Anti-gang campaign: Female bureau chief

At the meeting, Standing Committee Member Sun made the decision that Xu Houde would be placed under detention by the Provincial Commission for Discipline Inspection, Xu Honglei would be summoned by the special investigation team, and You Chuanfu was already in custody. The three lines of investigation would be closed simultaneously to prevent collusion and destruction of evidence.

As Standing Committee Member Sun closed the folder, he sighed and said that among the corruption cases in the mining management system he had handled over the years, those involving the level of deputy director of the National People's Congress generally had several common characteristics: long tenure, having been in charge of multiple powerful departments, still able to remotely approve projects through former subordinates after retirement, and almost without exception, their children and relatives being involved in mining-related industries.

Xu Houde was the fifth person he had met.

Xu Houde was taken away from the office of the county people's congress.

He didn't change his clothes as calmly as Tang Weidong, nor did he try to maintain his dignity with a smile like Wen Jingyao.

He sat behind his desk, a research report in front of him that he was reviewing. The report was titled "Several Suggestions on the Sustainable Development of Mineral Resources in Shiqiao County".

When the disciplinary committee members came in, he took off his reading glasses and placed them next to the report, pressing them down with a red pen. He stood up and took one last look at the People's Congress work guidelines that had hung by the office door for decades. Then, he stretched out his hands and said one word in a hoarse and weary voice:

"it is good."

Xu Honglei arrived at the police station more than three hours later than his father.

He was discussing business in a coffee shop at a five-star hotel in the provincial capital when he was taken away from his booth by plainclothes police officers from the special task force. When he was escorted back to Yi'an, the Rolex watch on his wrist reflected a glaring cold light under the fluorescent lights, creating an ironic contrast with the buzzing old-fashioned light bulb in the interrogation room.

Xu Houde sat in the detention room, his back slightly hunched, his hands resting flat on his knees, his fingers short and thick, his knuckles covered with age spots and calluses from years of holding a pen.

His hair was completely white, cut very short and close to his scalp. The wrinkles on his face were deep and neat. He spoke in a slow and deliberate tone, as if he were giving a work report at a county conference.

He worked in the mining management system of Shiqiao County for more than 20 years, rising from an ordinary staff member in a township mining management office to deputy county head, where he was in charge of land, urban construction, transportation, and environmental protection. After retiring, he served as deputy director of the county people's congress for nearly six years.

The core members of the mining management system he cultivated are still spread throughout the county. Tang Weidong is just one of the most prominent ones. There are also several other incumbent section chiefs and directors who were personally promoted by him back then.

He said he had never asked for money; it was always his subordinates who had helped him who offered him benefits. He felt that it would be unreasonable not to accept them.

Jiang Ruolan closed her notebook, looked at him with a calm and cold gaze, and asked him if he had thought about the farmers whose houses were demolished—they only received one-third of the legally mandated compensation for their land expropriation, while the remaining two-thirds were skimmed off at each level and turned into You Chuanfu's mining rights, Tang Weidong's renovation costs, and Xu Honglei's Rolex watches.

These people never intended to be heartless; they just wanted to live in their houses for a few more years.

Xu Houde remained silent for a long time, then suddenly smiled. There was no smugness or mockery in that smile, only a profound, deep-seated indifference.

He gently patted his knee with his short, stubby hands and said something that sent a chill down Jiang Ruolan's spine:

"Director Jiang, do you think I'm the only Xu Houde in Shiqiao County?"

"Who else do you want to confess to?"

Xu Houde did not answer immediately.

He shifted his gaze from Jiang Ruolan's face to the gray wall in the corner of the detention room.

After a long silence, he slowly uttered a name that made Standing Committee Member Sun put down his pen and made Jiang Ruolan's fingers tighten suddenly.

"Cao Weimin, the former deputy director of the Provincial Department of Land and Resources, was in charge of mineral resource approvals from 2006 to 2014. He held more than half of the approval authority in the province's mineral management system. Shen Wangshan was able to obtain the mining rights for the Chenjiagou rare earth mine in Shiqiao County thanks to Cao Weimin's personal approval. Without Cao Weimin, Shen Wangshan wouldn't have been able to establish even half of his influence in Shiqiao County. Do you think the mineral management system was clean after Shen Wangshan's downfall? Before he stepped down, he placed at least a dozen people in key approval positions in the provincial, municipal, and county-level mineral management departments. I don't have a complete list of these people in my mind, but there is one name you should focus on investigating—Chu Weiqing, the current head of the Mineral Resources Management Section of the Yi'an City Bureau of Natural Resources and Planning. He was promoted by Cao Weimin, and all mining rights approvals involving Shiqiao County ultimately went through him. He knows everything that's happening on my end; the person behind him is Cao Weimin."

Jiang Ruolan closed her notebook, stood up, walked to the door of the detention room, and whispered a few words to Standing Committee Member Sun, who was guarding the corridor.

Standing Committee Member Sun's expression turned unusually solemn at that moment.

The name Cao Weimin has appeared more than once in the provincial discipline inspection commission's database—there was a person with the code name "Director Cao" on the bribery list in the Pei Zongren case, who was not included in the case filing list at the time due to the lack of direct identification.

Wang Yuanshan's 2009 investigation report also mentioned that "a certain leader of the provincial department" had facilitated Fengmao Group's illegal mining activities in the Chenjiagou mining area.

Shen Wangshan never mentioned Cao Weimin's name during the interrogation, but his confession repeatedly mentioned the statement that "someone in the province helped me settle the mining rights."

The task force initially believed he was referring to Pei Zongren, but now it seems that mining rights approval and judicial protection are two different things—Pei Zongren was responsible for judicial protection, while Cao Weimin was responsible for administrative approval.

Shen Wangshan's black gold empire has at least two protective umbrellas: one in the courts and the other in the mining management system.

The Provincial Commission for Discipline Inspection held an emergency meeting overnight and decided to initiate investigations into Cao Weimin and Chu Weiqing simultaneously.

Cao Weimin has been retired for several years and lives in a detached villa in the suburbs of the provincial capital. When the people from the Discipline Inspection Commission came to his door, he was pruning bonsai in the yard.

It was a black pine tree that he had been raising for more than ten years. His branches were carefully coiled into layers of cloud-like shapes with wire, and every pine needle was trimmed neatly.

He was wearing a faded cotton shirt and holding a slewing tool that had been polished to a shine, with fresh pine resin still clinging to the blade and emitting a crisp pine scent.

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