Pham Van Thuy, Vice Chairman of Son La and head of the northern highlands province’s 2018 national high school exam organization team, has received an official warning from the Central Inspection Committee, the Party's top watchdog, at a three-day meeting that closed in Hanoi last Friday.

The committee said in a statement Monday that it has also urged the Party's decision-making Politburo and the Secretariat of the Party Central Committee to take disciplinary action against Hoang Tien Duc, director of the Son La Department of Education and Training.

Both officials allowed ‘serious violations’ in the national exam fraud that shocked the nation last year, the committee said.

It also reprimanded Cam Ngoc Minh, former Chairman of Son La Province, for his culpability in the case.

The committee concluded that the Standing Committee of Son La’s Party unit had committed several serious violations.

It had violated the principle of democratic centralism, broken working regulations, and been negligent in leading, managing, inspecting and supervising, leading to violations in organizing the 2018 national high school exam in Son La Province.

Their violations resulted in serious consequences, badly affected the reputation of the Vietnam’s education sector and sparked outrage from the public, the committee said.

The Standing Committee of Son La’s Party unit was asked to learn from the experience and take measures to avoid mistakes in the future.

The exam fraud was first discovered after the Ministry of Education and Training released the official test results of all candidates nationwide on July 11.

Son La was among a number of northern mountainous provinces, including neighboring Ha Giang and Hoa Binh with unusually better results, triggering public suspicion.

New reports from the ministries of Public Security, and Education and Training in March this year reaffirmed that 44 candidates from Son La had their exam results altered.

Prosecutors in Son La have so far charged eight provincial officials with "abuse of power or position in performance of official duties."