Legal upturn for local government

SHANGHAI: The number of failed lawsuits against local governments continued to decline last year because of a growing awareness of legal issues in administration as well as greater mediation by the courts, a senior judicial official said on Friday.

But analysts said the figure alone cannot justify the growing capability of law-based administration and that there needs to be more transparent supervision over judicial decisions to increase public credibility with administrative litigation.

The rate of government losses in administrative lawsuits in Shanghai dropped from 6.7 percent in 2008 to 5.6 percent last year, said Ying Yong, president of the Shanghai High People's Court, in his report to the annual municipal people's congress yesterday.