Nearly 100,000 officials of the ruling Communist Party's
committees at provincial, municipal, county and township levels are
facing re-election in 2006-2007 period. Public opinion will become
the major measure for selecting the new CPC cadres.
The information was released by He
Guoqiang, Head of the Organization Department of the CPC
Central Committee at the on-going Fourth Session of the Tenth
National People's Congress (NPC).
The large-scale re-election of the CPC's local leading cadres,
which will set out an? important personnel foundation for the
17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC) to be
held in 2007, will adopt a new cadre appraisal system which focuses
on cadre's popularity with the people rather than their efforts to
pursue GDP growth.
In the past years GDP growth was the most important way of
appraising local cadres causing some of them to blindly pursue GDP
growth while failing to let ordinary people enjoy the benefits of
economic development. Some local governments even became saddled
with debt due to excessive economic expansion.
"The change of the cadre appraisal method demonstrates the
important shift of the work priority of the ruling Communist Party
and the government," said Gao Xinmin, professor of the Party School
of the CPC Central Committee He added, "The new cadre appraisal
system will bring far-reaching changes to local cadre's style of
work."
The new appraisal system will include such things as public
opinion polls, analysis of political achievements, face-to-face
discussions and comprehensive assessments, according to an official
from the Organization Department of the CPC Central Committee.
The new cadre appraisal system has been put into operation on a
trial basis in provinces and autonomous regions like
Zhejiang,
Sichuan and
Inner Mongolia. Up to now a total of 12,117 cadres have
participated in the public opinion poll.
Chen Lina, an NPC deputy and a Doctor at the Central Hospital of
the Lishui City, east China's Zhejiang Province, where the new
cadre appraisal system was put on trial, said "In the past ordinary
people were accustomed to listening and obeying leading cadre's
instructions but nowadays we have the right to 'a say' in the
selection of cadres".
During the reshuffle of the city's Party committee a public
opinion poll was conducted and the result, which was released to
the news media, brought about a change in the final candidate list
of major cadre posts.
Lou Yangsheng, NPC Deputy and Secretary of the Lishui Municipal
Committee of the CPC, said the new appraisal system forced cadres
to pay much more attention to the lives of ordinary people. And the
cadres, who were selected in line with the new appraisal method,
were better equipped to take care of ordinary people and capable of
dealing with complex social problems.
Song Fufan, Professor with the Party School of the CPC Central
Committee, said the new appraisal method showed full respect for
citizen's rights to understand, participate in political affairs,
to select officials and to contribute to governmental affairs. The
cadre appointment system had shifted away from the decision of a
small number of officials to something based on the views of a
majority of people.
Introducing public opinion as one of the important criteria for
cadre selection also helped fight corruption. In the past cadres
had sought connections with higher ranking officials and it has
been said that bribes were used to secure promotion. The new cadre
appraisal method will help tighten the public supervision over the
CPC cadre re-election.
(Xinhua News Agency March 8, 2006)