The public have questioned contradictory figures released for Lushan earthquake donations by the Red Cross Society of China (RCSC) and the Ministry of Civil Affairs.

The ministry released figures for the amount of donations which were lower than those of the Red Cross.

[...]The ministry announced Friday that as of May 10, the RCSC reported cash and material donations of 134.51 million yuan ($21.9 million), and the Red Cross Foundation, a separate entity administered by RCSC had received 24.3 million yuan. These figures contradicted the one posted on the RCSC’s Sina Weibo account on May 10, which said 159.27 million yuan had been collected.

The RCSC Saturday clarified the discrepancy by saying that the ministry’s release did not include the donations received by the foundation, while the RCSC’s figures did.

[Source]

The South China Morning Post reports that, despite a Ministry of Civil Affairs statement explaining the inconsistency, this may have further damaged the already tarnished public image of the Red Cross Society of China:

But the damage may already be done. “You can believe what they say or not, I certainly don’t,” a commenter posted online. “You can donate or not, I certainly won’t.”

The questions raised had hit a nerve as the charity is still reeling from a damaged reputation after the Guo Meimei scandal in 2011, in which a young woman who claimed to work for the Red Cross flaunted her extraordinary wealth.

Ever since, the Chinese Red Cross has struggled to collect donations. The ministry’s data shows that other charities have managed to collect several times as much as the country’s flagship charity.

[Source]

Also see one Chinese web-user’s Red Cross-inspired poem, translated by CDT.

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“From what we have learnt from the region’s 2008 quake, economic impacts will be limited. Losses in local areas should not be blown up to a disaster for the whole economy,” said Wang Xiaoguang, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Governance.

[...]More days will be needed to calculate detailed losses, but the figure will be significantly lower than the mightier [2008] quake that jolted Sichuan’s Wenchuan City, which left about 87,000 people dead or missing, according to market estimates.

A Barclays report on Monday projected direct economic losses at about 10 billion yuan (1.6 billion U.S. dollars), much lower than the 845 billion yuan resulted from the Wenchuan quake. The bank has maintained its China growth forecasts.

[...]The economic impact the quake may bring will be like a change from 7.7 percent to 7.6 percent in the country’s growth, said Fanwei, an analyst at the Beijing-based Hongyuan Securities.

More bullish post-quake sentiment was expressed by the Global Times:

“The earthquake will affect market sentiment in the short term but will not trigger a crash or impact stocks in the long term,” Li Daxiao, director of research with Shenzhen-based Yingda Securities, told the Global Times Sunday.

According to Li, the effect of Saturday’s earthquake on the stock market will not be bigger than that of the Wenchuan Earthquake in 2008, when the stock market was going through a bearish phase, compared with the initial stages of a recovery now.

[...]Based on calculations on damage from previous earthquakes, the impact of Saturday’s earthquake on the country’s macro economy will be so small as to be statistically insignificant, [Lianxun Securities analyst] Yang [Xiaowei] said.

The Wall Street Journal focuses in on Sichuan’s local economy, summarizing the economic impact of the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake and showing how rebuilding efforts can be expected to stimulate certain industries:

Sichuan is one of China’s most populous provinces and occupies a strategic location as the gateway to the rapidly developing west. But it still punches below its weight economically, with output of 2.1 trillion yuan ($340 billion) in 2011, equivalent to about 4% of the national total.

[...]Sichuan’s massive 2008 earthquake cratered growth in provincial industrial output to 3.6% year-on-year in May of that year from 24.6% in April. Even then, national output growth was largely unchanged, and by August Sichuan had recovered close to previous levels.

[...]Even if the immediate impact on output is limited, the regional economy could still benefit from the boost given by rebuilding. In 2009, China’s economy was hit by the global financial crisis, with growth slowing to 9.2% from 9.6% in 2008. But thanks in part to the boost to investment from rebuilding, Sichuan’s growth accelerated to 14.5% year on year, up from 11% in 2008.

Another report from the Global Times shows that while stock prices for certain economic linchpins in Sichuan fell after the quake, medical and infrastructure stocks took off:

Sichuan-based distillers Wuliangye Yibin, Sichuan Swellfun, Sichuan Tuopai Shede Wine and Luzhou Laojiao saw a drop in share price of between 2.3 and 2.88 percent.

Emei Shan Tourism also saw its shares fall 2.76 percent, with local tourism expected to be affected after the disaster.

Life and property insurance companies also suffered a slide in share prices, amid a rise in claims related to the earthquake.

[...]But despite the bearish trend, Northeast Pharmaceutical Group and Shandong Lukang Pharmaceutical saw their share prices rise by the daily trading limit of 10 percent Monday, compared with a slight fall in the benchmark Shanghai Composite Index of 0.11 percent.

Another company that saw stock prices take off in the wake of the earthquake was Chongqing Fuling Zhacai Group, who produce the Sichuan-style pickle that Premier Li Keqiang was photographed eating for breakfast while visiting the quake zone. The Wall Street Journal reports:

A photograph of Chinese Premier Li Kequiang’s spicy Sichuan breakfast whetted investors’ appetites for one of the country’s leading pickle companies Monday.

The shares of Chongqing Fuling Zhacai Group Co., one of China’s largest producers of the Sichuan-style preserved pickle known for its spicy, sour and salty taste, soared as much as nearly 7% on a day when the broader Chinese stock market fell on worries over the damage the weekend earthquake would have on economic growth.

State media released a photograph of Mr. Li eating the pickled breakfast in a makeshift tent early Sunday morning in Lushan, the epicenter of the earthquake that has so far claimed 188 lives and wounded tens of thousands of people.

Looking back to 2008, the Global Times warns against the dangerous bubble that speculation in disaster-related industries could create:

Back in 2008, when Wenchuan was devastated by an earthquake that claimed more than 60,000 lives, several influential market players put forward calls not to sell stocks of firms based in Sichuan Province so that these businesses could retain capital for rebuilding. It wasn’t long before sensational rumors also began percolating through the market that several prominent fund managers had received calls from the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) ordering them to buy stocks in order to keep the market stable. Hordes of smaller retail investors pounced on this seemingly credible “news” and began pouring capital into listed companies that were either based in Sichuan or directly impacted by the disaster. For several days in a row, these stocks shot to the 10-percent daily limit as more and more investors got involved. But when big investors took their profits, the speculative bubble burst and left many retail investors with huge losses.

But more than five years later, similar tricks were on display in the wake of the weekend earthquake in Ya’an county, Sichuan Province. On Monday, stocks of Sichuan-based construction and building material companies saw their prices rally in what was otherwise a mostly down day for the markets. These shares found support on widespread beliefs that post-disaster reconstruction efforts would translate into more orders for these firms, which would of course mean more revenue and profits. Such ideas seemed reasonable on the surface, but just didn’t hold up under scrutiny.

