International Construction Review
August 3, 2006

A Chinese official named construction, land acquisition and the privatisation of state enterprises as prime fields for corruption in China, adding that the problem also extended to other sectors, including electric power and environmental protection.

Construction, land acquisition and the privatisation of State enterprises were named as prime fields for corruption by Li Yubin, deputy director of China’s leading group on combating commercial bribery under the Central Committee of the Communist Party, in a statement expressing the Government’s concern over the spread of bribery into almost every field of commercial endeavour. The problem, he said, extended to government procurement, purchase and sale of medical goods, resources development, bank lending, trade in securities and futures, commercial insurance, publishing, telecommunications, electric power, sport and environmental protection. Li Yubin is reported by the Xinhua news agency as saying that during the past twelve months his group uncovered nearly 7,000 cases of commercial bribery involving some 2,000 billion yuan of illicit money. At the current rate of exchange this would be equivalent to US$250 billion. … Li Jinhua, head of the national audit office, warned people that as the central government is increasing funding for development of rural areas, national and local audit offices would intensify the auditing of such expenditures. Known in China as the “iron-face auditor”, Li Jinhua created a sensation when three years ago he criticised four government departments in strong terms for large-scale embezzlement, also revealing misappropriation of disaster relief funds.