Xi Jinping's toilet revolution broke out a scandal

Direct translation

Xi Jinping's toilet revolution broke out a scandal, and the official media rarely criticized the "face project"

Editor: Wen Bin / https://www.ntdtv.com/gb/2025/07/23/a104005610.html / Image : The so-called "toilet revolution" launched by the leader of the Chinese Communist Party, Xi Jinping, has come to an end. The official media recently exposed various chaos and criticized the "face project". (Video screenshot)

The so-called "toilet revolution" launched by the leader of the Chinese Communist Party, Xi Jinping, has come to an end. The official media recently exposed various chaos and criticized the "look-good but not usable" toilets built in various places as "face projects" that will only damage the government's credibility.

After Xi Jinping proposed the public toilet renovation and upgrading plan in 2015, a "toilet revolution" was launched in various parts of China, creating some toilets that look "good" on the surface. However, because it was a project proposed by the leader of the Chinese Communist Party himself, the official media rarely exposed the chaos in the past ten years.

As the power struggle among the top leaders of the Communist Party of China becomes increasingly fierce, CCTV recently exposed the chaos in the construction of public toilets in various places.

CCTV's "Financial Investigation" program broadcast on 20 July 2025 mentioned that according to "mass reports", the new public toilets built with a lot of money in rural China are always locked and closed, becoming a decoration that villagers say is "good looking but not useful".

Many villagers in Jishan County, Yuncheng, Shanxi Province reported that in the past two years, the village has built new public toilets, which look clean and tidy, and have complete facilities but the villagers rarely use them.

Local villagers told reporters that the newly built public toilets are not for daily use, and they are only open when there are activities in the village or when leaders come to inspect.

Less than 100 m away from the newly built public toilets, the dry toilets that villagers are still using emit a pungent odour.

According to the "Government Purchase Service Information Platform", the contract announcement of the 2023 Rural Toilet Revolution Village-wide Promotion Financial Reward Project (New Public Toilets) in Jishan County shows that it plans to build 23 new public toilets with RMB 2.3028 million, and the funds come from government funds. The above-mentioned public toilets that are occasionally open or never open are all 23 new toilets built last year.

In response to the above report, the official media Southern Daily commented that such "half-finished projects" not only add to the frustration of the people, but also waste public resources in vain.

The article said that it is better not to build "if you don't use it", it is better not to build it. From the appearance, some public toilets have exquisite appearance design, and the location is close to the villagers' daily activity area, taking into account the convenience needs of the people. Why spend millions of yuan but not open it? ······Is it just to build a "bonsai" from the beginning?

The Workers' Daily published an article saying that the root of the problem lies in the fact that some places have alienated the "toilet revolution" into a political achievement project. First, they focus on construction and neglect management, blindly pursue the "standard" of the number and appearance of public toilets, but fail to implement the subsequent maintenance responsibilities, and even lock the public toilets to save trouble; second, they are out of touch with reality and ignore the needs of villagers. For example, in water-scarce areas, water-flush toilets are promoted without supporting water supply facilities, resulting in the "paralysis" of toilets as soon as they are built; third, formalism is at work, and public toilets are used as "inspection tools" only to deal with inspections from superiors, rather than truly serving the people's livelihood. The agricultural benefit policies have changed and distorted in implementation, damaging the government's credibility.

In 2015, Xi Jinping, the leader of the Communist Party of China, proposed a plan to renovate and upgrade public toilets, and repeatedly claimed that the construction of new rural areas should also promote the toilet revolution. Immediately afterwards, the Chinese Communist Party government regarded the "toilet revolution" as an important task of rural revitalization.

In response to Xi Jinping's toilet revolution, officials in many places flattered and catered to it. It was reported on the Internet that Hubei Province specially established the "Hubei Province 'Toilet Revolution' Project Construction Command Office".

As of the end of October 2017, 68,000 tourist toilets were newly built, renovated and expanded across China, with a total cost of more than RMB 20 billion. Subsequently, the National Tourism Administration launched its second three-year plan to build, renovate and expand 64,000 tourist toilets from 2018 to 2020.

Some commentators believe that in the case that many areas in China have not yet truly escaped poverty, limited funds should be used to solve the problem of food and clothing for the people, rather than engaging in face-saving projects such as the "toilet revolution". In this regard, on the overseas X platform, some netizens mocked Xi Jinping, "He thinks he is the greatest emperor in history, but in fact he is just a beggar who picked up a big ingot. He doesn't know how to mess with it."