Beijing storm 'exposed loopholes'

27 July 2012 Last updated at 05:26 ET

Chinese soldiers clear mud in Hougoumen village, Fangshan district, in BeijingThe clean-up after Beijing's worst storm in 60 years is still going on

Beijing's ex-mayor says the recent storm "exposed many loopholes" in urban planning and disaster management, state media reported, as the backlash against the authorities continued.

Guo Jinlong said lessons had to be learned from the disaster, Xinhua news agency said.

Residents have criticised poor drains, inadequate warnings and the time it took to announce an updated death toll.

Beijing authorities said on Thursday that 77 people had died in the storm.

Officials initially said 37 people had died in the torrential rain on Saturday that brought flooding and landslides to parts of the city.

Both the media and the internet community have accused local officials of a lack of transparency, amid a delay of four days before updated figures were announced.

Millions of angry comments about this issue and the failure of drains to cope with the storm have been posted on China's Twitter-equivalent weibo sites.

A commentary in People's Daily on Thursday said death tolls should no longer be a "sensitive issue" and said Beijing authorities needed to regain credibility.

The disaster had offered "profound lessons and exposed many loopholes," Xinhua news agency quoted Mr Guo as saying as he visited Fangshan, the worst-hit district on the outskirts of the capital.

"We must seriously reflect on the lessons and always bear them in mind."

The Beijing Municipal Government information office also said on Sina Weibo - one of China's Twitter equivalents - that "criticism and suggestions from media and society were of great contribution to Beijing".

Mr Guo resigned as mayor on Wednesday, but officials said this was not related to the floods but because he was taking up a more senior role as secretary of the Communist Party's Beijing Municipal Committee.

His name is a currently a censored keyword on weibo. Southern Weekly newspaper journalists also said several pages of coverage on the floods had been censored.

The storm, said to be Beijing's worst in 60 years, struck on Saturday night.

Roads were flooded, thousands stranded and about 60,000 people had to be evacuated from their homes.

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