Local governments will pay for misused funds

The chief of the National Audit Office said that local governments will now have to foot the bill for any cases of misused social security funds, the South China Morning Post reported. "The key is that the local governments are now responsible for the bill if any losses are incurred," said Li Jinhua, the body's auditor-general. Li said auditing departments at all levels are checking funds stringently after Shanghai's party secretary, Chen Liangyu, abused US$420 million of the city's social security funds. Li added that publicly listed state-owned enterprises, funds for agriculture and education in China's interior and land transfers in rural areas were on watch-list. He will present this year's audit findings to the National People's Congress Standing Committee this week. Sinopec, whose chairman, Chen Tonghai, resigned for "personal reasons" yesterday, was on his list of companies to be audited.