Party's top corruption watchdog to step up graft-busters' training

The Communist Party's top corruption watchdog was preparing to strengthen training for graft-busters at county and city levels next year to monitor better how the government uses public funds, the Jinan Daily reported yesterday.

Guangdong's graft-busters have also pledged to step up their game next year with a new initiative to identify and fix 'weak links' in the chain. The party's Central Commission for Discipline Inspection recently announced a national framework to train anti-graft officers until 2013. At city and district level, they would attend on-the-job training for at least three months before the programme ends, the report said.

They will receive intensive training designed to improve the graft-fighting standard nationwide. Newly appointed city-level anti-graft officers must attend the training within a year of taking up their posts. Graft-busters for state-owned enterprises will also study how to strengthen investigative skills to prevent and handle commercial corruption cases.

The new programme will also organise four training sessions for anti-graft officers stationed in the western region. Two of them would be designed for those appointed in cities populated by ethnic minorities, the report said.

The new round of training extends a programme designed for 2,000 secretaries of county-level commissions for discipline inspection. A total of 780 corruption fighters at that level, the first group out of 2,000, were called to Beijing in May for an eight-day course at the Central Communist Party School on stemming corruption in local government.

They are being taught skills such as how to handle petitioners and large riots, which are often rooted in anger over corruption - an issue largely ignored by local governments and party committees. The gathering followed similar meetings for county-level party bosses last year and police chiefs in February.