Beijing (AsiaNews) - One of the highest personalities of the Central Inspection body was expelled by the Chinese Communist Party after an investigation revealed that he had taken advantage of his position to receive bribes.
According to the statement of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI), released today, Zhang Huawei, deputy minister , "lost his ideals and convictions" and damaged the reputation of the Commission.
The CCDI had launched an inspection into Zhang's office last April. According to Caixin magazine he would be investigated for financial fraud.
Since coming to power, President Xi Jinping has launched a fight against corruption within the Party to hit "tigers and flies", high ranking figures and low ranking officials. For Xi an anti-corruption reform is a matter of "life or death" for the government of the Chinese Communist Party.
Although many observers point out that this campaign has political motives, directed against Xi Jinping's enemies, it has had some success.
In 2014, Zhang Huawei and his office were able to unveil the corruption of the Liaoning government, which for years has inflated its budget figures to show false promises in its economy, and two years later it again revealed in Liaoning a scandal about the sale of votes to be elected to the National People's Assembly.
But the struggle against corruption by commissions made up of the same corrupt Party is a war lost at the outset. Many dissidents have always invoked democracy as the only method to fight corruption.
The CCDI continues to fight corruption within its own structures, complaining of "darkness hiding beneath the light".
