By Tan HaoJun
Translated by Chen Shuling
The Disciplinary Inspection Commission of Guangdong Province announced that from January to August of the year, Party and government organizations members in Guangdong who went abroad on business were 60.4% less than that of the same period last year, and newly-purchased official vehicles were 90% less. Jiang Bin, member of Standing Committee of the Disciplinary Inspection Commission and Director of the Provincial Inspection Office emphasized that it was forbidden to release money and other properties disorderly with the excuse of the festivals. Whoever violated the rule would be dismissed from office at once, then punished according to the rules. Chinese Version>>
Nowadays, it's sometimes really hard to tell the ture meaning of such things as figures. Some figures look neither nice nor eye-catching, but very honest and quite trustworthy for reference while some figures are a little strange and it's hard to understand its meaning, although they appear nice and attractive.
According to the figures offered by the Disciplinary Inspection Commission, from January to August this year, the people of the province who went abroad on business were 60.4% less; newly-purchased official vehicles were 90% less; evening parties, exhibitions, ceremonies and forums which had been held were 91% less than that of last year. Meanwhile, 72 projects of new office buildings were stopped and 304 items of appraisal, standard reaching evaluation and commendation were cancelled, at the revocation rate of about 87%.
Certainly, these figures are not only nice but also true. However, the nice and true figures don’t necessarily show the real situation. Neither do they prove the substantial effects on controlling public funds for going abroad or purchasing vehicles. There are no means for the outside to know how much public funds are on earth used for going abroad or how many official vehicles are purchased every year. It’s also unknown how long such a control effect can keep and whether the old situation would happen again.
If the situation is in disorder and out of control, the so-called control result would only be some nice figures without much substantial effect. And if the old situation soon happens again after the control, it would be of no real value but providing some nice figures for next control.
So, except the figures themselves, the value of figures must be related with their 'surviving environment and condition'. If problems like controlling public funds for going abroad and purchasing vehicles were not related with the management and use of public funds, government organizations' work style improvement, government image establishment or corruption prevention and control, it would be very difficult to prove the function and the value of these figures.
Take the annual financial audit as an example. Frankly speaking, the audit departments are very serious in performance of duties. A lot of problems in violation of the financial discipline are found every year. However, it must be admitted that because of the large difference between the seriousness of audit and the standardization of behaviors, the public have many doubts about the function and effect of audit. Although the audit departments order the concerned units to make correction of problems which were found in the audit, but with the influence of vaious factors, the punishment doesn't help avoid future mistakes and there's no regulation about correction. Same problems still exist after the audit and such situations can always be seen. Then how should such audit be judged? What value would the audit achievement be of?
I'm not denying the achievements gained by concerned departments. The critical point is that behind the nice figures offered by each inspection and control, the repeated and recycled problems are always left to us. In some aspects, there even comes such situation that the more inspection and more frequent control, the more serious and more repeated problems. Then, does such figure achievement still worth praising? Shouldn't we make some more scientific and more rational analysis about these figures, instead of being intoxicated with these nice figures?
The public are full of hopes and expectations to all kinds of inspection and control not for the purpose of learning how many problems have been found or how many 'victories' have been gained but for preventing similar problems from recurrence through such inspection, control and rectification. If all the problems disappeared temporarily only to 'lie low until the wind blows over' and came back as soon as the 'blow' passed, people would doubt the credibility of government and the thought of concerned department's solution to problems.
So, for the govenment, in order to win the trust of the public and improve its image and position in people's minds, it has to put emphasis on the settlement of problems and the regulation of behaviors, and completely correct and regulate the behaviors which the public doesn't want to see instead of just telling people some nice figures which haven't much real meaning. As long as the problems are solved and the behaviors are regulated, even if the figures don't look nice, the public wouldn't have dissatisfaction or doubt about it.