HANOI, Vietnam (AP) — Vietnam’s To Lam was re-elected Friday as the general secretary of its ruling Communist Party.
The decision came at the conclusion of the National Party Congress, the country’s most important political conclave.
No announcement was made about whether he will also become president. If To Lam were to get both positions, he would be the country’s most powerful leader in decades, in a manner similar to that of Chinese leader Xi Jinping.
The Congress was framed by Vietnam’s defining national question: whether the country can transform itself into a high-income economy by 2045. During the meeting, Vietnam set a target of average annual GDP growth of 10% or more from 2026 to 2030.
The gathering brought together nearly 1,600 delegates to define Vietnam's political and economic direction through 2031. It also confirmed a slate of senior appointments, electing 19 members to the Politburo, the country’s top leadership body.
Beyond settling the question of who will lead Vietnam through 2031, the Congress will also determine how the country’s single-party system responds to world grown increasingly turbulent as China and the United States wrangle over trade and Washington under President Donald Trump challenges a longstanding global order.
Lam has overseen the most ambitious round of bureaucratic and economic reforms since the late 1980s, when Vietnam liberalized its economy. Under his leadership, the government has cut tens of thousands of public-sector jobs, redrawn administrative boundaries to speed decision-making, and initiated dozens of major infrastructure projects.
Lam spent decades in the Ministry of Public Security before becoming its minister in 2016. He led an anti-corruption campaign championed by his predecessor, Nguyen Phu Trong. During his rise, Vietnam’s Politburo lost six of its 18 members during an anti-graft campaign, including two former presidents and Vietnam’s parliamentary head.
