Currently, the Ministry of Home Affairs is drafting a Decree guiding the collection of public opinions on the establishment, dissolution, merger, division, adjustment of boundaries and renaming of administrative units to replace Decree No. 54/2018/ND-CP and Decree No. 66/2023/ND-CP.
Director of the Department of Local Government, Ministry of Home Affairs Phan Trung Tuan said that the draft decree does not have an appendix attaching the list of arrangement and merger from 34 provinces and cities down to 16 provinces and cities as are being spread on social networking sites.
"The development of this decree is to implement the provisions of the Law on Organization of Local Government No. 72/2025/QH15 and Decision No. 1589/QD-TTg of the Prime Minister promulgating the Plan to implement the Law on Organization of Local Government No. 72/2025/QH15" - Mr. Tuan emphasized.
Mr. Tuan informed that this law has had fundamental changes such as stipulating that our country's administrative units are organized into 2 levels, including: Provinces, centrally run cities (provincial level); communes, wards, special zones under provincial level (commune level).
Accordingly, in the administrative unit system, there are no more district-level administrative units, and at the same time, new regulations for the type of "special area" (commune level).
However, Decree No. 54/2018/ND-CP and Decree No. 66/2023/ND-CP mentioned above are being designed to guide the collection of voters' opinions on the establishment, dissolvement, merger, division, and adjustment of administrative unit boundaries according to the 3-level model (provincial - district - commune level).
He said that it is necessary to issue a new decree of the Government with specific instructions for implementation. The development and submission to the Government for promulgation of this decree aims to guide the collection of voters' opinions on common cases of establishment, dissolvement, merger, division, and adjustment of administrative unit boundaries.
Mr. Phan Trung Tuan gave an example of establishing a ward on the basis of a commune (rural) when the commune meets the standards and conditions to be upgraded to a ward (urban).
Adjusting administrative boundaries in cases where it is really necessary due to fluctuations in geological and terrain impacts or due to impacts from socio-economic development needs to be adjusted to suit management practices, not for the purpose of arranging and merging administrative units at all levels as false information has recently spread on social networks.
