Chen Liangyu, secretary of the Shanghai Municipal Committee of Communist Party of China (CPC), has been sacked for his involvement in a social security fund scandal.

Chen was also suspended from the posts of member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and member of the CPC Central Committee, said a decision by the CPC Central Committee published on Monday.

Shanghai Mayor Han Zheng has been appointed the acting secretary of the Shanghai Municipal Committee of the CPC by the CPC Central Committee.

The Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee convened a meeting on Sunday and discussed a preliminary investigation report on Chen's problems, which was tabled by the the CPC Central Commission for Discipline Inspection.

The CPC Central Commission for Discipline Inspection is investigating Chen's case.

According to the preliminary investigation, Chen was also involved in other discipline violations, such as "helping further the economic interests of illegal business people, protecting staff who severely violated laws and discipline, furthering the interests of family members by taking advantage of his official posts".

The CPC Central Committee held that its investigation into Chen and his subsequent punishment "demonstrated the CPC's resolution to build a clean Party and to fight corruption".

"Whoever it is, no matter how high their positions are, anyone who violates party rules or national law will be severely investigated and punished," the committee said in the press release.

The CPC Central Committee warned that "all Party members, especially senior cadres, must have a clear awareness of the far-reaching, complex and arduous nature of the fight against corruption", and urged them to maintain propriety in their lives, authority, social status and personal interests.

It reminded them to focus on improving their performance, to guard against temptations of power, money and sex, and to persist in stringent self-discipline.

Party committees at all levels should strengthen the education and management of cadres, tighten restrictions and supervision of authority, and promote a better party performance, clean and honest government, and the fight against graft, it said.

The CPC Central Committee said it believed corruption would be curbed under the leadership of Hu Jintao as general secretary and with joint efforts of all Party members and the public.

It was also confident of improving the general atmosphere in the Party and society and pushing ahead the construction of socialism with Chinese characteristics, the press release said.

Chen was born in October 1946 in Ningbo city, East China's Zhejiang Province. He graduated from the Architecture Department of the People's Liberation Army (PLA) Institute of Logistics Engineering where he had majored in architecture. He joined the CPC in April 1980.

Chen became Secretary of the Shanghai Municipal Committee of the CPC and a member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee in 2002.

The corruption involving Shanghai's social security funds has already felled two Shanghai officials.

Zhu Junyi, director of the Shanghai Municipal Bureau of Labour and Social Security, was stripped of his post in August. The 55-year-old city official is suspected of misconduct involving a 3.2-billion-yuan loan of city funds to toll road operator Fuxi Investment Holding Co.

Also in August, Qin Yu, deputy secretary of the Shanghai's Baoshan district CPC Committee, was dismissed from the post for being involved in the misuse of the social security fund.

Earlier reports said more than 100 investigators from Beijing have gone to Shanghai to probe the corruption case in which money was siphoned off from Shanghai's social security system, which manages more than 10 billion yuan (1.25 billion dollars) in funds.

Han Zheng, the acting Party chief of Shanghai, born in 1954, is a native of Cixi, East China's Zhejiang Province. He joined the CPC in 1979 and was a deputy at the 14th and 15th CPC National Congresses, and a member of the 16th CPC Central Committee.

Han was elected as deputy party chief of Shanghai in May 2002 and became mayor of Shanghai in February 2003.

Source: Xinhua