Senior Provincial official under investigation

A top official in Sichuan province is being investigated for alleged disciplinary violations, a move that reflects the Communist Party of China's determination to fight corruption, analysts said.

Li Chuncheng, 56, deputy secretary of the Sichuan provincial committee of the Communist Party of China, was taken to Beijing early on Monday, according to a source from the Sichuan provincial committee of the CPC, requesting anonymity.

Li, a vice-ministerial level official, is the highest-ranking official to be placed under investigation since last month's conclusion of the 18th National Congress of the CPC.

"Inspectors arrived in Chengdu on Sunday and talked with Li in the evening. He was taken the next morning to Beijing and provincial-level officials in Sichuan were briefed about the case in the afternoon," said a source from the Sichuan provincial committee of the CPC, requesting anonymity.

The investigation follows a series of recent cases where officials were investigated and dismissed for corruption.

Li was elected an alternate member of the CPC Central Committee, the highest leading body of the Party, during the congress last month. There are 205 members and 171 alternate members of the CPC Central Committee.

There was mounting speculation, according to the source, that the investigation was related to allegations of corruption against Dai Xiaoming, chairman of the Chengdu Industry Investment Group, one of the largest State-owned enterprises in Chengdu.

Dai, a protégéof Li, has been under investigation since August for alleged corruption, the source said.

A native of Haicheng, Liaoning province, Li was based in Harbin, capital of Heilongjiang province, until 1998. He was deputy mayor there before taking up the same post in Chengdu in December 1998.

Li then became mayor of Chengdu in 2001 and was promoted to Party chief of Chengdu two years later.

He held the post for eight years until his appointment as deputy secretary of the Sichuan provincial committee of the CPC last year.

Dai held a number of posts under Li in Chengdu.

During Li's tenure as Chengdu's Party chief, Chengdu spent 1.2 billion yuan ($190 million) building a luxury administrative center.

Covering 17 hectares and accommodating more than 5,000 people, the center was intended to serve as the headquarters for the city's CPC committee and government.

Its main building resembled Beijing's egg-shaped National Center for the Performing Arts and its peripheral structure borrowed designs from the Olympic National Stadium, better known as the Bird's Nest.

Premier Wen Jiabao visited the center following the Wenchuan earthquake in 2008, which killed more than 69,000 people.

Employees of the city's CPC committee and government were then evacuated even though they had moved in just before the quake. The city government announced it would sell the center to raise funds for post-quake reconstruction.

On Nov 13, 2009, Tang Fuzhen, 47, a resident of Chengdu, committed an act of self-immolation to protest against the demolition of her former husband's garment processing unit without the owner's consent.

Tang died of her injuries several days later.

In an open letter to Li, then Party chief of Chengdu, Wang Cailiang, a Beijing-based lawyer known for helping victims of forced demolition, urged the city's procuratorate to investigate the case and punish any wrongdoers. Nobody was punished.

　　Anti-graft enhanced

Zhu Lijia, a professor of public administration with the Chinese Academy of Governance, told China Daily on Thursday that the investigation highlights the Party's resolve to fight graft.

The Party's anti-graft agencies are "zero tolerant" toward those who violate the law, he said.

A number of officials have been investigated and sacked in recent weeks.

Lei Zhengfu, Party chief of a district in Southwest China's Chongqing municipality, was removed from his post on Nov 23, days after a sex video was put on the Internet.

Wu Hong, a law enforcement bureau official for Chongqing's Fuling district, was investigated on Dec 4 after sexually explicit photos were also circulated online.

Sun Dejiang, the manager of a State-owned company in Shuangcheng city, Heilongjiang province, and a deputy to the city's people's congress, was removed from his posts on Monday after a former TV host accused him of sexual assault.

Apart from Li, at least two other officials were also under investigation on Thursday.

Qi Fang, director of public security for the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region's Usu county, is being investigated over claims he promoted twin sisters he was having affairs with.

Li Junwen, a deputy to the Xiaodian district people's congress in Taiyuan, capital of Shanxi province, was removed from his post after he was exposed online as having "four wives and 10 children", the district government's publicity department said on Thursday morning.

Wang Qishan, secretary of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection of the CPC, pledged to strengthen supervision of officials during a seminar on Nov 30 when scholars were invited to give their suggestions on how to fight corruption.

"Trust can never replace supervision," Wang said during the seminar.