Chinese president's son linked to multi-million pound African corruption probe

Shanghai, July 18(ANI): Hu Haifeng, a Chinese businessman and the eldest son of Chinese President Hu Jintao, has been linked to a multi-million pound African corruption probe and faces questioning in connection with the investigation.

Haifeng was the president of the state-owned Chinese company Nuctech until last year, from where three people have been arrested on charges of fraud, corruption and bribery for involving in a government contract, The Telegraph reports.

Haifeng has since been promoted as the party secretary of Tsinghua Holdings, the group that controls Nuctech and 30 other companies.

The investigation centers on a 34 million pounds deal that Namibia had signed with Nuctech, a world leader in scanning technology. The company was supposed to provide it with scanners for its ports and airports.

Paulus Noah, Director of the Anti-Corruption Commission of Namibia, said that he would like to question Nuctech's management, including Haifeng.

"Of course if he can make himself available I will be happy," he said. "I would like to know how they do business in China," Noah said.

Noah added that Haifeng was not a suspect at this stage and he would be interviewed as a potential witness.

Under the deal, the Namibian government was to make a 8 million pounds down payment, with the balance coming from a loan Beijing has provided Namibia, on condition that it is spent with Chinese companies.

However, according to Namibia's Anti-Corruption Commission, within weeks of the Ministry of Finance making its payment to Nuctech, the company signed contracts for an identical sum with a Namibian consultancy called Teko Trading.

The money was allegedly then disbursed to Teko's co-owners, Teckla Lameck and Kongo Mokaxwa, and Yang Fan, a Chinese national described in court as Nuctech's African representative.

All three are being held in custody as the investigation is going on.

Noah further said that the matching sums going to and from Nuctech had raised suspicions. (ANI)