NextFin News -- Former Chongqing mayor Huang Qifan is being investigated by Chinese authorities for allegedly serious violations of Chinese laws and regulationsm, according to China's state-owned national broadcaster CCTV.
He had been scheduled to deliver a keynote speech at aforum in Hangzhou, but news surfaced that his speech had been canceled for any specified reasons.
According to a statement published on Tuesday (October 13) on the official website of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI) and the National Commission of Supervision, Huang is suspected of serious violations of discipline and law.
Huang, 74, is originally from Shanghai. When Wu Bangguo, former chairman of China's National People's Congress, was Shanghai's top leader, Huang served as deputy secretary-general of the Shanghai Municipal Committee and director of its policy research office.
In 2001, Huang was transferred to Chongqing to serve as vice mayor. He was promoted to mayor in 2010 and stepped down at the end of 2016. During his more than 10 years in Chongqing, Huang served under six successive secretaries of the Chongqing Municipal Committee of the Chinese Communist Party. He also weathered major political upheavals and subsequent purges following the downfall of Bo Xilai and Sun Zhengcai.
In March 2010, during China's annual “Two Sessions,” the meetings of the National People's Congress and the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, Huang described his working relationship with Bo Xilai as being “like a fish in water.”
In February 2017, Huang was transferred to the National People's Congress's Financial and Economic Affairs Committee, where he served as deputy chairman. He retired in March 2018. Since then Huang had traveled around China to deliver speeches as a high-profile economist.
A forum organized by the Hangzhou branch of Bank of Ningbo was scheduled to take place on October 26 at a five-star hotel in Hangzhou. Huang had been invited to deliver the keynote speech.
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