Sulin, "Historic Election"

Ask AI · How will Su Lin holding two positions affect Vietnam’s political landscape?

On April 7, 2026, the first session of the 16th National Assembly of Vietnam entered its second day. Around 9 a.m. local time, with all 495 deputies voting in favor, General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) Su Lin was elected as President of Vietnam, serving until 2031.

Su Lin immediately took the oath of office and delivered his inaugural speech. He emphasized that his top priority is to “maintain a peaceful and stable environment; promote rapid and sustainable national development; improve all aspects of people’s lives so that the people can enjoy the full benefits of development; and increase Vietnam’s contribution to regional and global peace, stability, development, and progress.”

Since the 7th National Congress of the CPV in 1991 officially established the “Four-Wheel Drive” leadership structure comprising the General Secretary of the CPV, the President of Vietnam, the Prime Minister, and the Chairman of the National Assembly, the positions of General Secretary and President have usually not been held by one person simultaneously. However, in recent years, the position of Vietnam’s President has seen frequent changes.

First, in 2018, then-President of Vietnam, Tran Dai Quang, died in office, and then-General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong concurrently served as President for over two years. In 2021, Nguyen Xuan Phuc was elected President. Between 2023 and 2024, Nguyen Xuan Phuc and his successor Vuong Dinh Hue resigned successively due to involvement in corruption cases involving subordinates. Su Lin, then Minister of Public Security, emerged amid high-level personnel upheaval, becoming both President and General Secretary of the CPV in succession—holding both major roles at once.

After Su Lin’s election as President, official media Vietnam News Agency described it as a “historic day.”

On the same day, through voting at the first session of the 16th National Assembly, Le Minh Hung was elected as the new Prime Minister. The current top leadership structure of Vietnam is: General Secretary and President Su Lin, Prime Minister Le Minh Hung, Chairwoman of the National Assembly Chen Qingmin, and Standing Secretary of the CPV Central Committee Chen Jin Xiu.

On April 7, 2026, in Hanoi, Vietnam, Su Lin took the oath of office as President. Photo/Visual China

“Anti-corruption enforcer”

68-year-old Su Lin has been elected President of Vietnam for the second time. From May to October 2024, he briefly served as President. Before him, two consecutive Presidents, Nguyen Xuan Phuc and Vuong Dinh Hue, resigned quietly, both related to anti-corruption investigations led by Su Lin.

Born in 1957 in a heroic family in Quang Ninh Province in northern Vietnam, Su Lin’s father, Su Quang, was a long-time underground agent in the south before Vietnam’s reunification, later rising to the highest position in the prison police of the Vietnam Public Security Ministry. Su Lin followed in his father’s footsteps, entering the People’s Security College’s special class in 1974, graduating, and then working in the Political Security Department of the Ministry of Public Security. This department was later integrated into the General Department of Security of the Public Security Ministry, Vietnam’s most important intelligence and counter-espionage agency.

In the early stages of his career, one of the key leaders in the Security Department system was Pei Shanwu, a veteran comrade of Su Quang from his espionage work in the south. When Vietnam media published memorial articles for Su Quang, they included a close photo of the two. However, a more critical figure in Su Lin’s career was Chen Daguang, a colleague a year older than him.

Chen Daguang entered the People’s Security College in 1981 for a five-year in-service training program, making him Su Lin’s “junior.” But Chen advanced quickly within the Security Department, gradually becoming Su Lin’s superior. In 2007, a year after Chen Daguang left his position as Deputy Director of the Security Department, Su Lin succeeded him. This marked Su Lin’s entry into the next generation of senior cadres after Chen Daguang. Among those promoted alongside him was Fan Mingzheng, who was then in charge of technical logistics at the Vietnam Public Security Ministry.

In 2007, Su Lin and Fan Mingzheng were promoted to the rank of Major General simultaneously. In 2010, both were promoted to Lieutenant General and appointed as Deputy Ministers of Public Security. Both first entered the Central Committee of the CPV in 2011 and joined the Politburo in 2016.

Most senior officials from the security system typically serve as provincial party secretaries before entering the Politburo to gain local leadership experience. In 2011, Fan Mingzheng, after just one year as Deputy Minister, was assigned as Secretary of Guangning Province. Su Lin, however, had no experience in local government. After returning to the central government, Fan Mingzheng was appointed as Deputy Minister of Public Security in 2021 and became the only member of the “55s” generation of the security system to hold the “Four-Wheel Drive” positions.

Since the corruption scandal involving nucleic acid test reagents broke out at the end of 2021, the importance of the Anti-Corruption Investigation Bureau of the Ministry of Public Security, code-named “C03,” has continued to rise. This was the eighth year of General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong’s “meltdown” anti-corruption campaign. Over the years, the investigation has gradually involved officials at the level of Central Committee members. Under the leadership of the Central Anti-Corruption and Negative Guidance Committee personally chaired by Nguyen Phu Trong, departments such as the Central Inspection Commission, the Supreme People’s Procuracy, and the Central Inspection Commission have played important roles.

On December 20, 2021, two days after the arrest of the first suspect, Pan Guoyue, in the nucleic acid reagent corruption case, Nguyen Phu Trong personally issued instructions requiring the police to “actively, proactively, vigorously, and effectively participate in combating negative corruption phenomena.”

