Hunan Reports 5 Typical Cases of Full-Chain Investigation and Handling of Prominent Problems in Bidding for Engineering Construction Projects

In recent years, Hunan Province has continuously carried out special governance of prominent problems in bidding for engineering construction projects, effectively integrating the forces of discipline inspection and supervision organs, public security organs, and functional regulatory departments to investigate and handle corruption in engineering projects and chaos in the bidding field in an all-round, full-process, and full-chain manner. The relevant cases investigated and handled since 2022 are hereby reported as follows:

1. The case of Liu Tieqiang, former Secretary of the Party Leadership Group and Chairman of the Xiangtan County CPPCC, for serious violations of discipline and law.

In 2017, Liu Tieqiang, then Secretary of the Party Leadership Group and Chairman of the Xiangtan County CPPCC and Commander of the Command Headquarters for the Xiangtan County Binjiang Scenic Belt (Yanghe Section) Quality Improvement Engineering Construction Project, accepted the request of Ma and instructed Rong Hucheng, Deputy Commander of the Command Headquarters, and the project leader to help Ma and others win the bid before the project's public bidding. By having the project leader tip off the bidding agency, artificially raising the threshold, increasing similar construction performance in specific industries among the qualification conditions, and making the acquisition of specific awards a bonus item, potential bidders were excluded and restricted from participating in competition, thereby enabling Ma's company to successfully win the bid at more than 45.76 million yuan. Liu Tieqiang also had other serious violations of discipline and law. In February 2023, Liu Tieqiang was punished with expulsion from the Party and expulsion from public office, and the suspected criminal issues were transferred to the procuratorial organ for review and prosecution in accordance with law. Rong Hucheng and the relevant project leaders were placed on file for investigation and handling. In August 2022, Ma was criminally detained by the public security organ in accordance with law on suspicion of the crime of bid collusion.

2. The case of Chen Kexiang, former Secretary of the Party Leadership Group and Director of the Yueyang Municipal Urban Management and Comprehensive Law Enforcement Bureau, for serious violations of discipline and law.

In 2019, Chen Kexiang, then Secretary of the Party Leadership Group and Director of the Municipal Urban Management Bureau, during the bidding process for the Luojia'ao Fly Ash Landfill Project, accepted the request of Wu and tipped off the bidding agency. Wu and his son Wu used the bidding agency to add flood control and disaster relief as a credit bonus item to the bidding documents, invited companies to uniformly prepare quotations, and other methods to collude in bid rigging. At the same time, through relevant staff of the Yueyang Municipal Public Resource Trading Center, they obtained the roster of companies participating in the bidding, spent 170,000 yuan to persuade relevant competitors to withdraw, and ultimately borrowed the qualifications of relevant companies to successfully win the bid at a price of 9.43 million yuan. After winning the bid, Wu became the actual contractor by signing a false labor subcontracting contract. Chen Kexiang also had other serious violations of discipline and law. In December 2022, Chen Kexiang was punished with expulsion from the Party and expulsion from public office; in June 2023, Chen Kexiang was sentenced to three years and six months in prison for the crime of accepting bribes and fined 400,000 yuan. In October 2022, Wu and others were transferred for prosecution on suspicion of the crime of bid collusion. In 2023, the relevant staff of the Yueyang Municipal Trading Center were placed on file for investigation and handling.

3. The case of Li Ronghe, former Secretary of the Party Leadership Group and Director of the Hengyang County Water Conservancy Bureau, for serious violations of discipline and law.

From February to May 2017, during the bidding process for the Yanpi River Chishui Protection Circle Governance Project in Hengyang County, Li Ronghe, then Secretary of the Party Leadership Group and Director of the Hengyang County Water Conservancy Bureau, by instructing the setting of bonus award items in the bidding documents and other methods, provided help for Chen to win the bid; at the same time, Chen achieved the winning bid through affiliation with a company and bid collusion, with a bid amount of 4.1217 million yuan. In addition, Li Ronghe helped Chen, through bid rigging and collusive bidding, successively undertake three other engineering projects, including the 2017 Xiangjiang Zhangmu Dike Reinforcement Emergency Repair Project in Hengyang County, the Zhengshui Hengyang County Meihua Protection Circle Flood Control Project in Hengyang City, and the Zhengshui Xidu Town Doupi and Xinqiao Protection Circle Governance Project in Hengyang County. Li Ronghe also had other serious violations of discipline and law. In August 2022, Li Ronghe was punished with expulsion from the Party and expulsion from public office, and the suspected criminal issues were transferred to the procuratorial organ for review and prosecution in accordance with law. In May 2022, Chen was transferred to the procuratorial organ for review and prosecution on suspicion of the crime of offering bribes, the crime of bid collusion, and other issues.

 4. The case of Mo Haitian, former Secretary of the Party Leadership Group and Director of the Shaoyang County Agriculture and Rural Affairs Bureau, for serious violations of discipline and law.