Moving from the financial market back to Sichuan’s local economy, the South China Morning Post reports on a noodle shop in Yingjing county – just south of hard-hit Lushan county – capitalizing on the influx of rescue workers, much to the outrage of locals and netizens:

Chinese internet users said on Tuesday that a noodle shop in Yingjing county had raised the price of its popular tata noodles, a local speciality, to 20 yuan per bowl, from five yuan.

Netizens accused the shop-owners of “immorally” capitalising on the large numbers of rescue workers but doing little to contribute to relief efforts. The workers were enroute to neighbouring Lushan county, but were held back by damaged roads and forced to stop in Yingjing.

Yingjing residents demanded an apology from the shop’s owner. But they were only angered further after the owner shut the doors and “disappeared”.

For more on the 2013 Sichuan earthquake, see prior CDT coverage.

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The quake, rated at a magnitude of 7.0 according to the China Earthquake Networks Center and 6.6 by the U.S. Geological Survey (followed by more than 3,600 aftershocks), hit the prefecture-level city of Ya’an in western Sichuan province just after 8:00 AM on April 20. Tremors were felt by Ya’an natives working in nearby Chengdu, who along with other out-of-town Ya’an residents anxiously headed home to survey the damage. The New York Times reports:

[...V]illagers who work in Chengdu, about 100 miles away, streamed back home Sunday morning, many on foot, the lucky ones on motorbikes, to check on their homes.

Song Yuanqing, 43, a construction worker, arrived back after a 22-hour trip to find his roof and the walls unstable. “We would like to do something, but we can’t do anything,” Mr. Song said as he sat with neighbors around an outdoor fire built by the village leader in his backyard. Some people had slept under the machinery at a lumber yard.

[...]Yang Yubing, an executive at a sculpture factory in Baoxing County, one of the hardest-hit areas, said he was visiting Chengdu when he felt the tremors. He immediately left on a seven-hour drive to his home in Baoxing. But emergency workers stopped him when he got close to his apartment, Mr. Yang said. “They said five or six kilometers of roads were collapsed,” he said in a telephone interview. “We are all living in temporary tents in the school.” Badly injured people were taken to hospitals by helicopter, he said.

The Guardian tells of another migrant worker who found his home destroyed and his family missing upon returning to Longmen township in Lushan county – a hard-hit region in northeastern Ya’an:

19-year-old stonemason Shu Liwen was working in the north of Chinawhen he heard the news of the quake. He borrowed money from his boss to buy a plane ticket, went straight to the airport and flew to Chengdu. “The first thing I heard when I arrived was that my colleague, a 40-year-old stonemason, was killed when a boulder hit his car,” he said. “And then a bit later, as I got closer to home, I found out my family home had been destroyed and my mother and brother were missing. I fear for the worst, but I really hope I can find them.”

Many whose homes were left standing evacuated as aftershocks echoed throughout Sichuan, The Guardian reports:

Completely leveling many buildings, and leaving many more unfit for living, the quake and its aftershocks have left an estimated 100,000 people in Sichuan province homeless.

Not all of the displaced have been lucky enough to secure a Red Cross tent. A photo gallery from China Daily shows quake victims living on the street or in cars.

In remote areas like Lushan and Baoxing counties – close enough to the epicenter to be seriously damaged, but too far for relief to be easily distributed – victims were becoming desperate as food and medicine supplies dwindled on Monday. The South China Morning Post reports:

Residents of isolated Baoxing county were relieved when rescuers reached them, but they are still struggling for necessities.

The roads connecting Baoxing and Lushan county, another badly hit area, were repaired on Sunday night, but landslides are making the journey difficult.

It can take up to six hours to make the 40-kilometre trip.

The hilly terrain also makes it difficult for helicopters to land and one had to abandon its mission due to strong winds.

Despite the victims’ desperation, Daily Telegraph reporter Tom Phillips met with much generosity during his travels in the quake zone, including Lushan:

Humbled by how much food & water we were offered by #Sichuan #earthquake victims who had lost their homes & relatives.

— Tom Phillips (@tomphillipsin) April 23, 2013

A report from Lushan yesterday also told of the kindness of quake victims, noting a convivial atmosphere amongst some of those most affected by the damage. From the Wall Street Journal’s China Real Time blog:

Given what they had gone through, almost everyone we came across was in surprisingly good spirits, clearly lifted by a sense of camaraderie. Walking through the rubble we came across people playing cards and laughing over dinner. At the temple, kids ran around playing, and several groups insisted we share their food.

While some reporters were met amiably, the Global Times reports that others only added to the chaos:

While a doctor surnamed Chen of West China Hospital conducted the [earthquake counseling] session, nearly 40 reporters swarmed around her podium and delayed the class from starting.

At one point, the incessant flashes of over 30 photographers was enough for one student, who stood up in anger and shouted, “We can’t calm down with all these journalists’ questions and flashes cameras going off!”

Certainly, loss-of-home and lack-of-food add additional trauma to the distressed quake victims. More disturbing though, is the abundance of stories of lost family members. AFP has a video interview with a man who lost his only son - and with him all hope. The South China Morning Post tells of a villager who lost his brother when a kiln collapsed, and the cultural and biological importance of quickly burying the bodies of the deceased:

Grieving relatives had no time to prepare mourning clothes or a proper burial service for 40-year-old quake victim Duan Jihong.

The best Duan Jigui could do was wash his brother’s body after retrieving it from the debris of a collapsed kiln and dress it in new clothes before burying him in a donated coffin.

“We have no other way,” Duan Jigui, 49, said. “The body attracted insects.”

Villagers from Wangjia village in Longmen township carried the coffin up the mountain in morning drizzle for burial yesterday. Duan Jihong’s son burned paper money while villagers watched silently.

As the ground began to shake last Saturday, some recalled the severe devastation of the 2008 Sichuan earthquake. Of all those who lost loved-ones last weekend, the most tragic stories are of the families who underwent the same horror five years ago. The South China Morning Post tells of  a mother who lost both her children to the movement of the Longmenshan Fault:

Life has not been fair for 50-year-old Lu Jingkang, who lost her teenage daughter in the 7.0-magnitude earthquake that hit Yaan on Saturday. Barely five years earlier, she lost her son in the other catastrophic Sichuan earthquake, in Wenchuan.

“God has been too harsh on me, way too harsh,” Lu told the Yangtse Evening Post on Sunday.

The two deadly earthquakes that struck Sichuan, just 85 kilometres apart from each other, have now left Lu childless.

The South China Morning Post also has news of a girl who, born in the aftermath of the 2008 earthquake, perished in the 2013 earthquake:

Four-year-old Wang Yanxia was considered lucky and a gift to her family when she was born in the wake of the magnitude-8 earthquake that hit Wenchuan, Sichuan, in 2008. Now her family is struggling to face the reality of her death in the Yaan quake.

