More efforts will be made to keep the provincial capital of
Guangdong safer this year, the city's mayor said yesterday.
In his government work report to the deputies of the annual
municipal people's congress, Zhang Guangning said the city
government will put the safety of its citizens as its top priority
and boost public security and social order.
"Among other things, Guangzhou will keep an iron-handed approach
against gang-related crimes as well as crimes of severe violence,
while continuing efforts aimed at social evils such as
prostitution, gambling and drug addiction," the mayor said.
He said the city will increase funding to that effect. Measures
include improving video surveillance, community work,
emergency-response, and introducing state-of-the-art crime
prevention and control.
Guangzhou will set aside 4.48 billion yuan ($624 million) for
public security projects this year, accounting for 17.8 percent of
the city's budget.
The city had spent 4.3 billion yuan on similar projects last
year.
Guangzhou, which many view as a city long plagued by a public
security problem partly due to a large migrant population,
installed more than 100,000 video cameras as part of a security
monitoring system citywide last year, adding the total number of
devices to 212,674.
Recent figures by the Guangzhou public security bureau showed
that Guangzhou's crime rate last year fell 15.8 percent from 2006,
with the total number falling below 80,000, the first time since
the year 2000.
Peng Peng, a researcher with the Guangzhou Academy of Social
Sciences, said the city government's efforts to improve public
security have been paying off.
Citing a recent survey by Sun Yat-sen University, Peng said
Guangzhou citizens' sense of safety rose by 11.2 percentage points
from the end of 2006, while their satisfaction of public security
rose by 35.8 percentage points, with 86.7 percent of the
interviewees feeling safe.
Respondents also ranked public security top of the city's five
social issues that have witnessed the greatest improvement in the
past five years.
(China Daily February 17, 2008)