“One group wants to find patrons and aims to get an advantage in the market,” he said. “The other group hopes, after obtaining wealth, to seek political power. This is dangerous.”
Yang said the anticorruption campaign would be instrumental in cutting collusion between officials and businesspeople.
Yang did not name any names but the Beijing-based Legal Evening News said some businesspeople, such as executed mining tycoon Liu Han, went into politics themselves while others sought to wield influence by funding the promotion of political allies.
An example of the second kind was coal-mining kingpin Zhang Xinming, who conspired with senior officials in Shanxi province and was nicknamed the “underground organisation minister”.
Famed hedge fund manager Xu Xiang also came to grief over stock market manipulation, sentenced to 5½ years in jail in January. But the fate of mainland billionaire Xiao Jianhua remains a mystery – he disappeared from Hong Kong earlier this year and is reportedly assisting investigations on the mainland.
