BEIJING - After clamping down on chronic corruption in the past decade, the Communist Party of China (CPC) is turning its focus to fighting “hidden corruption”.

The party’s anti-graft watchdog, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI), said during its annual plenum that it will go after “new forms of corruption and hidden corruption”.

The CCDI did not elaborate on what this referred to during the meeting earlier in January.

President Xi Jinping also vowed during the party’s quinquennial congress last October to crack down on new forms of corruption and hidden corruption, and to investigate leading cadres’ spouses, children, siblings and aides.

At the CCDI meeting, during which the commission detailed its priorities for the year, it said a key area would be “concentrations of power, funds and resources”.

It singled out targets such as state-owned enterprises, the justice and financial system, and areas relating to grain purchasing and marketing, according to a readout of the meeting.

Traditional corruption involves officials accepting cash in exchange for approving bank loans, government subsidies, construction projects and job promotions, among other things.

Some experts say the new and hidden forms of corruption could refer to officials’ family members and aides taking bribes on their behalf in the form of shares in privately owned companies, antiques, calligraphies, paintings, sculptures and consultancy fees. It could also refer to the business activities of current and former officials.

There are also signs that Beijing is now training its sights on this “collusion between such officials and business people”, said political analyst Willy Lam, an adjunct professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong.

On Monday, CCDI deputy director Xiao Pei wrote in the official People’s Daily that Beijing would soon enact a law to restrict the business activities of current and former officials.

It would “clarify management mechanisms such as recusal of civil servants, and restrictions on part-time work, commercial dealings, and employment after they leave their jobs”, said Mr Xiao.

Dr Lam pointed out that China at the moment does not have comprehensive laws to govern civil servants’ dealings in the private sector.

“This could also be a so-called ‘new’ form of corruption that they are tackling,” he said.

“Since the beginning of economic reforms and the open door policy in the 80s, there were people who retired from the civil service or party bureaucracy and gone into business taking advantage of their connections, but relatively few officials have been prosecuted.”

Unlike 2022, the readout of 2023’s CCDI meeting did not mention that the anti-graft agency will crack down on the “disorderly expansion of capital and platform monopolies”, which experts say is a clear sign that Beijing is shifting its focus away from private firms and tech giants.

In the last few years, Beijing had launched anti-trust investigations into tech firms such as Alibaba, Meituan and Didi, reining in a tech industry that once operated with little oversight.

Corruption, a scourge that toppled many Chinese dynasties, had been virtually wiped out in the decades after the 1949 communist revolution, but it has bounced back since China began opening up to the world in 1978.

Since he took power in 2012, one of Mr Xi’s signature policies is his crackdown on corruption – the boldest and most far-reaching in decades – going after “tigers” (senior officials), “flies” (low-level cadres) and “foxes” (fugitives who have absconded abroad).

Almost five million party members were investigated for possible corruption in the past 10 years – or an average of 1,369 people per day – with 553 prosecutions, the CCDI revealed in October.

The figure accounts for 5.2 per cent of the CPC’s 96 million party members.

A party insider told The Straits Times that “fighting corruption is the new normal” and there would be no end in sight under Mr Xi.