OPINION> Commentary
High payments under spotlight
(China Daily)
Updated: 2009-03-03 07:49

If civil servants can open their compensation to the public and meanwhile work hard for the interests of the masses, no one will continue to question their salaries, says an article on the website of the Xinhua News Agency. Following is an excerpt:

A list of the annual remuneration of leaders of a village in Suzhou, Jiangsu province, was recently exposed on the Internet: 150,000 yuan for the Party secretary and 120,000 yuan for the deputy Party secretary and the director of the villagers' committee. The high salaries of these village leaders are beyond the expectations of the public for they are higher than the compensations for civil servants.

However, the strange thing is that no villager has opposed the payment. For one thing, the payment list is posted on the bulletin board in the village for public review; for another, the leaders have worked diligently to bring benefits to villagers.

(China Daily 03/03/2009 page6)