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After the May 1 holiday in China, the Chinese Communist Party’s Ministry of Finance appropriated one hundred billion yuan (US$14.6 billion) to “Maintain Stability,” according to a report in Hong Kong-based Chengming Magazine’s May 2009 issue. The figure doesn’t include the cost of countering Xinjiang and Tibetan independence movements.

The “Maintaining Stability Leadership Office” has spread across China, the magazine said. In addition to leaders from the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) Committee of Political and Legislative Affairs, members of this office also include apparatchiks from public security organizations, procuratorial organs, courts, as well as the national security and propaganda departments. All county and district level administrations have established stabilization offices as well, according to the magazine.

Officials have also tried to spread “stabilization” to petitioners, in the form of bribery.  “[The local regime] offers a few thousand bucks or even ten thousand bucks to ‘stabilize’ you, requesting you not to go to Beijing to appeal anymore,” said Liao Heping, a rights petitioner from Shanghai.

“The local regime will spend money on or make deals with appellants to get them to stop,” said Ma Yalian, a persistent rights appealer who had her Shanghai home forcefully demolished and spent a year in a forced labor camp in 2001. “For example, if we agree not to go to Beijing to appeal, we will get paid. Some appellants accept the deal because their life circumstances are so difficult,” she said.

“Maintaining Stability” is called Weiwen in Chinese

“First they abduct you, and then they offer you a car.  If this doesn’t sell you, they arrange a meeting in a hotel and offer you a large sum of money,” said Li Xiufen, another petitioner from Jiangsu Province

The Nanfang Daily, a state-run newspaper in Guangdong Province, reported that some local “stabilization offices” began placing ads for “Weiwen information volunteers” for different government departments and communities. The requirement from Taxia County in Jiangxi province was even more specific. Every information collector had to “develop at least five extensions to collect information.” The information collectors had to be approved by the municipal level stabilization office.

“For example, some people are put under house arrest,” explained Ma Yalian. “House arrest is not restricted to homes; some are detained in hotels, and others are sent on a trip. The so-called trip is actually a form of freedom control. Guards for these individuals are hired from laid-off workers from other sectors of society, and paid 100 yuan (US$14.6) a day. The expense for hiring those people is relatively small, but sometimes they must pay hotel rental fees as well.”

“This ‘Weiwen’ program gives local authorities exactly what they’re looking for. If he faces any complaint or opposition, he will simply suppress it under the name ‘Weiwen.’ The fees involved are basically hush money, but they allocate many expenses to this ’stabilization’ initiative—officials’ personal graft and embezzlement are closely tied with this. Local authorities categorize all sorts of expenses as a “stabilization” expenses.”

“‘Weiwen’ targets every rights appealer,” said Ms. Wu from Beijing. “It is a way for authorities to continue their corruption unchecked, and they have many ways of getting money for this program. The central government may feel that local appealers are unreasonable to deal with, but in fact it is the local authorities that are being unreasonable. They treat every rights appealer as an expense. Last time I saw the county leader he told me, ‘Do you know how much I spend on you?’”

“It is very corrupt inside…very corrupt. The central government has no way to investigate how these expenses are being used.”