HANOI, Vietnam
Vietnam’s rubber-stamp parliament voted in public security minister, To Lam, as the country’s new president on Wednesday, after a major anti-corruption campaign forced his predecessor to resign.
In a secret ballot, 472 of 473
National Assembly deputies voted to approve the nomination, according to state
television.
Thousands of people —
including several senior government and business leaders — have been caught up
in the Southeast Asian country’s “blazing furnace” crackdown on graft, led by
Communist Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong.
Lam takes over from Vo Van
Thuong, who resigned in March over what the party called “violations and
shortcomings”.
That came just a year after
Thuong began his presidency, declaring he was “determined in the fight against
corruption and negative phenomena”.
Lam, 66, has been public
security minister since 2016 and has taken a hard line on human rights
movements in the communist country.
It had appeared he was set to
hold the presidency and his position at the Ministry of Public Security
concurrently, which would have been a first for Vietnam.
But hours before the secret
ballot, parliamentarians agreed they would dismiss him from the powerful role.
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