Audits play role in fighting corruption

National office uncovers more abuses of positions, power for financial gain

Audits have played a key role in fighting corruption and promoting the self-reform of the Communist Party of China by supervising economic power and revealing clues about major violations of discipline and law in the past year, the National Audit Office said on Tuesday.

From May 2021 to April this year, auditors found and transferred more than 300 pieces of information about major violations of Party discipline and laws to related authorities, involving more than 130 billion yuan ($19.4 billion) and over 3,000 people, data from an annual audit report showed.

Hou Kai, head of the National Audit Office, delivered the report on the central government's budget implementation for 2021 on Tuesday to the ongoing session of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, the country's top legislature, for review.

The audits found that there are increasingly prominent problems of officials being targeted by interest groups and there are more hidden and varied ways for officials to abuse their positions or authority for financial gains, the report said.

Corruption at the grassroots level and in areas related to people's livelihood has exacerbated the people's urgent problems and worries, it said.

Practicing the idea of people-centered development, the office said it has carried out auditing projects in areas closely related to people's livelihood, including employment, elderly care, medical care, housing, poverty alleviation and rural vitalization to ensure government funds have been properly used in such areas.

In the past year, the office audited more than 87,000 units nationwide, helping to increase revenue, cut expenditures and save losses totaling more than 380 billion yuan, data showed.

The office has issued an opinion on establishing and improving a long-term mechanism for rectifying problems discovered through auditing.

By April, problems found in the 2020 audit had been basically rectified, with more than 1,520 system procedures improved, and 8,300 people held accountable, it said.

Since September 2017, the office has been auditing the construction of venues for the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympic Games and the financial revenue and expenditure of the Beijing Winter Olympics Organizing Committee for five consecutive years. The audit has found a total of 549 problems, and by the end of 2021, they had been basically rectified, it said.