Some clues had been laid earlier: in 2018, two years after Su Lin became Minister of Public Security and restructured C03, his fellow from his hometown in Xing’an, Nguyen Vi Yu, who was a senior officer in the Ministry of Public Security, was appointed head of the bureau. In 2020, Nguyen Phu Trong criticized anti-corruption efforts multiple times, focusing on “poor coordination, irregularities, and inefficiency between the prosecution and police.” From 2021, Nguyen Vi Yu, who had been promoted to Deputy Minister of Public Security, also served as Director of the Investigation Bureau, leading C03 and other investigative departments.

The investigation into the nucleic acid reagent scandal clarified the dominant role of the Ministry of Public Security. According to Dr. Kyle Sayer, a retired professor at the University of New South Wales, Australia, and an expert on Vietnam affairs, Vietnam’s anti-corruption procedures in this case involved many innovations, such as C03’s arrest, investigation, and transfer to disciplinary authorities for decisions, establishing a new model.

The subsequent anti-pandemic supply package corruption case also marked a turning point, with investigations increasingly targeting the current top leadership of Vietnam. In January 2023, then-President Nguyen Xuan Phuc resigned due to political responsibility for the two cases. A year later, Vuong Dinh Hue, his old subordinate and successor as President, was detained by C03 for involvement in a construction corruption scandal, and subsequently resigned. Later, higher-ranking Politburo members Wang Tinghui and Zhang Shimei also resigned quietly.

By this point, aside from General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong and Prime Minister Fan Mingzheng, Su Lin was the highest-ranked Politburo member. On May 22, 2024, Su Lin was elected President of Vietnam. Afterward, Nguyen Phu Trong fell seriously ill and passed away, and Su Lin began to lead the actual work of the Central Committee of the CPV, officially elected as General Secretary in August with all votes in favor.

“Pragmatic” style

“Not letting the country fall behind, not letting the people miss development opportunities, and striving for the long-term prosperity of the nation.” On April 7, 2026, after being elected President, Su Lin made this pledge in his inaugural speech.

As before, besides paying tribute to Ho Chi Minh, Su Lin’s speech focused entirely on specific policies, without quoting historical allusions or literary works. The late General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong and former President Vuong Dinh Hue often quoted modern Vietnamese poetry in their speeches. Currently, Politburo member Pan Wenjiang, who was once a military commander, has also recited works by revolutionary poet Su You in interviews with Vietnam People’s Army “Military Literature.”

Sayer told “China News Weekly” that the difference between Su Lin and Nguyen Phu Trong’s governing styles is that “Nguyen Phu Trong is an intellectual, Su Lin is a pragmatist.” After taking office as General Secretary, Su Lin quickly expanded the anti-corruption and anti-negativity campaign into a broader fight against “corruption, waste, and negativity,” breaking previous “red lines,” and proposing new policies such as “disciplinary actions against key party and state leaders.” He also did not hesitate to discipline the young cadres born in the '70s and newly appointed ministers within his first hundred days in office.

Meanwhile, Su Lin launched a swift “reorganization,” completing major tasks of streamlining ministries, merging provinces, and simplifying administrative levels within eight months—an effort that had been discussed and brewing for eight years. Vietnam’s 63 provinces and cities were reduced to 34; over 690 district-level administrative units and nearly 7,000 communes were eliminated, affecting around 250k officials. Officially, this was described as Vietnam’s “largest, most extensive, and most thorough” institutional reform to date.

In these two campaigns, a number of officials were promoted. Nguyen Vi Yu, who served as Su Lin’s deputy leading C03, has held key positions such as Director of the Central Office of the CPV, Secretary of Hanoi, and Director of the Central Inspection Commission since 2024. According to incomplete statistics, among the 180 members of the new Central Committee of the CPV elected in January 2016, at least 15 had a security background, and at least 20 listed Xing’an as their hometown on official profiles.

The 14th National Congress of the CPV held in 2026 further demonstrated Su Lin’s “pragmatic” style. After the congress, Su Lin published an article emphasizing that for the first time in the history of the CPV’s congresses, the 14th Congress “not only adopted resolutions but also simultaneously formulated and issued action plans,” with each goal having “clear responsibilities, timelines, resource guarantees, and final objectives.” “Because of this, the resolutions of the 14th Congress truly serve as a guide for the entire party and political system, acting as a ‘guiding light’ to lead the country onto a new development path.”

Also, after the 14th Congress, most analysts believed that Vietnam would see a long-term pattern of the General Secretary also serving as President. In October 2024, two months after Su Lin became General Secretary, he no longer held the presidency, and military officer Le Quang was elected as President. However, in January 2026, Le Quang, over the age limit, was not re-elected to the Central Committee at the 14th Congress.

After Su Lin officially took on both roles, Vietnam News Agency reported comments from Nguyen Thi Yue E, a delegate from Haiphong. She said, “The merging of the General Secretary and President positions meets the current needs of the country and ensures the Party’s continuous, convenient, and consistent leadership over socio-economic development and political institutions; the ultimate goal is for the people to enjoy the fruits of development.”

It is noteworthy that in September 2025, the Politburo issued a new regulation expanding the “top leaders” of Vietnam—“the main leaders of the Vietnamese Party and State”—to include the General Secretary of the CPV, the President, the Prime Minister, the Chairman of the National Assembly, and the Standing Secretary of the Central Committee, forming a “Five-Wheel Drive.” This also means that the current top leadership of Vietnam still consists of four persons.

Reporter: Cao Ran

(caoran@chinanews.com.cn)

Editor: Xu Fangqing