Government/Politics - 276. page

Li Jinai, a member of the Central Military Commission and chief of the General Political Department of the PLA, published an article in the Party’s top publication Qiushi, reemphasizing the absolute leadership of the Party over the army. “The Party’s absolute control of the army is a fundamental principle of the army’s development and the eternal soul of the army.” Li slammed the voice of “nationalization of the military,” calling it an “attack on the fundamental principle and system of the Party’s absolute control of the army, with a goal of breaking the army away from the Party’s leadership, overthrowing the ruling status of the CCP, and overthrowing socialism with Chinese characteristics.” 

The idea of “nationalization of the military” calls for a western style relationship between the military and political party, where the army is led by the government instead of any political party. In recent years, it has been under heavy attack by official media.

Source: Qiushi, June 16, 2011
http://www.qstheory.cn/zxdk/2011/201112/201106/t20110615_87256.htm

On Monday, June 13, 2011, Mao Qunan, the Director of the Public Information Center of China’s Health Ministry, said at a conference themed “scientifically understanding food additives,” that media reports on food safety are increasingly worrying the public. The Ministry is establishing a media platform “to attack and contain the few media that are intentionally misleading the public by spreading wrong messages with ulterior motives.” “We will also establish a blacklist for a very few media reporters,” said Mao.

Source: Xinhua, June 15, 2011
http://news.xinhuanet.com/politics/2011-06/14/c_121530771.htm

On June 10, 2011, the Chinese Communist Party’s Organization Department of the Tibet Autonomous Region announced that CCP organizations have been established in each of the 5,200 administrative villages, a complete coverage of the region’s countryside. 

Xu Xuejiang, the deputy chief editor of Xinhua News Agency, wrote a commentary calling for beefing up the Chinese Communist Party’s loyalty education, in the run up to its 90th anniversary. 

According to the official China Central Television, by the end of 2012, 2 millions seats in the grassroots versions of the National People’s Congress, China’s rubber stamp legislature, will be chosen by 900 million voters in more than 2,000 counties and over 30,000 villages. 

On June 8, 2011, more than 40 Chinese online media’s senior executives participated in a “Beijing Online Media Tour of the Red Homeland.” They visited the historic places where the Chinese Communist Party grew and where it rioted against the ruling Kuomintang government in the 1920’s. One stop was the conference site of the CCP’s first National Congress in 1921 in Shanghai; another stop was the South Lake in Jiaxing City of Zhejiang Province, where the conference transferred into a boat to avoid arrests. The tour was organized by the Beijing city government’s Internet Propaganda Management Office (BIPMO) and the Beijing Association of Online Media, a self-claimed nonprofit organization headed by BIPMO’s deputy chief. 

In an article originally appearing in Chinese Social Science Today, a publication of the state think tank, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, the author, a former National People’s Congress standing committee member, proposed “cultural exportation" as a means to ensure cultural security. “In the past, people often paid attention to the influence that foreign cultures had on our cultural security in the process of ‘cultural importation,’ while overlooking the effect of ‘cultural exportation.’ Actually, the strategy of international promotion of our culture is not only a cultural strategy, but also a political strategy and an important initiative for China to vie for its voice in an era of globalization.” “It … also includes intangible culture values. The latter is … how to spread and unfold the mainstream culture values of today’s China, namely our socialist core value system and corresponding cultural, artistic, and social science products.” 

A government sponsored lawyer’s group has been established to “assist” lawyers without licenses in counties and cities. The Party’s United Front Work Department and the Ministry of Justice are sponsoring the "One Heart Legal Services Group,” which consists of 48 lawyers who are not Party members. According to Chen Xiqing, Deputy Chief of the United Front Work Department, establishing of the group is “an important measure to effectuate the rule of law, protect the less developed regions, and share the results of civilized society under the rule of law; to better "work the masses" under the new situation and maintain social harmony and stability; to build up the brand name of ‘one heart’ for the Party’s United Front Work Department and strengthen its political foundation; and to deepen the United Front Work on persons who have newly joined China’s social elite, and strengthen the importance of training and educating non-Party representatives.”