Nearly 40,000 members of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) have been disciplined over the past five years, local media reported Friday.

The CPV Central Committee, its Political Bureau, and the CPV Secretariat (9th tenure) alone disciplined 114 party members, including 12 members of the committee, in the five-year period, Young People newspaper reported.

Among the nearly 40,000 people, 17 were sentenced for their involvement in Vietnam's most notorious criminal case: Nam Cam. In 2003, the gang leader, Truong Van Cam, alias Nam Cam, received the death sentence for murder, assault, gambling and illegal emigration organization, criminals support, bribery and usury.

Of the 17 sentenced party members, several held important positions like former Deputy Minister of Public Security Bui Quoc Huy, former deputy head of the People's Supreme Procuracy Pham Si Chien, and former director of the Voice of Vietnam radio station Tran Mai Hanh.

Huy was found guilty of neglecting his duty, resulting in major negative consequences. Chien and Hanh were both convicted for receiving bribes from Nam Cam.

The most recent case is wrongdoings at the Project Management Unit No.18 under the Transport Ministry. Bui Tien Dung, general director of the unit, which is in charge of implementing and overseeing infrastructure construction projects with funds coming from either the state budget or official development assistance, has been prosecuted for four charges, namely, gambling; intentionally acting counter to state regulations in economic management, resulting in severe consequences; receiving bribery; and giving bribery.

Local investigators estimated that Dung had made total bets of some 7 million U.S. dollars on foreign soccer games, including English and Spanish ones, for a long time before his arrest in January.

As a result, Transport Minister Dao Dinh Binh has resigned, and Deputy Transport Minister Nguyen Viet Tien has been detained for his responsibility for the scandal, and his mismanagement, respectively.

Tien has been prosecuted for two charges: intentionally acting counter to state regulations in economic management, and lacking responsibility, resulting in severe loss in state assets.

At the ongoing 10th National Congress of the CPV, running from April 18-25, Vu Quoc Hung, vice chairman of the Commission for Inspection under the CPV Central Committee (the 9th tenure), said: "Degradation in morality and lifestyle, resulting in bureaucracy, corruption, wastefulness and people pestering among a considerable number of party members are still progressing very seriously."

Degradation in morality and lifestyle, opportunism and individualism tend to be found in more state cadres and party members, he said.

Source: Xinhua