Falling debris hit Yanxia as she rushed out of the house when the magnitude-7 quake struck Lushan county on Saturday. She died that day at a hospital in Yaan, news portal Cheng.cn reported on Wednesday.

“At first we thought that if she managed to survive the Wenchuan earthquake, she would be blessed her entire life. But she did not escape the catastrophe after all,” her mother said, recalling how her daughter loved drawing and dancing.

More uplifting than the Lu and Wang stories are those of new lives coming out of the rubble. Xinhua reports on babies born in the wake of the Ya’an quake:

Mothers in quake-hit areas in southwest China named their new-borns with characters like “luck” and “quake” to mark their births after the devastating earthquake.

Over a dozen babies have been delivered in make-shift tents or even in the open air since the 7.0-magnitude quake jolted Ya’an City in Sichuan Province on Saturday, leaving over 200 people dead or missing and injuring hundreds of others.

Two babies have been named “Zhensheng,” meaning “born in quake,” including one delivered in Ya’an and another in Lushan County near the epicenter, both shortly after the quake that struck at 8:02 a.m..

The Wall Street Journal points to video footage of one such birth:

Other encouraging stories tell of those who made it through the disaster, despite all odds. From the Global Times:

Huang Yurong has no idea how she managed to lift a 100 kilogram object that had fallen on her son during Saturday’s earthquake.

After the family members ran to safety they realized Huang’s son, Ling Li, had been buried under the ruins of their collapsed house. When Huang realized her adult son was missing she went back into the rubble.

“Mom will get you out,” she yelled to her son as she made her way to his side, without regard for her own safety and the danger of further collapse, the Chengdu-based West China City Daily reported on Sunday, without providing the age of Huang or Li.

The mother managed to lift the slab, which the paper did not identify, and got her son to safety.

As Ya’an natives struggle to cope with the damage and death wreaked by the quake, they are receiving emotional, spiritual, and physical support from across China. China Daily has a photo gallery of Buddhist monks who have raised 2.35 million yuan in relief funds at a prayer meeting in Beijing, and China Daily has photos of candlelight vigils throughout China. China View reports on foreign students from Chengdu who traveled to remote Lushan county to volunteer in relief efforts:

Click here to view the embedded video.

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Despite the volunteers’ enthusiasm, their efforts have become controversial as most zones near the epicenter, where food, water, electricity and telecommunications are scarce, are cut off by disrupted roads.

The Guangzhou-based Nandu Daily reported Sunday that nearly 300 volunteers, mostly college students, who arrived in Longmen township, did not even bring food and water for themselves, not to mention tools for rescue efforts.

[…] Han Han, a popular writer who volunteered his services following the Wenchuan earthquake, wrote that the help provided by volunteers may actually hamper rescue efforts.

“Volunteers should leave the first few days after the disaster to relief workers because what they can do at the scene is quite limited,” he wrote.

The Financial Times’ Leslie Hook spoke to a team leader in the official relief effort, who complained that “the volunteers have created a certain kind of disaster themselves [….] It seems like there are more volunteers than there are earthquake victims. They have no place to sleep, and nothing to eat, and most of them have no experience or training [….] For some people, the biggest help that they can do for disaster areas is go back where they came from safely.”

Similarly, the BBC’s Damian Grammaticas quoted a military officer’s frustration at “all those volunteers bringing two packets of instant noodles each blocking the roads.” The Economic Observer’s Zhang Xiaohui suggested that the volunteers were not the main problem in terms of traffic, but had few kind words for them in any case.

The situation is made worse by the number of “disaster gawkers” (观灾者) who like to refer to themselves as “volunteers” (志愿者), despite the fact that they’ll often do more harm than good and leave rubbish behind when they move on.

The Sichuan Transportation Bureau (四川交通局) has blamed private vehicles for clogging the roads, in fact we’ve seen that it has more to do with large trucks and rescue vehicles. In addition, due to the earthquake occuring in a mountainous area, the PLA’s air rescue capabilities are limited.

As no-one expected Lushan to be hit by a quake, no emergency transportation contingency plans were ever put in place. The blind zeal of many volunteers who consider themselves better qualified to offer assistance than the army or the government – for example a well-known philanthropist surnamed Chen ["Nice Guy" Guangbiao] – also complicate the situation. Still, the main cause of the transport bottleneck in Lushan county is that the region’s transport capacity is limited.

The same issues have also led China to decline offers of help from abroad. Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokeswoman Hua Chunying told a press briefing on Monday that “we currently don’t need foreign teams due to the narrow roads and limited space in the area,” and denied state media reports that a 200-strong Russian team was on its way. The Russians’ reported involvement had offered a curious contrast with Beijing’s refusal of Japanese assistance, amid renewed tension over visits to the Yasukuni Shrine war memorial.

Some have cast doubts on the authorities’ motives for barring volunteers, however. From Verna Yu at South China Morning Post:

Huang [Qi] believed he was barred from helping because of his imprisonment for “illegal possession of state secrets” after he investigated the collapse of school buildings in the 2008 quake. He and others blamed corruption for the destruction of the shoddily built structures.

Huang also campaigned on behalf of parents who wanted to sue authorities over the crushing to death of their children when the schools collapsed.

[…] Many activists believe officials are preventing individuals from helping because they fear they will expose corruption, like in 2008, and embarrass the local government. Huang said he and his associates were driving on country roads and would not have hindered other traffic. He said he wanted to give money directly to quake victims, so that it could not be embezzled.

Fears that financial donations would go astray have been widespread, possibly adding to the stream of volunteers. Offbeat China has posted images of messages scrawled on donated banknotes, such as “fuckhead, I dare you to graft this.” For more on this disillusionment, see ‘Disaster Shows Faith in China’s Red Cross Badly Shaken‘ at CDT.

Some volunteers did at least offer a break from the post-disaster diet of instant noodles. From Zhuang Pinghui at South China Morning Post:

Even locals who were affected by the quake have come out to help those in greater need. Four construction site workers were cooking batches of porridge to give to the hungry.

“Around 400 people have eaten the porridge. It is very popular when all that everybody had was instant noodles,” Liu Xiyi said.

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Many Chinese traveled to Sichuan to volunteer. Charities were inundated with donations. By February 2011, the Red Cross Society of China, a member of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, had received about $650 million in donations from within China and abroad for that quake, according to a report on the Web site of the official China News Service.

But the Red Cross became a pariah in the eyes of many Chinese after a scandal two years ago that centered on Guo Meimei, a 20-year-old woman who had posted photographs of herself online posing next to Italian sports cars, hoarding Hermès handbags and flying in business-class cabins. She said on her microblog that she was the “commercial general manager” at the Red Cross. People speculated about whether she had gotten her title by being the mistress of a top Red Cross official. She became the most talked-about subject on the Chinese Internet during those months, and her name invariably comes up in discussions of philanthropy here.

As a result, Chinese are saying on microblogs and other forums that people who want to give to current relief efforts in Sichuan should, without a doubt, avoid the Red Cross.

