Lack of professional staff, surplus in other positions
After operating a 2-level local government, Ca Mau is facing a paradox in arranging commune-level personnel: some places lack people but some places have surplus cadres and civil servants in some positions.
According to the Ca Mau Provincial Party Committee's Organization Committee, after reducing the number of commune-level administrative units from 164 to 64, the number of leadership and management positions has decreased significantly. Meanwhile, the existing contingent of cadres and civil servants still needs to be arranged and assigned appropriately. Resolving redundant personnel has become an issue raised in the process of operating the new apparatus.
Notably, the situation of surplus occurs in parallel with a shortage of human resources in professional positions. The Provincial Party Committee's Organization Board pointed out areas that still need to be supplemented such as land administration - construction, justice - civil status, information technology, finance - accounting. The shortage of professional human resources has caused some places to have to arrange concurrent positions or assign jobs that are not really suitable for the training expertise, affecting the quality of advice and the effectiveness of public service performance.
This problem is even clearer when placed next to the volume of work the commune level is undertaking. According to a report by the Ca Mau Provincial People's Committee, the total number of tasks of the local government is currently 2,981, of which the commune level performs 938 tasks. Compared to June 30, 2025, the tasks of the commune level increased by 808, from 130 to 938 tasks, an increase of more than 7 times.
Among the additional tasks, the commune level received 129 tasks, including 79 tasks from central ministries and branches and 50 tasks decentralized by the provincial level.
The workload has increased sharply, but human resources have not been supplemented accordingly. In 2026, Ca Mau was assigned 2,832 commune-level civil servant positions, but the actual number is 2,582 people, a shortage of 250 people.
Not just adding enough people, but the right people
Mr. Nguyen Minh Phung - Deputy Head of the Organization Committee of Ca Mau Provincial Party Committee - said that the current difficulty lies not only in the number of staff but also in the structure and quality of the team. After the merger, localities prioritize arranging existing cadres and civil servants, and at the same time resolve regimes for redundant cases. Therefore, new recruitment has not been implemented synchronously, although some specialized fields are still short of people.
The Department of Home Affairs of Ca Mau province said that from July 1, 2025 to now, Ca Mau has mobilized and assigned 198 officials, civil servants, and public employees to communes and wards, excluding health and education; and at the same time received 221 non-specialized commune-level personnel to become civil servants in 55 communes and wards.
The province is continuing to review the job positions and capacity of each official to have plans to retain, train, adjust, transfer, rotate or recruit appropriately.
The Provincial Party Committee's Organization Committee also proposed building a capacity framework according to each title, job position, and each type of area, instead of applying a common requirement. This is to accurately identify capacity gaps for training and fostering according to needs.
In fact, despite great labor pressure, administrative procedure resolution activities at the grassroots level are still maintained. The commune level has received 595,582 dossiers, of which 97.81% of dossiers were submitted online; the rate of early and on-time resolution reached 99.44%.
These figures show that the grassroots apparatus still maintains the pace of serving the people. However, when the commune level bears hundreds of more tasks, solving the human resource problem cannot only be calculated by quantity. The necessary thing is to put capable people with the right expertise in the right positions that are lacking, and at the same time handle reasonably the surplus cases after arrangement.
