The China Media Project summarizes a report in Caijing about a mysterious woman who has links to several high-level corruption cases, and argues that the magazine is keeping up its legacy of hard-hitting investigative reporting despite the departure of editor Hu Shuli:
The Caijing report alleges that Li Wei (李薇) used her relationship with her husband, a former tobacco official, to get close to top officials in Yunnan, Guangdong, Beijing and Qingdao, creating a vast network of protection and favor that she used to personally enrich herself.
The report’s title, “The Public Band”, or gonggong qundai (公共裙带)), references the intersection of money and power, or “crony capitalism,” which in Chinese can be literally translated “skirt-band capitalism,” or qundai ziben zhuyi (裙带资本主义).
According to the article, many high-level officials now being held in Beijing’s Qincheng Prison — including former Yunnan governor Li Jiating (李嘉廷), former Beijing deputy mayor Liu Zhihua (刘志华), former deputy judge of the Supreme People’s Court Huang Songyou (黄松有), and former deputy chief of the China Development Bank Wang Yi (王益) — all had previous dealings with Li Wei’s network of power and money.
The report also mentions, withholding names, two high-level state officials who previously supported Li Wei. As a matter of general practice in China’s media, the withholding of the names of “high-level officials” in news reports indicates those concerned are officials at the most senior levels.
