Overseas social media platforms have recently seen a surge in accusations against the operation of grassroots stability maintenance funds in multiple areas of Jiangsu. Several posters have disclosed significant discrepancies in expenses in areas such as personnel monitoring and cross-province escorting of petitioners, providing specific amounts, number of personnel, and time frames as evidence.
In interviews with multiple interviewees, they told The Epoch Times that in some regions, grassroots officials responsible for stability maintenance do not stop petitioning activities but instead encourage petitioners to repeatedly travel to Beijing or other provinces through hints or indulgence to trigger stability control mechanisms. Officials can profit from this by receiving condolence fees and stability control funds from relevant allocations.
An overseas social media account under the name Yang Caiying recently revealed alleged fund embezzlement issues within the grassroots stability maintenance system in various areas of Jiangsu. Yang claimed that in Nantong, Jiangsu, where petitioners are subjected to round-the-clock monitoring, the standard stability maintenance fee officially allocated is 500 yuan (RMB, hereinafter) per day, but the actual black security guards in charge of tracking only receive 200 yuan per day. To maximize fund extraction, even when the person is not at home, staff are arranged for 24-hour “guarding empty spaces.” These black security guards are not temporary hires but directly commanded by the local police station chief.
The article also mentioned that the situation in Changzhou, Jiangsu, is even more prominent. Despite the local authorities allocating stability maintenance funds based on the same 500 yuan/day standard, the actual amount given to black security guards is only 160 yuan/day. Calculated with at least 3 years of operation, with a minimum of 2 personnel per day, the on-site monitoring personnel scale can reach up to 40 to 50 people during peak periods. The amount suspected of being embezzled for personnel monitoring alone (for each petitioner during stability maintenance) exceeds 750,000 yuan.
In addition to daily monitoring, the article also revealed discrepancies in expenses during the cross-province escorting process. Quoting information from grassroot national security personnel and insiders, when forcibly bringing petitioners back to the local area from Beijing, the reported “black car fee” per vehicle is 60,000 yuan, but eyewitnesses in Suzhou have seen the actual payment per vehicle to be around 18,000 yuan. They stated that their family members were forcibly taken from Beijing more than 30 times, and only the black car fees alone amounted to over 1.3 million yuan of allegedly embezzled funds.
Ms. Zhou, a petitioner from the outskirts of Xiangfan, Hubei, told reporters that local town government officials and security guards cooperated in encouraging her to petition in Beijing, with officials profiting from escort fees. She recalled, “Four or five security guards grabbed me from the entrance of the National Petition Office in Beijing and took me back. Two people took turns driving and were very polite to me along the way. I thought to myself, this might be the last time they treat me this well, buying me food and taking me to a restaurant. When they dropped me off at the village entrance, they even gave me 2,000 yuan. Before leaving, they said, ‘Next month, when you go to Beijing to petition again, we will bring you back and give you more money.'”
Ms. Zhou mentioned that these security guards would profit thousands of yuan each time they went to Beijing to pick up petitioners. She added, “I heard it was a mission from the deputy mayor. Every time they go to pick up petitioners in Beijing, there is a stability maintenance fee, 18,000 yuan per person, and they gave me 2,000 yuan. That’s why they kept telling me to go to Beijing to petition again; they would inform me in advance when to go.”
Mr. Jia, who understands the local operation of stability maintenance, told reporters that grassroots stability maintenance funds are usually allocated step by step under names like “key personnel control,” “emergency handling,” and “temporary labor,” controlled by the local public security system or comprehensive governance office. In the internal circulation process of related funds, calculations are often based on indicators like “number of personnel,” “days of surveillance,” and “round-the-clock monitoring,” with specific accounts only visible internally and difficult for outsiders to access.
Mr. Jia also disclosed to reporters a long-standing covert trade relationship between Beijing office personnel and local police stations. He stated, “Once Beijing police locate a petitioner, they immediately inform the Beijing office personnel. Some individual police officers directly receive cash from Beijing office or intercepting personnel, all done in secret. These police officers are busy all day grabbing petitioners, and we all say they’re not doing their job properly; they are just cashing in on this madness.”
Mr. Jia, who frequently interacts with petitioners, also told reporters that local governments often use black security guards, social workers, or temporary vehicles to take on specific stability control tasks through outsourcing or temporary hiring methods. There are generally significant discrepancies between the reported expense standards and the actual payment to the executing personnel. In some regions, they further inflate the overall fund amount by artificially increasing the number of guards, extending guard hours, repetitive reporting of cross-province escort expenses, and other methods.
When interviewed, Mr. Jiang, a human rights activist in Wuhan, expressed that in recent years, the CCP’s fiscal revenue has declined, requiring local governments to bear a considerable proportion of stability maintenance funds. In provinces like Zhejiang and Jiangsu with relatively better financial conditions, grassroots officials can continue the aforementioned practices. However, in financially tight areas like Wuhan and Fushun, local governments have demanded street offices to independently cover related expenses.
He said, “Where do the street offices get so much money for stability maintenance? I heard that some street offices have already laid off security guards and switched to temporary hiring. Security guards are only hired when needed to pick up people in Beijing, but due to overdue funds, there have been situations of demanding salaries.”
The interviewees generally believe that the embezzlement of stability maintenance funds is not a “loophole” in the CCP’s governance system but a direct result of its operational methods. In a system where power is unchecked, finances are opaque, and the judiciary is not independent, stability maintenance itself provides a space for power seeking rents and systematic corruption.