Audit Office conference the first to go live online

The National Audit Office on Sunday became the first central government department to broadcast its Party committee's conference live online.

The conference, held at the Office's training center in the northern Beijing suburb of Huairou, was broadcast on cpc.people.com.cn.

The move came after Hu Jintao, then-Party chief, said at the opening of the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China on Nov 8 that Party organizations should become more transparent to the public and be supervised by the people.

The theme of the audit office's two-hour conference was implementing the spirit of the Party congress, which ended last week and elected the new leadership. Eight audit officials introduced their working plans at the conference.

Liu Jiayi, head of the audit office, vowed to fight corruption by closely monitoring government projects and public funds.

More than 130 Internet users commented on and asked questions about audit work when the conference was broadcast.

One netizen commented: "I hope the audit authorities can play a more important role in fighting corruption. Many hidden corruption activities, such as bribing officials with antiques, are difficult for the Party's supervisory authorities to monitor."

Questions asked on the Web were not answered immediately, as there was no interactive process during the conference, but Liu said the audit office attaches great importance to Web users' questions and suggestions.

"Netizens showed great interest toward the online live broadcast of the conference, and we will collect their opinions and suggestions to improve the audit work in the future," he said.

More central government agencies will broadcast their Party activities live online, a publicity official from the Work Committee of Central Government Departments under the CPC Central Committee told Xinhua News Agency. The committee supervises Party organizations in these departments.

The State Administration of Work Safety will soon be the next to do so, the official said.

Liu Xiaoying, a professor in media research at the Communication University of China, said the online broadcast shows the government's determination to promote transparency.

He said the audit office's conference may not be very interesting to some netizens, but is a sign of the government's efforts to get closer to the public.

Liu said that with the number of China's Internet users passing 538 million as of June, it has become vital for the government to communicate with the people through websites.

anbaijie@chinadaily.com.cn