Xinhua News Agency, Guangzhou, December 1 (reported by Kong Bo and Zhan Yijia) -- Liu Zirong, the director of the Zidong Village Committee and the Party Branch Secretary in Nanzhuang Town, Chancheng District, Foshan City, Guangdong Province, was prosecuted for allegedly embezzling 23.7 million yuan of public funds. The case was heard on the afternoon of December 1st at the Chancheng District Court in Foshan.
According to a responsible person from the Discipline Inspection Commission of Foshan, in January 2009, during an inspection of the use of land requisition compensation funds in Zidong Village by the Discipline Inspection Commission and the Rural Work Office of Nanzhuang Town, it was discovered that Liu Zirong, the Party Branch Secretary and Director of the Village Committee, was suspected of misappropriating collective village funds, most of which were the village's retained land requisition compensation funds. Subsequently, a special investigation team was formed in Nanzhuang Town, and the People's Procuratorate of Chancheng District also initiated an investigation. On January 23rd, the Anti-Graft Bureau of the Chancheng District People's Procuratorate arrested Liu Zirong in Nanzhuang Town.
Upon review, the People's Procuratorate of Chancheng District found that between 2003 and 2007, Zidong Village deposited 26,135,951 yuan of land requisition compensation funds into the account of Foshan Mingchuang Trading Co., Ltd., a village-owned enterprise. A relevant official from the Discipline Inspection Commission of Foshan told reporters that Zidong Village established Mingchuang Company to evade collective debts. Although Zidong Village introduced a social intermediary organization to manage rural finances in July 2006, the financials of Mingchuang Company were not included under the management of this intermediary organization.
In court, the prosecutor stated that in September 2005, after Liu Zirong assumed responsibility for the village's investment in the Sanzhou Land Resources Office engineering project in Gaoming District, Foshan City, he used his position as Party Branch Secretary and Director of the Village Committee to repeatedly misappropriate a total of 23.7 million yuan of land requisition compensation funds from the Mingchuang Company account between December 2005 and December 2008. These funds were used for personal investments, debt repayment, or gambling. After Liu Zirong was apprehended, he returned all the misappropriated funds.
The prosecutor further stated that as a public official, Liu Zirong took advantage of his position to misappropriate 23.7 million yuan of public funds for personal use, engaging in profit-making activities and illegal activities, with serious circumstances. His actions violated Article 384, Paragraph 1 of the Criminal Law of the People's Republic of China, and he should be held criminally liable for the crime of embezzlement of public funds.
A relevant official from the Discipline Inspection Commission of Foshan believed that the reason why the case of Liu Zirong misappropriating collective funds occurred was mainly because, before implementing intermediary organization management of rural finances, Zidong Village had stored collective funds separately to avoid collective rural debts. After implementing intermediary organization management, these funds continued to circulate outside the formal system and were not included under the management of the intermediary organization, exposing loopholes in current rural financial management.