The screen capture shows that Liu Tienan, former China planning official is in trial at... Read More
Liu Tienan, 60, who ran the National Energy Administration, admitted to taking a lesser sum of 19 million yuan, according to postings on Langfang City Intermediate People’s Court’s microblog. Liu and his son Liu Decheng took the money from 2002 to 2012, receiving it in stocks, cars, cash, and a phantom job for his son drew a salary, it said. The court ordered the confiscation of all Liu’s personal assets.
“Liu believes the punishment is harsh,” Li Fabao, Liu’s lawyer, said by phone immediately after the sentence was announced. “He did everything because of his son. He’s spoiled his son, and he now regrets that.”
The case of Liu Decheng, who gave testimony at his
father’s trial, will be handled separately, according to the postings.
Liu is the latest “tiger” to be punished in President Xi Jinping’s two-year anti-corruption campaign to bolster his power base and curb the graft that he’s warned could erode the party’s legitimacy. More than 80,000 officials have been punished for breaking party rules, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection said last week.
Deterrent Sentence
Liu was also former deputy head of the National Development and reform Commission, China’s top planning body, until he was stripped of his position in May 2013. The agency approves infrastructure projects and controls energy prices.Zhuang Deshui, professor of public administration with Peking University, said the punishment meted out to Liu is intended as a strong deterrent for other officials.
“Liu’s case is high profile and will have a big impact,” Zhang said. “So the sentence could be made not only from a judicial perspective based on the criminal acts, but also after taking into consideration its influence.”
At today’s hearing, Liu stressed he had voluntarily provided information about his case and hadn’t put up a legal defense.
“I don’t have anything to say for myself because I caused huge loss for the country and the party,” according to the court’s records on the Weibo social media service. He also “broke down in tears for his fall from grace,” it said.
The court’s postings also showed several testimonies from the son against him. One case involved the son receiving a Nissan Teana as a gift after his father approved a heavy-polluting chemical plant in the eastern Chinese city of Ningbo.
Phantom Job
In another case, Liu Decheng said he didn’t go to work while drawing about 1.2 million yuan in salary between June 2007 and Dec. 2012 from Denway Motors Ltd., owned by Hong Kong-listed Guangzhou Automobile Group Co. The company was trying to cultivate connections with Liu to increase the chances of its projects being approved, according to the court’s postings.Liu knew about both cases and had persuaded his son “to at least sit in the office or try to write some reports to the bosses” in return for his salary, it said.
The successful prosecution of Liu vindicates public claims made against him by a journalist months before his downfall from a ministry that controls a vast swathe of the economy and sets energy prices. Luo Changping, deputy managing editor of Caijing Magazine, posted allegations on his Weibo microblog in December 2012 saying Liu exaggerated his academic credentials and that his son received payments in U.S. and Canadian dollars into bank accounts from a business executive. Luo didn’t answer calls to his mobile phone today.
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