Suspicious official hides moldy Sichuan quake donations

四川绵阳官员疑为掩盖事实连夜清理霉变物资(图)

4月23日是四川绵阳三台县新生镇德光办事处赶场的日子，而前来的村民意外在办事处院内闻到莫名的恶臭，工作人员打开散发恶臭的房间后，发现里面堆放了大量食品、衣物，甚至还包括“5·12”地震时分发的部分救灾物资都已霉烂。目前当地纪委已介入调查，相关责任人被停职。[查看全文]

Mianyang (ECNS) -- Assistance materials meant to aid victims of the 2008 Sichuan earthquake have been found six years later in a government office in Sichuan's Santai county, but they were soon secreted away by a local official suspected of a cover up, Chinanews.com said.

A strong mildew smell hit residents of Deguang town who were near the office last Wednesday, a villager surnamed Yu told the Beijing Youth Daily.

Staff then opened a door to a locked room in the office and found half the room cluttered with expired instant noodles, bread, bottled water, rice and tattered clothes, all covered in mold.

Yu said the items had production dates from 2008 and appeared to be assistance materials distributed after the massive earthquake.

Guo Fangping, the township party branch secretary, came later and dispersed the villagers, then called a vehicle to take the moldy items away, Yu added.

Other villagers said that Guo came again that night to move away items and clean up the room.

A video shot by villagers showed that the room had been emptied overnight, leaving no evidence except for rice on the ground and some moldy packages dumped in a drain outside.

It is still unknown where the moldy items have been taken.

The township government admitted on Tuesday that all of the items except some bags of rice were part of assistance packages in 2008 for earthquake victims, but that they had been kept for safety reasons.

Two boxes of noodles and bread had expired by the time they were to be distributed, and packaging around six boxes of bottled water were broken, the township government explained.

The 12 bags of rice, which were meant as festival gifts for some villagers in 2009, were water-damaged and left in the storage room, it said.

Guo has been suspended, as he was in charge of distributing quake aid in 2008.