简体中文
Sitting separately in a small conference room, 40 deputies to the Xinzhou municipal people's congress, all wearing facial masks, listened to the government work report delivered by Zhu Xiaodong, acting mayor of the northern Chinese city in Shanxi Province.
All other deputies were attending this livestreamed conference in 15 branch venues across the city. Two big electronic screens were hung on both sides of the rostrum, shuffling real-time videos of participants of the plenary.
Conference staff would hand out medical masks and hand sanitizer to the attendees at the entrance, while nurses with local hospitals would take their body temperatures and make registrations.
China's prefecture- and county-level "two sessions," in usual practice, are held intensively during January and February, while most of which had been postponed this year due to the COVID-19 outbreak.
Many Chinese cities across the country are now attempting to hold the annual sessions of their legislative and political advisory bodies online as epidemic wanes.
"It was my first-time participation in the session via video conferencing, and the pictures were clear and smooth, just like being personally present," said Qiao Wenquan, a deputy to the people's congress of Xinzhou.
The process, agenda and discussions were no different from what they used to be, Qiao noted. "It helped avoid crowd gathering and reduce the risk of infection."
Xie Renwang, deputy general manager of the Xinzhou branch of China Unicom that provided technical support to the sessions, said the company had set up a special WAN line for the meeting, with more than 100 technicians dispatched to each venue to ensure stable network transmission and information safety.
Deputies voted by their hands this time instead of using voting machines since not everyone was in the same meeting place.
"The voting and counting of votes in all venues were live-broadcasted to ensure the whole process was fair and just," said Wei Guangcai, deputy director of the standing committee of the Xinzhou municipal people's congress.
Epidemic-related topics were hot during the local "two sessions," for example, more government policies support to the cost-effective traditional Chinese medicine, which has played an important role in COVID-19 treatment, has been suggested by some political advisors.
Many cities across China are holding their streamlined "two sessions" online in late April, with a shortened duration of the meetings. This maiden attempt was considered by local Chinese lawmakers and political advisors as an opportunity for the promotion and application of 5G, e-government and smart city construction.
What has changed was not only where and how the meetings were held, but also the social etiquettes for this key event on the country's political calendar.
In Wenzhou City in east China's Zhejiang Province, serving chopsticks and spoons were put into more than 1,000 meeting packets prepared for attendees during communal dining.
In Quzhou, another prefecture-level city in Zhejiang, deputies to the local people's congress and members of the municipal committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference abandoned handshakes when they met, but greeted each other with folded hands, traditional greeting etiquette in ancient Chinese culture.
"The new attempt of holding online 'two session' not only helps epidemic prevention and control, but also helps local governments to set their annual targets and make plans as soon as possible, which is good for economic recovery," said Xing Yuan, a professor of sociology at Shanxi University.
