China city chief accused of blowing up hotel project over fengshui

[Balthazar]

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/china-city-chief-accused-of-blowing-up-hotel-project-over-fengshui-2014-08-25

The former party chief of the eastern Chinese city of Huainan, removed from office earlier this month, reportedly ordered the destruction of a hotel construction site amid concern that it would create negative spiritual energy toward his office. The official, Fang Xiping, was investigated for "serious violations" of party disciplines, according to a Communist Party statement released recently. While the statement didn't offer details of Fang's offenses, a report Sunday by the government-run The Paper news website said Fang had ordered the destruction of the partially constructed buildings of what would have been the municipality's first five-star hotel. The report said Fang was possibly motivated by fear of a negative fengshui impact on his office, located just north of the site. Fengshui, China's traditional art of geomancy, believes the arrangement of everything from buildings to trees to furniture can affect people's well-being. The report said Fang may have also been jealous that the hotel project would be seen as his predecessor's achievement. While it quoted the local government as saying that the "termination" of the hotel's construction was at the behest of investors, it also cited a would-be manager at the hotel as rebutting the claim, noting that the destruction of the site resulting in a large loss.

WTF???

This reason is just brilliant, never seen anything like that.

[cinder]

Chinese superstitious. Sound pretty stupid in the modern age.

He should get prosecuted for abusing his position.

[pedrog]

http://whatstheharm.net/fengshui.html

[kuroman]

Chinese superstitious. Sound pretty stupid in the modern age.

He should get prosecuted for abusing his position.

He is getting punished, the communist party in china is no joke when it comes to PR image to the population, they know they are monitored by the population and things could turn bad for them, heck in the last two years 4 or 5 members were punished for various reasons, included one which son was involved in a mortal car crash with Ferrari .....

As for Chinese superstitious, there are some people that still believe strongly on such things especially old people which is the case of this guy

[Balthazar]

It seems crazy. I would never believe that mayor position could be achieved by somebody with so strong religious prejudices.

[Kluge]

Oh, jeez. Well, at least he didn't force a working poor woman to have a Down Syndrome rape baby, then rail against her for going on welfare.

[Honeypot]

This type of superstitious attitude is more prevalent than you think in many parts of the world, especially in the east asian region. They go to great lengths to deny and hide it from outsiders.

Fengshui <----- they should ask why these 'wise' people haven't made themselves rich.

[Balthazar]

From comments:

louis tan 2 days ago

Fengshui is everything even if one does not believe in it. Just ask all the foreign companies in Hong Kong to measure the extent to which this is practised even with them. In any case it would have been better if he had moved office instead of closing down the site when the digging has already been done and changed his luck.