Chinese companies found to rig lotteries to pander to government officials

Companies in China have come up with another ingenious way to bribe government officials, which as always, tends to lack subtlety, according to a report by the China Procuratorial Daily.

Companies invite local officials to Spring Festival parties, hold a prize draw and come up with a predictable result. The official wins top prize again.

"My colleague tried to please a government official by rigging the draw. The official received top prize of a laptop worth more than 10,000 yuan," Xu Xiaobin, a salesman with the Hangzhou Buynow Notebook Computer Marketplace, said.

"It's hard to gather much evidence in such bribery cases as the officials may get the prize but actually do very little for the company", said Zhao Jie, a procurator with the Beijing Dongcheng District's Procuratorate.

Ren Jianming, deputy director of the Anti-corruption & Governance Research Center in Tsinghua University, suggested activities such as lucky draws at parties should be standardized, with more regulations banning government officials from taking part.

Source: Xinhua