The CPC has decided to expand the pilot project of practicing a permanent tenure of office for the Party congresses across the country to obtain more successful experience, according to some authoritative analysts inside the Party.

This is an important and new move toward improving the Party's congressional system and expanding intra-Party democracy, said the analysts.

In his report to the Party's 17th National Congress which concluded in Beijing on October 21, Party Chief Hu Jintao said that the Communist Party would improve its congress system by adopting a tenure system for the congress delegates on a trial basis in selected counties (cities, districts).

The new system will be conducive to the maintenance of the CPC's status as the ruling party, said Zhang Xiaoyan, dean of Teaching & Research Section of the Party School of the CPC Central Committee.

The core of the new system is to identify Party members as subjects of intra-democracy and maintain their dominant status inside the Party, she said.

The Party delegates should be empowered with the right to supervise Party organizations and leading cadres; they should also have the right to recommend, elect and assess Party cadres; to ask the presidium of Party congresses or relative Party organizations to explain hot issues of concern to Party members; and to put forward proposals for dismissing the Party officials who have violated Party disciplines and laws.

The Party Constitution stipulates that "the highest leading body of the Party is the National Congress and the Central Committee elected by it.' To define terms of office for both the congress delegates and the congress itself represents the full implementation of the Party Constitution.

"Establishing terms of office for the Party congress will make it the Party's highest policy-making and supervisory organs. The system should be explored from three standpoints: structure, forms and content,' said Liu Yunxian, a professor of the Scientific Research Department of the China Executive Leadership Academy Pudong (CELAP).

When the Party's national congress is not in session, the National Committee shall exercise the functions and powers of the National Congress with its standing committee enforcing the power of execution while the discipline inspection committee enforcing the power of supervision. The Standing Committee in charge of the routine work is responsible to the National Committee.

It is believed that the institutionalized Party congress is better than the system where the congress is held at fixed interval of five years and the delegates to the congress were elected each time. In the latter case, delegates can not exercise their functions well when the congress is not in session.

As matter of fact, the institutionalized Party congress has been tried out in some 20 counties or cities across the country since 1988.

Taizhou in east China's Zhejiang Province has been piloting the new program for near 20 years. The Party congress in the city is held annually. This allows the delegates to carry out extensive research, contact with Party members and the masses and report issues of public concerns to relevant departments for solutions.

The initial purpose of the reform is to assist Party members at all levels in fully exercising their functions at Party congresses. "The fundamental objective is to strengthen democratic decision-making and supervision within the Party,' said Zhang Xiaoyan, who has followed the progress of the reform for a long time.

(China.org.cn by Yang Xi, October 22, 2007)