Voting: Single system proposed to protect voting right

BEIJING - A Chinese lawmaker proposed here Monday the establishment of a single system that includes all basic information about every individual, as China acted to amend its electoral law to protect people's right to vote.

Wu Xiaoling, a deputy to the National People's Congress (NPC), China's top legislature, made the proposal at a panel deliberation of the draft amendment to the Electoral Law, which was tabled at the ongoing NPC annual session for a third reading Monday.

The amendments seek to grant equal representation to the country's legislatures at all levels, ensuring equal representation among people, regions and ethnic groups.

"To protect the citizens' basic rights to vote and rights to stand for election, we need to establish a single system to include all basic information about every national citizen," said Wu, a member of the NPC Standing Committee.

Enacted in 1953 and amended several times, the Electoral Law stipulated that each rural deputy represented a population four times that of an urban deputy after the last amendment in 1995.

Critics, however, said this could be interpreted as "farmers only enjoy a quarter of the suffrage of their urban counterparts."

Before the 1995 amendment, the difference was eight times.

Calling the ongoing amendment "timely", Wu said the draft would realize the equality between rural and urban areas and result in "great progress" for the country's democracy.

As the central government is undertaking social security and other policies to improve people's well-being, "it would be a huge waste of resources should each policy need a separate system," said Wu, also former central bank vice governor.

He added that if the current public security information system can be upgraded and integrated with other information systems to contain all information about each individual citizen, the right to vote for every eligible citizen could be guaranteed, even if they have migrated elsewhere.

According to the draft amendment, every administrative area, regardless of the size of its population, should have the same base number of deputies. Also, ethnic groups with the smallest population must also have at least one seat in the legislature.

The draft amendment also includes that "the number of grassroots deputies of farmers, workers and intellectuals should be guaranteed."

Currently, a large number of legislators in China are government officials and entrepreneurs, leaving few seats for farmers and workers.

It takes two or three readings before a law is passed by the top legislature. Lawmakers are expected to vote on the draft amendment at the closing meeting of the session scheduled on Sunday.