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Vietnam holding Politburo elections

Vietnam's Communist Party was set yesterday to elect its elite Politburo and a new set of leaders who will face the task of reining in corruption while driving the country's economic growth.

The country's ruling regime was likely to see a shake-up in the top leadership, with Prime Minister Phan Van Khai, 72, and President Tran Duc Luong, 68, widely expected to step down to make way for younger leaders.

General Secretary Nong Duc Manh, 65, who was chosen during the last party congress, was expected to retain his post as the head of the Communist Party.

But party insiders have said the positions of president and prime minister -- which must be formally confirmed by the National Assembly -- were likely to be filled by two emerging leaders from the southern part of the country.

The 160 members of the Central Committee, newly elected on Sunday, were scheduled to vote for the 15 to 17 members of the Politburo, the party's innermost circle of leaders, as well as the general secretary later in the day.

State-run newspapers yesterday ran front-page photos of the nearly 1,200 delegates to the congress lining up to drop ballots for committee members into glass boxes. It was the first time that delegates were allowed to nominate candidates for general secretary.

Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung, 56, from southern Ca Mau province, has long been seen as Khai's heir apparent for the job of prime minister. A 20-year veteran in the army and a former head of Vietnam's State Bank, he has been in his current post since 1997.

The leading candidate being talked about for the post of president is Nguyen Minh Triet, 64, of southern Binh Duong Province, who has been the Communist Party chief in southern Ho Chi Minh City since 2000.

Triet has widely been seen as a reformer who has nurtured booming growth in the country's economic engine.

The new leadership will be formally announced today at the closing of the eight-day party congress, held once every five years.

If the two southerners are chosen, it would mark the first time that Vietnam has strayed from a longtime formula that kept the top three positions evenly distributed between the north, central and southern parts of the country. Manh is from northern Bac Can Province.

Vietnam's new leaders will face the challenge of keeping the country on its path of economic reforms while uprooting the deep-seated corruption that threatens to derail it.
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