Shenzhen names an ally of party chief Wang Yang its new mayor

Shenzhen appointed a new mayor yesterday, a year after Xu Zongheng was removed amid a graft probe.

The city's executive vice-mayor, Xu Qin (pictured), a close ally of Guangdong party chief Wang Yang, was appointed mayor of the border city.

The appointment marked the end of a political storm whipped up by the corruption scandal. It is also the latest in a string of appointments that has been described as the largest political reshuffle in Guangdong in a decade.

Former Shenzhen party boss Liu Yupu was appointed chairman of the municipal people's congress yesterday. Speculation have been rife for months that Liu would be given a post in Guangdong's provincial political consultative conference. Liu was former Guangdong vice-party secretary and was transferred to Shenzhen in 2008.

Former vice-mayor Yan Xiaopei was appointed vice-chairwoman of the Shenzhen Municipal People's Congress, and vice-mayor Chen Yingchun will stay in the post. They were both reportedly implicated in Xu Zongheng's case.

The appointments are signs that Beijing would not dig further into the scandal and it is not going to punish more senior Shenzhen officials for the corruption that rocked the city's political arena a year ago.

Xu Zongheng was sacked on June 4 last year in a corruption probe. Two district party bosses and a people's political consultative conference district chairman were sacked.