Xi Jinping is touted to be a reformist even before he came in to power. It appears he still is.
Rafael Hui and Thomas Kwok found guilty of bribery in Hong Kong’s biggest graft trial
Kwok’s younger brother, Raymond Kwok Ping-luen, was acquitted of all his four charges. He now takes sole charge of Sun Hung Kai Properties, the city’s biggest property developer by market value, as its chairman.
Red-eyed and weary, the 61-year-old walked free from the High Court alone as two other co-accused were also found guilty.
“I have conflicting emotions,” he told the media circus waiting outside court. Thanking his wife, mother, children and God, he added: “On the one hand, I’m happy … I’ve been proven innocent after these two years of struggles. On the other, I’m very unhappy because Thomas Kwok and Thomas Chan … are convicted. We will continue to support [them and their] families.”
Rafael Hui (left) and Thomas Kwok at court this morning to hear the verdicts.Thomas Kwok, 63, was convicted of one count of conspiracy to commit misconduct in public office. The brothers’ top aide Thomas Chan Kui-yuen, 68, was found guilty of two counts – a fate shared by ex-stock exchange official Francis Kwan Hung-sang, 64.
Last night, SHKP said Thomas Kwok and Chan would appeal against their convictions. Both resigned from the property giant after the verdicts.
The man at the centre of the storm, Hui, was convicted of five out of eight charges, making him the highest-ranking official in Hong Kong’s history to be convicted of taking bribes.
TIMELINE: Rafael Hui: the rise and fall of a political powerbroker
The case marked the dramatic fall of a man who was once the most influential and decorated star in local politics. Failing to escape the long arm of the law, a fragile Hui, 66, nodded blankly in the dock yesterday as the jury delivered its verdicts at 2.45pm.
Chan, who sat behind Hui, turned red in the face, while Raymond Kwok laid a hand on the shoulder of his elder brother. As he prepared to leave the dock, Raymond paused to speak to the court guards, as if to confirm he really could go.
SHKP boss Raymond Kwok was acquitted of all four counts.
All four criminals were taken away by Correctional Services Department officers. They may be sentenced as soon as Monday when Mr Justice Andrew Macrae hears mitigation pleas. By last night, Hui and Kwan had yet to decide if they would appeal.
Macrae ordered a doubling of fees for the nine jurors to HK$820 a day, meaning each could claim about HK$100,000 for their work on the case. He exempted all nine from jury service for five years, thanking them for showing “why retention of the jury system is so important in the city”.
The case, lasting 131 days, was a close fight to the end. The jurors alone took five days and four nights to make up their minds, and had to seek directions from the judge once. And although four of the five were convicted, only 10 out of the 19 verdicts were in favour of the prosecution.
DON’T MISS: How bribe-taker Rafael Hui’s taste for the high life led to his fall from grace
“[Thomas Kwok] considers the verdict very strange,” his lawyer Lawrence Lok SC said outside the court. “Why were some defence arguments accepted but not others, when they were part of the same thing?”
Of Hui’s five convictions, three counts were about misconduct in public office. He concealed from his public-sector employers financial benefits totalling HK$16.582 million.
Thomas Chan, one of two men who helped facilitate Thomas Kwok’s money transfers to Hui, was convicted on two counts related to bribing a public official.
Thomas Kwok was convicted of paying Hui HK$8.5 million, via middlemen Chan and Kwan, days before the latter became chief secretary in 2005. All four were found guilty of conspiracy to commit misconduct in public office in a 7-2 jury decision. But the Kwoks were cleared of involvement in HK$11.182 million in bribes for which the other defendants were found guilty.
The billionaire brothers and Hui were cleared of paying HK$5 million and HK$4.125 million in bribes in 2005.
The Independent Commission Against Corruption said it would continue to exercise the law “regardless of the background, status and position of the persons involved”. SHKP and two listed subsidiaries, Smartone and Sunevision, were suspended from trading at 2.45pm.
Additional reporting by Enoch Yiu, Julie Chu and Thomas Chan
Hong Kong graft investigators swoop on unit of Chinese finance giant Guotai Junan
Samuel Chan and Sophie Yu
Hong Kong-listed subsidiary of mainland investment giant is at centre of investigation as its executive director is taken away by the ICAC
Independent Commission Against Corruption investigators swooped on the Central offices of Guotai Junan International, the local subsidiary of Guotai Junan Securities, on Monday. They seized “certain securities trading account-opening records and an agreement relating to a placing case”, the company said in a statement to the stock exchange.
Sources said the investigation was related to a recent share placement. Company chairman Yim Fung could not be reached for comment last night.
Officers also executed a search warrant at the home of Wong Tung-ching, the company’s chairman and executive director, the statement added.
Michael Sze Cho-cheung says it has been difficult for the ICAC. Photo: Edward Wong“Wong was invited to visit the ICAC to assist in an investigation,” the company said. No other director or employee was “taken away”, it added.
Trading in the company’s shares resumed yesterday after a two-day suspension pending the release of “price-sensitive information”. Shares fell 7.6 per cent to close at HK$5.69.
Shanghai-based Guotai Junan Securities is one of the mainland’s largest brokerages and asset managers.
The high-profile case broke on the day the ICAC reported that the number of corruption complaints had fallen for the third consecutive year. But officers denied the 11 per cent fall was due to a loss of public confidence in the watchdog after claims former commissioner Timothy Tong Hin-ming breached rules with his lavish hospitality spending.
