National audit office paves way for new public scrutiny measures

China's national auditing watchdog held a live online broadcast of its regular Party meeting Sunday, the first time a central government department has employed such means in an attempt to show the Party is becoming more open to the public.

The National Audit Office (NAO) held a quarterly study meeting among its key Party members Sunday afternoon, which was broadcast on People's Daily Online and the Party's news portal cpcnews.cn. In a move to step away from the style of previous meetings that were behind closed doors within the NAO, this session was open to the public with pictures, videos and all speeches published online and a section created for Web users to leave comments.

Fewer than 100 officials and employees from the NAO and its branches nationwide attended the quarterly meeting. Eight NAO officials shared their thoughts on the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC), which concluded on November 14, and mapped out plans for the authority's future work.

According to NAO director Liu Jiayi, highlights of the office's work include the implementation of China's major economic policies, and the exposure of corruption, malpractice and economic crimes. Sun Baohou, NAO's general auditor, said at the meeting that the office should enhance auditing of officials' financial track records.

Some Web users applauded the online broadcast while some raised questions concerning what measures the NAO will take in the next decade to ease corruption and bribery, and how exactly the authority plans to improve the work of its financial audits of local government officials.

The live broadcast will help central government departments work better under public supervision, according to the Work Committee of the Central Government Departments of the CPC Central Committee. Some other departments, including the State Administration of Work Safety, will hold similar broadcasts of their Party study meetings in the near future, a publicity officer with the committee told Xinhua.

The CPC Central Committee issued a guideline in 2010 to promote openness within Party affairs. Public openness is better implemented at the local level, said Lin Zhe, a professor with the Party School of the CPC Central Committee.