China announced today the establishment of the National Bureau
of Corruption Prevention (NBCP).
"The establishment of the bureau is a major step taken by the
Chinese government to further promote corruption prevention," said
bureau head Ma Wen at a press conference.
Ma, who is also Minister of Supervision, said the bureau would
focus on supervising and regulating the use of power and adopt
effective measures to prevent the abuse of power.
She said the bureau would study ways to cut off corruption at
the roots, constantly improve corruption prevention systems, push
for the sound operation of these systems, and coordinate the
corruption prevention efforts of various departments.
The new bureau will report directly to the State Council.
"The bureau won't step in the investigation of individual cases
as it doesn't have the power," said Qu Wanxiang, deputy head of the
bureau.
Qu said the bureau has been assigned the task of pushing forward
transparency of government information at various levels, which he
said is the way to "prevent corruption at its root.”
The NBCP will also evaluate loopholes in new policies that may
give rise to corruption and study countermeasures, and push for
sharing information among the prosecutors, police, banks, and
courts and the NBCP.
"The NBCP staff will collect and analyze information from
sectors including banks, land use, medicine, and telecommunications
and share it with other departments," Qu said.
He said this is an important basic job for finding and exposing
corruption as early as possible, a deterrent to corruption
activities, and an effective way to prevent corruption.
The bureau is also tasked to inspect corruption prevention work
at various levels, conduct pilot projects, and develop a set of
standards to judge whether a department or an official is
clean.
Qu said the bureau will guide the anti-corruption work in
companies, public undertakings, and non-governmental organizations,
help trade associations to establish self-discipline systems and
mechanisms, prevent commercial bribes, and extend corruption
prevention work to rural organizations as well as urban
communities.
"Corruption not only happens among civil servants in government
departments, but also among employees in private sectors and other
organizations," he said.
The bureau will also engage in international cooperation and
international aid in corruption prevention, according to Qu.
The bureau will, under the framework of the United Nations
Convention Against Corruption, offer help to developing countries
on corruption prevention and work to win technical support and
other help from foreign countries and international organizations,
Qu said.
He said the bureau will learn from the anti-corruption
experience of foreign countries and would like to exchange
information with international organizations and other
countries.
A total of 97,260 officials were disciplined last year, more
than 80 percent of who had failed to carry out duties, taken
bribes, or violated the party's financial rules, according to the
Central Commission for Discipline Inspection of the Communist Party
of China.
Several high-profile officials fell in corruption scandals,
including the former head of the food and drug administration and
former party head of Shanghai.
(Xinhua News Agency September 13, 2007)
