Mr Manh made the suggestions during a working visit to VOV on February 3 on the occasion of the traditional lunar New Year (Tet) Festival. He praised the national radio for its significant contributions to the nation during the past struggle for national liberation and the current cause of national construction and defence.

He said the Voice of Vietnam serves as a source of great encouragement to the Vietnamese people, provides fast and reliable information about Vietnam to help international friends get better understanding about the country, and discover and defeat the enemy’s dark schemes.

“VOV should innovate with its programming to attract more listeners and to make it become the voice of the Party and the forum of the people,” Mr Manh told VOV leaders and staff at the working session.

He welcomed VOV’s decision to turn it into a multi-media communications agency supported by the radio, VOV Online (VOVNews), The Voice of Vietnam newspaper and the upcoming video image broadcasting channel.

He encouraged VOV to apply advanced technology to its production processes, from programming to transmission, in order to improve the quality of broadcasts and expand coverage to every region of the country. He praised VOV for its effort to preserve invaluable audio files, including those of the late President Ho Chi Minh, Party and State leaders and the country’s other important events, in its archives. He asked the national radio to use information technology to preserve these files for future generations.

The Party leader stressed that together with other media agencies of the Party and State, VOV should increase its airtime to discover and replicate exemplary role models while playing the leading role in combating corruption, wastefulness and other social vices, as well as defeating hostile forces’ dark schemes.

Last but not least, he underlined the need to raise VOV staff’s political conscience and professional skills to master new technology and provide fast and reliable information. He asked VOV to discover and train presenters with good voices to make broadcasts more attractive to listeners from near and far.

VOV General Director Vu Van Hien briefed Mr Manh on the radio’s major achievements in 2007 and said VOV is restructuring its channels to ensure its efficient operation. Currently he said VOV has six channels with a total airtime of 218 hours/day. Among them, VOV4 broadcasts programmes in 11 ethnic languages to provide the Party guidelines and State policies to ethnic minority groups. VOV6 which broadcasts in 11 foreign languages aims to introduce the image of Vietnam, its land, culture and people to international friends. In addition to VOV Online newspaper and The Voice of Vietnam newspaper, VOV is preparing for a video image broadcasting channel to be launched late this year.

On the occasion of the traditional lunar New Year (Tet) Festival, Party General Secretary extended Tet greetings to all VOV leaders and staff.

Earlier, Mr Manh made a fact-finding tour of several VOV departments, including VOVNews.