A nationwide audit by China's National Audit Office found some local governments had inflated revenue levels and raised debt illegally, Bloomberg News reported Dec. 10.
The National Audit Office found that 10 cities, counties or districts in the provinces of Yunnan, Hunan and Jilin, as well as the city of Chongqing, inflated their fiscal revenues by 1.55 billion yuan, it said on its website Dec. 8.
In Wangcheng district, the provincial capital of Hunan, officials faked the ownership transfer of local government buildings to boost revenue by 1.24 billion yuan.
Further, the audit found that five cities or counties in the Jiangxi, Shaanxi, Gansu, Hunan and Hainan provinces raised about 6.43 billion yuan in debt by offering commitment letters and violating other rules. The audit covered the third quarter of the year.
Earlier in June, the Communist Party's Central Commission for Discipline Inspection said that some regions in Jilin province and Inner Mongolia falsified reports. Details, however, were not available, Bloomberg said.
China has been increasing efforts to curb data fraud, including setting up a supervisory body in April to boost and ensure data authenticity and quality. Data fraud has been widespread in the poorer provinces, where officials were encouraged to inflate the numbers to advance their careers, according to the report.
As of Dec. 8, US$1 was equivalent to 6.62 Chinese yuan.
