Former adviser in Hebei surrenders

Pressure from CCDI credited for voluntary confession

Ai Wenli, a former senior political adviser in Hebei province, surrendered himself to anti-graft officials, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection said on Tuesday.

According to the anti-graft watchdog, Ai is suspected of graft and "serious violations of Party rules" and is under investigation by the CCDI and the National Supervisory Commission.

He is the first vice-ministerial level official that the CCDI had announced had given himself up since late 2012, when the new leadership took office and the anti-graft campaign became a top priority across the country to combat both "tigers and flies"-referring to high-ranking and low-ranking officials.

"His confession of his crime is the result of the high-pressure stance of the anti-corruption campaign, which has achieved remarkable success," said Jiang Laiyong, vice-secretary of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences' research center on clean governance.

Moreover, his surrender also shows that supervisory officers have "fully performed their duties according to the law and Party regulations and achieved good social effect, which will motivate corrupt officials to give up any idea of escaping and awaken their loyalty to the Party and trust the laws," he said.

Seven high-ranking officials in Hebei province have been placed under investigation for corruption since late 2012, including Zhou Benshun, former secretary of the Hebei Party Committee.

The other five are Liang Bin, former minister of the Organization Department in Hebei; Zhang Yue, the top security chief in Hebei; Zhang Jiehui and Yang Chongyong, both former vice-heads of the Hebei People's Congress; and Jing Chunhua, secretary-general of Hebei Party Committee.

In 2014, Liang Bin was investigated by the CCDI for "serious violations of Party discipline" and was sentenced to eight years in prison in 2016 for accepting bribes valued at 5.57 million yuan ($814,000). In 2015, Zhou Benshun was also probed by the CCDI for disciplinary violations and sentenced last year to 15 years in prison for accepting bribes valued at 40 million yuan.

In 2016, Zhang Yue was investigated by the CCDI for disciplinary violations and in July was jailed for 15 years for taking bribes valued at 157 million yuan. Last year, Yang Chongyong was placed under investigation for corruption and has been charged with taking bribes of up to 200 million yuan.

Jing Chunhua, was sentenced to 18 years in 2016 for taking bribes of more than 60 million yuan.

Yang Kai, a lawyer with the Beijing Lawyers Association, said recently that the country has never slackened its efforts to combat corruption, and if corrupt officials are thinking they won't be caught, they are wrong.

"The active surrender of Ai is not from his willingness but the result of strong pressure from the anti-graft body, because if they investigate one corrupt official, they will discover many more graft clues and dig deep into more corrupt officials," he said. "His best choice is to admit what he did wrong and actively confess his crime to get lenient punishment."