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Friday, December 19, 2014

Combating corruption
Dec 19, 2014
Lifestyles of the Corrupt and Famous: China Airs Anti-Graft Documentary
A scene from Episode 1 showing President Xi Jinping arriving at the revolution shrine Xibaipo in Hebei, July, 2013.

ccdi.gov.cn
China has taken its antigraft fight to the small screen.
In a four-part television series broadcast this week, the Communist Party’s corruption watchdog displayed its efforts to stamp out the problem. It introduced viewers to government officials confessing to accepting gifts of jade and debit cards, took them inside luxurious private clubs featuring $6,000 dinners, and aired rare peeks into the offices of party investigators who revealed they like to interrogate suspects over holidays and prefer to announce big cases on Fridays.
The primetime show, with the clunky name “The Party’s Work-Style Construction Is Always on the Road,” was broadcast by China Central Television. But credits indicate it was underwritten and coproduced by the party watchdog agency, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection.
The program seeks a return to basic values. “Substance should be an inheritance, like how to be an official, how to deal with issues, how to govern a country,” says party historian Li Zhongjie on camera.
Chinese President Xi Jinping is harnessing state-controlled mass communications and social-media platforms to spur public support for his anticorruption strategy. Since he took power two years ago, broadcasts that highlight official corruption increasingly feature a gotcha approach, sometimes with exposes using hidden cameras or reenactments, and televised jailhouse confessions.
President Xi, the husband of a telegenic and popular singer, appears to recognize a photo opportunity. In the first episode of “On the Road,” Mr. Xi uses a visit to a Mao Zedong exhibit to stress test his own work against principles set by the party founder.
“We did it,” Mr. Xi says to the officials around him as he ticks off Mao’s guidelines like less drinking and gifting.
Billed as a documentary shot in 18 provinces, “On the Road” is tinged with propaganda messages.
“A wedding is an important moment in Chinese life, as well as a merry celebration,” the narrator says to begin the fourth episode. “But a wedding isn’t merry when it becomes the stage for competition, and the window for party officials to receive gifts and build guanxi,” or connections.
Bass drums introduce vignettes of alleged bribe-taking and overindulging by mostly mid-level officials at weddings, dinners and tours. One 12-bottle wine dinner cost $6,000, the program says, basing its evidence on receipts and recollections of waiters. Once on the case, party investigators arrive to trumpets, and clangs that sound like slammed prison doors punctuate confession statements.
One of the cases covered in the program of a named senior official is a former provincial governor, Ni Fake, whose affection for jade turned into an addiction favor-seekers helped him satisfy. “My focus changed from work to preparing for my life in retirement,” says a narrator reading from Mr. Ni’s confession.
In the show, the antigraft campaign gets an endorsement from Henry Kissinger. “I’m sure it’s being conducted both from the point of view of preventing in the future what may have happened in the past, but also to do it in a way that the society can remain cohesive,” says the former U.S. Secretary of State.
Media analysts say Chinese editors and producers appear ill-equipped to capitalize on Mr. Xi personal PR savvy, not least because several well-known personalities from CCTV and local newspapers have faced corruption allegations themselves.
“Anticorruption has clearly moved to the top of the agenda. When that happens, it takes over everything,” says Doug Young, the Shanghai-based author of “The Party Line,” a 2013 book about Chinese media.  Still, Mr. Young added, “I think this particular campaign is unimaginative,” with formulaic coverage of developments.
“On the Road” never explores the darker side of the series co-producer, the party’s inspection commission.
While the show goes inside the commission’s unmarked Beijing headquarters, viewers see little more than the lobby and a classroom. There’s no hint that the commission, according to lawyers, interrogates suspects in secret locations, often for months without lawyers present or a public record.
Few corrupt tigers appear in the series. Notably missing were allegations against former Politburo Standing Committee member Zhou Yongkang, who the party this month accused of of unspecified corruption and is expected to become the highest-ranking party official in three decades to face criminal charges. He isn’t reachable.
The Wall Street Journal found that when in 2008 Mr. Zhou oversaw the Ministry of Public Security, the policing agency funded a multipart drama aired in primetime by CCTV. The series was produced by Mr. Zhou’s daughter-in-law and lauded law-enforcement work.
–James T. Areddy, with contributions from Yang Jie

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