China will enforce the one child per couple family planning policy on its rich and powerful citizens including celebrities and business people, as they seem to be flouting the rule, a senior official has said.
Stating that they have "no privileges", Minister in charge of the National Population and Family Planning Commission, Zhang Weiqing said the government will take serious measures to curb the trend by rich and powerful who violate the family planning law by having more than one child.
Acknowledging that such problems existed in China, he said all people are equal before the law and people who break the law should be penalised.
China began to practice family planning in the early 1970s and implemented the Population and Family Planning Law in 2002, allowing most couples to have only one child.
Those who violate the law are normally forced to pay a large fine, but such sanctions fail to deter the rich and powerful.
Blaming poor management and certain "complicated reasons" for the problem, Zhang pledged the government would find ways to address it.
{{/usCountry}}Blaming poor management and certain "complicated reasons" for the problem, Zhang pledged the government would find ways to address it.
{{/usCountry}}The family planning policy has helped China prevent 400 million births by the end of 2005, he said.
China has in the past three decades curbed fast population growth and recorded a low birth rate, reducing 300 million births by 1998 and 400 million births by 2005, Zhang was quoted by the latest issue of Qiushi (Seeking Truth From Facts) magazine.