Qiu Incident should spur reform
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Journalist Qiu Ziming's stand for principles and stand against outright corruption has attracted lots of attention. The latest reports indicate that the Suichang public security bureau had revoked the criminal-detention order against Qiu and offered him a face-to-face apology.
Qiu, an employee of the Beijing-based Economic Observer, a Chinese business weekly, had been on a national online list of wanted criminals since July 23 after he valiantly exposed insider trading of the Zhejiang Kan Specialty Material Company (ZKSMC), which is listed on the Shenzhen stock exchange.
This incident demonstrated public opinion overcoming the errors of local authorities. In the future, how will illegal acts and corruption be fought? Is it best done by the media, or can the public play a more robust role?
In my opinion, businesses and market players want to hide their corruption and illegal activities, and the media is ideally supposed to expose it. The problem is adequate laws and supervision are lacking. Our "regulators" sit back and wait for the media to expose something, when they should be leading the process, not always reacting to what the media uncovers.
In a law-based society, businesses and market players must be diligently monitored by government institutions and backed up with the force of law. There must be strong, definitive laws to guide our country's legal foundation.
In addition, the officials of the Suichang public security bureau were criticized not only for their horrifically poor judgment, but worse, they didn't seem to know what law to apply or where to seek guidance. This demonstrates major defects in the construction and execution of the local legal system.
After this incident, it seems most people are calling for the strengthening of public supervision, but I believe this only scratches the surface. What we should do now is to perfect laws and regulations while strengthening supervisory boards and implementing preventative tactics in order to empower the legal foundation of our society.
Qiu's ordeal has begun to fade, but our society must learn from this incident and react proactively to ensure the integrity of system and the rights of our citizens.
The author is a postgraduate student with Shandong University of Finance.
(This article was translated by Lin Liyao.)
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