Kids’ charity questions

Another charity group, the Angel Mom Fund, operating under the auspices of the much maligned China Charities Aid Foundation for Children (CCAFC), was accused on Monday of embezzlement, which the fund manager has denied, calling the accusation groundless.

Zhou Xiaoyun, an online whistle-blower who accused CCAFC of money laundering in December, told the Global Times that the Angel Mom Fund had set up a separate account and embezzled donations that were supposed to be spent on orphans and children suffering diseases.

Zhou claims reported donations received by the Angel Mom Fund in 2011 were 6.83 million yuan ($1.10 million) less than what was reported on the CCAFC's financial statement for the fund, which is posted on the foundation's official website.

Zhou also claims that the fund's financial accounts appear muddled and are out of sync with CCAFC's report on the Angel Mom Fund.

"There is only one explanation to the discrepancy, which is that the Angel Mom Fund under the CCAFC has set up a concealed account and embezzled the money. The CCAFC has clearly lost control of the funds operating under its name," Zhou said.

Zhou also blamed the Ministry of Civil Affairs for failing to investigate the allegations that were raised about CCAFC's financial statement in December.

Deng Zhixin, founder and director of the Angel Mom Fund, told the Global Times in a phone interview on Monday that there is some confusion in its accounting but denied funds had been embezzled.

"Zhou found discrepancies because the fund had its own bank account to deposit donations before July 2012. We switched to an official CCAFC account to follow the charity's accounting standards after we were told this would increase the fund's transparency," said Deng.

"We did not embezzle donations and our fund welcomes public scrutiny," said Deng, adding that all the donation and expenses of the fund can be tracked on its website.

In response to the accusation, the fund has published its employees' salaries from December 2007 to June 2012, which accounted for less than 2 percent of its donations.

Zhou is not satisfied with the explanation. "The fact that they set up their own bank account to collect money is against the law. It shows the fund had been operated without supervision for a long time and the CCAFC did nothing about it."

The Angel Mom Fund, which was established in 2007, joined the CCAFC in January 2010. Before establishing the fund, Deng worked as chief financial officer for several companies and was an accounting manager.