People's Daily:

Mr. Yuan mentioned several times the need to preserve the "red roots." We all know that Nanhu Lake in Jiaxing, Zhejiang province, is the birthplace of the CPC. Nowadays, Zhejiang has proposed stepping up the building of an integrated intelligent governance system guided by Party building. Can you elaborate on that? Thank you. 

Yuan Jiajun:

Thank you for your question. The "red roots" is indeed a distinct feature of Zhejiang, where the "red boat" of revolution set sail. When visiting the sites of the first National Congress of the CPC in Shanghai and the site of the "red boat" in Jiaxing, General Secretary Xi Jinping said, "this is where the roots of the Party are." Therefore, we call them the "red roots." During the important centenary of the founding of the CPC, Zhejiang is responsible for undertaking the task of preserving the "red roots." As the inheritor and protector of the "red roots," Zhejiang will strengthen the overall Party leadership and Party building, and build an integrated intelligent governance system guided by Party building, to ensure that the high-quality Party building leads high-quality development, and showcases that the 100-year Party is in its prime through the Party leadership of Zhejiang. 

Specifically, we will promote the integrated intelligent governance guided by Party building from the three perspectives of system, governance and intelligence. 

First, in terms of system, there are two keywords. The first is enhancing the overall Party leadership. We will improve the leading and working mechanisms, working structures and systems in which the Party provides overall leadership and coordinates the efforts of all involved. We will consolidate the organizational system that allows communication between higher and lower levels and ensure the work is carried out in a firm manner, and enhance Party building in all sectors and stages, to promote the overall Party leadership in urban and rural areas, and primary level areas.

The second is to build a mechanism for constantly improving the Party leadership according to the lists of issues. The Party leadership should keep abreast of the times. We should make full use of the lists of issues, and focus on solving problems, meeting targets and achieving results. We have seven lists of issues, including major issues in inspections, supervision and auditing. For example, a new round of central inspections was just completed. Other examples include the supervision of the State Council, the central supervision of environmental protection, and annual auditing at the national level. Other lists of issues are related to major security, production safety, natural disasters, major online public opinion, and major public complaints. We and other functional departments sorted through the problems exposed in the work and formulated the seven lists of issues. When reporting their work, the Party organizations should refer to the seven lists of issues rather than merely stating their work achievements, to examine their Party building and Party leadership. If their work is done well, there will be fewer problems and no major problems. Through advancing Party building by solving problems and referring to the seven lists of issues, we will foster an innovative and hard-working atmosphere that features Party building as the lead, integrated intelligent governance, and "practicing values of loyalty and honesty, and daring to break through difficulties."

Second, in terms of governance, we have two key phrases. The first is, "striving to be advanced and creating excellence." Party-building means to motivate the spirit of Party officials of all levels, cultivate their sense of responsibility and foster their ability to shoulder responsibility. We should continue to cultivate the team culture which stresses pioneering spirit, pragmatism, and achieving good outcomes through scientific measure. Institutions should be established to encourage pioneering spirit in such fields as making breakthrough in reform, raising quality in service sector and risk prevention and control. We also need to improve the virtuous interactive mechanism of "two responsibilities," under which officials take on their work responsibilities, and the Party organizations stand behind those who live up to their responsibilities. We have improved the performance assessment and evaluation system for officials and strengthened closed cycle of management for listed problems so as to give full play to the enthusiasm and creativity of Party members and officials. For example, we convene a quarterly meeting attended by county-level Party secretaries from all the 90 counties, cities and districts in the province, focusing on a certain topic every meeting. At each meeting, ten Party secretaries, who have made achievements during the period, will share their experience in a bid to motivate more and more officials to seek excellence in their performances.

The second key phrase is, "be both strict and caring." One must be strict when leading a team and so is our Party-building. We need to strengthen the supervision at every point in the process, establish a sound mechanism for procedure-based exercise of power, in particular, continue our efforts to address the practice of formalities for formalities' sake, bureaucratism, hedonism, and extravagance. We need to strictly fight against corruption and take coordinated actions to make Party members and officials not dare, not able, and not want to commit corruption. Meanwhile, we also need to improve the decision-making system relating to major decisions, appointment and dismissal of key officials, major project arrangements and the use of large amounts of funds. We have taken the lead in exploring the introduction of synchronous economic responsibility audits of chief Party and government officials at the city and county levels so as to encourage officials to get on honestly with their jobs. Meanwhile, we need to improve the mechanisms to allow for and address errors, clarify facts and provide protection for officials and ensure that they are free from unnecessary restrictions and excessive burdens. In this way, those who work hard can be provided with more opportunities and a wider stage.

Third, in terms of smart. As we are entering a new development stage, in particular the digital era, we'll focus on two more key phrases. The first is, "digital empowerment." Any organization or relevant people will have to excise digital means during Party-building, adopting digital thinking, digital cognition and digital technology. We will use big data to conduct comprehensive studies and analysis. Therefore, we'll have a complete and accurate evaluation for organizations and officials' performance.

The second key phrase is "capability of driving modernization." We have embarked on a new journey of modernization, but modernization is first and foremost to achieve modernity of people, especially the modernity of Party members and officials, which is also a main concern of our work. During this year's elections at the city, county and township levels, we will view the ability to apply digital reform as an important criterion when evaluating officials' ability to study and advance modernization, so as to create pressure for them to broaden vision, cultivate innovative way of thinking and improve their scientific ability. In this way, we will enhance officials' capacity for execution, build their abilities to advance the modernization drive. Thank you.