Chinese officials slammed for flushing US$31,000 from poverty reduction fund down the toilet
Communist Party mouthpiece criticises village cadres for failing to understand the needs of the people
Local government officials in a rural part of China have been criticised by state media for failing to serve the needs of ordinary people after it was revealed they had spent more than 200,000 yuan (US$31,000) building a “luxury” public toilet in an impoverished village.
Chinese President Xi Jinping has made improving living standards one of the priorities of his second term in office, setting the goal of eradicating rural poverty by 2020.
Despite his lofty ambitions, a commentary in Monday’s People’s Daily, the official mouthpiece of the ruling Communist Party, accused officials in the unidentified village of missing the point.
“On a recent field trip, I discovered that new problems have emerged in the drive to improve infrastructure and facilities in rural villages,” Zhang Zhifeng said.
“In a poor village I went to, there was a well-decorated public toilet that the village officials told me cost 200,000 yuan, and that the money had come from the government’s poverty alleviation fund.”