Nguyen Thanh Phong and Tran Viet Nga have been recommended for prosecution on bribery charges by the Investigation Police Agency Office (C01), Ministry of Public Security. The case involves 55 defendants.
According to the conclusions, Phong served as director from January 2015 to September 2024. During the 2018-2024 period, regulations for registering and declaring products in the health supplement category were general and lacked specificity. The regulations also did not include detailed guidelines on procedures, technical criteria, or required documentation.
This regulatory ambiguity led to businesses facing difficulties and confusion when carrying out product declaration procedures. Competent authorities also encountered issues in receiving, reviewing, and evaluating applications.
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Nguyen Thanh Phong, former director of the Food Safety Department, Ministry of Health. *Photo: Linh Dan* |
In September 2018, as the director of the Food Safety Department, Phong chaired a party committee meeting. During this meeting, he agreed to assign the Center and the Department of Standard Management and Food Testing to review product declaration registration applications. However, these two units were not authorized or tasked with reviewing declaration applications for health supplements.
Following discussions with these units, Phong introduced a policy for specialists to accept money beyond the regulated fees when reviewing product declaration applications. Typically, this ranged from 5 million dong to 10 million dong per application, averaging 7 million dong per application. The illegally collected money would then be shared proportionally among the group.
Through this method, from 2018 to 2024, specialists at the Food Safety Department received nearly 95 billion dong from individuals. This illicit money was collected to facilitate the early issuance of acceptance papers and GMP (Good Manufacturing Practice) certificates for factories. Phong alone appropriated nearly 44 billion dong, with 43,5 billion related to declaration applications and over 330 million dong related to GMP certification.
C01 accused Phong of being the mastermind and ringleader, holding him criminally responsible for the total amount of nearly 95 billion dong received by specialists as bribes. He is personally required to deposit 44 billion dong into the state budget.
During the investigation, defendant Phong made sincere declarations, admitted to all criminal acts, expressed remorse, and actively cooperated with the investigative agency in resolving the case.
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Tran Viet Nga, director of the Food Safety Department, Ministry of Health. *Photo: VGP/HM* |
Tran Viet Nga, Phong's successor as director, was assigned to directly oversee information, education, and communication activities, including signing confirmations for advertising content related to health supplements. Nga frequently allowed applications to expire without approval or returned them with unclear reasons.
Using this tactic, Nga instructed Tran Thi Thu Lieu, deputy head of the Information, Education, and Communication department, to ensure specialists collected money. This money, at least 2 million dong per application for advertising content confirmation, was then to be given back to Nga.
According to C01, specialists received 12,7 billion dong in bribes and transferred 8 billion dong to Nga personally. Nga is accused of committing the crime as a mastermind and ringleader, holding criminal responsibility for the total amount of 12,7 billion dong and required to deposit 8 billion dong into the state budget.
Pham Du
