(Yicai Global) May 29 -- Dongfeng Automobile has nothing to do with Dongfeng Lightweight Truck, the biggest debtor on a blacklist recently made public by the government of Wuhan, a major city in central China, the Chinese auto giant said today.

Dongfeng Auto has no equity relations nor business contact with Dongfeng Lightweight, which owes CNY23.5 million (USD3.3 million) to the municipal government, the Wuhan, Hubei province-based company said. There is no creditor or debtor relations between the two parties nor with the government agency Wuhan Changjiang Asset Operation Management.

The names of 259 companies that owe money to the Wuhan government were listed in a notice in the local newspaper on May 26, demanding payment for debts dating back to 2018.

Rumors were swirling that the automaker, which is under state-owned car giant Dongfeng Motor Corp. and also makes lightweight trucks, is connected to heavily indebted Dongfeng Lightweight.

Dongfeng Lightweight was insolvent as of its last financial report released in 2017 with debts of CNY36.1 million and assets of just CNY8.1 million (USD1.2 million). Set up in 1991, the company was a unit of Wuhan Industrial State-Owned Holding Group, which went out of business in 2014. Despite a few other investors coming on board after that, the firm has not been operating since 2015.

No one at Dongfeng Lightweight answered the phone when Yicai Global called yesterday.

Editors: Tang Shihua, Kim Taylor