More than 2,000 officials in Chinese city hand over passports as deterrent to stop cadres fleeing overseas with cash
PUBLISHED : Wednesday, 16 September, 2015, 1:10pm
UPDATED : Wednesday, 16 September, 2015, 1:10pm
He Huifeng
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The former deputy mayor of Guangzhou was one senior government official caught in the anti-corruption crackdown. He was accused of taking nearly 300 million yuan in bribes. Photo: SCMP Pictures
More than 2,000 officials in Guangzhou in southern China, mainly the heads of more than 1,100 villages in the area, have handed in their passports and entry permits to travel to nearby Hong Kong and Macau as part of precautionary measures to deter cadres from fleeing abroad who may have amassed huge amounts of cash though corruption.
The rule has been in force since last year as grassroots officials collect large amounts of rents and are more at risk of seeking or taking bribes as their districts rapidly develop, the government-run Guangzhou Daily newspaper said.
The report gave the example of 25 villages in the Tianhe district of the city that own assets worth over 20 billion yuan (HK$24 billion).
Officials who plan to trips overseas, whether for business or personal travel, have to fill in a detailed application form, including saying why they need to go overseas, which hotels they will stay at, who they will meet and listing information about their schedule.
Su Zhisheng, the chief of Gantang village in the Panyu district, was quoted as saying he had not gone overseas since the regulations were introduced.
READ MORE: Guangzhou orders village chiefs to hand over passports to prevent corrupt from fleeing
The Guangdong Provincial People’s Procuratorate said officials working in the government or for state-owned enterprises intending to flee abroad with huge bribes usually first ensured their spouses and children had emigrated to another country, the Southern Metropolis Daily previously reported.
They then transferred huge sums of money overseas through Hong Kong and Macau through various channels, the prosecutors’ office was quoted as saying.
Under rules introduced in January, officials in Guangdong province with family overseas, dubbed “naked officials”, are no longer considered for promotion.
