The former mayor and party secretary of Nanjing (r) inspects a city street in 2010
Source: Nanjing Gulou

Oct 17, 2013
Economic Observer Online
By Qiu Ziming (仇子明)
Translated by Elise Zheng
Original article: [Chinese]

At around noon on Wednesday, Ji Jianye (季建业), the mayor of Nanjing, flew from Nanjing to Beijing accompanied by some unknown people.

That afternoon, news began to spread that these mysterious people were actually officers from a special team of the Central Discipline Inspection Commission (CDIC) of the Chinese Communist Party. The team had travelled to Nanjing on the Tuesday evening without notifying local authorities. Early in the morning of Oct 16 they located Mayor Ji and flew back to Beijing with him before noon.

Only hours after he was detained, news that the mayor was under investigation by the CDIC for alleged economic crimes started to circulate in the city's political circles.

The EO sought confirmation of these reports from various officials in Nanjing, but they all refused to comment on the issue.

As of 4pm on Oct 16, officials from Nanjing's propaganda department (南京宣传部门) were still saying that they had not received any confirmation of this news.

By Wednesday evening, news of the mayor's detention began to spread through various social media platforms.

On Thursday (Oct 17), Xinhua News Agency published an article stating that Ji Jianye was suspected of "severe violations of party disciplines and laws" and was being investigated by the relevant authorities.

It is being alleged that Ji may have had some improper holdings in some of the city's public construction projects. Li's "economic problems" might also go be beyond Nanjing.

According to people within the Nanjing Government, Ji Jianye's case could be related to that of Zhu Xingliang (朱兴良), the head of a listed company from Suzhou called Jingtanglang (金螳螂). Zhu has also been detained by the CDIC.  

According to an informed source, before coming to Nanjing, the special CDIC team spent a month in the city of Yangzhou (扬州). Before becoming mayor of Nanjing, Ji Jianye had served as the party secretary in Yangzhou.

In addition, prior to Ji's detention, a female boss in Yangzhou, who is said to be in a "close private relationship" with Ji (一位与季建业私交甚密), was placed under "isolated investigation" by the special investigation team in Xuzhou (徐州) .

After news that an investigation into Ji's activities had been made public, the prevailing sentiment of online chatter in Nanjing appeared to welcome the news.

Words such as "a good catch" (抓得好), "should have been caught long ago" (早就该抓了) were used frequently.

Some even made public calls on social media inviting friends out to drink in order to celebrate Ji's downfall.

The warm repsonse displayed by many residents might be related to their spontaneous love for Nanjing's environment.

During the four years that Ji served as mayor in the city, roads were repeatedly dug up.

The cutting down of many of the city's Chinese parasol trees (梧桐树) further irritated residents.

As did the blasting of the West Viaduct on one of the city's major roads, which brought great inconvenience to the Nanjing citizens to get around.

Ji also oversaw an expensive but by all accounts ineffective wastewater drainage diversion project.

The announcement has also not caused many waves in the city's political circle. Many officials said that Li Jianye was bound to be detained sooner or later.

Ji Jianye was born in January 1957 in the county-level city of Zhangjiagang (张家港)in Jiangsu Province. Ji also received a doctorate degree in law from Suzhou University, though accusations of plagiarism have been made in relation to his thesis "A Discussion over Peasants' Rights" (农民权利论).