China's campaign against extravagance and undesirable work styles has seen about 262,600 officials punished in the past five years, according to a statement from the discipline inspection agency.
A week after the release of the figure by the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI), President Xi Jinping issued an instruction in response to a Xinhua article about new forms of misconduct, once again sounding the alarm about officials' work styles.
Xi, also general secretary of the CPC Central Committee, stressed in the instruction made public Monday that the fight against undesirable work styles -- including formalities for formalities' sake, bureaucratism, hedonism, and extravagance -- must not stop.
The Xinhua article pointed out that although the fight against undesirable work styles has yielded major achievements, relevant problems still linger as some officials found new ways to dodge discipline.
The new forms of misconduct are, in their nature, old problems, Xi said.
During the past five years, great efforts have been made by the party to rectify hedonism and extravagance, but whenever there is a policy, there are countermeasures.
Rather than holding banquets at restaurants, some officials wine and dine at the public's expense at government agency cafeterias and training centers, or at private apartments. Travel on public funds still happens in the name of team building or recuperation.
The practice of formalities for formalities' sake and bureaucratism remain the most severe problems, according to the CCDI. It pointed out that certain officials seek excessive publicity but lack solid practice and implementation.
The CCDI said that some party and governmental agencies show false concern for the public without doing practical work to serve the people. For example, some public service hotlines are never answered.
There are also problems such as local governments working for the attention of higher officials, rather than for the people's satisfaction, busying themselves with meetings instead of action.
Nearly 38,000 cases were investigated for the violation of the party's eight-point frugality code from January to October this year.
Over 9,600 cases, accounting for 25.5 percent of the total, involve violations that occurred in 2017, indicating that the fight has not deterred all the officials.
The agency asked all party members to firm their ideals and faith, and party organizations at all levels to take concrete measures to rectify problems of formalities for formalities' sake and bureaucratism, especially in targeted poverty alleviation, pollution prevention and improving people's livelihood.
According to the CCDI, supervision shall be tightened, and violators shall be reminded, criticized, admonished, demoted, removed from office and exposed.
A revised regulation on official vehicle use and a regulation on office occupancy for CPC and governmental agencies were put into operation on Dec. 5, 2017.
Issued by the general offices of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council, the regulations called for governmental agencies to take the lead in using new energy vehicles and creating a reasonable allocation of offices to build a clean and economical government.
The two regulations stress increased supervision over CPC and governmental agencies, said an official of the National Government Offices Administration.