[…] The Red Cross Society of China declined to comment for this article. Zhao Baige, an executive vice president at the organization, told a reporter from Southern Metropolis Daily that there were may online critics who had deep-rooted misunderstandings and prejudices toward the group.

China Real Time’s Josh Chin reported the immediate and visceral backlash against the Chinese Red Cross on Saturday, when its announcement on Sina Weibo that it had dispatched an investigation team was met with thumbs down and worse:

“Little Red, you’ve really lost the people’s hearts,” read one of the few responses suitable for print on the website of a family newspaper.

“Investigate your [expletive] you gang of swindlers,” went another.

Why so much vitriol?

Unlike most Red Cross organizations, which operate independently of government, the Chinese Red Cross has close ties to the state. For several decades after the Communist victory in 1949, it was an actual government agency, operating essentially as a branch of the Ministry of Health. Although now separate from the ministry, it maintains active links with health officials and is one of only a handful of organizations officially allowed to solicit contributions from Chinese citizens.

For much of its existence, that semi-official status gave the Chinese Red Cross clout that Red Cross branches in other countries lacked, but it has also helped make the organization a target for public anger over official corruption.

Though photos have shown Red Cross collection boxes sitting empty, the organization had in fact collected over 50 million yuan by Saturday evening, according to Global Times. But as the newspaper’s Chen Tian reported, more public donations were flowing through new platforms set up by China’s Internet giants:

Sina Micro-charities, which was launched this February, had initiated 29 quake relief projects with the help of institutions and individuals for the hardest-hit city of Ya’an by Sunday morning, according to a notice posted on the platform late Sunday.

The Sina Micro-charity projects, which allow the public to donate money with debit cards, credit cards or the online payment platform Alipay, have gathered nearly 80.4 million yuan ($13.01 million) from more than 60,000 Internet users.

Meanwhile, other Internet service providers offering online payment platforms, including Tencent and Alipay, have collected tens of millions of yuan in donations for the quake-hit areas.

[…] Wang Zhenyao, president of Beijing Normal University’s One Foundation Philanthropy Research Institute, told the Global Times that the [Sina] platform offers information in a way that allows donors to know where their money is going.

“The purpose of each micro-charity project is clear and highly targeted, and the project timelines track how the funds are utilized,” Wang said. “This reassures people and makes them want to donate.”

Disillusionment with the fate of money sent to the mainland has spawned an anti-donation campaign in Hong Kong, with participants seeking to block a proposed HK$100 million package from the government. Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying has insisted that although he “supports all national measures against graft […] financially, the Hong Kong society should donate to the people affected” on a basis of “love, care and support for compatriots.” But in an online poll at South China Morning Post, 92% opposed the donation, even if conditions are imposed to prevent misuse. Online polls are unscientific and notoriously easy to manipulate, but there were many expressions of opposition through other channels as well. From Emily Tsang and Joshua But at South China Morning Post:

Such reluctance comes in sharp contrast to the generosity that followed the Sichuan earthquake five years ago, when the government gave HK$10 billion, and non-government groups raised HK$15 billion from the public.

[…] The Democratic Party and the Civic Party said they would decide today whether to support the government’s proposed donation. Democratic Party chairwoman Emily Lau Wai-hing said she received many objections about the funding plan.

“I am deeply sorry and feel sympathy for the disaster … but the mainland lacks a system rather than money. I do not wish to see the money fall into the pockets of corrupt officials,” Lau said.

[…] “HK$100 million could be used in many better ways to help Hong Kong, rather than wasting it on the mainland bureaucracy,” one user wrote. Another said: “I doubt that even one dollar in a 100 would really go to helping the victims.”

Senior journalists familiar with mainland affairs also reminded Hongkongers to think twice before donating. They said some of the money raised five years ago was wasted on fancy meals and building unused roads. A HK$2 million secondary school was built with donations but torn down after 11 months to make way for luxury flats.

Updated at 2:00 PST, April 23: On Twitter, SCMP’s George Chen clarifies that funds used for the demolished school were returned:

HK gov confirms a HK-funded school after 2008 #earthquake was removed by local gov. Built in 2010 w/ HK$2M donation. Sichuan gov returned $.

— George Chen (@george_chen) April 23, 2013

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Crowds of survivors protested outside the local disaster relief headquarters on Sunday night, after it emerged that victims had been cremated without their families’ approval. Local authorities apologized, but explained that they were not equipped to deal with so many dead bodies at once. From Xinhua:

“Why can’t I see my child for the last time?” Luo Yuanju, a migrant worker who hurried home after she got the tragic news that she had lost 29 relatives in the landslide, told the Beijing News. “This cremation was done without our approval. Why couldn’t the authorities wait for one or two days?”

[…] Government authorities had cremated all the bodies by Sunday, triggering anger from the victims’ families. According to the tradition of the village, where dwellers are mostly members of the Yi ethnic minority, the bodies of the dead are usually buried instead of cremated.

Lei Chuying, deputy head of Zhenxiong county, said cremation orders were given due to consideration of epidemic prevention and people’s feelings.

“Many parts of the bodies were missing while the buried were dug out,” Lei said, “The painful scene might cause trauma among relatives.”

An official investigation quickly concluded that the landslide was an entirely natural disaster, but local authorities have still faced criticism over their lack of preparedness. From Global Times:

Jiang Xingwu, a geological expert in Yunnan, told a press conference on Saturday afternoon that the area’s steep incline of 35 to 50 degrees and the composition of the soil made it prone to landslides.

Jiang said that the earthquakes with magnitudes of 5.7 and 5.6 which hit neighboring Yiliang county in September 2012 were also a cause, and the continued rainy and snowy weather over the past month led to the saturation of the slope, with gravity eventually causing the landslide.

The People’s Daily, a flagship newspaper of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, Sunday questioned why there wasn’t any early warning given the prolonged rainy and snowy weather over the past month.

[…] Also of concern was the fact that a 2010 geological disaster prevention plan by the Zhenxiong government showed that the local government had compiled files for 184 hazardous sites including 29 major ones areas, but Gaopo village was not on the list.

In addition, some locals continued to voice suspicions that nearby mining activity was really to blame. From Xinhua:

Some villagers believe the landslide may have been triggered by a gas explosion, and they doubt the experts’ conclusion that the coal mine boundary was 500 meters away from the landslide.

“The mining area is right beneath the landslide,” a coal miner in Gaopo said, as quoted by media on Monday.

Witnesses told Xinhua they saw “earth and rocks sprayed up into the air” when the landslide occurred. At the same time, some other villagers said they had not been to the scene and only heard about the “explosion” from others.

[…] Wang Shijun, another person who lost family in the landslide, said a big crack appeared before the landslide. “Big enough to swallow a bull.”

However, some villagers said the crack was 1 meter wide and some said a half meter wide, while others said there was no crack.

Update: Global Times reports that 72 of the villagers have written to the State Council requesting a second investigation into the cause of the landslide.

Luo Yuanshou, the brother of a victim, initiated the joint letter and sent to the State Council on Wednesday. The villagers believe the Gaopo coal mine, which is 500 meters from the landslide scene, could have played a role in the landslide. Villagers wondered why the hillside remained stable following a 50-day snowstorm in 2008.

Luo told the Global Times that the villagers are demanding the State Council order the State Administration of Coal Mine Safety, the Ministry of Land and Resources and the China University of Geosciences to investigate the landslide. The original investigation “hastily concluded the landslide had nothing to do with the mine without even an on-site investigation of the mine. The hill was not that steep and is covered with vegetation,” said Luo.

Jiang Xingwu, who headed the original investigation, told the Global Times Wednesday that he stands by the results of his investigation, adding he understands that the villagers may want another opinion.

The preference for burial over cremation is not limited to the Yi: see ‘Henan Officials Commit a Grave Error‘ on CDT. Neither is Friday’s landslide the only apparently natural disaster for which human activity has been blamed: see ‘2008 Sichuan Earthquake Likely Man-Made‘.

© Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2013. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: coal mining, death, disaster relief, earthquakes, funerals, landslides, mining, natural disasters, State Council, Yunnan
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“I heard a sound like thunder, firecrackers or trucks dumping rocks at around 8 am. When I woke up and found some neighbors to follow the sound, we saw that the whole village had already been buried under the landslide,” Li Yongju, a villager in neighboring Zengjiazhai village, told the Global Times, adding that it had been snowing for 10 days.

The landslide hit the village around 8:20 am, burying the homes of 14 families. At least 46 people are believed to have been buried, among whom 19 were children.

Two injured people have been sent to a nearby hospital, and their conditions are stable after treatment.

“The landslide, which brought about several hundred thousand cubic meters of watery mud to the village, buried all of the houses there and created great difficulties for rescue efforts amid low temperatures,” said Sun Anfa, the leader of a local rescue team.

Xinhua reported on the rescue efforts, while Beijing Cream shared purported footage of the search for survivors:

Xi, general secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, said efforts must be made to resettle affected residents, prevent secondary disasters and successfully complete relief work and reconstruction so as to ensure stability.

[…] Snow continued. As of 11 p.m. Friday, rescuers were still searching for the missing, with the help of lamps and life detectors. They hoped to find any survivors despite bitter wind and low temperatures.

[…] “Many soldiers had even no time for their meals,” said Liu Guanneng, head of the fire fighting squad of Zhaotong City, at the scene.

[…] More than 1,000 soldiers, police, fire fighters and mine rescue workers had joined the search operation, said Feng Xuelan, secretary of the Zhenxiong county committee of the Communist Party of China.

At the South China Morning Post, Keith Zhai reported locals’ suspicions that heavy mining may have contributed to the disaster

The cause of the landslide remains unknown. Wu [Liang, a spokesman for the county government] said they occurred occasionally in the region, which was prone to earthquakes and heavy rains. But local residents said over-exploitation by coal miners caused soil erosion and destabilised hillsides.

[…] “The government should have monitored the geological hazards in the region long ago but they have failed to do so,” one resident said.

He said there was a major coal mine close to the buried village.

[…] County government official Xiong Changkai said the village had not been included in the county’s monitoring system because it had never experienced such landslides.

He also denied any link to over-exploitation by miners. “We have a precaution system for landslides, but this time it really was an accident,” Xiong said.

The affected Zhenxiong county borders Yiliang, the site of earthquakes and a subsequent landslide which killed at least 100 people last autumn.

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City workers are still carrying out search efforts, which have been impeded by mudslides that followed Saturday’s storm, the Beijing municipal government said in a statement posted to its official account on the Twitter-like microblogging service Sina Weibo late Thursday night.

Of the 77 dead, the vast majority drowned, with five electrocuted and one struck by lightning, the state-run Xinhua news agency said, quoting Beijing flood-control spokesman Pan Anjun.

A further sharp increase in the death toll “is not likely” because the search is drawing to an end, Mr. Pan said, according to Xinhua, though he added “we will not give up searching just yet.”

Xinhua reports that a second storm bypassed Beijing on Wednesday and struck the nearby city of Tianjin instead, flooding roads and stopping air traffic. Angry bloggers have blasted Beijing’s response to the floods on a scale not seen since last summer’s Wenzhou high-speed rail disaster, according to The Financial Times, and The Los Angeles Times reports that online censors have scrambled to control the information flow as suspicious netizens have posted their own death toll figures. TIME’s Austin Ramzy explores the sensitivity with which official death toll statistics are guarded in China:

Experience with scrubbed numbers has left many in China wary of official statistics, particularly when they deal with human life. During the SARS epidemic mainland Chinese officials were slow to tell the outside world about the then-mysterious disease, which helped fan its global spread. When a handful of cases arrived in Beijing, the government said they were under control, even as the disease spread rapidly through the capital’s hospitals. It was not until a single doctor spoke out that it was revealed that the total cases were several times what the government had claimed.

…

In response to the Beijing floods volunteers have launched their own investigation into the death toll. A spreadsheet posted online now list the names of 26 dead and two missing. Based on reports of other dead it lists an unconfirmed total of 42. “Officials have been very eager to release numbers in terms of how much property is damaged, but people are asking, ‘If you’re so quick to say how many animals are dead, what about the humans?’” says Dali Yang, a professor of political science at the University of Chicago. “There is some disconnect by officials in the sense they don’t want to draw too much attention to Beijing. A larger number would show Beijing in a bad light.”

Dikötter says that in terms of scale, there is no comparison between recent disasters and the massive calamities in the Mao era like the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution. But despite pledges of openness, the official instinct to tightly control information remains. “This is a very well rehearsed machine that’s been in place for some decades,” he says. “It can’t help itself. It wants to control information. That’s the default mode. Even if in some cases (the information) might not seem be all that shocking, that just what it does. It’s like brushing its teeth in the morning, that’s what you do. You don’t think about it too much.”

See also previous CDT coverage of the flooding in Beijing.

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The city suffered the worst rain in six decades over Saturday and Sunday and many people have questioned the official death toll.

Wang Hui, director of the Information Office of Beijing Municipal Government, told a news conference they understood the importance of information transparency following the 2003 SARS cover up.

She added that the death toll had not risen because some bodies are yet to be identified.

According to their official micro blog early Tuesday evening, 1.9 million are affected by the rain, 77,325 have been relocated, and the government has allocated a 100 million yuan disaster relief fund. But it made no mention of casualty figures.

