Implementing the 2019 theme: “Improving the effectiveness and efficiency of the political system”, the Department of Culture and Sports has maintained reviewing and supplementing the Working Regulations and work-handling processes at the Department following the practical situation. The PAR index of the Department increased by 2 ranks, from the 14th rank to the 12th rank out of 22 departments, sectors and agencies in the City. Besides completing and implementing 100% of the Administrative Procedures (88 Procedures) under the jurisdiction of the Department at the level of 3 and 4, the Department received, classified and directed the handling of 11,656 documents as well as issuing 8,561 administrative documents. 100% of departure and arrival documents of the Department were received and published in the document management software as prescribed.
State management, inspection, and verification were strengthened. The Department of Culture and Sports advised the City People’s Committee to issue a Plan to accomplish and enhance the quality of the grassroots sports and cultural institution system in the City until 2020. To take cultural resources and cultural creativity for the sustainable development of the City, the Hanoi City has been recently recognized as an official member of UNESCO Creative Cities Network.
The Department has successfully fulfilled its role as a standing agency of the Steering Committee of the Program No. 04 of the City Party Committee on “Socio-cultural development, improvement in the quality of the Capital human resources, a build-up of Hanoians’ elegant and civilized image in the period 2016-2020”. Moreover, the Department advised and reported to the City People’s Committee to support districts in building 108 culture houses missing in the City. Building Hanoians’ an elegant and civilized image with a focus on propaganda and implementation of the two Codes of Conduct has been implemented with many innovative, creative forms and models, especially in propagandizing the Code of Conduct in public. Also, the City-level acceptance of the Scientific Topic “Evaluating cultural development, building Hanoians’ an elegant and civilized, ensuring social security for the 16th Congress (term 2015-2020) with development orientation up to 2025 and vision up to 2030” has been completed.
There have been multiple outstanding achievements in cultural development. The conservation and promotion of cultural heritage values were concerned; the restoration and embellishment of relics got a great investment. The City also completed the inspection, survey, and development of the investment, restoration and embellishment plan of 150 ranked relics, degraded revolutionary relics with the typical value has increased at 22 districts and towns. 177 relics located in 30 districts and towns were restored and embellished. Furthermore, 52 relics were ranked, some relics such as the Temple of Literature, Ngoc Son Temple, Hoa Lo Prison, and revolutionary relics have welcomed and served more than 3.2 million visitors.
The construction of grassroots cultural lifestyles was interested in implementing many practical activities. The whole City has 87% of families recognized with the title “Cultured family”, 60% of villages recognized with the title “Cultured Village” and 70.5% of residential groups recognized with the title “Cultured Residential Group”. The organization and management of festival activities in 2019 got several positive changes. In the festival season 2019, the Hanoi City no longer has hot spots of the festival management.
Visual propaganda and promotion activities were organized at the 2nd DPRK-USA Hanoi Summit taking place in Hanoi
In 2019, the Department of Culture and Sports has successfully organized activities of celebrating big anniversaries of the country and the Capital, including three National-level Anniversaries assigned to the Hanoi City as the host agency by the Central and two City-level Anniversaries. The Department also completed successfully the missions of serving the DPRK-USA Hanoi Summit in Hanoi. The decoration, visual propaganda and promotion activities had many innovations, which contributed to beautifying the Capital street landscape. The Department has launched the campaign to decorate the Hanoi City in 2019, a contest to compose skits to propagandize about the political missions in 2019, and an international art photo contest “Proud of Hanoi” in 2019.
The Hanoi City celebrates the 20th anniversary of receiving the title “City for Peace”
Cultural and artistic movements in districts and district-level towns have been increasingly concerned. In 2019, there were seven mass art festivals organized, the City won five medals at the National Amateur Dance Competition taking place in Ninh Thuan. The City Theaters organized nearly 2,600 art performances and 3,300 film screenings in theaters managed by the Department and in remote rural districts and district-level towns. The Hanoi City had 32 artists awarded and posthumously awarded the title of People’s Artist and Meritorious Artist by the President.
The quality and scale of cultural, artistic and sports activities have been kept improving, many events impressed the people and tourists such as Cherry Blossom Festival, Hanoi Cuisine Culture Festival, Street Festival, Folk Culture in Contemporary Life Festival 2019, Hanoi International Heritage Marathon 2019, etc.
The mass sports movement has prospered. The City organized 56 activities and mass sports tournaments with more than 10,000 athletes attending and awarded 2,901 medals accordingly. Districts and district-level towns organized 772 sports tournaments; communes, wards and district-level towns organized 2,811 mass sports tournaments. The City continued to launch the Olympic Running Day for the entire people’s health and also organized the 46th Hanoi Moi Newspaper Open Running Tournament for Peace. At the same time, the Department of Culture and Sports coordinated with the Department of Education and Training to develop and implement the program on physical education and school sports in the Hanoi City for the period of 2019-2021. The indicators of the mass physical training and sports movements have completed and exceeded the planned targets with 40% of people who practised sports regularly and 29% of sports households.
In 2019, Hanoi hosted 14 national professional sports tournaments with the participation of over 3,000 athletes. The Hanoi High-Performance Sport maintained its leading position in the country when winning 2,814 medals in domestic sports tournaments plus 463 medals in international sports tournaments. The outstanding achievements include Gold Medal at the 2019 Muay World Championship of athlete Bui Yen Ly, Gold Medal at Taekwondo World Championship of athlete Pham Quoc Viet, three Gold Medals at archery in the SEA Games 30 of athlete Loc Thi Dao, two Gold Medals at Artistic Gymnastics of athlete Dinh Phuong Thanh, and the national championship for the 5th time in a row of Hanoi Football Club, in which Nguyen Quang Hai was honored as the best football player of the year by the Southeast Asia Football Federation.
Hanoi became the locality that contributed the most number of medals to the total number of medals and the number of gold medals for the Vietnamese Sports Delegation at SEA Games 30.
The Hanoi Sports contributed 186 out of 856 members of the Vietnam Sports Delegation to attend the 30th SEA Games and became the locality that contributed the most number of medals to the total number of medals and the number of gold medals for the Vietnamese Sports Delegation. Vietnamese women’s national football team stepped on the podium to receive the 6th Gold Medal, Vietnamese men’s national football team received a Gold Medal after 60 years of waiting. In particular, in 2019, the Department has actively coordinated with the units preparing to host the Formula One Racing Championship in 2020 besides surveying and preparing physical training and sports facilities for the organization of SEA Games 31 and Para Games 11 in 2021.
In 2020, the final year of implementing the five-year socio-economic development plan between 2016 and 2020 and Resolution of the 16th Congress of Hanoi Party Committee in term 2015-2020; with the spirit of “Solidarity – Discipline – Responsibility – Efficiency”, the Culture and Sports sector is determined to perform well its key tasks, continues to effectively carry out five key tasks and 3 breakthrough stages in the Resolution of the 16th Hanoi City Party Congress, the Program No. 04-CTr/TU of the Hanoi City Party Committee and the contents of the five-year socio-economic development plan in the period of 2016-2020.
Thanh Mai