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The institutional reform plan of the State Council launched at the two sessions of China this time has attracted the attention of the outside world. It is surprisingly mentioned that the State Letters and Calls Bureau will be adjusted to an institution directly under the State Council. On Friday (March 10), the First Session of the 14th National People’s Congress voted to pass the decision on the institutional reform plan of the State Council and approved the plan.
The State Bureau of Letters and Calls is an agency of the State Council in charge of receiving letters and petitions from the public, but it has been criticized in the past for not playing its due role. This round of organizational adjustments will upgrade the bureau, and this point in time has attracted special attention.
Some analysts believe that this measure is related to several rounds of large-scale protests that broke out in China in recent months, but other voices believe that this reform will not bring about any substantial changes. .
Related to increased protests?
On March 7, Xiao Jie, State Councilor and Secretary-General of the State Council, delivered a speech at the National People’s Congress: “Implement the Party’s mass line in the new era, strengthen and improve the work of people’s letters and visits, and better safeguard the fundamental interests of the people. The national bureau managed by the General Office of the State Council has been adjusted to an institution directly under the State Council.”
In China, the State Bureau of Letters and Calls is responsible for handling letters and calls from the domestic masses, foreign people, legal persons and other organizations to the Party Central Committee, the State Council and leaders through the letter and visit channels, and receiving visits, etc.
Wu Muluan, an associate professor at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore, pointed out to BBC Chinese that the State Letters and Calls Bureau is a public opinion collector for the Chinese party and government.
He believes that the transfer of the State Letters and Calls Bureau to an institution directly under the State Council is to upgrade the status of this institution. In the future, the director of the State Letters and Calls Bureau can directly report to the Prime Minister, and the Prime Minister can better understand the following situation.
Since last year, there have been more and more large-scale protests and demonstrations in China.
After the Urumqi fire broke out, protests against the new crown epidemic prevention and control spread across China. This is a rare expression of anger in mainland China towards the country.
At the end of last year, thousands of people in China gathered on the streets, holding blank papers at night to oppose China’s strict new crown eradication policy. Protests spread to Beijing, Shanghai, and Chengdu. After the protest, many people have been arrested.
On February 8 and 15, two protests mainly erupted among retirees in Wuhan City, Hubei Province. The reason is that the medical insurance reform carried out in Wuhan has reduced the monthly payment of the insured person’s personal medical insurance account from more than 200 yuan to more than 80 yuan. The retired elderly thought that this move harmed their own interests, so they took to the streets to protest.
Wu Muluan believes that the promotion of the State Bureau of Letters and Calls is related to the recent protests and demonstrations, which means that the Chinese government pays more attention to these issues.
“In the past, the State Bureau for Letters and Calls was under the General Office of the State Council, and the director could not report directly to the Prime Minister. Now, the director of the State Bureau for Letters and Calls can report directly to the Prime Minister. From the perspective of the Prime Minister, he will know more about the following situation. For the Communist Party, collecting information It’s better than before,” Wu Muluan said.
Elderly people protest cuts in personal medical insurance accounts in large-scale rally in Wuhan
Superficial articles?
The Chinese media Caixin quoted Zhai Xiaoyi, a professor at the School of Politics and Public Administration of China University of Political Science and Law and a former member of the Expert Committee on Complaints and Calls, as saying that the adjustment will bring about three major changes: first, the status of the institution will rise; The comprehensive coordination ability relying on the State Council will face a test, but the joint meeting system for petition work proposed in the “Regulations on Petition Work” can also play a coordinating role; third, upgrading to an institution directly under the State Council means that the party and the government have regarded petition as a A specialized business to increase the professionalism of petition work.
But Chinese netizens have mixed reactions. Weibo netizen “Mr. Mingde” said: “I sincerely hope that the upgraded Letters and Calls Bureau can grow teeth, less the “ball-playing letters and calls” of more than ten years ago, and actually solve problems for the common people, and lead the masses in the new era. route.”
Weibo netizen “Fengqiao” said: “I met the leader and didn’t solve the problem. I wrote it down in my notebook, but I didn’t remember it in my heart. The problem is still a problem.”
People who have suffered injustice in common social issues such as land requisition and house demolition hope to seek help from the higher-level government through the petition system, but they are often blocked or suppressed by the local government. The government mainly sets up detention facilities in some small hotels in big cities such as Beijing, as a turnaround point for detaining and transferring “leapfrog petitioners”.
The non-governmental organization Human Rights Watch has published several reports saying that Chinese petitioners face serious threats of violence.
In 2011, the organization published a report exposing China’s “black jails”, saying that since 2003, a large number of citizens have been imprisoned in secret illegal detention facilities commonly known as “black jails” during petitioning. for days or months.
The report notes that these facilities are primarily used by local and provincial officials to detain petitioners who have traveled to Beijing and various provincial capitals to seek judicial redress if their complaints have not been resolved by lower levels of government.
Xia Ming, a political science professor at the City University of New York, believes that the main problem with China’s petition system is that petitions are not allowed, and that petitions are not allowed to leapfrog. With China’s current control model, many petitions will be intercepted, and petitions at the central level are meaningless.
He does not believe that this reform is valuable and will bring about any changes to China’s petition system. “The petition work at the central level is superficial. It hangs an empty sign and draws a cake for the common people, so that they can look far away at Tiananmen Square in Beijing.” , but practically untouchable to them.”
“If anyone says, I’m going to appeal to the State Bureau for Letters and Calls, the local governments will immediately stop you.” Xia Ming pointed out to the BBC that in today’s China, any gathering will be immediately characterized as provoking trouble or subverting the country. regime.