OpinionXu Caihou case shows Chinese leaders must clean up the military
Hu Shuli says the corruption case of PLA general Xu Caihou must be only one milestone in a wider and more sustained crackdown
Last week's announcement that Xu Caihou will face charges for corruption was major news, undoubtedly one of the most important in recent times.
Speculation about Xu's fate had been rife for months after Gu Junshan , the former deputy logistics chief of the People's Liberation Army, was charged with bribery and embezzlement in March. Although Xu was widely expected to be the next to fall, the news still came as a shock. The 71-year-old top general was, after all, the vice-chairman of the Central Military Commission. This made him the most senior PLA officer ever to be caught for corruption, and reflects the government's determination to catch the "tigers".
Xu has been expelled from the party and has yet to be formally charged. But some details of his case have already been published. By contrast, though Gu has been indicted, little about his case has been officially revealed. This reflects a growing level of transparency on the PLA's part.
In fact, it's possible to reconstruct how the Chinese military has conducted its recent crackdown on corruption.
- From December 10 last year to March 13, teams of discipline inspection officers were sent to the Beijing and Jinan military commands on orders of chairman Xi Jinping . Officers reportedly found irregularities involving officers' promotion, infrastructure construction, land transfer, housing sales and health care.
- On March 15, the central government ordered an investigation into Xu.
- On March 28, evidence of infractions were handed over to the CMC's Commission for Discipline Inspection and party headquarters.
- On March 31, military prosecutors charged Gu with corruption, bribery, embezzlement and abuse of power.
- In early May, the CMC published guidelines on rooting out and preventing corruption.
- On June 30, Xi chaired a Politburo meeting to hear the case against Xu, after which the top leaders decided to expel him from the party and handed over his case to military prosecutors.
The speed of the anti-graft campaign has been breathtaking of late.