GUANGZHOU - All government cars in this Guangdong provincial capital will be equipped with Global Positioning System (GPS) devices after the Spring Festival holiday, a senior local Party official said on Tuesday.

And major Party and government officials have been required to be the first to equip their official cars with GPS devices, according to Su Zhijia, deputy Party chief of Guangzhou.

"The move aims to strengthen management of the city's large number of government cars and prevent government cars from being used for private purposes," Su said.

Su, who is also the head of the city's Party discipline inspection commission, made the remarks at a work conference of the disciplinary watchdog in Guangzhou on Tuesday.

Guangzhou is the first metropolis to install GPS devices in government cars in Guangdong province, which borders the Hong Kong and Macao special administrative regions.

Guangzhou's Huangpu district government departments, the city's bureau of finance and the Chengguan authorities (city administration units) took the lead in a pilot project last year.

The cost to operate those government cars dropped 24 percent after they were equipped with GPS devices, Su said.

Su said the cars will be supervised in real time once they are equipped. Departments that manage the official cars could immediately know where the cars are; they also could directly contact the people on board or send them text messages.

Su also promised to further improve and standardize the regulations for the use of government cars in 2011.

Guangzhou has more than 31,000 registered government cars.

Zhang Jieming, director of the city's bureau of finance, said the government pays up to 35,000 yuan ($5,316) annually for each government car, including parking fees, tolls and gasoline. The government also pays each government driver a monthly salary of about 5,000 yuan.

"Many official cars have been found to be frequently used for non-official duties in the past," Zhang said.

Members of the provincial people's congress and the provincial committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference have applauded the move.

Qi Hai, a deputy of Guangdong provincial people's congress, said GPS devices would certainly help enhance the management of the city's fleet of cars.

"But I hope relevant departments will do more to let the city's official cars' operation be supervised by the public," Qi said.

He said the departments should frequently disclose the results of the GPS supervision, details on official cars' being used for non-official duties and the punishment of officials and drivers who use government cars for private purposes.

Earlier this week, Guangdong Governor Huang Huahua promised to further reform the use of official cars across the province to help alleviate heavy traffic jams, but refused to restrict vehicle registrations for local residents.

Guangdong is estimated to have more than 410,000 government cars.

China Daily

(China Daily 01/27/2011 page7)