When Vietnam takes over the ASEAN chairmanship in 2020, the country outlined five priorities to be executed throughout the year. Among all, strengthening the institutional capacity of ASEAN and leveraging the Industrial Revolution 4.0 to address inequality, are the most challenging goals to be realized within a year. Other scholars such as David Hutt, meanwhile, even pointed out that Vietnam’s most important goal is to secure a united stand on the Code of Conduct to be negotiated with China this year ⸺ a consensus that if achieved, will ensure any agreement regarding the contentious South China Sea dispute to be mutually favorable for all the disputants involved.
That said, the unexpected outbreak of the COVID-19 has greatly disrupted Hanoi’s initial ambitions to drive the ASEAN agenda into new heights. Not only the global pandemic postponed the regional bloc’s summits and meetings to later dates, it also compelled leaders of all ASEAN countries to devote great focus on this outbreak at the ASEAN level. While the online Special ASEAN Summit last April was able to result in a joint statement to address the COVID-19 pandemic under the chairmanship of Vietnam, it was by no means, adequate for the country to play an active role as the ASEAN’s driver this year. Given the COVID-19’s disruption to ASEAN’s annual meetings and summits, it is not hard to see why Hanoi is seeking to extend another year of its chairmanship despite this may clash with Brunei’s preparations as the next chairman of the Southeast Asian bloc.
Utilizing Confidence Gain in COVID-19 Response
As the country which managed to control COVID-19 and keep it to an excessively low number of transmitted cases, Vietnam has gained an unprecedented confidence among its ASEAN peers as well as those outside of the region. As highlighted by Coleman and Sheehan, Vietnam became a new model of how a developing country can respond to COVID-19 without devoting mass resources for the purpose. Dubbed as low-cost COVID-19 strategy as coined by different scholars, the Vietnamese success stemmed on its abilities on three fronts: mobilizing all segments of society in responding to the crisis, initiating early prevention measures (mask-wearing policy, targeted testing, contact tracing, and quarantine) and utilizing different technologies (website and app) for public communication.
With such coordinated measures, Vietnam has cast itself as an exemplary model in controlling the pandemic despite not having colossal resources in conducting mass testing and epidemic surveillance of South Korea, China, and Singapore. As a matter of fact, the Vietnamese COVID-19 response model is a highly attractive model that can be readily emulated by other developing countries with limited resources at hand. Within ASEAN, the Vietnamese model can be replicated in Cambodia, Laos, and Myanmar ⸺ countries that would need effective COVID-19 response strategy without their governments devoting huge costs for it. By occupying the ASEAN chairmanship status, its COVID-19 success resonated confidence from the whole regional bloc on its ability to play a leading role in this testing time. To take it further, such gain of confidence within ASEAN, should be further capitalized by Hanoi to implement regional agendas that would bring pragmatic returns to all member states in the short-run.
Pushing for Short-Term Goals within ASEAN Smart Network Cities (ASNC)
With the COVID-19 pandemic yet to be effectively controlled around the world and has the capacity to recur in the near future, no one knows how much longer would the restarted economies in the bloclast. This situation, in turn, made the ASEAN Smart Cities Network (ASCN) as reached by the Southeast Asian bloc in April 2018, an ever more important priority for immediate implementation. From Anbound’s observations, there are two reasons for such urgency.
First, with COVID-19 vaccine yet to be developed at least not in the immediate future, reduction in face-to-face engagements has become a norm of human interactions. As such, there is no other choice for ASEAN players, whether they are the governments, businesses, and average citizens, but to adapt to this new norm in their daily activities. By pushing for the immediate implementation of the ASCN, Vietnam will be able to utilize technology to rejuvenate the economy and improve the lives of ASEAN citizens in the post-pandemic era.
By all means, this will establish Vietnam’s legacy as the chairman that brings ASEAN out of the socio-economic crisis that was brought by the COVIS-19 pandemic. Considering that the 36 cities have planned their strategic projects within the Smart City Action Plans document, what Hanoi could do is to call for an online meeting with the respective national leaders and relevant city mayors, and designate certain short-term goals to be realized by the end of 2020. These goals can be any easier and achievable goals in the three pillars of technological utilization, industrial automation, and digitalization of economy.
Second, similar to becoming a model for COVID-19 response, Vietnam could also become another model of smart cities for the lower developing peers in ASEAN. In the course of adapting smart cities vision to its local conditions, Hanoi can share with their peers on how to kick-start smart cities governance in three different cities with three distinctive needs, namely, Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, and Danang. As a latecomer to the smart cities game, these three Vietnamese cities have demonstrated their capabilities to prioritize smart solutions according to their local needs instead of developing all sorts of smart solutions in their localities.
Whereas Hanoi had started the iParking app for drivers and looking to venture into smart solutions in healthcare, education, transport, and tourism, Danang planned to become a green city through the adoption of smart solutions. As such, the latter’ had begun developing its natural disaster management systems that set it apart from Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City. As for the southern city of Ho Chi Minh, it is planning to become the first smart city of Vietnam and placed emphasis on attaining five capabilities for achieving a comprehensive smart city: development of cloud computing infrastructure, utilization of Big Data, building of data centers, erection of security centres, and establishment of an open data ecosystem. Without question, the cost-effectiveness approach of these three Vietnamese cities is highly relevant to those lower developing peers in ASEAN in which limited resources are available for them.
An Opportunity Not to Be Missed
Within the ASNC vision, Vietnam is provided with an opportunity (not to be missed) in leading ASEAN toward the next stage of economic development. While it may want to gain specific achievements in the other areas of South China Sea issue and ASEAN’s institutional capacity, realizing these goals requires a lot of diplomacy with the other nine member states. With a little more than half year left, it is still challenging for the country to achieve these goals despite it is not an entirely impossible endeavor to start with. Pushing for short-term goals within the ASNC vision, meanwhile, will help Vietnam to get quick result and one that is also vital for the new course of ASEAN’s economic development.
