Curse of Chongqing? Probe into Sun Zhengcai evokes memories of Bo Xilai’s dramatic fall
Investigation into Sun Zhengcai, once considered a favourite to join China’s ruling elite, casts another shadow over city’s leadership
The investigation into Sun Zhengcai, the departing party boss of Chongqing who was once considered a front runner in the race for China’s next generation of leadership, inevitably reminds one of the dramatic downfall of one of his predecessors in the hillside metropolis five years ago.
Bo Xilai, who had ruled Chongqing since 2007, was dismissed from the post in March 2012. A month later, the high-flying and flamboyant politician who had his eyes set on high office was announced to be detained under the party’s internal investigation for “serious discipline violations” and stripped of his most powerful post as a Politburo member.
Bo’s seat in the 25-strong Politburo – which Sun now also holds – could have made him a candidate for its seven-seat standing committee, the party’s innermost circle of power, at a key leadership transition later that year. Some observers think he could have even challenged Xi Jinping, then the vice-president, in leading the next administration.
But his spectacular fall from grace upset the power transition and marked the start of a years-long purge of several senior political and military figures, and their factions, whom Xi later said had “engaged in political conspiracy activities”.
