The public is being invited by the country's top procuratorate
to join in the fight against dereliction of duty and power abuse by
officials.
"Without the help of the public, we're unable to effectively
fight against duty dereliction and abuse of power," Wang Zhenchuan,
deputy procurator-general of the Supreme People's Procuratorate
(SPP), said at a teleconference in Beijing yesterday.
People are encouraged to report such cases to procuratorates at
all levels, and the top procuratorate has promised to protect the
informants, such as keeping their identities confidential.
The campaign started in 2003 and investigations have focused on
government officials and staff of the justice department who have
abused their power for private gain. Officials who have neglected
their duty and caused big economic losses have also been
targeted.
Wang said the effects of dereliction of duty are often more
harmful than those resulting from bribery. According to an SPP
investigation, a bribery case causes an average loss of 258,000
yuan (US$33,506), while one instance of dereliction of duty costs
2.85 million yuan (US$370,000).
The biggest case reported yesterday happened in 2005 in Sichuan Province - the former director of the
Chengdu Housing Fund Management Center Yang Canzhi caused a loss of
200 million yuan (US$26 million).
Yang's case is only one of the 29,351 cases that procuratorates
investigated since 2003. SPP figures show that they caused a direct
loss of 35.73 billion yuan (US$4.64 billion), and involved 35,011
officials.
However, Wang said the cases uncovered account for only a small
part of the total. "Many cases have been neglected, or even
dismissed, because many people do not realize the harm caused."
Some local officials try to impede investigations and seek
leniency for indicted officials because they consider dereliction
of duty simply as "a bad outcome generated by good intentions"
rather than a violation of law, he added.
Song Hansong, deputy director of the SPP's anti-dereliction
bureau, called for stiffer penalties for civil servants found
guilty, describing the current punishments as "too lenient."
For instance, the local court in north China's Shanxi Province in December handed down
sentences to 12 officials who had been found guilty of dereliction
of duty in a coalmine accident last May. The accident killed 56
miners, but the court ruled that three of the officials would not
have to face criminal punishment and put the remaining nine on
probation.
According to the Criminal Law, officials found guilty of
dereliction crimes can receive prison sentences of up to 10
years.
Song said many workplace accidents are directly related to
dereliction of duty and abuse of power.
(China Daily May 10, 2007)