Beijing August 19: China’s ruling Communist Party has told local officials to meet every month with people upset with what they see as local injustices in a bid to stop them from traveling to Beijing to petition the central government.
It is the first time the highest levels of the party have issued such a proposal for dealing with the issue.
Petitioners — mostly from China’s vast, impoverished countryside — routinely flock to the capital by the tens of thousands to air complaints after their local governments ignore them. The system, which has its roots in China’s imperial past when people petitioned the emperor, is considered inefficient with only a very small percentage of cases ever resolved.
Petitioners in recent years have become bolder in seeking new means to get their voices heard, including staging protests in central Beijing that often embarrass the authorities. Many were cleared out before the start of the Olympic Games last August.
Complaints include land grabs by local officials, miscarriages of justice, and stories of being beaten at the hands of local police and summarily detained. Many return year after year, becoming symbols of the failure of China’s legal system, which remains under control of the Communist Party.
The official Xinhua News Agency said Wednesday that the inability of the current system to address the petitioners’ cases has marred the public’s perception of justice.
To rectify this, the Communist Party will send legal officials to visit provinces and other areas with a high number of petitioners who come to Beijing and will accept cases on the spot, Xinhua reported.
Important officials from local politics and law committees in every province, city and county have been told to set aside one day a month to meet with petitioners, it said. Government Web sites should also receive petitions online and they should be solved within 60 days, Xinhua said.
“Problems can be solved without coming to Beijing,” Zhou Benshun, secretary-general of the Political and Legislative Affairs Committee that drafted the proposal, was quoted as saying earlier this month.
But the proposal also said that people who have had their cases heard locally but repeatedly come to Beijing to petition will have their cases terminated, Xinhua said.
Officials from Beijing will regularly visit the provinces to review cases to check for any legal abuses, the report said. It is common now for local governments to ignore court decisions against them — an action that also drives petitioners to Beijing to seek redress.
Zhou was quoted as saying government officials should handle public complaints carefully to maintain social harmony and stability ahead of the 60th anniversary of the People’s Republic of China — an important event for the leadership. Beijing has tightened security in numerous areas ahead of the event.
–Agencies