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China Tightened Control of Party Officials Making Public Speeches and Comments Online

Officials have tightened control of party officials who make public speeches and comments online. In June, the Ministry of Publicity, the Ministry of Organization and the Office of the Central Leading Group for Cyberspace Affairs issued a joint statement which required that the party officials must follow “political order while they are online.” They must “safeguard the authority of the central administration. … They are prohibited from publishing improper comments and political rumors. … They are not to visit illegal and anti-China websites.” Below are a few incidents reported recently in which party officials were fired for policy violations.

According to an article VOA published, on July 25, Shi Jiepeng, an associate professor with Beijing Normal University, was fired for “publishing false statements against main stream values on the Internet. This was unfit for a professor to do. It crossed the ideology red line, violated the political order and caused serious damage to the reputation of the university.”

An article in Singtao reported that Li Mohai, a professor from the Shandong Institute of Business and Technology and the party school of Zhifu District of Shandong Province was put on probation and dismissed from the party school for posting comments online criticizing a number of social problems on the Internet.

In January of this year a professor from Shandong University of Architecture and Engineering was fired for posting negative comments about Mao Zedong online.

Source:
1. Voice of America, August 4, 2017
https://www.voachinese.com/a/voanews-20170804-shi-jiepeng/3972326.html
2. Singtao, August 1, 2017
https://www.singtaousa.com/sf/9-中國/225447-批評極權+指責不公+遭到舉報++斥網友愛國奴相+黨校教授被停職/