{"id":46652,"date":"2026-04-07T06:04:28","date_gmt":"2026-04-07T06:04:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=46652"},"modified":"2026-04-07T06:04:28","modified_gmt":"2026-04-07T06:04:28","slug":"vietnams-top-leader-to-lam-wins-state-presidency-gets-china-style-mandate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=46652","title":{"rendered":"Vietnam’s top leader To Lam wins state presidency, gets China-style mandate"},"content":{"rendered":"
Vietnam’s lawmakers \u200bon Tuesday unanimously elected Communist Party Secretary General To Lam as the country’s state president for the next five years, making him the \u200cmost powerful Vietnamese leader in decades.<\/p>\n

The widely anticipated move marks a break from Vietnam’s traditional collective leadership system, consolidating authority in one figure in ways analysts say could tilt the one\u2011party state toward greater authoritarianism, while also enabling faster decision-making, similar to its neighbour China.<\/p>\n

The parliament said on its website that all 495 deputies present at Tuesday’s National Assembly session endorsed the Communist Party’s \u200bnomination, while five lawmakers were absent. Officials have said the nominations for top state leadership posts were finalised in a meeting in late March.<\/p>\n

The former head of \u200bpublic security now has a double mandate to rule the country for the next five years, after he secured a second term \u2060as general secretary in January.<\/p>\n

Parliament is scheduled later on Tuesday to elect a new prime minister who will replace the outgoing Pham Minh Chinh.<\/p>\n

After the vote, Lam told deputies in a televised address that it was an honour to hold both posts and pledged “a new growth model with science, technology, innovation, \u200band digital transformation as the primary driving forces”. He also said he would prioritise self-reliance in defence.<\/p>\n

He said his top priorities were to maintain stability, promote rapid and sustainable national development and improve “all aspects of people’s lives”.<\/p>\n

Analysts said Lam’s dual role could make it easier for him to achieve his goals, while cautioning against the risks of excessive power concentration.<\/p>\n

“Concentrating greater power in To \u200bLam’s hands could pose risks to Vietnam’s political system, such as increased authoritarianism,” said Le Hong Hiep, senior fellow at the ISEAS Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore.<\/p>\n

However, \u200bsuch consolidation “could enable Vietnam to formulate and implement policies more quickly and effectively,” supporting growth, he said.<\/p>\n

Read: Trump meets Vietnam leader, vows to remove Hanoi from restricted lists<\/p>\n

The combination of the two roles “will shift Vietnam’s domestic politics to a new normal where \u200cmost of \u2060the old assumptions about Vietnam’s politics, including those about collective leadership, are no longer valid,” said Alexander Vuving of the Asia-Pacific Centre for Security Studies in the United States.<\/p>\n

Lam held both posts for a period of a few months following the death in 2024 of the late party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong.<\/p>\n

Even after relinquishing the state presidency in favour of army general Luong Cuong, Lam often acted as if he had retained the role, travelling extensively and representing the country in meetings with foreign \u200bleaders.<\/p>\n

In his first stint \u200bas party chief, 68-year-old Lam launched \u2060sweeping economic reforms designed to make Vietnam more competitive, which drew both praise and criticism.<\/p>\n

Lam has vowed to pursue double-digit growth through a new development model that is less reliant on low-cost manufacturing, long the backbone of Vietnam’s export-driven boom and led by foreign \u200bmultinationals.<\/p>\n

Lam’s moves have at times unsettled the administration and businesses, but he has shown a pragmatic flexibility in executing them.<\/p>\n

He \u200bhas backed the expansion \u2060of private conglomerates, but before his reappointment, also issued a directive emphasising the leading role of state-owned enterprises in a bid to reassure party traditionalists.<\/p>\n

Foreign investors, a key component of Vietnam’s export\u2011reliant economy, have often praised the country’s political stability and see Lam as a pro\u2011business leader. However, his backing of national champions and push for breakneck growth have \u2060raised concerns \u200bamong some about favouritism, corruption risks, asset bubbles and waste.<\/p>\n

In foreign policy, Lam has also been \u200bpragmatic.<\/p>\n

He has maintained Vietnam’s “Bamboo Diplomacy” and sought to balance relations with major powers while expanding international partnerships.<\/p>\n

“Lam’s double-hat would not signal any changes in Vietnam’s foreign policy, even if there are concerns that Vietnam is \u200bconcentrating more power in a single individual,” said Khang Vu, a visiting scholar at Boston College.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Vietnam’s lawmakers \u200bon Tuesday unanimously elected Communist Party Secretary General To Lam as the country’s state president for the next five years, making him the \u200cmost powerful Vietnamese leader in decades. The widely anticipated move marks a break from Vietnam’s traditional collective leadership system, consolidating authority in one figure in ways analysts say could tilt […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-46652","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46652","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=46652"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46652\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=46652"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=46652"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=46652"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}