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Latest anti-corruption campaign takes aim at 'naked' officials
By Wan Lixin |
March 29, 2013, Friday
|
Print Edition
Print Edition
SOME people may wonder what luoguan means, but luoguan are already targeted by the Party's disciplinarian authority in the new crusade against official graft.
One of the top 10 buzzwords for 2009, luoguan literally means "naked officials," referring to officials whose spouses and children have gained permanent residency in foreign countries. Hence, without their families, they are "naked."
Most of these officials have multiple identities themselves and, while serving the people in their official capacity, are ever ready to join their family, with their ill-gotten fortune.
According to statistics from the Supreme Procuratorate, in 2011, China seized 1,631 suspected officials who had been on the run, which led to confiscation of 7.8 billion yuan (US$1.25 billion) in ill-gotten gains (March 25, Wenhui Daily).
The word "naked" is slightly misleading, for it is hard to see clearly naked officials, and the government is taking steps to get a better view of them.
At a recent conference, Wang Qishan, secretary of the Communist Party of China's Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, vowed to step up management and supervision of officials whose spouses and children have moved overseas.
The Guangzhou city disciplinary authority decided recently to randomly scrutinize 15 percent of officials to see if they have honestly reported about their family assets and the nationality of their family members, in accordance with reporting requirements.
Revealing cases
Some of the high-profile corruption cases involve luoguan.
For instance, when Luo Yinguo, former Party chief of Maoming City in Guangdong Province, was investigated for corruption in February 10, 2011, his children were already residents of Australia and the Chinese territory of Macau, while Luo himself had multiple identities.
While being investigated, Luo listed more than 100 other high-ranking officials in connection with his case. Investigators discovered 10 million yuan in cash in Luo's office and home, believed to have been received during the Spring Festival (February 3).
He reportedly had had sex with many women, some of them his subordinates.
But before his disgrace, Luo had been often invited as a sort of crime-buster to share his graft-fighting experience on TV for the benefit of other officials.
Another senior official Pang Jiayu, former deputy head of the provincial political advisory body in Shaanxi Province, was disgraced for graft in 2007 after being brought down by his own 11 mistresses, mostly pretty and young wives of his subordinates.
He helped his mistresses make big money by giving them or their husbands lucrative government projects.
Business ties
In one water-diversion project in which Pang's wife and mistresses were involved, water pipes exploded and collapsed only half a year after completion, and an investigation pointed to poor quality.
The mistresses decided to blow the whistle after one of the mistresses' husband was sentenced to death for fraud.
Pang had promised he would be spared the worst if he pleaded guilty and did not implicate others.
Pang was sentenced to 12 years imprisonment in 2008. Pang was also a luoguan whose wife and daughter emigrated to Canada in 2002.
It does not take much imagination to see that luoguan are highly vulnerable to corruption, for at the very least they must pay for the costly living expenses of their familes abroad.
In addition to the luoguan, there is also luoshang, or naked businessmen, business people who have struck gold, obtained foreign residency, and returned home to make money in China as "foreign investors."
Many of them have made their pile by grabbing lands for property development in collusion with local officials.
"As the money was so quick, they do not feel safe with Chinese identity, hence the need to emigrate," one businessman revealed anonymously in an interview with Wenhui Daily.
According to Zhang Yanling, former deputy governor of the Bank of China, there is a shortfall of tens of billions of dollars in the "Net Errors and Omissions" item in China's balance of international payments, traceable to a large extent to money laundering, which is closely associated with corruption.
One of the top 10 buzzwords for 2009, luoguan literally means "naked officials," referring to officials whose spouses and children have gained permanent residency in foreign countries. Hence, without their families, they are "naked."
Most of these officials have multiple identities themselves and, while serving the people in their official capacity, are ever ready to join their family, with their ill-gotten fortune.
According to statistics from the Supreme Procuratorate, in 2011, China seized 1,631 suspected officials who had been on the run, which led to confiscation of 7.8 billion yuan (US$1.25 billion) in ill-gotten gains (March 25, Wenhui Daily).
The word "naked" is slightly misleading, for it is hard to see clearly naked officials, and the government is taking steps to get a better view of them.
At a recent conference, Wang Qishan, secretary of the Communist Party of China's Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, vowed to step up management and supervision of officials whose spouses and children have moved overseas.
The Guangzhou city disciplinary authority decided recently to randomly scrutinize 15 percent of officials to see if they have honestly reported about their family assets and the nationality of their family members, in accordance with reporting requirements.
Revealing cases
Some of the high-profile corruption cases involve luoguan.
For instance, when Luo Yinguo, former Party chief of Maoming City in Guangdong Province, was investigated for corruption in February 10, 2011, his children were already residents of Australia and the Chinese territory of Macau, while Luo himself had multiple identities.
While being investigated, Luo listed more than 100 other high-ranking officials in connection with his case. Investigators discovered 10 million yuan in cash in Luo's office and home, believed to have been received during the Spring Festival (February 3).
He reportedly had had sex with many women, some of them his subordinates.
But before his disgrace, Luo had been often invited as a sort of crime-buster to share his graft-fighting experience on TV for the benefit of other officials.
Another senior official Pang Jiayu, former deputy head of the provincial political advisory body in Shaanxi Province, was disgraced for graft in 2007 after being brought down by his own 11 mistresses, mostly pretty and young wives of his subordinates.
He helped his mistresses make big money by giving them or their husbands lucrative government projects.
Business ties
In one water-diversion project in which Pang's wife and mistresses were involved, water pipes exploded and collapsed only half a year after completion, and an investigation pointed to poor quality.
The mistresses decided to blow the whistle after one of the mistresses' husband was sentenced to death for fraud.
Pang had promised he would be spared the worst if he pleaded guilty and did not implicate others.
Pang was sentenced to 12 years imprisonment in 2008. Pang was also a luoguan whose wife and daughter emigrated to Canada in 2002.
It does not take much imagination to see that luoguan are highly vulnerable to corruption, for at the very least they must pay for the costly living expenses of their familes abroad.
In addition to the luoguan, there is also luoshang, or naked businessmen, business people who have struck gold, obtained foreign residency, and returned home to make money in China as "foreign investors."
Many of them have made their pile by grabbing lands for property development in collusion with local officials.
"As the money was so quick, they do not feel safe with Chinese identity, hence the need to emigrate," one businessman revealed anonymously in an interview with Wenhui Daily.
According to Zhang Yanling, former deputy governor of the Bank of China, there is a shortfall of tens of billions of dollars in the "Net Errors and Omissions" item in China's balance of international payments, traceable to a large extent to money laundering, which is closely associated with corruption.
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