The low-profile cadre who rocketed up the ranks to take the helm of China’s new anti-graft super agency
Yang Xiaodu’s career began in the far reaches of Tibet before taking him back to Shanghai – and to the side of the man who would become president
When an unassuming man was lost looking for his bus among the fleets parked near Tiananmen Square in October last year, few would have guessed that he was one of the Communist Party’s most powerful graft-busters.
Yang Xiaodu, a deputy director of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, was second only to Zhao Leji, then the newly elected head of the CCDI.
As he looked for his ride back to his hotel during the Communist Party’s national congress, the few journalists who did recognise him asked about progress on the creation of the National Supervisory Commission, a body expected to have sweeping powers to investigate state employees for corruption.
“Everything is going smoothly,” Yang said, without breaking his stride.
A day later, his name and face were more widely known when he was unexpectedly made a member of the party’s 25-strong Politburo.
On Sunday, Yang, 65, was named as the founding chief of the NSC, capping a political career that began in 1976 after he graduated from the Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine with a degree in pharmacology.
