-- With the adoption of the Supervision Law, standing committees of people's congresses at all levels well poised to oversee other state organs
Supervision is an important power of people's congresses and their standing committees endowed by the Constitution.
To exercise the power efficiently calls for a relevant law that helps make the practice standardized and institutionalized. In recent years, the standing committees of people's congresses at various levels have actively explored ways of overseeing other state organs and gained valuable experiences in this regard. However, there has been no uniform legislation to standardize the practice.
On August 27, 2006, the Standing Committee of the 10th National People's Congress (NPC), China's top legislature, adopted the Draft Supervision Law by an overwhelming majority. The Supervision Law, which has drawn attention from all sections of Chinese society, finally came out. The law is expected to further standardize and institutionalize the supervision power of the standing committees of people's congresses at various levels.
A pragmatic legislation
"This law is highly political, as it bears on China's political system and state structure," said Qiao Xiaoyang, a member of the NPC Standing Committee and Deputy Director of the NPC Legislative Affairs Committee at a press conference held by the General Affairs Office of the NPC Standing Committee on August 27, explaining why it took 20 years to formulate the Supervision Law.
"China's political system is the people's congress system instead of the system of ‘powers and balances." Under the precondition that people's congresses excise state power in a unified manner, there is a clear-cut division of administrative, judicial and procuratorial powers, or of the functions of the state organs exercising these powers. People's congresses supervise and at the same time support the governments, people's courts and people's procuratorates. They are expected to oversee the governments, courts and procuratorates but not take their place to exercise administrative, judicial and procuratorial powers. They are all state organs under the leadership of the Communist Party of China (CPC). Although they are charged with different responsibilities, they share the same missions and aims -- safeguarding the fundamental interests of the state and the people. This is a compelling feature and an advantage of China's political system. As far as the state structure is concerned, exercising the power of supervision involves the relations between people's congresses on the one hand and the governments, courts and procuratorates on the other hand and between the central state organs and local state organs. When formulating the Supervision Law, these relations should be properly handled so that it can precisely reflect our political system and state structure, correctly grasp the characteristics of the supervision of people's congresses and help make the most of this supervision. It took time to deal with these pressing issues. We had to accumulate experiences in practice before consensus could be reached." For these reasons, Qiao said, the NPC Standing Committee attached great importance to the Supervision Law. It carried out a series of research programs in a most prudent manner, committing tremendous, in-depth and scrupulous efforts. Thanks to these efforts, parties concerned gradually came to a common understanding of the supervisory role of people's congresses and the need to formulate a supervision law. "In addition to the initial deliberation by the Ninth NPC Standing Committee, the law went through another three rounds of deliberation by the current [10th] NPC Standing Committee before it was adopted today," Qiao said. "That's why it took such a long time."
Qiao stressed that being specifically targeted and highly pragmatic, the Supervision Law is expected to enhance the power of the standing committees of people's congresses to oversee the governments, courts and procuratorates. First, the law explicitly provides that the supervision of the standing committees of people's congresses mainly focuses on issues that concern the general goals of China's reform, development and stability and the people's immediate interests and draw wide attention from society. Second, the law stipulates that the main form of supervision is to hear and review reports of the governments, courts and procuratorates on some major issues designated by the standing committees of people's congresses in a planned manner every year. The law sets out six ways of determining the subjects of the reports, which shall cover issues such as those that have aroused the concern of many deputies to people's congresses or members of the standing committees of people's congresses and that are often raised in people's letters and calls. (In China, members of the public are allowed to write letters or make personal calls to government offices to make complaints or offer suggestions.)
Judging from the ways of determining the subjects of the reports, affairs that are subjected to supervision are all widespread concerns of the general public, such as issues concerning agriculture, the countryside and farmers, compulsory education, health care, environmental protection, work safety, social security and compensation for the relocated people in the work of the governments, and difficulties in enforcing court rulings, in gaining access to legal recourse and in claiming damages, extracting confession through torture, illegally prolonged detention, failures to rectify wrong rulings and judicial injustices in the work of the courts and procuratorates. The standing committees of people's congresses identify problems of common concern that have aroused strong public outrage and exercise fundamental, all-inclusive and legally binding supervision over them. At the same time, by putting the performance of the leading officials and problems in their work under scrutiny, they supervise the officials elected and appointed by people's congresses.
According to Qiao, the Supervision Law states that the governments, courts and procuratorates shall submit written work reports to the standing committees of people's congresses, detailing the actions they have taken in response to the latter's reviews of their performance. If necessary, the standing committees of people's congresses can adopt a resolution regarding a specific work report. The governments, courts or procuratorates concerned shall then file another report on the implementation of the resolution to the standing committees of people's congresses within the time frame set in the resolution. This means once they start a supervision process, the standing committees of people's congresses will stick to it until concrete results are achieved.
The Supervision Law provides that the supervision exercised by the standing committees of people's congresses as well as the implementation of their resolutions by the governments, courts and procuratorates shall be made known to the deputies to people's congresses and the general public. The supervision power of the standing committees of people's congresses is thus put under the scrutiny of the deputies to people's congresses and the whole society.
While explaining the provisions of the Supervision Law on the record keeping and authorizing of government regulations, Qiao said certain resolutions, decisions and directives issued by some local governments are unauthorized and illegal. For example, some local governments establish examination and approval procedures, charge fees and impose fines and coercive measures without authorization. As a result, the lawful rights of citizens, corporations and other organizations are limited or deprived of, or their obligations get exaggerated. In the spirit of addressing these problems, the Supervision Law provides that people's congresses and their standing committees at the county-level or above have the right to revoke inappropriate resolutions and decisions adopted by inferior people's congresses and their standing committees, and decisions and directives issued by the governments on par. The revoking procedures shall be specified by the standing committees of people's congresses of provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities directly under the Central Government, in accordance with relevant provisions of the Legislation Law.
Qiao stressed that the legal interpretations made by the Supreme People's Court and the Supreme People's Procuratorate shall be submitted to the NPC Standing Committee for examination and record衚eeping. Despite the crucial role the legal interpretations of the two agencies have played in guiding the application of laws in the legal practice, it should be admitted that some of the interpretations conflict with existing laws. By drawing on the provisions of the Legislation Law on the record keeping and examination of government regulations, lawmakers have made detailed provisions on the record keeping of the legal interpretations of the Supreme People's Court and the Supreme People's Procuratorate in the Supervision Law.
