Government/Politics - 234. page

Meng Sutie, the Yunan Party Secretary of Politics and Law, announced that Yunnan would cease processing “cases of re-education through labor,” effective immediately. It has been common in China for the authorities to suppress opponents of the government by administratively sentencing them to forced labor camps as punishment. Meng, as Yunnan’s top law enforcement official, made the announcement on February 5, 2013, “Throughout the province, Yunnan will cease to approve and review all cases of re-education through labor for three alleged actions: endangering national security, constantly petitioning the authorities to redress officials’ abuse of power, and vilifying a leader’s image. The processing of cases based on other grounds will be suspended and will be handled in accordance with relevant laws; re-education through labor will not be used."
 
Source: Xinhua, February 7, 2013
http://news.xinhuanet.com/politics/2013-02/07/c_124332693.htm

China Review News published a commentary on the gap between the official GDP and the GDP as calculated by totaling the figures from local governments. According to the preliminary number that China’s National Bureau of Statistics released earlier, the domestic GDP for 2012 was 52 trillion yuan (about US$8.3 trillion). However, the total of the GDP figures that the local governments released was 5.76 trillion yuan (about $9.3 trillion), a discrepancy of 5.76 trillion yuan. The two figures have been inconsistent for several years.

According to the author, “the cause of the difference is that the local governments inflate GDP. Apart from statistical standards and technical reasons, the figure bears a direct relationship to how a number of local officials measure their performance. The most direct consequences of this inflated GDP are that it leads to economic data distortion and misguided macro-control policies; it adversely affects the moral integrity of the government and its attempt to build its credibility; and, eventually, it will hurt the healthy and steady development of the national economy and the people’s vital interests.”

Source: China Review News, February 5, 2013
http://www.chinareviewnews.com/doc/1024/3/0/3/102430386.html?coluid=123&kindid=0&docid=102430386&mdate=0205104515

On January 29, Xi Jinping gave a speech during an inspection tour of the armed police in Beijing. During his speech, he underscored the stability of the armed police and the importance of its absolute loyalty to the Communist Party of China. Xi stated, “The armed police forces should be united, secure and stable.” The armed police should follow the command of the leadership of the Communist Party. “Absolute loyalty to the Party is always the first and foremost political requirement for them. … [We] must ensure the absolute loyalty, absolute purity, and absolute reliability of the armed police forces.”

Source: Xinhua, January 29, 2013
http://news.xinhuanet.com/politics/2013-01/29/c_114545239.htm

Chinese authorities cut 40 minutes out of the American movie Cloud Atlas to be released in China on January 31, 2013. “Although in the Mainland version, the censors cut 40 minutes off as compared to the international version, the Mainland version of Cloud Atlas will not cause difficulties or problems for viewers. … The censors cut lines of words ruthlessly from the Mainland version. Most of the footage chopped off consists of dialogue.” Love scenes were also removed by the Chinese film censors.

[Editor’s note: Explicit love scenes, including between two same sex characters, were cut. Scenes of graphic violence, including a fatal gunshot and a man having his throat slit, remained. The film’s directors were not involved in the cuts.]  
Source: Jiefang Daily reprinted by Nanjing Daily, January 23, 2013
http://www.njdaily.cn/2013/0123/310120.shtml

Recently, Guangzhou local government officials announced their support for calls for government officials to make a public disclosure of their personal assets. Fan Songqing, a Guangzhou Committee member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference introduced a bill that would require public disclosure of personal assets. Fan was followed by Guangzhou Mayor Chen Jianhua, who announced at a press conference that, if financial disclosure is required, he will take the lead to disclose his personal assets.

Sources:
Xinhua, January 22, 2012
http://news.xinhuanet.com/local/2013-01/22/c_124265245.htm
Xinhua, January 21, 2012
http://news.xinhuanet.com/local/2013-01/21/c_124255691.htm
People’s Daily, January 24, 2012
http://politics.people.com.cn/n/2013/0124/c14562-20316254.html

Xinhua published a short news article with the title “Comrade Jiang Zemin Requested that the Party Central Committee List His Name among Other Senior (Retired) Leaders in the Party and State Leaders of that Rank.” The entire news article read, “A Reporter obtained information from a relevant party that, after the 18th National Party Congress, comrade Jiang Zemin made a request to the Party Central Committee that, from now on, his name should be listed among other senior (retired) leaders in the Party and state leaders of that rank. This reflects a Communist Party member’s integrity and open-mindedness.”

[Editor’s Note:
1. In China, the ranking order of top leaders is extremely important. It shows who has more power.
2. From this short news item, it is hard to tell if Jiang indeed made the request. One thing is likely to happen: Jiang’s ranking order will be lowered.]

Source: Xinhua, January 23, 2013
http://news.xinhuanet.com/politics/2013-01/23/c_124266293.htm

China Economic published a commentary stating that China has identified urbanization as a major solution for expanding domestic demand and enterprise development. The article argued, however, that the core of urbanization in China is to “urbanize people,” or to make farmers the same as or similar to city residents. The article quoted three scholars’ opinions. They argued that 50 percent of the total population in China now lives in cities, but only 35 percent of the total population have city Hukou – China’s unique household registration system which identifies a person according to his or her original area (e.g. from Beijing, Shanghai, or a rural village). This means that of the 700 million people who are identified as urban dwellers, 220 million of them are still labeled as farmers. These farmers are mainly the “immigrant farmers” and cannot enjoy the same social benefits, such as social security, employment, land ownership, housing, education, and so on, as city residents.

Source: China Economic Net, January 18, 2013
http://paper.ce.cn/jjrb/html/2013-01/18/content_141406.htm

Meng Jianzhu, Secretary of the Central Political and Law Commission, announced recently, at a meeting on national political and legal work, that China will abolish the “education through labor” system this year. Xinhua Net published the relevant news on the same day. However, the news report was removed that night. One week later, several labor camp bureaus claimed that they had not received any notification about labor camp reforms. Lawyer Zhou Ze believes that no agreement was reached on the issue due to the fact that different departments have different interests.  

Source: Radio Free Asia, January 14, 2013

http://www.rfa.org/mandarin/yataibaodao/yf-01142013161055.html