China is growing increasingly intolerant of mediocrity of its
public servants though corruption charges remain the major reason
why Chinese officials are dismissed.??
Since February, 2,390 officials in east China's Zhejiang
Province were chastised, warned or added to a misbehavior file,
and 94 were suspended or removed from their government jobs for
offenses such as chatting online, trading personal stocks and
playing computer games during office time as well as unjustified
delays in and neglect of works.
Chinese officials used to be secure in their jobs for life as
long as they weren't caught breaking the law. That is no longer
true.
Xie Aiming, head of Shaodong County in south China's Hunan
Province, had his name added to the official misconduct file on
November 12 for "failing to handle a situation satisfactorily" when
his subordinates refused to pay tolls and beat toll-collectors and
policemen in his presence in southwest China's Guangxi
Zhuang Autonomous Region.
Xie's anecdote attracted wide attention in China and triggered
off the general public's support for a national campaign aimed at
enhancing the quality of officeholders.
"Fighting against corruption is not enough for governments to
gain the recognition of the people," said Chen Guoquan, a professor
at the School of Public Administration of the Hangzhou-based Zhejiang University.
"Measures should also be taken to prevent various forms of power
abuse and administrative
mediocrity."
In order to better supervise government works, a hotline and an
email account were launched earlier this year by the Zhejiang
provincial government, inviting complaints about the misbehavior of
government officials.
Meanwhile, some 20,000 deputies to the People's Congress and
members of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference
(CPPCC) at various levels as well as members of noncommunist
parties were invited to become "social supervisors," obligated to
report government workers' failure in fulfilling their duties.
Media were also expected to play greater roles in watching out for
administrative
wrongs, said Xi Jinping, secretary of the Zhejiang Provincial
Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC).
"Government officials should be better informed of their duties
and stricter control be exerted over administrative power of the
government," said Lian Xiaoming, vice chairman of Zhejiang
Provincial Federation of Social Sciences, stressing China is now
becoming increasingly polarized and government workers should be
more skillful in handling the increasingly complex social
situations.
Five months ago, the government of Wanyuan City in southwest
China's Sichuan
Province forced local enterprises and institutions to buy
tickets to a government-sponsored concert at a total of 700,000
yuan (US$84,650).
Lin Lang, secretary of the CPC Committee of Wanyuan City,
recently received a serious warning, one of the CPC penalties on
underperformed Party members, from the Sichuan provincial
government for the coerced purchase. An official paper from the
provincial government criticized "wrong administrative concepts" of
the Wanyuan City for making a decision evoking extensive
dissatisfaction among the affected parties.
In September, a central CPC conference launched a decision on
enhancing the Party's ruling capacity and urged governments at all
levels to make decisions "scientifically, democratically and
lawfully."
"The Party should better serve the people. It's a principle that
the CPC must follow and always stick to," said Li Zhongjie, vice
director of the Party History Study Office of the CPC Central
Committee.
(Xinhua News Agency December 19, 2004)