A supervisory committee is set to be established in Shanghai to manage the city's 10 billion yuan pension fund in the wake of the recent pensions scandal.

The Municipal Bureau of Labour and Social Security confirmed on Wednesday that the committee would be set up before the city's new regulations on the management of the social security fund goes into effect on Jan. 1, 2007.

The Chinese government is still investigating the misuse of 3.2 billion yuan (US$407 million) of Shanghai's pension fund in Shanghai. The investigation has so far led to the removal of the former secretary of the Shanghai Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China, Chen Liangyu, and several other Shanghai officials.

A bureau source said that the committee would be made up of 20 members and would be the first of its kind in China.

Guo Shizheng, a member of the municipal committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) told Xinhua that the pension fund supervision committee was different from the so-called social security supervision committees that have been set up in 27 Chinese provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities.

"The latter consisting of government officials and experts is still a primarily a government body. However, the Shanghai pension fund supervision committee will include CPPCC members, representatives from the city's labor union and auditing professionals," said Guo.

Shanghai's pension fund manages the social security insurance for 12 million Shanghai residents.

(Xinhua News Agency December 7, 2006)