In the past three months, three top-ranking Chinese military officials committed suicide, which political observers view as the result of Chinese President Xi Jinping's anti-graft campaign starting to affect the top leaders of the People's Liberation Army (PLA).

The latest casualty was Vice Admiral Ma Faxiang who is said to have jumped to his death on November 13 from the 15^th floor of the PLA Navy's headquarters in Beijing. His suicide was initially kept a secret, but on November 17, rumors of Ma's death circulated on the Chinese internet, while the South China Post confirmed the suicide based on confirmation from an ex-naval officer.

Like Us on Facebook

A WeChat news group said the Central Military Commission (CMC) had called Ma for investigation which led to the officer's depression and suicide. Ma was last seen in public at Zhoushan, a port city, on October 22 when he met the seamen who got back from a rescue mission searching for the missing Malaysian airline jet MH370. However, the Chinese government and the mainland press has not officially confirmed Ma's fate.

Tang Jingyuan, a political commentator, linked Ma's alleged suicide to cover up how corruption happens among his higher-ups in the military.

Within the same week, Maj. Gen. Song Yuwen, the deputy commissar of the Jilin military district, allegedly hang himself, reports The Washington Post. Song was included among the eight officers arrested recently for corruption.

Like Ma, Rear Admiral Jiang Zhonghua also jumped from a hotel at the naval base in Zhejiang Province on September 2, the daily added.

PLA officials used to wallow in privileges, money and power that caused corruption to spread. However, since the PLA backs up the communist government, officers were not punished for their corrupt practices and this went on for several decades until Xi initiated his anti-corruption drive.

So far, over 200 senior PLA officials are being probed for corruption. Believed to be behind the big chain of military corruption is Gen. Xu Caihou, the former vice chairman of the CMC of the Chinese Communist Party.

According to The Diplomat, Xi's campaign has resulted in the removal from office of 56 corrupt high officials, although it noted that only three are from the PLA, including Xu. The other two are Gu Junshan, ex-deputy chief of the PLA General Logistic Department and Yang Jinshan, member of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party and deputy commanding officer of the Chengdu military region.

Changes have been initiated in the PLA hierarchy after two years of Xi's leadership. One such reform is the takeover on November 6 by the CMC of the PLA auditing office and placing the unit under CMC supervision. This development is expected to result in more house cleaning in China's corruption-prone military, which in turn could likely lead to more suicides among the PLA top brass.

TagsAnti-corruption