Former member of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) and former deputy director of the Ethnic and Religious Affairs Committee, Gou Zhongwen, has been expelled from the party and dismissed from public office. He is under investigation for various offenses, including the unauthorized retention of classified documents, which has garnered significant attention. Gou Zhongwen previously served as the director of the National Sports Administration of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
He is accused of seriously damaging the political ecology of the sports system by approving large sums of money without proper explanation, leveraging his position for personal gain in the selection and appointment of officials, engaging in nepotism by providing assistance for family business activities and involved in corrupt practices. Additionally, he is alleged to have engaged in power and money transactions, utilizing his authority to benefit others in business operations and personnel adjustments, and unlawfully accepting substantial bribes. His arbitrary decisions and abuse of power have resulted in significant economic losses.
Gou Zhongwen has also been stripped of his party membership, and the suspected criminal charges against him have been referred to the procuratorate for review and prosecution.
In public records, Gou Zhongwen was born in June 1957 in Zhenyuan County, Gansu Province. Prior to his role as the director of the sports administration, he had no experience in sports-related work. He previously worked at the former Ministry of Information Industry of the CCP, holding positions such as the director of the China Electronics Information Industry Development Research Institute and the deputy minister of the Ministry of Information Industry, responsible for military, enterprise informatization tasks.
In 2008, Gou Zhongwen was appointed as the deputy mayor of Beijing and later served as a member of the Beijing Municipal Committee and the secretary of the Committee of Education Workers, with additional roles as the secretary of the Zhongguancun Management Committee, the principal of the Beijing Party School, and the president of the Beijing Administrative College. In April 2016, he became the deputy secretary of the Beijing Municipal Committee and was transferred to the National Sports Administration half a year later.
In 2017, Gou Zhongwen, then director of the Sports Administration, was embroiled in the controversial dismissal of Liu Guoliang, the head coach of the Chinese National Table Tennis Team, leading to widespread criticism from the public for his alleged incompetence in sports management.
Rumors circulated that Gou Zhongwen and the deputy director of the Sports Administration, Cai Zhenhua, had a strained relationship. The reshuffling of personnel in the Sports Administration, including the removal of Liu Guoliang, was seen as targeting Cai Zhenhua, who was the chairman of the Chinese Football Association and the only central alternate member of the Sports Administration. Cai Zhenhua had previously served as the head coach of the Chinese Men’s Table Tennis Team, with Liu Guoliang and Kong Linghui being his close associates.
Analysts speculated that at the 19th National Congress of the CCP, where the National Sports Administration was allocated one central committee member position, Gou Zhongwen’s main competitor was Cai Zhenhua. Gou Zhongwen eventually became a central committee member after the 19th National Congress held in October 2017.
On July 29, 2022, Gou Zhongwen was removed from his position as director of the National Sports Administration, and later appointed as the deputy director of the Ethnic and Religious Affairs Committee of the CPPCC.
In recent years, there have been multiple corruption cases involving officials in the Chinese sports industry. Since the investigation of Li Tie, the former head coach of the Chinese national football team in 2022, numerous officials in the sports sector have been implicated.
On April 1, 2023, Du Zhaocai, former deputy director of the National Sports Administration of the CCP, was also investigated. Several mainland media outlets have suggested that there will be more high-profile individuals targeted, with Gou Zhongwen being among them.