Monday 9 March 2015

China’s Top Anti-Graft Regulator To Inspect 26 State Companies

China is pointing to 26 SOEs as targets for its first large-scale inspections in 2015, after similar probes last year found graft and abuse of power.

Energy companies, including China National Petroleum Corp., the largest oil and Gas Company in the country, depending on the target list. China National Offshore Oil Corp., the largest oil explorer and offshore gas in the country, and State Grid Corp. of China also called, according to a statement yesterday from the Central Committee of the Communist Party Discipline Inspection.


 
President Xi Jinping has warned that corruption is a threat to the survival of the party and its campaign against corruption has stuck around 100,000 employees at different levels in the last two years. CNPC and its listed unit Petro China Co. has been in the eye of the storm against corruption, and the loss of more than a dozen senior officials to research from August 2013.

Officials SOEs were found taking bribes, using the power for personal gain and committing other serious violations, said the inspection in December after completing inspections of one month in eight companies.

Some officials of state enterprises deliberately bought assets at high prices and they are sold under for personal gain, and some others used company resources for personal advancement and promotion, the Commission said in yesterday's statement.

The "sword inspection" should hang over the head of officials to ensure the SOEs respect the law, the commission said in explaining the purpose of the inspections.

More than 70 officials of the state-owned enterprises have been investigated and officials can be captured as discipline inspections begin to expand, according to a report published today in the newspaper Economic Information state-controlled Xinhua.

Former President Jiang Jiemin was investigated in September 2013, just months after being promoted to minister of the administration of state-owned assets. He was expelled from the party last year and is awaiting trial.

Zhou Yongkang, a former head of the CNPC, was expelled from the party in December on charges ranging from leaking official secrets to accept bribes. Zhou was a former member of the senior decision-making body of the Party, the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau.