Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) – The General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV), To Lam, has become one of the most powerful men in his homeland in decades: The National Assembly elected the 68-year-old as president of the Southeast Asian country on Tuesday. The hardliner thus combines the leadership of the party and the state in one person. This had only happened once before and only for a few years, when Nguyen Phu Trong held both positions from 2018 to 2021.
