China Briefing | Officialdom still a breeding ground for flies, rats and fleas
Parasitic officials will continue to feast on society unless the system is changed at its core
It's been two years since President Xi Jinping embarked on a sweeping campaign to root out official corruption and few today would doubt his determination to target both the high-ranking "tigers" and low-level "flies" in the bureaucracy.
The results have been very encouraging, with Xu Caihou, the military's former second in command, and Zhou Yongkang, the former chief of the massive security apparatus, caught in the net along with tens of thousands of lower-ranking officials.
The top anti-graft watchdog, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI) led by Wang Qishan, one of the country's most capable and savviest officials, has spearheaded the campaign and inspires fear with the mere mention of its name.
Despite the crackdown's wide reach, Wang has repeatedly warned that it is far from over.
The difficulty of stamping out corruption is vividly illustrated in a copy of a damning speech widely circulated online.
The speech's author, Cai Xiaopeng, is a retired bureaucrat now heading a fruit growing and processing firm in Beijing. His tales of rotten government attracted widespread attention not just because he and Wang worked closely together in the 1980s but also because of the ways corrupt and faceless bureaucrats openly stole from the kinds of smaller companies that the leaders are counting on driving the economy forward.
Speaking in October at a meeting partly organised by the CCDI, Cai detailed how "brazen thieves and bandits" from various government arms robbed, extorted and harassed private firms, citing his own company as an example.