Ministers lose jobs in China
NZPA-Reuter Peking China yesterday announced the sacking of four Government Ministers and plans to reduce the number of VicePremiers from 13 to two as part of sweeping antibureaucratic reforms. The New China. News Agency announced the abolition of several Ministers and commissions in the first' stage of the reforms, masterminded by the country’s most powerful politician, Vice-Chairman Deng Xiaoping. Four relatively young officials are also promoted to Ministerial posts, but the agency did not say who the Vice-Premiers would be. It said Mrs Chen Muhua, aged 61, had been appointed to head the newly established Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Relations, an umbrella organisation merging four previously separate departments. The standing committee of the National People’s Congress, China’s Parliament, approved the appointment of four new Ministers with an average age of. 57, mere youngsters by ’Chinese standards. Senior officials are often in their.7os and 80s.
The committee, on the final day of its present session, also decided that Ministers would normally have to retire at 65 and-Vice-Minis-ters at 60. It announced the formation of six streamlined Ministries from 12 previously existing organisations, each of the new departments having only three or four Vice-Ministers compared with about 12 previously. It also announced the formation of a standing committee of the State Council (Cabinet) presided over by the Premier and consisting also of the two VicePremiers, State councillors, and a secretary-general. The reforms are part of plans to almost halve the nuinber of Ministries and commissions from 98 to 52 and to cut staffing levels by about a third. Among the Ministers sacked yesterday were the Commerce Minister (Mr Wang Lei), who was at the centre of a scandal in 1980 when it was revealed that he paid only a nominal sum for his frequent feasts at a wellknown Peking restaurant. Mr Wang, aged about 68, is replaced by a 51-year-old Vice-Minister, Liu Yi.
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Press, 10 March 1982, Page 8
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318Ministers lose jobs in China Press, 10 March 1982, Page 8
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