【10.01.05 英国卫报】Investigation into wedding banquet for Chinese police chief's dau

青蛙小王子

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jan/05/chinese-police-wedding-banquet-investigation

A senior police officer could pay dearly for his daughter's wedding after police announced an official investigation into the lavish 110-table banquet.
Officers in Shenzhen, in Guangdong province, announced the investigation following outrage over the event's estimated cost of up to 600,000 yuan (£55,000).

The average disposable income in China last year was less than 16,000 yuan.

The case has highlighted widespread anger over inequality and corruption.
Officials often use such functions for networking and easing relations, but "hongbao" – the red envelopes in which guests give cash to the newlyweds – offset, and often outweigh, the cost of the wedding. They have also been used to deliver bribes.
The official Guangzhou Daily newspaper, quoting Zhou Baojun, a police spokesman, said an investigation into the event – hosted by Liu Shengqiang, a deputy director of the Shenzhen airport police – had begun.
More than 1,000 guests dined in the vast banqueting hall at the five-star Kempinski hotel, enjoying delicacies including shark's fin soup and abalone.
But Liu told the Southern Metropolis Daily, which reported on the event, that "80% of the guests were merely friends".
He added: "I expected the media would report the way I celebrated my daughter's wedding. But I could not have cancelled the banquet.
"Both families have lived in Shenzhen for decades, and my old army buddies just expect to be invited."
He declined to comment on the cost of the event or how much guests had donated. Calls to the Shenzhen police spokesman's office went unanswered today.
"Officials like Liu know the purpose of such a party. They take the opportunity of a wedding or a funeral to collect hongbao," Wang Yukai, a professor with the Chinese Academy of Governance, told the China Daily newspaper.
"If they were not powerful officials, there wouldn't be so many people present at their dinner parties."
The banquet was held five days after a deputy police chief in the same province was suspended over allegations he received money from more than 1,000 guests he had invited to celebrate his purchase of a new home.
On Thursday, the county's disciplinary authority banned Communist party members and officials from accepting hongbao, even at weddings or funerals, saying officials would be dismissed at once if they had more than 10 tables of guests at any party.
"With no specific punitive measures, most crackdowns on such practices are of little consequence," Wang said, adding that confidence in officials would increase if the county's measures worked.
The Huashang Daily newspaper reported yesterday that authorities In Shaanxi province had dismissed Wu Fengzhou, a high-profile schoolmaster from Ankang city, over his son's wedding banquet.
So many teachers from the town's schools attended the event, held on 28 December, that classes for around 2,805 students were suspended.