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Keep the job clean

(China Daily)
Updated: 2008-06-16 07:35

Judging from the first report the National Audit Office has published, the use of disaster relief funds and materials in the wake of the Wenchuan earthquake does not appear to have been as bad as some had feared.

There indeed are loopholes to plug. The three cases of abuse, though small in both the quantity involved and impacts on the bigger picture, underscore the importance of stricter monitoring.

In a sense, the case in which local officials tried to seek personal gains in the purchase of disaster relief materials, and the one where bank officials bought Nike sneakers for their staff in the name of "disaster relief materials" expose the usual ways of such people that we are familiar with at other times.

The ploy to defraud us of donations via mass-circulated text messages to our cell phones, too, is nothing new to us.

Imposters who take advantage of our sympathy and desire to lend a hand to our compatriots in anguish deserve nothing but hatred. And we believe they will get what they deserve in the end.

But at this moment, we have good reasons to focus on the disposal of the donations received as well as government allocations earmarked for disaster relief.

The stakes are too high for us to not be vigilant.

Other factors apart, the figures involved are without precedents. To date, donations, from home and abroad, have amounted to almost 44.6 billion yuan.

The same can be said of relief funds from the State coffers. By last Thursday, according to the Ministry of Finance, governments at all levels had put 23.6 billion yuan in relief work. That did not include the 30 billion yuan allocated last Wednesday to help rural families, whose homes collapsed or were seriously damaged during the quake, rebuild their homes.

Besides a 10,000-yuan allowance for each of such families, the money is also meant to provide "proper" assistance to others whose houses suffered lesser damage.

Who are qualified for such subsidies, and to what extent? Answers to such seemingly simple questions rest heavily on the judgment of local officials,most of whom have earned our profound respect and trust due to their exemplary deeds in that dreadful hour of emergency.

Still, given the afore-mentioned cases of abuse, the best way to allay suspicions and ensure fairness is to have the job done with absolute transparency.

The audit authorities have done a great job in the past years and earned itself a reputation as an upright whistleblower against fraudulence in public offices. We wish they will continue to live up to the society's confidence in their trustworthiness.

(China Daily 06/16/2008 page4)