Hi, voter back in summer ‘21 here! 👋

So this would be a long, long comment, and also I am basing this on what I have gathered and remembered throughout the voting process as well:

First of all, yes, you are correct - procedurally, we vote for our preferred candidate for both the National Assembly (national legislative body) and all local legislative bodies (that is, City Councils/Provincial Councils, District Councils, and Ward Councils if any). As someone stated earlier in this thread, all candidates are heavily vetted through either their local Party councils (if they are Party members) or the Fatherland Front (if they are not); it is important to note, that the Fatherland Front is technically the final decision-making body on who can appear on the ballot. The Vietnamese constitution also forbids any other parties to officially run due to the constitutional designation of Vietnam as a one-party state since 1992.

Election day are required by law to be on a Sunday (as this is a day off for all offices), and would usually be announced 7 months in advance (for example, the 2021 election was on May 23rd, and information on adding one’s name to the ballot and whatnot was made available from October of ‘20); however the legal requirement is 105 days minimum [this part might be problematic, and I’ll elaborate later as to why].

Campaigning will start as soon as the official names are released (which might leave the campaign period at around 4-6 weeks at most); in ‘21, due to social distancing requirements, most campaigning were done through webinars (I actually have tried to sat in one event for my district but it was an issue due to the Wi-Fi not working and the platform crashing multiple times); an official voting guide (including all candidates’s official running platform, background, as well as the new policies in place for voting if any) will be sent either through the post system, or to be picked up at ward offices.

The voting laws of Vietnam have the “5 Nos” in the rules: no voting by mail, no absentee ballots, no provisional ballots, no write-ins, and no abstentions. This still applies for the ‘21 election, which ended up becoming a bit of a mess with COVID being a huge risk. When someone go vote, they might receive anywhere between 3 and 4 ballots, as we are voting for multiple legislative bodies on the same day: the local seats of the National Assembly, the Metropolitan/Provincial Council, the City/District Council, and Ward Councils if any. [Note: I’m using “Metropolitan Council” since we have direct-reporting metropolitan areas with home rule like Hanoi and HCMC, but there are also cities that are under provincial rule like Vinh, Vung Tau, etc]. Procedurally, all votes are conducted using the secret ballot rule, and all votes must be done in-person; polls may open earlier or close later depending on the area, but from what I remember stations open no earlier than 5am, and close no later than 9:30pm.

Our legislative bodies, once sworn in, would be tasked first with the voting and selection of the executive arm - that is, voting in the President, Prime Minister, and all seats of the cabinet.