Stephen Wong, the Asia Times Online contributor, has recently published an article that suggests that as result of recent restrictions, government employees in China as well as officials, are beginning to gamble online.

In his report, Wong reports that it appears to be the case that extended jail sentences as well as the risk of losing one’s job has failed to deter officials from gambling, and that visa restrictions to Macau, which is known to be the most popular gambling destination for Chinese officials, has only had the affect of driving officials to online casinos.

The online publication also notes that attempts by Beijing to stop gambling using public funds by Communist Party officials and government bureaucrats seem to have made little progress. Mr.Wong then cites several examples to explain his assumptions. He describes the arrest of government officials and leaders of state-owned firms who were arrested for Internet gambling on sports, horse races and lotteries that to the place recently in six online casinos.

In Wong’s expose he describes how the Chinese political leaders have produced many campaigns directed against gambling bureaucrats in their ongoing effort to curb the corruption which has begun to erode the public trust for the government and government officials. In one part of his article he describes how a study in 2008 that was made of 99 high rollers who derived from mainland China indicated that 59 had some sort of state affiliation. Of these 59, 33 were government officials, and 19 were describes as being senior managers of state-owned enterprises while another seven were cashiers at state businesses. This is according to the study, which was carried out by Professor Zeng Zhonglu of the Macau Polytechnic Institute.

Furthermore Wong notes that last year the results of this study encouraged the Chinese government to set visa restrictions on government officials. According to the latest regulations a mainland official is limited to only one single, seven-day trip during a three month period.
In China, lawmakers are doing what they can to make it more difficult for these party and company officials to gamble unchecked with public money. There are those who are proposing much harsher penalties for those get themselves caught. In the writer, Stephen Wong’s opinion, this will do little to stop old habits. He believes that in order to curb gambling and gambling-linked corruption, what is needed in China is a free press and an independent judicial system that will expose the wrongdoings of public officials. In the short-run possibly heavy handed campaigns may curb gambling for a while, but to completely root out gambling and corruption by officials, the article argues, it is necessary for Beijing to put in place political reforms.

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