Factory boss slain in wake of reforms

Stephen E Philion philion at hawaii.edu
Mon Oct 11 18:12:14 PDT 1999


Hong Kong Standard 10.11.99

Factory boss slain in wake of reforms on

corruption

STORY: A CHIEF executive of a state-owned enterprise (SOE) in the

northwest province of Shaanxi is thought to have been murdered

because of his bold moves to restructure the loss-making firm,

according to an official newspaper.

Hu Dan, former general manager of the Shaanxi provincial livestock

products import and export company, was stabbed 19 times at his

home in Xian on 30 August, the Guangzhou-based Nanfang Weekend

News reported.

Mr Hu was killed after he battled the corrupt influences in the ``SOE for

five years'', the weekly said, indicating Mr Hu could have been murdered

by people with vested interests whose benefits were damaged by

reform.

Mr Hu took over the company in 1994 and discovered some staff had

purchased poor-quality wood at very high price and then sold it at very

low price, which made the firm suffer heavy losses.

Targeting the corrupt personnel and departments, Mr Hu launched bold

moves reforming the debt-ridden firm, which meant some people lost

their positions while some others lost their power, the report said.

``Since the personnel reform in the company, we often received

threatening telephone calls,'' Mr Hu's wife, Xiong Yuanying, said, adding

some people even warned that her husband ``is digging his grave''.

According to the newspaper, Mr Hu was killed three months after he

filed an appeal to the Supreme People's Court against a ruling by a

court in Hebei province over a controversial deal for wood, the

company's major export product.

The murder came about two weeks before the ruling Communist Party

convened its annual plenum focusing the reform of the ailing SOE. The

Nanfang Weekend News, run by the southern Guangdong provincial

authorities, revealed the murder after the sensitive period of the 50th

anniversary of the People's Republic.



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