In 2018, Mo Haitian, taking advantage of his position as Secretary of the Party Leadership Group and Director of the County Agriculture and Rural Affairs Bureau, before the bidding for the Shaoyang County Rice Production Functional Zone and Rapeseed Production Protection Zone Delimitation Service Project, disclosed to Peng the project bidding requirements (such as bidding company qualifications, bidding time, bid evaluation methods, etc.) and information about the bidding agency. Subsequently, Peng, through the intermediary Qing, contacted three companies to rig bids and collude in bidding for the project, and the head of the bidding agency, Qu, helped Peng persuade other companies participating in the bidding to withdraw and buy up their qualifications. In November 2018, the company to which Peng was affiliated won the bid at 5.681 million yuan. Mo Haitian also had other serious violations of discipline and law. In April 2022, Mo Haitian was punished with expulsion from the Party and expulsion from public office, and Peng, Qing, and Qu were transferred to the procuratorial organ for review and prosecution on suspicion of the crime of bid collusion. In May 2023, Mo Haitian was sentenced to three years and eight months in prison and fined 225,500 yuan.

5. The case of bid collusion by bid evaluation experts in the water conservancy industry of Yiyang City.

From 2020 to 2021, Luo Youkun, a bid evaluation expert in the water conservancy industry of Yiyang City and a staff member of the Lanxi Town Agricultural Comprehensive Service Center (formerly the Water Management Station) in Heshan District, together with Li Chunhua, a staff member of the Yuxingshan Reservoir in the High-tech Zone, Xiong Kang, deputy director of the Yiyang City Water Conservancy and Hydropower Survey, Design and Research Institute, and others, used the advantages of their status as bid evaluation experts and their "connections" to buy off staff of the Yiyang Municipal Public Resource Trading Center. By obtaining information on the day's bid evaluation experts, requesting and buying off bid evaluation experts to give high scores to the companies they controlled, and other methods, they won 9 engineering projects, involving more than 106 million yuan. After winning the bids, Luo Youkun and others resold the relevant projects to private bosses at prices ranging from 80,000 yuan to 1.1 million yuan, illegally profiting more than 3 million yuan. In 2022, three bid evaluation experts, including Luo Youkun, Li Chunhua, and Xiong Kang, were transferred for prosecution on suspicion of the crime of offering bribes to non-state public officials, and Luo Youkun was also transferred for prosecution on suspicion of the crime of bid collusion. Fourteen bid evaluation experts involved in the cases were disqualified as bid evaluation experts.

The above five typical cases fully demonstrate that corruption in the bidding field of engineering construction projects and chaos in the industry are intertwined and mutually reinforcing, that the problems are severe and complex, and that special rectification still has a long way to go. All levels and units throughout the province must, with the perseverance of clinging to the green mountain without letting go, take deepening special rectification as the main battlefield of corruption governance, a powerful weapon for rectifying the order of the bidding market, and an important measure for serving and safeguarding high-quality economic development, and pursue it tirelessly with sustained efforts to continuously consolidate the results of special rectification.

First, strengthen the deterrent effect of investigation and handling.Discipline inspection and supervision organs and public security organs must implement the dual special task force working mechanism and investigate and handle in an all-round manner problems in the bidding field such as leading cadres' improper interference and intervention, bid evaluation experts' acceptance of bribes and engaging in favoritism and fraud, and bid rigging and collusion; relevant functional departments must continuously intensify efforts to crack down on and investigate illegal and criminal acts in the bidding field of engineering construction projects, seriously handle problems such as qualification affiliation, illegal subcontracting, and illegal subcontracting, and effectively fight this tough and protracted battle of special rectification.

Second, strengthen administrative supervision.Administrative regulatory departments must further strengthen supervision over the entire bidding process, strengthen substantive review of bidding document filing, and prevent filing from becoming "unmanaged." They must strengthen and improve on-site supervision and management of bid evaluation, promote practices such as bid opening and evaluation without face-to-face contact, and strengthen the internal management and risk prevention and control of public resource trading centers. They must strengthen inspections of contract performance, on-site construction, project personnel, and engineering changes for awarded projects. They must continue to promote the construction of the "six unifications" of information platforms, vigorously promote credit supervision, regularly publish lists of serious dishonest conduct, and strengthen joint punishment.

Third, strengthen promoting reform through cases.All localities must continue to thoroughly investigate problem clues, investigate and handle influential full-chain cases, and report typical cases of leading cadres' improper interference in the engineering field, continuously release the deterrent effect, and strengthen warning education. They must strengthen the summary and analysis of key cases in the bidding field of engineering construction projects, solidly promote reform through cases, focus on problems that occur commonly and repeatedly, deeply study methods to fundamentally solve the problems, and promote local Party committees, governments, and functional departments to improve rules and regulations, plug regulatory loopholes, and achieve greater governance results and more institutional achievements in the engineering bidding field.