China unveils anti-graft plan and warns task 'arduous'

The survival of China's ruling Communist Party rests on its ability to curb corruption, the government warned in a plan released on Monday that outlines the need to clean up sectors from land use to fiscal transfers.

The 2008-2012 anti-corruption plan says the situation in China is "grim and the tasks arduous" and in a departure from the Party's usual style, called for more public hearings and professional consultation to improve transparency.

"Resolutely punishing and effectively preventing corruption relates to whether the people support you or not and to the Party's life-and-death survival," said the report, published on the government's website (www.gov.cn).

Widespread graft in China is a major cause of public resentment and social unrest that the Party is at pains to curb, and has been blamed for a variety of the country's ills, such as poor enforcement of food and product standards and workplace safety regulations.

The Party has initiated several clean-up campaigns and in his annual state-of-the-nation report Premier Wen Jiabao stressed the need to curb graft. But with no meaningful checks on power, the country has had only limited success.

The report touches on various elements of the financial sector, calling for deepening reform of budget management and standardizing the system of fiscal transfers.

It also orders state-owned companies to create "legal, clean and democratic management" and says the heads of such enterprises must curb "wasteful spending" of government money.

The system of "internal Party supervision" should be perfected, the report said.

China's auditor has previously named several ministries for faking spending items to swindle funds, including its top economic planner, the National Development and Reform Commission, which it said transferred government funds for outside investment.

And the plan devoted several items to cleaning up the system governing land use, a sector of key importance as rural land is swallowed up for development and as lines blur between collective, state and private ownership.

The system of imposing levies on land use should be standardized and methods of giving compensation for land and resettlement perfected, the report said.

Earlier this month, China's audit office said city governments kept more than 70 percent of revenues from land sales off their books.

Those found guilty of corruption should be punished and no such behaviour should be condoned, the report advised.

In an accompanying commentary, the Communist Party mouthpiece, the People's Daily, lauded the government's efforts.

"In recent years, we have made visible results in the fight against corruption, but corruption is still very serious," it said. "Anti-corruption work should be held tightly in hand, and not allowed the slightest relaxation."