a document reporting the implementation situation and proposing to remove difficulties and obstacles at the Nha Trang Vocational College BT Project (phase 1) in Phuoc Dong commune, Nha Trang city, Khanh Hoa province.
According to HoREA, the investment project to build a new Nha Trang Vocational College in the Bac Hon Ong planning area, Nha Trang City has been approved by the Prime Minister in the form of a construction - transfer contract (BT contract) and assigned the People's Committee of Khanh Hoa province to organize a bidding to select an investor in Official Dispatch No. 390/TTg-KTN dated March 15, 2011. After that, Vinaminco Khanh Hoa Joint Stock Company (Vinaminco) was selected as an investor under the designation form, based on Decree No. 108/2009/ND-CP. The project was signed by Khanh Hoa Provincial People's Committee under BT contract No. 08/2015/HD-BT on August 14, 2015 with a total contract value of more than 295 billion VND.
By 2018, Vinaminco had completed the construction of the new Nha Trang Vocational College on schedule, was handed over and qualified to be put into use according to Decision No. 1159/QD-UBND dated May 2, 2018 of Khanh Hoa Provincial People's Committee. At this time, the investor has fully fulfilled its responsibilities and obligations according to the BT contract signed.
However, more than 7 years have passed, and the People's Committee of Khanh Hoa province has not yet fulfilled its obligations under the BT contract on the capital recovery plan for investors. According to the plan determined in Decision No. 2861/QD-UBND and adjusted in Decision No. 403/QD-UBND dated February 12, 2015, the capital refund to investors is implemented from the source of land use rights transfer at 32 Tran Phu - the old campus of Nha Trang Vocational College. The delay is believed to stem from the "customer" reason.
As a result, Vinaminco and Sunshine Group have encountered many difficulties over the past 10 years due to focusing all their finances and human resources on completing on schedule according to the signed BT Contract and in addition to having to pay too large costs to complete the construction of Nha Trang Vocational College (phase 1) according to the signed BT Contract, the Group has also invested a lot of resources and human resources to try to promote the legal process in recent years.
In Document No. 5888/UBND-XDND dated May 15, 2025 sent to the Government Office, Khanh Hoa Provincial People's Committee determined that the current problem is the use of state agency headquarters to pay investors. Based on the opinion of the Ministry of Finance in Official Dispatch No. 4005/BTC-QLCS dated April 24, 2023, the use of old housing and land facilities to pay for the BT Project is not in accordance with the provisions of Decisions No. 09/2007/QD-TTg, 140/2008/QD-TTg and 86/2010/QD-TTg as well as the direction of the Prime Minister at the time of signing the contract. In addition, Decree No. 35/2021/ND-CP currently does not have regulations on transitional handling of BT contracts that have been signed but are not in accordance with regulations or instructions.
However, HoREA believes that the Ministry of Finance's opinion is not really satisfactory. Currently, there is sufficient legal basis for the People's Committee of Khanh Hoa province to submit to competent authorities to allow the implementation of payment obligations under the BT contract signed with Vinaminco, through the use of revenue from transferring land use rights of the land plot at 32 Tran Phu as a capital recovery plan for the project.
According to the amended PPP Law, Point a, Clause 2a, Article 45 stipulates that BT contracts can be paid with land funds managed by the State to implement counterpart projects, and Clause 4, Article 101 clearly states that BT contracts signed before January 1, 2021 continue to be implemented according to the provisions of the contract. Thus, the contract between Khanh Hoa province and Vinaminco is completely subject to continued implementation.
In addition, Resolution 170/2024/QH15 of the National Assembly also allows to remove difficulties for many projects in Ho Chi Minh City, Da Nang and Khanh Hoa, of which Khanh Hoa province has 11 projects being handled. However, the BT Project of Nha Trang Vocational College is not on this list, although it is similar. HoREA believes that if Khanh Hoa province had submitted a proposal before, this project could have been completely resolved within the framework of Resolution 170.
From the above reality, HoREA proposed expanding the scope of regulation of Resolution 170/2024/QH15, allowing similar application to projects of the same type in all provinces and centrally run cities. This is to resolve a series of projects out of a total of 1,533 projects that are stuck nationwide, including the Nha Trang Vocational College BT Project.
In addition, Decree 69/2019/ND-CP is still in effect, stipulating that payment for BT projects using public assets can only be made after receiving approval from a competent state agency. Therefore, the document sent by the Khanh Hoa Provincial People's Committee to the Government Office is the basis for the Government Steering Committee to consider and propose to allow payment in public assets for this BT Project.
HoREA recommends that the Steering Committee on resolving difficulties and problems of backlogged projects consider allowing the implementation of the capital recovery plan in accordance with the content of the BT contract signed between Vinaminco and the People's Committee of Khanh Hoa province, using revenue from land at 32 Tran Phu as a payment source.
At the same time, based on Clause 5, Article 3 of Decree 69/2019/ND-CP, the Association also proposes to allow payment of interest arising up to the time the competent state agency issues a decision to allocate land, lease land or hand over assets to investors, in order to minimize losses for enterprises that have seriously fulfilled their investment commitments under the BT contract.
