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dam-l Dam officials face scrutiny by anti-corruption taskforce (SCMP)
South China Morning Post, Friday, June 9, 2000
Dam officials face scrutiny by anti-corruption taskforce
VIVIEN PIK-KWAN CHAN
Special inspectors have been sent to units responsible
for resettling people affected by the Three Gorges
Dam project to purge cadres guilty of corruption after
several cases of embezzlement of resettlement funds
were uncovered.
The new order came as critics of the project warned
of possible unrest by discontented, displaced peasants
affected by the construction of the huge dam. About
140 corruption cases relating to the project, which
involve billions of yuan and implicate hundreds of
officials, have been uncovered since the project was
launched six years ago.
"Some 473 million yuan in resettlement funds was
embezzled, misappropriated or illegally used in 1998
alone," Xinhua said, adding that "those punished
included Huang Faxiang, a land management official
in Fengdu county, near Chongqing in Sichuan, who
was executed early this year for the embezzlement of
15.56 million yuan".
Officials claimed about 430 million yuan of the funds
misappropriated in 1998 had been recovered, adding
that the money still missing would hopefully be
replaced by authorities using public funds by the end
of this month.
Special investigators had been despatched to each
resettlement unit to check their accounts, Xinhua said.
"Investigators will also check if special subsidies for
resettled peasant migrants were distributed on time," it
said.
The Chongqing municipal Government yesterday
issued an order demanding that all funds designated
for resettlement to be used according to law. It also
listed regulations detailing how the use of such funds
would be subjected to auditing.
"Those who misuse, embezzle, misappropriate or
cause losses to the funds will be dealt with harshly,"
the order said.
Chongqing has even set up special telephone lines for
the public to report crimes connected with the misuse
of resettlement funds and graft activities by officials
of the dam project.
By the end of last year, the mainland had invested
17.68 billion yuan (HK$16.62 billion) in resettlement
work.
Officials project 1.07 million farmers, 85 per cent of
them from Chongqing, will have to move by the time
the dam's 560km-long reservoir is fully filled in 2009.
One of the most vocal opponents of the dam project,
Dai Qing, blasted the ill-treatment of forced migrants
who lost their homes because of the project. She said
the dam-builders had deliberately covered up the
number of people who would be displaced, and that
the actual number of those affected was in fact more
than 1.8 million.
"The authorities have only managed to resettle
200,000 farmers since 1992, and it won't be possible
for them to find land to resettle the targeted number
of displaced peasants by 2009," Ms Dai said.
"These people have nowhere to go. Some 600 of the
resettled peasants were moved to Shihezi, in Xinjiang
province, an impoverished area suffering from
desertification."
Ms Dai warned that discontented peasants could pose
a great threat to social stability. "I think it is very
likely that we will have a repeat of the 1987 riots by
resettled peasants affected by the Sanmenxia Dam
project of 1957, which displaced 300,000 peasants,"
she said.
Large groups of resettled peasants clashed with
military units which had occupied land in Henan
province, near where their old homes had been, when
they returned there 30 years later.
Ms Dai said public security forces were out in force
and ready to suppress any organised demonstrations
by displaced peasants affected by the project.
-end-
Doris Shen
International Rivers Network
1847 Berkeley Way
Berkeley, CA 94703
doris@irn.org
tel: 510.848.1155 ext. 317
fax: 510.848.1008
IRN http://www.irn.org IRN China Page http://www.hk-sanxia.org
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