In Jiangsu Province’s Zhangjiagang City, various government new media accounts are being centralized and shut down. This move comes after the Zhangjiagang Finance Department had previously called for all levels of government departments to “tighten their belts”.
According to reports from The Paper, on April 22, the Zhangjiagang City Housing and Urban-Rural Development Bureau’s WeChat public account announced that in order to further promote the healthy and orderly development of government new media, in accordance with work requirements, their government new media account “Zhangjiagang Housing and Urban Development” on WeChat public account will stop releasing information from April 22, 2024, and initiate the process of shutting down.
Official statements indicate that services such as “second-hand house transaction reservations,” “smart property,” “drawing shop assistants,” and “reporting gas safety hazards” have been migrated to the “Today Zhangjiagang” mobile application.
Earlier, the Zhangjiagang City Water Authority’s WeChat public account “Shuirungangcheng” had stopped releasing information since April 19 and initiated the shutdown process. Similarly, the Zhangjiagang City Agriculture and Rural Bureau’s government new media account “Zhangjiagang Agriculture and Rural” also ceased information dissemination starting from April 17 of this year.
In addition, Weibo accounts like “Zhangjiagang Court” announced on April 16 that the Zhangjiagang City Court’s government new media accounts on Weibo and WeChat video will stop releasing information from April 16, 2024, and begin the shutdown process.
Furthermore, numerous school new media accounts in Zhangjiagang City have also been successively shut down.
According to a report by Modern Express on April 26, the Zhangjiagang City Literature and Art Federation also announced that, in order to further promote the healthy and orderly development of government new media, in accordance with work requirements, the Zhangjiagang City Literature and Art Federation’s new media account “Zhangjiagang Wenlian” on the WeChat public account will stop releasing information from January 24, 2024, and start the shutdown process.
Apart from government departments, some street and village WeChat public accounts have previously been closed. For example, the “Hemei Shuangfeng” WeChat public account of Shuangfeng Village, Deji Street, Zhangjiagang decided to stop updating and apply for shutdown and cancellation from April 15, 2024.
Public information shows that in recent years, news of government new media accounts being suspended has occasionally surfaced in various places, which some areas explain as a way to unify the government information release channels and avoid redundant operations causing resource wastage.
Last year in February, the Zhangjiagang Finance Department in Jiangsu Province posted an article on their website emphasizing the government’s need to “tighten their belts” and requiring all levels of departments to “increase revenue and reduce expenditure”. In reality, as early as 2022, Nanjing, the capital of Jiangsu Province, had already mandated local governments to “tighten their belts”.
Since 2019, the Chinese Communist Party authorities have repeatedly issued notifications requiring governments at all levels to “tighten their belts” and prepare for “tightening their belts” as a “long-standing policy”. This period coincided with the second year of the intense struggles during the US-China trade war.
Subsequently, the three-year pandemic lockdown policy implemented by the Chinese Communist Party authorities has had a significant impact on the Chinese economy. Meanwhile, local governments have expended substantial resources on epidemic prevention and control. Additionally, the crackdown on real estate developers by the Chinese Communist Party has led to a nationwide real estate crisis, which has also hit the local government’s reliance on land financial revenues for survival.