China Daily reports from today keep the death toll at 37, but accounts from the ground have suggested that this number may be a serious underestimation. On Monday, The Wall Street Journal quoted locals expressing their disbelief:

“The death toll is definitely higher [than 37],” said a man surnamed Li who was found standing by the side of the road in Shuangma Zhuang village next to a white sedan, its shape twisted by the waters. Mr. Li, who declined to provide his given name, said he was called to Shuangma Zhuang to identify the body of his older brother, who had been discovered inside the car when police pulled it out of the water on Monday afternoon.

As Mr. Li pointed to where police had sawed through the metal to remove his brother’s body, a friend standing nearby also cast doubt on the official number. “The government says 37 died. It’s probably more like 370,” he said.[...]

A McClatchy article published yesterday has more on doubt surrounding official numbers, the government’s tendency to distort data in the aftermath of disaster, and explains how modern communications technology has changed the nature of public discontent in China:

It took just one glance at a jumble of cars mired in the brown waters covering the G4 expressway late on Monday afternoon to cast doubt on Chinese government estimates that only 37 had died in flash flooding over the weekend.

“They must hide this,” said one old man who was hustled away from a perch overlooking the scene by uniformed police yelling that photography in the area needed prior consent. With plainclothes security milling around the area, he and other onlookers didn’t give their names.

The man said that he’d already heard how many were killed in Fangshan, a district roughly 20 miles southwest of downtown Beijing, after heavy rains on Saturday night: “More than 300.”

Another point of frustration, easily seen in Weibo activity, involves Beijing’s infrastructure and emergency preparedness – how could a modern city, one that ”poured huge sums of money into the Olympics”, be so overwhelmed by and infrastructurally ill-equipped to deal with the recent storm? These types of questions were found not only in web chatter, but also in a Global Times op-ed released just after the storm. A more recent Global Times piece reports on angry reactions to a government sponsored relief fundraiser [zh] that many distrust or see as a means to distract from the municipal government’s inability to manage the flood:

Su Meng, 25, a resident of Chaoyang district, said that charity donations are not a solution to disaster relief efforts, and the government would be better off considering some of the factors that led to the disaster instead.

“It seems the government is using the fund to divert the public’s attention from questioning its responsibility about the destruction,” she said.

[...]“I don’t trust government-led charity drives because I’m not sure whether my donation will get to those who really need it,” she said.

Zhu Lijia, a professor at the Chinese Academy of Governance, said now is not the right time for Beijing government to launch the fund.

“Thirty-seven people died in the flood disaster. The first priority for the government is to hold someone accountable for the deaths,” said Zhu.

An article from CNN quotes residents of Beijing’s Fangshan district, the area hit hardest by the storm, on their outrage at officials’ poor planning and insufficient response to the flood:

“Our family of five lives off one income,” said the 46-year-old farmer Wednesday. “Nobody cares about us because there’s no official in this household.”

[...]One neighbor, Gao Liying, added that she feels even more shaken by the village officials’ response when she told them the flood has ruined almost all her worldly possessions.

“They actually said: ‘If your house didn’t collapse and nobody died, then you’re not a victim,’” she said, raising her voice. “I asked: are you still human?”

Villagers like Zhang and Gao blame local officials for their decision to cover a former waterway with concrete — thus turning it to a road and diminishing drainage capacity — and their failure to warn residents before the storm.

“It was more than a natural disaster,” Gao said. “The officials are responsible too.”

While the government continues to insist on the accuracy of their reporting and the methodical nature of their response, they also stress the “unprecedented” nature of the storm, a point that a Caixin English op-ed directly refutes:

This is not the first time Beijing has had an “unprecedented” rainstorm. On June 23, 2011, Beijing was also inundated. It was also a day as dark as night and traffic ground to a standstill. However, just one year later, the government is again using the term.

The city’s underground sewage system is directly responsible for the flooding. Within of Beijing, it seems that the Forbidden City still has the best drainage. For a system built during the Ming and Qing dynasties, with extra work done after 1949, it works effectively despite its 600-year age. No matter how heavy the rain, there is no flooding in the Forbidden City. I wonder if one should celebrate the wisdom of our ancestors or be ashamed of our own stupidity?

There was a wave of skepticism regarding the quality of Beijing’s drainage system in 2011. The Beijing Drainage Group admitted that only the drainage systems of the eastern and western sections of the city moat, Tiananmen Square and the Olympic Park are up for the challenge of once-in-a-decade rainfalls, while most other areas can fend off only the regular storms occurring every one to three years.

Li Chengpeng, a Chinese blogger known for his reflections on the disastrous Sichuan earthquake of 2008, posted his take on reactions to the flood, and what they say about civic awareness in China. While his blog was quickly deleted, chinaSmack has recorded and translated the post, along with a selection of comments.

Update: 07/26/2012 13:40 PST

State-owned media updated the official death toll today:

The death toll from Saturday rainstorms in Beijing rises to 77 as more bodies were retrieved, the Beijing government said Thursday.

— Xinhua News Agency (@XHNews) July 26, 2012

Also see Crazy Crab’s illustrated take on the disaster, and the rest of CDT’s coverage of the 2012 Beijing flood.

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Post tags: beijing flood 2012, disaster relief, floods, Li Chengpeng, natural disasters, rainfall
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“Be moved! But more than that, move the sewers!”

Beijing’s floods are emblematic of government mismanagement. Chinese netizens are quick to make social critiques of disasters both great and small, and this most recent one has drawn out some dark, incisive jokes:

IMD__: There was a shooting in the U.S. What did the editor-in-chief say? “It should go without saying. Report on it as much as possible!” Now there is flooding in Beijing. What does the editor-in-chief say? “It should go without saying. Report on the U.S. shooting even more!”

IMD__：“美国出事了，枪击，总编什么指示？”“这还用我说？全力报导！”“北京出事了，暴雨，总编什么指示？”“这还用我说？加大美国枪击的报导！”

chuzhaoxin: There’s a city that poured huge sums of money into the Olympics, a nation’s capital. When it rained in this city, the streets flooded. People drowned in their cars. A policeman died of electric shock. This city is called Beijing. The country has sunk to this level. When the people can’t make decisions and the city officials have no shame, what can you do? The spontaneous rescue efforts of the people have thoroughly discredited those whose reputations were already bankrupt. This country’s hope lies not in a bureaucrat or an organization, but in every single individual.

褚 朝新：一个投巨资办过奥运会的城市，一个国家的首都，下场雨，居然有人在市中心的马路上开车时被淹死，有警察触电死。这个城市，叫北京。国家沉沦至此，民 不能做主，治理城市的官员毫无羞耻感，奈何？来自民间自发的各种相互救助，让信誉破产者彻底破产。这个国家的希望，不在某官某团体而在每个普通人身上。

WuyueSanren: Several events stand out from yesterday’s storm and its aftermath: The first is that the early warning system didn’t actually warn anyone early; the second, that the emergency response was slow to start; the third, that people who drove on the airport highway to pick up stranded passengers were charged tolls; the fourth, that neither the government nor public facilities opened their doors to those in need; the fifth, that drivers stuck in the middle of the road were fined for parking illegally. The only thing that functioned properly last night were the people of Beijing.

