CHONGQING -- The local legislature in southwest China's Chongqing Municipality has appointed Zhang Guoqing as acting mayor.

The decision was made at a meeting of the Standing Committee of the Chongqing Municipal People's Congress Friday, which accepted Huang Qifan's request to leave the post of mayor and appointed Zhang as acting mayor, according to a brief official statement.

Huang, born in 1952, was first elected mayor of Chongqing in 2010.

Zhang, born in 1964, has been serving as vice secretary of the Chongqing municipal committee of the Communist Party of China since 2013.