China is set to reform its petition system, so that authorities must respond to and terminate cases within the legal framework. "Petitioning" is a system for people to voice their grievances and complaints.

For decades, it has been criticized for lack of efficiency. But at the Communist Party of China’s key meeting held last week, top decision-makers vowed to make a difference, saying China will promote an online petitioning service.

The phone call connects the consultant to a person appealing for help. Although China’s petition system has existed for decades, its inefficient procedure as well as some inappropriate settlements of cases led to public outcry. This website backed by Liaoning’s provincial discipline inspection commission, was built with the principle to solve people’s complaints in a timely fashion.

"We established the website about 10 years ago. Anyone who has complaints or are not satisfied with government decisions can send their request for re-examination to us, using our online form. Once the case is received our consultant will be on it until the petition is forwarded to the relevant government departments." Han Ying, deputy director of WWW.MXWZ.COM, said.

A recent example case was helping a group of forest rangers to claim their overdue salaries. A consultant got in touch with the secretary of the county party committee, who until that point wasn’t aware of the rangers’ plight.

“We didn’t know about the matter until the consultant from the website forwarded the case to us. After investigating, we found out it would still take some time till they could get paid, so we’ve decided to pay their salary from the county’s public finance on behalf of the forest bureau.” Pu Xinzi, party secretary of Huanren County, Liaoning Province, said.

The country’s petition system was aimed to help the government maintain close contact with the public, but too many petitions could also rock social stability. It needs better congestion control, and that’s where the Internet steps in.

“Compared with the traditional way of petitioning which requires people to visit the relevant government departments in person, online petition is more efficient, accurate, and cost-effective. Since we’ve established extensive contacts with the local government departments, a lot of time is saved during the investigation procedure.” Han said.

Reporter: "Petitioners can seek redress through the legal system or local petitioning bureaus. However, those who feel that justice has eluded them this way, often travel to the capital as a last resort to appeal in the age-old manner. So the online system could greatly reduce the pressure on authorities, and at the same time speed up the process to settle people’s concerns.”

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