五岳散人：昨日暴雨以及今日善后有几个地方不能释怀：一是预警机制没真的预警；二是应急机制启动缓慢；三是机场高速对自发接滞留旅客的车收费；四是政府机 构、公共建筑没有开门为被困者提供庇护；五是很多被主人暂时停在路边的车被贴上了违章停车的罚款单。昨晚唯一合格的，是北京市民。

FinanceGossipGirl: In my brief existence, a once-in-a-century solar eclipse has happened twice, a once-in-five-hundred-year flood has happened ten times, and a once-in-a-millenium earthquake has happened twice. The only thing that hasn’t happened is the once-every-five-year general election. Repost if you feel me~~

金融八卦女：在我这短短的一生中，百年一遇的日全食遇到了两次，五百年一遇的洪水遇到十次，千年一遇的地震遇到两次，唯独五年一次的人民大选还没遇到。有同感的转~~

pufei: According to reports, the Beijing Sea and the Chengdu Sea are China’s only undisputed maritime territories. Fisherman, please go to work at ease. No need to worry about foreign warships giving you trouble.

pufei：据悉，北京海与成都海是我国领海中唯一没有与外国有海权纠纷的海域，请各位渔民放心捕鱼，无需担心外国军舰骚扰。

pufei: In the Celestial Empire, every natural disaster is a prelude to an award ceremony.*

pufei：在天朝，每一场天灾都是一次表彰大会的序曲。

* Implies the Party will have a public back-patting for its flood relief efforts.

hnjhj: Under a once-in-forever government, be it a once-in-a-millenium earthquake or a once-in-a-century storm, the Chinese people can face it with grace.

hnjhj：面对万年一遇的政府，无论是千年一遇的地震，还是百年一遇的暴雨，中国人都能坦然面对了。

mynamexu: Superficially, what the storm brought to light was the problems of the Beijing sewer system. But we need only hold this question up to related issues to discover that the “sewer” is a metaphor for the unraveling of the China rising myth. Should a social storm hit, this regime, which cares so much about saving face and nothing about saving its ass, will drown in a puddle of its own making.

mynamexu： 从表面上看，大暴雨揭穿的是被阳光给包裹起来的北京城市建设下水道问题，但是，只要把此一问题再与其它相关问题普遍联系起来观照，我们就会发现，“下水 道”应是中国崛起之神话面临破产的隐喻。倘有一场大的社会暴风雨来临，这个顾脸不顾腚的政权最终必淹死于自己亲手制造的水坑之中。

Via CDT Chinese.

© Anne.Henochowicz for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Beijing, beijing flood 2012, disaster relief, floods, infrastructure, natural disasters, rainfall, sina weibo, weibo, Wuyue Sanren, Yao Bo
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Netizens have reached out a digital hand to those left stranded by Beijing’s torrential rains. There are over 7.4 million posts on Weibo on the subject (北京 + 暴雨), many of them calls for help—and answers. From a CDT Chinese screenshot:

cellifa: I live near Tiantan East Gate. If anyone nearby needs to rest, you can come to my place. No gender preference, 2-3 people, direct message me.

cellifa：家在天坛东门附近，附近有朋友需要休息可以来我家，男女均可，两至三人，需要的请直接私信联系。

J0j0JiaoJiao: Three to four girls can stay at my place. I have a hot shower, food, clothes and shoes. Any girls or older people who aren’t afraid of cats and dogs can stay here for the night. Send me a direct message and I’ll pick you up in front of the Xuantechenguang Police Station.

J0j0娇娇：三四女生能住下，热水洗澡食物衣鞋都有，不怕猫狗的女生和老人可以安置。私信，炫特晨光警局在她楼下，私信联系可以去接人

XiaoqianME: My office is at Zuojiazhuang A2 Beijing Friendship Garden 1-6H. We have water, snacks, TV, computers, wifi, beds, sofas, Sanguo Sha and hot showers! All for free! For real! I’m not a bad guy! If anyone is stuck nearby feel free to duck out to my place! This is what a Beijinger can do! I will wait at my computer all night! Don’t be a stranger! And I hope that people on the road are able to get home safely. @NumberTail Help spread the word.

小 谦ME：本人公司在左家庄街甲2号北京国际友谊花园1号楼6H,公司有水有零食有电视有电脑有WIFI有床有沙发有三国杀能洗热水澡！全部免费提供！不要炒作！不是坏人！困在附近的可以过来避难！都是北京人就想做点儿自己能做的！我会通宵守在电脑旁！不用跟我客气！同时祝赶路的朋友平安 @数字尾巴 大叔帮扩散

UncleFlower: Already contacted them, they can go now.  // @Lonely_Epoch: I have a friend stuck at Chengshou Road who needs to get back to Lianri Ludao. Can anyone help her? One little girl and one adult, riding an electric bike, going in the direction of Lianri Ludao. Her cell phone number is 15175088361. Thank you!

如花二大爷：这个已经联系过，已经能走了 // @孤单_纪元：我一位朋友被困成寿路一带，要回恋日绿岛，现在应该在成寿路附近，有人能去帮帮她吗？一晚上了，一个小女孩和一个大人，骑电动车，方向是恋日绿岛，谢谢大家了。她手机号15175088361.谢谢！

While some embrace those in need, others have taken advantage of the chaos. Weibo user @SuYe reports hotel rip-offs, while @YanYaobin implores the government to follow the lead of ordinary citizens:

SuYe: I drove two people who had arrived from Russia to Zhongguancun. As soon as we arrived at their place, the rain stopped. They said, “Without you guys, we would be finished. Other people at least have cover, we have nothing.” We were very happy, even though it cost us a lot of gas Hotels at Sanyuan Bridge jacked up their prices to over 2000 yuan a night, and some even dragged people to the Asian Games Village. There was a taxi driver who cursed at us from Sanyuan Bridge, “Messing with other people’s business!” Good luck to you all.

苏 椰：送了两位从俄罗斯回来的人要去中关村。我们刚送完回来，雨已经停了。他们说：“没你们，我们就完了，别人还有毯自，我们啥都没有。”我们都很高兴，虽 然损失了许多油 三元桥坐地涨价到2000多的酒店，还有三元桥上那个超高价拉人去亚运村，还骂我们是“吃饱了撑的”的出租车司机，祝你们好运。

YanYaobin: Netizens from Wangjing started a car team to take some of the 80,000 people stuck at Beijing Airport home for free. A lot of residents got in their own cars and into the street to help people back home. This is the Beijing spirit! You bring warmth to this night of pain. At this moment, I am seriously concerned about the 62,000-plus government-owned cars. Where are you? Do you have the guts to get out there and do something? I’m betting on you rushing out and filling the streets. We won’t curse you tonight!

