Death of innocence creates crisis of credibility

• Source: Global Times
• [22:19 November 23 2009]
• Comments

Selected web users attend the investigation meeting for the hide-and-seek  case in Jinning county, Yunnan Province, on February 20.

"Although we didn't rake up the judicial truth of the case",  he said, "we did push the relevant bodies to find out the truth." 

Third-party investigation needs government help to clean away all the barriers as they are not authorized to access relevant information, according to Liu Xiaoying, associate professor in The School of Television and Journalism of Communication University of China in Beijing. Liu advocates surveillance by the masses, something he believes is quite weak in China.

Mo advocates a mechanism for third-party investigations be established.

Inspired by the American investigative system, Mo suggested the National People's Congress organize and authorize third-party muckraking investigations.

"It could be piloted to see if it really works. If so, we can expand it nationally and regulate it by law,"  Mo said.

If legal authorities fulfilled their legal duties in handling these cases, there would be no need to carry out a second investigation by a third party, argued Pu.

"China does not lack legal institutions to supervise illegitimacy."

"The point is how to make those institutions work,"  Pu told the Global Times.

He opposes legalization or authorization of third-party investigations as an independent organization. The Chinese people can figure out their own ways of investigating and supervising government without any need to resort to regulation, he believed.

"It would prove no better than other supervisory bodies in China which are entitled by law and equipped with professional staff,"  he said. "As soon as it's regulated, corruption could breed. It would be no different from other institutions."