Beijing Daily:

In October 2016, General Secretary Xi Jinping stressed the CPC's unswerving leadership over state-owned enterprises (SOEs) during a national meeting on strengthening Party building within SOEs. Please let us know what progress and achievements SOEs have made in upholding the leadership of the Party and strengthening Party building? What role does upholding and strengthening the Party's leadership play in the reform and development of SOEs?

Weng Jieming:

Thank you for your questions; these questions are fundamental ones. Upholding the Party's leadership and strengthening Party building are the "root" and "soul" of SOEs and their unique advantages. Since the national meeting on strengthening Party building within SOEs was held, central SOEs as well as the entire domain of SOEs, have continued to thoroughly implement the spirit of General Secretary Xi Jinping's important speech. SOEs have launched one special themed campaign every year, and five special actions have been taken to promote the Year of Implementation of Party Building Work, the Year of Quality Improvement for Party Building, the Year of Promoting Grass-roots Party Building, the Year of Consolidating Party Building, and the Year of Innovation and Expansion for Party Building. SOEs take the implementation of the requirements of full and strict self-discipline of the Party as the main task and take solving problems as a breakthrough in order to increase the awareness and responsibility of state-owned enterprises to enforce Party self-discipline. The weakening of the Party's leadership, the lack of Party building, and the poor implementation of strict self-discipline of the Party have been significantly rectified, and the reform and development have achieved remarkable results. The development of the enterprise and the spiritual outlook of cadres and workers have taken on a brand-new look.

First, SOEs are more determined to achieve the "two upholds" – uphold General Secretary Xi Jinping's core position on the Party Central Committee and in the Party as a whole and uphold the Party Central Committee's authority and its centralized, unified leadership. SOEs insist on taking the Party's political building as the fundamental building, and acquire a deep understanding of the decisive significance of the establishment of both Comrade Xi Jinping's core position on the Party Central Committee and in the Party as a whole and the guiding role of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era. We adhere to the system of "first issue," which refers to taking the study of the relevant theories, thoughts, and instructions of General Secretary Xi Jinping and the CPC Central Committee as the first priority issue of various Party meetings in different levels. We have established a working mechanism to supervise its implementation and constructed a closed loop of learning, research and deployment, implementation, tracking and supervision, and reporting feedback to ensure that the decisions and deployments of the Party Central Committee and General Secretary Xi Jinping are being implemented.

Second, the Party's comprehensive leadership over SOEs is more powerful. SOEs have fully implemented the "two consistencies," which means it must be consistent for an important political principle of adhering to the Party's leadership over SOEs, while it must also be consistent for the establishment of a modern enterprise system as the direction of SOEs reform. The building of a modern enterprise system with Chinese characteristics has been accelerated. We have strengthened the Party's leadership in improving corporate governance and fully implemented the systems of "incorporating general requirements for Party building into a company's articles of association," "one-shoulder stand," which means an SOE's chairman should also be the company's Party secretary. We have also "listed the pre-research items for the Party committee of SOEs" to ensure that the Party's leadership is institutionalized, has due procedure and is well exercised. We adhered to the principle that the Party supervises cadres and the Party manages talents and built a loyal, clean, and responsible team of high-quality professionals.

Third, the grassroots foundation for Party building is firmer and more stable. We insist on strengthening the grassroots Party organizations of SOEs without slackening, insisting that Party building and business operations are simultaneously planned, deployed, implemented, and assessed, and actively promote the standardization of grassroots Party building. Since the 18th CPC National Congress, central SOEs have added more than 40,000 Party organizations and absorbed 1.148 million new Party members. The grassroots Party organizations have been established as they should, and their political functions and organizational capabilities have been continuously enhanced.

Fourth, the responsibility of enforcing Party self-discipline has been strengthened. We have established and implemented three systems for the Party committee (Party group) of central SOEs to report the annual Party building work to the party committee of the SASAC, that the secretary of the Party committee (Party group) to report to the party committee of the SASAC on-site, and that the secretary of the grassroots Party organization to review and evaluate the work of the Party building. We have formulated measures for the implementation of the responsibility system for Party building work in central SOEs, continuously improved the assessment and evaluation system for Party building, and consolidated corporate Party building responsibilities.

Fifth, the corporate political ecology is more optimized. We continue to work to improve Party conduct, build clean governance, and fight corruption. We worked ceaselessly to address the practice of formalities for formalities' sake, bureaucratism, hedonism, and extravagance, persistently investigate and deal quickly with problems that violate the guiding principles of central Party leadership's eight-point decision on improving conduct, increase the anti-corruption efforts within SOEs, ensuring that officials do not dare to be, are denied the opportunity to be, and have no wish to be corrupt so as to foster a healthy political atmosphere of integrity.

The Party leadership and Party building of SOEs have been fundamentally strengthened, providing a strong guarantee for the reform and development of enterprises. We will continue to thoroughly study and implement the spirit of the national meeting on strengthening Party building within SOEs, rev up efforts to strengthen our "roots" and "souls" to make sure the high-quality development of enterprises is led and guaranteed by high-quality Party building.

Thank you.