Discipline inspector warns of misbehavior ahead of holiday

BEIJING - A senior discipline inspector on Tuesday warned of possible misbehavior among officials ahead of the International Labor Day holiday.

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The upcoming May 1st holiday is a critical time to watch out for and prevent some officials from picking up bad habits again, said Li Yufu, deputy chief of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI) of the Communist Party of China (CPC), in an interview with Xinhua.

Misbehavior is more secretive now, such as spending public money on lavish feasts, private tours and luxury gifts in disguise of proper expenses, Li said.

Some officials frequent more private clubs instead of ordinary hotels and restaurants to avoid supervision. Some continue accepting gifts and money though they have stopped hosting feasts on occasions such as wedding, birthday parties and funerals, according to Li.

Gift cards distributed by online shopping sites also make gift giving more undetectable, he said.

The CPC has been carrying out a large-scale campaign against harmful working practices such as bureaucracy, formalism and extravagance since the current leadership took office in late 2012.

Li noted that a handful of party and government officials are still not fully aware of the severity and persistence of the campaign.

"They still think they can lay low for a while and do what they used to after the wind blows the other way," Li said. "They lack the incentive to discipline and improve themselves."

Different areas and departments have carried out the campaign in different ways, he said, adding that some are very effective and the others are superficial.

"These problems suggest that the anti-decadence battle will not be won with a single strike. We should keep the momentum till the work is done," he said.

Li stressed that party discipline inspectors should work harder to expose and punish misbehaving officials and inspection agencies at different levels should improve coordination.

Discipline agencies will also adopt zero tolerance of malpractice of their own staff and never cover up nor harbor misbehaving ones, he said.

The agencies welcome tip-offs from the public and media and will take their information seriously, he said.

The CCDI will continue publicizing officials violating Party rules on its website weekly, according to Li.

Since the CPC leadership issued an eight-point anti-bureaucracy and formalism rules in December 2012, 42,666 people had been punished nationwide by the end of March.