ASEAN Beat | Politics | Southeast Asia

Vietnam Communist Party Chief To Lam Appointed as State President

The decision marks a break with the collective decision-making model that has prevailed for most of the country’s recent history.

The National Assembly building in Ba Dinh Square, Hanoi, Vietnam.

Vietnam’s National Assembly today unanimously elected To Lam, the head of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV), to serve as the country’s state president for the next five ‌years.

During a session today, Vietnamese state media reported, all 495 delegates present chose to confirm the 68-year-old to the post, endorsing a nomination that was reportedly finalized at a meeting in late March.

The decision, which has been widely anticipated since Lam’s reappointment as party chief at the CPV’s 14th National Congress in January, marks a break with the previous system of collective leadership in which Vietnam’s “four pillars” – its four main leadership roles – were held by different officials. It also frames Lam’s status as the most powerful Vietnamese leader in many years.

Lam previously held both positions simultaneously for a few months after the death of Nguyen Phu Trong, his predecessor as party chief, in July 2024.

After the ⁠vote, Lam gave a televised address to the National Assembly in which he said that it was an honor to hold both posts and pledged “a new growth model with ​science, technology, innovation, and digital transformation as the primary driving forces,” Reuters reported. He also said he would “prioritize self-reliance in defense,” the news agency added.

To a certain extent, today’s vote formalizes a system that has already existed in practice since Lam took over the leadership of the CPV in August 2024. Despite handing the state presidency to Luong Cuong, a general in the People’s Army of Vietnam, Lam has acted as a de facto head of state, traveling abroad frequently and leading a historic expansion of the circle of Hanoi’s “strategic” and “comprehensive strategic” partners.

The appointment of Lam to the presidency and the leadership of the party aligns Vietnam with fellow communist nations, including China, where Xi Jinping serves as both head of the party and the head of state, and Laos, where the corresponding posts are currently held by Thongloun Sisoulith.

However, such double-ups have been rare in Vietnam’s history. Nguyen Phu Trong, Lam’s predecessor as CPV general secretary, held both positions after the death of President Tran Dai Quang in 2018, but relinquished the presidency in 2021. Prior to that, the only leaders to hold both positions were Ho Chi Minh, who held both between 1951 and 1969, and Truong Chinh, who served as party chief for five months after the death of Le Duan in July 1986.

Lam’s consolidation of the two roles has raised concerns about the erosion of a collective leadership model that has largely succeeded in preventing too much power from being concentrated in any one individual. While the Party has attempted to preserve collective leadership by informally anointing the permanent member of the CPV Secretariat as a fifth “pillar,” it is likely that Vietnam is entering an era that will come to be closely associated with the former public security minister.

Since taking over the Party leadership, Lam has left a deep impression. As The Diplomat explored in a recent video, Lam has spearheaded a series of bureaucratic reforms aimed at creating “a leaner, more efficient” state and party administration. This administrative “revolution” has involved a merger of ministries, Party commissions, and National Assembly committees; it also eliminated an entire layer of state administration and reduced the number of provincial and city administrations from 63 to just 34. At the same time, the space for permissible dissent in Vietnam has further contracted under Lam’s watch.

Le Long Hiep of the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore told Reuters that “concentrating greater power in ​To Lam’s hands could pose risks to Vietnam’s political system, such as increased authoritarianism.” But he added that such consolidation “could enable Vietnam to formulate and implement policies more quickly and effectively,” something that could benefit the country during the economic fallout from the Iran war.

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Vietnam’s National Assembly today unanimously elected To Lam, the head of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV), to serve as the country’s state president for the next five ‌years.

During a session today, Vietnamese state media reported, all 495 delegates present chose to confirm the 68-year-old to the post, endorsing a nomination that was reportedly finalized at a meeting in late March.

The decision, which has been widely anticipated since Lam’s reappointment as party chief at the CPV’s 14th National Congress in January, marks a break with the previous system of collective leadership in which Vietnam’s “four pillars” – its four main leadership roles – were held by different officials. It also frames Lam’s status as the most powerful Vietnamese leader in many years.

Lam previously held both positions simultaneously for a few months after the death of Nguyen Phu Trong, his predecessor as party chief, in July 2024.

After the ⁠vote, Lam gave a televised address to the National Assembly in which he said that it was an honor to hold both posts and pledged “a new growth model with ​science, technology, innovation, and digital transformation as the primary driving forces,” Reuters reported. He also said he would “prioritize self-reliance in defense,” the news agency added.

To a certain extent, today’s vote formalizes a system that has already existed in practice since Lam took over the leadership of the CPV in August 2024. Despite handing the state presidency to Luong Cuong, a general in the People’s Army of Vietnam, Lam has acted as a de facto head of state, traveling abroad frequently and leading a historic expansion of the circle of Hanoi’s “strategic” and “comprehensive strategic” partners.

The appointment of Lam to the presidency and the leadership of the party aligns Vietnam with fellow communist nations, including China, where Xi Jinping serves as both head of the party and the head of state, and Laos, where the corresponding posts are currently held by Thongloun Sisoulith.

However, such double-ups have been rare in Vietnam’s history. Nguyen Phu Trong, Lam’s predecessor as CPV general secretary, held both positions after the death of President Tran Dai Quang in 2018, but relinquished the presidency in 2021. Prior to that, the only leaders to hold both positions were Ho Chi Minh, who held both between 1951 and 1969, and Truong Chinh, who served as party chief for five months after the death of Le Duan in July 1986.

Lam’s consolidation of the two roles has raised concerns about the erosion of a collective leadership model that has largely succeeded in preventing too much power from being concentrated in any one individual. While the Party has attempted to preserve collective leadership by informally anointing the permanent member of the CPV Secretariat as a fifth “pillar,” it is likely that Vietnam is entering an era that will come to be closely associated with the former public security minister.

Since taking over the Party leadership, Lam has left a deep impression. As The Diplomat explored in a recent video, Lam has spearheaded a series of bureaucratic reforms aimed at creating “a leaner, more efficient” state and party administration. This administrative “revolution” has involved a merger of ministries, Party commissions, and National Assembly committees; it also eliminated an entire layer of state administration and reduced the number of provincial and city administrations from 63 to just 34. At the same time, the space for permissible dissent in Vietnam has further contracted under Lam’s watch.

Le Long Hiep of the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore told Reuters that “concentrating greater power in ​To Lam’s hands could pose risks to Vietnam’s political system, such as increased authoritarianism.” But he added that such consolidation “could enable Vietnam to formulate and implement policies more quickly and effectively,” something that could benefit the country during the economic fallout from the Iran war.

Sebastian Strangio is Southeast Asia editor at The Diplomat. 

Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV)

Vietnam National Assembly

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