The newly-founded website of China's National Bureau of
Corruption Prevention (NCBP) crashed on Tuesday, just hours after
it was launched, as Chinese people logged on in their droves to
complain about corruption among the official ranks.
The website (yfj.mos.gov.cn) was inaccessible on Tuesday
afternoon due to the large number of visitors, Beijing Youth
Daily reported.
A NBCP official, who declined to be named, confirmed to Xinhua
the breakdown had occurred, saying, "Repairs were carried out soon
after the website's sudden breakdown and normal service has been
resumed.
"The number of visitors was very large and beyond our
expectations."
By 4 p.m. on Wednesday, netizens had left 22 pages of messages
on the website's guestbook. Many were anxious to report specific
cases of official corruption but were immediately directed to other
websites, such as that of the Ministry of Supervision, by the
webmaster.
Some called for the strengthening of the government's
anti-corruption work, others said corruption in institutes of
higher education and grassroots governments should receive special
attention.
"The corruption problem in China is a fatal illness,
establishing more institutions can not solve the problem," one
comment read.
The enthusiasm that greeted the launch of the website reflects
the growing frustration felt by the general public towards
corruption at government level, which has been accentuated by
several high-profile corruption cases in the last five years.
Many senior officials have been found guilty of serious
corruption, including the former director of the National Bureau of
Statistics Qiu Xiaohua, the former food and drug administration
head Zheng Xiaoyu and former Party head of Shanghai Chen
Liangyu.
Last year, more than 90,000 officials were disciplined, but it
only accounted for 0.14 percent of the total number of the CPC
members.
The NBCP was officially established on September 13 with Ma Wen,
the Minister of Supervision, as its head.
The bureau has been entrusted to collect and analyze information
from the banking, land use, medicine and telecommunications
sectors, among others, and to share it with prosecuting organs,
courts and the police.
It is not, however, involved in the investigation of individual
cases.
(Xinhua News Agency December 20, 2007)