What are the major tasks a village party secretary needs to grasp well
Editor's note: Huayuan Village in Dongyang City, Zhejiang Province is a modern village renowned throughout the country. This once poor mountain village, under the leadership of Secretary Shao Qinxiang, after thirty years of hard struggle, has now developed into a demonstration village with a developed economy, prosperous villagers, civilized rural customs, a neat village appearance, democratic management, and a sound ecology.
One month ago, the 8th National College Student Village Officials Forum was held in Huayuan Village. At the main forum, facing more than 200 college student village official representatives, Secretary Shao Qinxiang, drawing on his own personal experience, exchanged views with these young village officials on how to be a good village party branch secretary. He said——
Shao Qinxiang
I was elected as the brigade leader of Huayuan Village in Dongyang City, Zhejiang Province in 1979, elected as the village party branch secretary in 1986, and now serve as the party committee secretary of Huayuan Village. Counting it up, I have worked in the position of village secretary for 29 years. Over these years, I have run enterprises while building a new countryside. When it comes to how to be a good leader and how to lead villagers to common prosperity, I truly have deep feelings. The most important insights I have are these:
A rural branch secretary must learn economics, understand economics, and grasp economics
Rural work is solid and practical; there is no room for opportunism. Among all difficulties, the key difficulty lies in economic backwardness. When the village is poor and the people are poor, everything is a problem; when the village is rich and the people are rich, things are easy to handle. Therefore, a rural party branch secretary must have an economic mind and always take developing the economy as the top priority. In our Huayuan Village, over these years we have consistently taken economic development as the central task and built it up bit by bit, making it stronger and stronger. Up to now, biomedicine, basic materials, construction and real estate, packaging and color printing, rosewood furniture, film and television culture, tourism and commerce, electronic equipment, education and healthcare, ham food and other industries, one by one, have developed and grown. At present, Huayuan Village has 1,539 private enterprises. It should be said that every family has a career, every household is starting a business, and everyone is getting rich. It has also attracted merchants from all over the country to come to Huayuan Village to start businesses and trade. It can be said that Huayuan Village has already become a large platform for entrepreneurship and innovation.
A rural branch secretary must handle matters fairly, openly, and impartially
Being a rural branch secretary itself means dedication. In the development process of Huayuan Village, I have personally felt this. A rural branch secretary is not a civil servant and does not have much authority. To lead all the villagers, firmly implement the party's line, principles, and policies, and devote full effort to building a new countryside, it is impossible without a spirit of dedication. Precisely because of the dedication of the village officials, the officials of our Huayuan Village have not taken remuneration or paid salaries all these years. Since the village merger in 2004, 4 villages have been relocated as a whole, 3 villages have been demolished and rebuilt as a whole, and 3 villages have undergone old village renovation. The whole village has demolished and rebuilt more than 1,700 households, demolished more than 5,000 houses, with an area of more than 520,000 sq m, and arranged more than 4,000 newly built houses. To accomplish these things and crack these “hard nuts”, it requires not only that the branch secretary have perseverance, be able to endure hardship, and stress dedication, but also that matters be handled fairly, impartially, and openly, that he be able to listen to criticism, and that he be able to rely on the villagers and mobilize their enthusiasm. In addition, he must also stress democracy and law. No matter what he does, especially matters concerning the villagers' vital interests and the exercise of their rights, he must ensure that the villagers truly enjoy democratic rights.
A rural branch secretary must educate and guide villagers to renew their thinking
Party member officials must not only be good at getting rich themselves, but more importantly must guide and lead the masses to emancipate their minds, renew their thinking, achieve common prosperity, and live a moderately prosperous life. Leading the masses to prosperity not only requires providing them with information, building platforms, and broadening paths, but more importantly also lies in guiding them according to circumstances, directing the masses' thinking and energy toward developing the economy, toward building a new countryside, and toward an atmosphere of doing practical work and starting businesses. It is precisely because the pace of new countryside construction accelerated that our Huayuan Village formed a good atmosphere of all-people entrepreneurship and all-people innovation, and all villagers devoted their energy to the development of the village's economic and social undertakings.
A rural branch secretary must truly do good deeds and practical things for the masses
Over these years, contradictions and disputes in Huayuan Village have not left the village, achieving zero petitions by villagers. When there is a matter, look for the village officials; when there is a contradiction, look for the village officials. This has become the conscious action of Huayuan villagers. I believe that the villagers' affairs should be resolved by village officials, and village officials should shoulder the responsibility of serving the villagers and resolving the villagers' difficulties and contradictions. They should treat the villagers' difficulties as their own difficulties and the villagers' contradictions as their own contradictions.
Only in this way can village officials be forced to improve their ability to solve problems and resolve contradictions. This is not only an important task in building a new countryside, but also a test of whether village officials truly serve the people. Only when villagers are helped to solve problems well can the masses put down their burdens, be happy in body and mind, and actively devote themselves to building a new countryside.
A rural branch secretary must ensure that villagers gain interests and receive tangible benefits
Through so many years of development, Huayuan Village has complete infrastructure and sound welfare benefits. What urban residents enjoy, Huayuan villagers also enjoy; what urban residents do not enjoy, Huayuan villagers also enjoy. The three insurance benefits of pension insurance for land-lost farmers, the new rural cooperative medical insurance, and urban-rural residents' pension insurance, as well as television viewing fees, installation of digital television one-way and two-way services, and telephone monthly rental fees, are all borne by the village. In addition, there are more than 10 labor protection and welfare benefits such as a scholarship system and special hardship subsidies.
For rural areas to be harmonious and farmers to be prosperous, first they rely on the party's policies and the support of party committees and governments at all levels; second, they rely on the branch secretary, while leading villagers to prosperity, to do a good job in harmony work. That our Huayuan Village can be what it is today is inseparable from the guidance of party member officials' three-sentence action guide. Following Sun Yat-sen's “the world is for all”, Mao Zedong's “serve the people wholeheartedly”, and Deng Xiaoping's “development is the absolute principle”, and combining them with the reality of Huayuan Village, we proposed that village officials take the lead in establishing the ideological awareness of “taking Huayuan as the public good”, “serving Huayuan wholeheartedly”, and “Huayuan's development is the absolute principle”, further advancing the working principle of “dedication, fairness, impartiality, and openness”.
No matter how much is said, building a new countryside is a long-term and systematic project. It requires one generation to work hard, and may even require sacrificing some personal interests. As a rural leader, one needs to give even more. As for me personally, for many years, I have always taken building a new countryside as my constant pursuit and leading villagers to common prosperity as my lifelong wish.