A total of 24 senior officials from the influential Communist Youth League (CYL) from southwest China have been removed from their posts for failing to comply with government standards, in a move that highlights Beijing’s tightening grip on league and other government organs in recent months.
In the latest campaign by the CYL's Chongqing branch evaluating the performance of its 57,512 branch secretaries, 24 secretaries--comprising of college students, employees, teachers and village officials--were relieved of their titles for "lacking a sense of responsibility and a spirit of service," the state-owned Global Times newspaper reported on Monday.
Zhou Bo, secretary of Chongqing's municipal youth league committee, said that more than 96 percent of the 35,607 secretaries in country leagues scored a "satisfactory" rating from fellow league members, while 98 percent of those in enterprises and nearly 95 percent in schools were deemed "satisfactory."
A new batch of secretaries has already been elected to replace those removed, the report said.
Zhi Zhenfeng, an associate research fellow-in-law at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said that the Chongqing CYL has set a good example in promoting democracy in organizations under China's ruling Communist Party.
"This campaign should be promoted among other Party and government organs," said Zhi.
However, Zhi pointed out the lack of contribution by ordinary citizens in the campaign as the evaluation was open only to CYL members.
Zhang Xien, a professor of political science at Shandong University, questioned the campaign's credibility.
"Is there any black-box operation behind the campaign?" Zhang told the Global Times in an interview. "Is it fair to remove these secretaries' titles only on account of one single evaluation?"
In 2010, authorities from the Ningxia in north-central China tested out a democratic evaluation system in assessing county governments in the region. A total of 174 teams were sent out to villages to audit local accounts and interview villages on how government subsidies were distributed.
The campaign resulted in 44 officials being dismissed and 49 others receiving punishment.