Former Vice Governor of Jiangxi Province and former Vice Chairman of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, Hu Youtao, is under investigation.
According to a report on the website of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection of the Communist Party of China on the evening of June 19, Hu Youtao, who has been retired for 7 and a half years, is currently undergoing review and supervision.
Hu Youtao, aged 70, has long worked in Jiangxi Province. He previously held positions such as Deputy Director of the Jiangxi Provincial Development and Reform Commission, Director of the Jiangxi Provincial Finance Department, Vice Governor of Jiangxi Province, and Vice Chairman of the Jiangxi Provincial Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, until stepping down in January 2018.
Jiangxi Province is the hometown of the influential figure in the Chinese Communist Party, Zeng Qinghong. Recently, there has been a concerted effort to clean up the power and influence of the Jiangxi Gang.
On June 6, Hong Lihe, former Deputy Secretary of the Party Committee and Vice Director of the Standing Committee of the Jiangxi Provincial People’s Congress, was expelled from the Party. The official report mentioned sensitive allegations, accusing Hong Lihe of “organizing factions and cliques within the Party for a long time, discussing the Party’s major policies at will, and privately reading books with serious political issues.” This clearly implicates connections to the Jiangxi Gang linked with Zeng Qinghong.
Around the time before and after Hong Lihe’s expulsion from the Party, the website of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection also reported on several Jiangxi officials being investigated.
On June 9, Yu Guojie, former First-level Inspector of the Xinyu Municipal Government in Jiangxi Province and former Secretary of the Party Working Committee of the Xinyu High-tech Industrial Development Zone, was investigated.
On June 3, Wu Jianping, member of the Standing Committee of the Nanchang Municipal Committee and Secretary of the Political and Legal Affairs Committee in Jiangxi Province, took the initiative to turn himself in.
On May 30, Li Xiaogang, former Secretary of the Party Committee and former Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Jiangxi Supply and Marketing Cooperative Association, was investigated.
On May 29, Wu Yunbo, former Secretary of the Party Committee and Director of the Standing Committee of the People’s Congress of Pingxiang City in Jiangxi Province, voluntarily surrendered.
On May 28, Liao Jinqiu, former Secretary of the Party Committee of Jiangxi University of Finance and Economics, voluntarily surrendered.
With the recent investigation of Hu Youtao, the number of mid-level officials who have been officially announced to have fallen from grace this year has now reached 29.