“The year has been difficult for the ICAC, as we all know. The internal governance of the ICAC was questioned,” said Michael Sze Cho-cheung, chairman of the ICAC’s operations review committee. But he said the institution, which celebrated its 40th anniversary in February, would rebuild its battered reputation.
“The ICAC has been very successful in tackling its problems. I am confident that the public will soon have the same level of trust … as before,” said Sze, who will retire this month.
And Sze said the public need not worry that the ICAC’s highest-profile investigation, into allegations former chief executive Donald Tsang Yam-kuen accepted favours from tycoon friends, would simply “vanish”. The 21/2-year-old investigation could not be wound up without the approval of his committee, which examines all investigations the ICAC is proposing to drop.
Holding its annual year-end media conference yesterday, the agency revealed that complaints received from January to last month were down 11 per cent to 2,190 cases, from 2,452 in the same period last year.
But Sze said there were no signs of worsening cross-border corruption. Complaints regarding cross-border affairs edged up to 32 from 28 for the first 11 months of the year.
Additional reporting by Ray Chan
source »
Macau watchdog to meet bankers over dirty-money crackdown
In a note sent out late on Tuesday, Monetary Authority chiefs told city bankers they would “explain a live monitoring system” which the South China Morning Post yesterday revealed will give Beijing’s powerful Ministry of Public Security unprecedented access to all transfers through the state-backed China UnionPay bank payment card.
All Macau casino stocks dropped in trading yesterday in the wake of news of the crackdown, which comes just 48 hours before President Xi Jinping arrives in Macau to lead ceremonies marking the 15th anniversary of the former Portuguese enclave’s return to Chinese sovereignty.
Galaxy Entertainment Group suffered the most, dropping 8.2 per cent, while MGM China fell 7 per cent and Sands China 6.18 per cent. SJM Holdings dropped 6.17 per cent and Wynn Macau by 4.30 per cent while Melco Crown Entertainment was down 3.86 per cent.
In comparison, the benchmark Hang Seng Index lost 0.37 per cent.
The note sent to banks, seen by the Post, also asked banks to provide a list of names and information on high-risk businesses who use the China UnionPay bank card system.
These include stores selling watches and jewellery, wine, pharmaceutical products, dried seafood and telecommunications businesses, the note said, adding that “high-risk businesses” in nearby casinos were also included.
The key involvement of the ministry’s Economic Crimes Investigation Bureau – which is spearheading the “Fox Hunt” operation aimed at securing the return of corrupt party officials who have fled overseas – provides confirmation of the long-held belief by many that Macau casinos are a major conduit for capital flight from the mainland.
A senior gaming insider said yesterday: “This is causing a lot of concern; it seems Beijing means business, and it’s not just the VIP junket operators who bring in the high-rollers who are nervous.”
The latest move deals another blow to the gaming industry following six months of declining revenue, due in large part to Xi’s “tigers and flies” anti-corruption drive.
Analysts forecast a year-on-year drop of around 20 per cent this month that will push the city to register its first full-year casino revenue decline.
It is unclear how deeply the new measure will affect VIP volumes, Bloomberg gaming analyst Tim Craighead said.
However, he added that the news comes in a month when institutional investment managers review their year-end portfolios.
“If there’s even more concern, do they want to back off positions? It can have an amplified impact,” he said.
China Resources’ vice-president Jiang Wei latest executive to be implicated in corruption probe
A source close to the company told the South China Morning Post that the investigation into Jiang Wei was linked to China Resources’ controversial acquisition of a Shanxi coal mining firm four years ago.
China Resources’ board office in Hong Kong confirmed yesterday that Jiang had been detained by the authorities.
“Mr Jiang has been taken away by prosecutors to assist in an investigation,” a staff member said, refusing to provide further details.
Jiang is the latest in a string of senior executives of the company and its subsidiaries to be detained in corruption inquiries since former chairman Song Lin was taken away earlier this year.
China Resources (Holdings) is the parent company of five Hong Kong-listed firms. From 2001 to 2012, Jiang was the chief financial officer of the parent company.
He also later became the chairman of China Resources Capital, the group’s financial service platform, putting him at the helm of China Resources Capital’s five offshoots, including China Resources Bank of Zhuhai, China Resources Investment Enterprise and China Resources SZITIC Trust.
Jiang was in hot water over his decision in 2010 to have China Resources SZITIC Trust lend about 2 billion yuan (HK$2.5 billion) to Jinye Coal and Coking Group in Shanxi, a problematic acquisition that China Resources Power (CRP), a subsidiary of the parent group, made that year, the source and the reports said.
CRP bought troubled Jinye for 7.9 billion yuan in May 2010.
It was accused of dramatically overpaying for the coal group, and controversy over the deal later triggered a series of investigations by the authorities into a number of China Resources executives. To help pull Jinye out of its financial straits, CRP enlisted China Resources SZITIC Trust to lend about 2 billion yuan to Jinye for a little under two years. But Jinye failed to pay back the money by the 2012 deadline.
The Shanghai Securities News and the source claimed that Jiang juggled the trust company’s finances to make it appear – at least on paper – that the debt had been repaid.
State auditors looked into CR Capital’s books last year and reported in June this year that they had uncovered a web of problems with its accounts. But it is not clear if any of those issues are related to the Jinye loan.
Jinye’s boss, Zhang Xinming, once the richest man in Shanxi, was taken into custody in August, the same month that CRP executive director Wang Yujun was detained by prosecutors in Jiangsu province.
On Saturday, the director of the Shanxi Coal Industry Bureau, Wu Yongping, was detained by the province’s anti-graft agency for investigation.
Several sources in Shanxi said that Wu helped pave the way for the Jinye acquisition.
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