Public decries plan to impose fees on vehicles

Under the ministry’s proposal sent to the Government, the so-called vehicular circulation fee will be imposed, at VND20-VND50 million a year on automobiles of under nine seats, and VND500,000 to VND1 million on motorcycles.

Minister of Transport Dinh La Thang said colleting the fee would help build up the fund for infrastructure projects, upgrade facilities for better transportation, and ease traffic congestion.

The plan, however, is being criticized by many citizens as well as local media.
“Collecting the vehicular circulation fee is to place burdens on the people,” Vnexpress said.

Nguyen Bach Phuc, chair of the Ho Chi Minh City Science-Technology Consultancy and Management Association, questioned the purpose of the proposed fee collection on this online paper.

“First, what is the purpose of the proposed vehicular circulation fee?” said Phuc, who asserted the scheme would not help restrict the number of private vehicles, especially motorcycles.

Traffic congestion, Phuc said, is caused by many reasons, and the scheme will only help generate more revenues for State coffers.

Le Hieu Dang, former vice chair of the Ho Chi Minh City Fatherland Front Committee, vehemently rejected the scheme, saying it couldn’t solve congestion because congestion was caused by limited traffic space.

According to Dang, the people have been suffering from too many types of fees, so they should not be forced to shoulder a new burden.

Public transport means have failed to meet the people’s demand, so it’s incorrect to discourage private transportation. “Collecting the fee is similar to transferring the burden from the transport sector to the people,” Dang said.

Bui Danh Lien, chairman of the Hanoi Automobile Transport Association, criticized the proposed fee as an excessive collection, saying vehicle owners had been subject to too many types of fees, from higher registration and number plate fees to the fee collected via petrol prices.

“That is not to mention the owners will be subject to the environment protection fee via petrol and another fee for road maintenance that is being decided by the Government,” Liem told Nguoi Lao Dong Newspaper.

“Frustration is the common feeling among millions of people,” Nguoi Lao Dong said.
For its part, Tuoi Tre calculated that with 650,000 automobiles registered in Vietnam, the circulation fee alone would amount to at least VND15 trillion a year.

The question is how the ministry will use this huge fund, Le Hieu Dang told Lao Dong Newspaper.

This newspaper together with Sai Gon Tiep Thi demanded transparency from the ministry about the use of different funds as well as the effectiveness of such spending.

Sai Gon Tiep Thi even slashed at the ministry over its lack of research and vision when proposing this scheme as well as its recent plans regarding transport management.

“The core (in any scheme) is the way of thinking, but regrettably, this is the weakest point, as research and surveys have been skipped. This negligence leads to the shortage of data to develop correct solutions,” said the paper.

Recalling the transport minister’s recent proposal to apply the staggering working hours in Hanoi, the paper quoted a Council member from the capital city as complaining that “a scheme that affects millions of people is presented within just a few pages like the essay of an elementary school student.”

Mocking the transport minister’s saying that collecting the circulation fee “is a solution to ensure social equitability,” Tuoi Tre said hardly any country in the world had ensured social equitability by collecting such a fee.

Rarely have the public reacted so strongly to a scheme by a ministry, as thousands of feedbacks on local media have been published, calling the initiative as lunatic, nonsensical, illogical, unfeasible, and weird, ands out of touch.

Readers say the burden is already too heavy for them, especially at a time when the majority of the population has to tighten their purse string to survive economic difficulties.

A reader told Tuoi Tre, “Please don’t tell us that losses and wastes in constructing and managing roads and bridges are being offset by the collection of fees like this one.”