Titillating post suggests next corruption case

The Shandong provincial procuratorate announced on Tuesday the investigation of three local officials for bribery, sparking predictions among Chinese netizens of an upcoming crackdown on higher ranking officials.

The government organ said it plans to post "very important information about cases" on its official Sina Weibo account, which had received more than 3,000 comments and was reposted more than 5,000 times at time of print.

Information about the bribery cases of Xu Tongwen, former Party chief of the Shandong-based Qilu University of Technology, Wang Guoqun, a vice-major of Yantai in Shandong and Chen Ruizhai, a vice-president of a State-owned enterprise, were posted at 10 am on Tuesday.

Some Net users expressed disappointment over the post.

"If they just plan to release department-level officials' cases, there is no need to announce it in advance," a Net user said.

However, some speculated the news may precede an investigation announcement of a high-ranking central government official.

The Shandong procuratorate currently has more than 400,000 followers on its Sina Weibo account, many of which it accumulated after the post on Tuesday.