Chapter 154 Chen Tai
"Old An, you have been in Jinghai for many years. What do you think of Chen Tai?"
Qi Tongwei believes that Chen Tai is the most difficult one to deal with because he has basically completed the initial accumulation and started trying to launder his wealth.
Another thing is that this person is said to be very cunning and never does anything himself, so it is difficult to catch him.
"Chen Tai, Chairman of the Construction Group, has no children. He adopted a goddaughter named Chen Shuting, who married Bai Jiangbo."
An Changlin thought for a moment and continued, "Speaking of Chen Tai, he is quite legendary."
"Tell me in detail?" Qi Tongwei also became interested.
"Chen Tai was also an honest and decent person at first. He grew up in a poor family and his parents died early. When he was young, he made a living by herding cattle for the team.
People from all over the neighborhood looked down on him, and no one was willing to marry their daughter to him.
This kind of life continued until the land contract responsibility system was introduced.
When the situation was a little better, Chen Tai borrowed money to buy a second-hand bicycle and went to the countryside to sell popsicles, earning his first pot of gold.
Then he started selling sunflower seeds at train stations, cinemas, etc. During this period, he married a wife and his life became much better.
Unfortunately, the good times did not last long. In June 1983, when he and his wife were selling melon seeds in a movie theater, they encountered two gangs fighting each other.
In the chaos, he and his wife were accidentally caught up in it. His pregnant wife was trampled and injured, resulting in the miscarriage of the fetus in her womb, and he himself died of heavy bleeding.
This incident completely changed Chen Tai, turning him from an honest small trader into a vicious gang leader. "Speaking of Chen Tai, An Changlin couldn't help but sigh.
"Tell me how Chen Tai got started?" Qi Tongwei became even more curious. Chen Tai was an honest man in the first half of his life. He looked a bit like the male protagonist in a cool novel.
"After his wife passed away, Chen Tai stopped his melon seed business and started his journey of revenge.
That August, a nationwide crackdown happened to begin, and many thugs in society were either sent to labor camps or shot.
After the crackdown began, it was unknown how Chen Tai found evidence of these people's crimes and sent it to provincial and municipal newspapers.
Originally, only a small number of these thugs needed to be shot. In the end, because of Chen Tai’s design, all of them were shot.”
Although these evidences were mailed anonymously, An Changlin believed that they must have been written by Chen Tai.
"From this we can see that Chen Tai is born to do great things. He knows how to use the opponent's strength to his advantage without any guidance." Qi Tongwei interrupted An Changlin's narration and said with emotion.
"Who said it wasn't? I still don't understand where he got the evidence from." An Changlin agreed.
Qi Tongwei had some guesses, but he didn't say them out loud. Besides, there was no point in saying them, so he asked, "What happened next?"
"This severe crackdown lasted until October 1986. All the former gangsters and street thugs were either arrested or too scared to come out, and the society was thus cleaned up.
The power vacuum objectively helped Chen Tai. Unlike others, he saw the change in national policy, which focused on economic development and the fact that crackdowns were a thing of the past.
So he decisively gathered some idle people in society and established the Jinghai Construction Group.
Initially, due to factors such as social background, Chen Tai's Jinghai Construction Group did not develop very fast. It could only undertake some small projects with low profits and barely support its younger brothers.
Later, he found that construction companies in Jinghai City needed to purchase sand, stone and other building materials from outside, so he seized the opportunity to join in. Now Bai Jiangbo's Xiawan sand mining site was originally owned by Chen Tai.
Chen Tai was doing well in the sand and stone business, but this could not satisfy his desires. By chance, he learned that the government was going to build a shopping mall, and he had negotiated with the residents many times but could not reach an agreement.
The then district chief Huang Yanjun (played by Mr. Huang in the play) was very anxious. At this time, Chen Tai appeared and promised the other party that he would get the relocation contract of the relocated households within a week.
Chen Tai was indeed a man who could do great things. He did not ask for any benefits at the time and only wanted to make friends with Huang Yanjun, the then district chief.
Huang Yanjun was worried that he would not be able to relocate the households and would not be able to explain to his superiors. The appearance of Chen Tai was like a timely relief. He immediately agreed and signed a relocation contract with him.
Chen Tai then sent his men to carry out the demolition using violent means, including but not limited to cutting off water and electricity, looting and other strategies.
The residents who were frightened by Chen Tai's violent methods had no choice but to grit their teeth and agree to the demolition. Chen Tai completed Huang Yanjun's task very well.
In this way, Chen Tai got in touch with Huang Yanjun, his benefactor in his career.
With Huang Yanjun's endorsement and the benefits of this violent demolition, Chen Tai began to use violence to force projects and transactions. He once threatened to beat anyone who disagreed until they obeyed.
His behavior caused extremely bad social impact. It was a pity that Chen Tai himself never took part in all the illegal actions. It was all caused by his followers who were pushed forward by him.
Even if someone called the police, they could only arrest Chen Tai's gang.
Chen Tai treated those who took the blame very well. He not only arranged jobs for their families and took care of their lives, but also gave them important positions after they were released.
So much so that many of his younger brothers were willing to go to jail for him and not say anything about Chen Tai's crimes.
Because of this, the public security organs have not been able to find conclusive evidence of Chen Tai's crime.
Those competitors who reported him to the police would suffer his brutal revenge.
In this way, as time went by, no one dared to compete with him anymore. As long as it was a project that he took a fancy to, almost no one dared to participate in the bidding.
Even those people with strong backgrounds, when they contract projects in Jinghai, he would give in on the surface, but would make things difficult for the other party in other areas, such as the supply of construction materials and the disturbance of idle people in society, and eventually they would have to withdraw from the Jinghai market.
Moreover, this old guy is really not simple. He did not greedily take over all the engineering projects, but would reserve some projects for others to compete.
At the same time, he would subcontract part of the projects he had contracted to others.
In this way, everyone tacitly acknowledged his status in the world.
In addition, since Huang Yanjun was transferred to the Provincial Party Committee Organization Department last year, Chen Tai began to try to clean up his name and get out of trouble. "An Changlin explained the history of Chen Tai and his Jinghai Construction Group to Qi Tongwei in detail.
From this we can see that Meng Dehai's evaluation of An Changlin is quite objective. An Changlin is indeed a capable person. He has long paid attention to Chen Tai and has understood his situation so clearly.
The only regrettable thing is that there is still a lack of conclusive evidence to prove Chen Tai’s crime.
After listening to An Changlin's narration, Qi Tongwei couldn't help but sigh: "It seems that Chen Tai is not so easy to be overthrown. By the way, does he have any financial dealings with Huang Yanjun?"
"There should be, but I haven't investigated it." An Changlin shook his head, indicating that he didn't know either.
Qi Tongwei nodded in understanding. Given Huang Yanjun's status, it was indeed not someone that An Changlin could investigate. However, he was certain that the two had financial dealings, but he was not sure about the amount and the method of bribery.
"Tell me about Xu Jiang and Bai Jiangbo." Qi Tongwei rubbed his temple and continued to ask.
"Okay, Director Qi." An Changlin sorted out his thoughts and began to tell the story of Xu Jiang and Bai Jiangbo's grievances.