中 国经营报宴耀斌：为了首都机场滞留的八万人，望京的网友们自发组成车队免费接送。北京很多的私家车主将车开上街头，帮助大家回家。这才是北京精神！你们是 这个疼痛雨夜的温暖！此刻，我无比牵挂北京的62000多辆公车，你们在哪儿？你们敢开出来发挥一下吗？我就赌你们就是一拥而上，占据所有车道，今夜，俺 们也不会骂你！

At least 37 have died in the floods, including a number of police officers. This post about one of these officers on the official Weibo of the city Public Security Bureau (PSB) has been reposted and commented on over 593,000 times:

PeacefulBeijing: On July 21, Beijing experienced its heaviest rainfall in over 60 years. The municipal PSB received many calls for help. At noon, Comrade Li Fanghong, chief of the Yanshan Branch Xiangyang Road Police Station, started to lead rescue operations in the rising water of Fenghuangting. He saved more than 50 people. At 5:20 p.m. Comrade Li went into the water again to rescue more. He touched a fallen electrical wire and made the ultimate sacrifice.

平 安北京：2012年7月21日，北京遭遇60年以来最大降雨，北京市公安局接到大量群众求助报警。燕山分局向阳路派出所所长李方洪同志从中午开始就带领民 警奋战在辖区积水严重的凤凰亭村，先后救起50余名被困群众。17时20分许，当李方洪同志再次冲入水中救助群众时，被一根落入水中的电线击倒，光荣牺牲。

Individual heroism mingles with stories of systemic neglect. The state-run newspaper Global Times has acknowledged that Beijing’s under-built sewers are in part to blame for the mayhem, though it goes on to suggest “overhauling the entire network may be unfeasible, as it will take time and an enormous injection of cash.” On Twitter, Beijinger @MissXQ shares dire stories and photos, including reports that more than 200 senior citizens died in an assisted living facility in Fangshan, a poor district hit hard by the floods:

Source said more than 200 elders dead in a senior care center in Fangshan district in BJ due to the rainstorm.

— XQ (@MissXQ) July 23, 2012

The post abt over 200 elders dead in a senior care center in Fangshan had been deleted.

— XQ (@MissXQ) July 23, 2012

Tea Leaf Nation has translated more Weibo comments on the flood, while Foreign Policy has created a slide show of the devastation. Read more on the floods and the aftermath from CDT.

© Wendy Qian for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Beijing, beijing flood 2012, disaster relief, floods, infrastructure, natural disasters, rainfall, sina weibo, weibo
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The following directives were first posted on CDT Chinese on July 21, 2012:

Beijing Municipal Committee Department of Propaganda: For public opinion guidance (舆论引导) concerning yesterday’s rainstorms, all media outlets, including central news organizations, must emphasize the power of human compassion over the elements. All Youth League committees and branches must coordinate positive reports and information on the storm in their commentaries, forum posts, and reprints of articles. Public Weibo accounts, accounts of individual Youth League members and newly registered accounts must all complete report forms.

北京市委宣传部：关于昨日北京暴雨的舆论引导，要多报道暴雨无情人有情，包括中央媒体也要执行。各团委、团支部：对北京暴雨的正面报道和消息，组织好评论、跟帖、转发工作，已登记的公开微博用户及团员个人用户ID、新注册用户账号均需做好汇报表格。

Beijing Municipal News Office: Do not report on the collapse of the subway. (The floods caused the Jintai Road construction site on Line 6 to cave in [zh].)

北京市委新闻办：地铁塌方不能报道。

Beijing Municipal Office of Internet Propaganda Management: Remove Li Chengpeng’s essay “Totem”.

北京市互联网宣传管理办公室：李承鹏的《图腾》一文必须删除。

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The heaviest rainfall in six decades caused widespread havoc in this capital over the weekend, killing at least 37 people and forcing the evacuation of 50,000 others from waterlogged neighborhoods and villages, according to the state news media.

More than six inches of rain fell overnight Saturday into Sunday, collapsing roofs, downing power lines and turning highway underpasses into ponds that engulfed scores of cars and buses. About 80,000 passengers at Beijing Capital International Airport were stranded overnight after fierce thunderstorms forced the cancellation of 500 flights, the state-run Xinhua news agency said.

China Real Time Report, QQ.com, the BBC and Beijing Cream have all posted photo galleries of the floods, with Beijing Cream also sharing video of firefighters and civilians struggling to rescue stranded drivers while drunken foreigners frolicked elsewhere.

Fangshan, to the southwest of the city, was hit hardest. The heaviest rain there in 500 years forced over 20,000 from their homes and flooded a major expressway, stranding hundreds of passengers. Parts of Fangshan, according to Bill Bishop at Sinocism, “are so rural and poor that they make Appalachia look almost like Westchester County. Fangshan is a stark reminder of the close proximity of the first and third worlds in China, and given the topology, the deforestation and the poor infrastructure in parts of Fangshan things could really be quite bad there.” Global Times reported that mudslides had killed at least one person in the area, while floods had left many others without shelter, power or clean water. The Telegraph’s Malcolm Moore later tweeted from the scene, however, that the situation there, “apart from Jingshi expressway, [is] not as bad as feared. Lots of damage, but not many victims, say locals.”

Although the weekend’s weather was exceptional, the failure of drainage infrastructure to cope with the deluge sparked widespread anger. Some accused the authorities of spending billions on cosmetic development projects while neglecting the less glamorous basics. From Josh Chin at China Real Time Report:

Among the sharpest criticisms came in the form of a series of photos, posted to Sina Weibo around midnight, contrasting Beijing’s flooded streets with images of sewer systems in other famous capitals, including Tokyo’s massive “Underground Temple” flood prevention system.

“Sewers are not a face-giving infrastructure project,” artist Li Yijia wrote in response to the images, repeating a sentiment widely expressed elsewhere on the site.

“Beijing’s glossy appearance can’t withstand the erosion of a bout of heavy rain,” wrote another Sina Weibo user. “In just a few hours, Beijing is washed back into the old days. The city government hasn’t stopped rebuilding this city, but they can’t even deal with getting waterlogged.”

A Global Times op-ed agreed that the rain “exposes holes in [China's] modernization drive”, and described the city’s lack of preparedness as “unforgivable”.

The record precipitation did expose a coarse facet of Chinese modernization. There is an unofficial but interesting criterion in judging whether a city is developed or not: After three hours of rainfall, if you walk in the street and see slow but moving traffic, roads that are slippery but not swamped, then this is generally a developed place.

For a while, China was seen as entering the ranks of developed countries. However, Chinese cities are apparently unpracticed in facing disasters such as Saturday’s torrential downpour. If so much chaos can be triggered in Beijing, the capital of the nation, problems in urban infrastructure of many other places can only be worse.

[…] The disaster of Saturday was particularly unforgivable, given that Beijing’s inadequate drainage system and emergency response mechanism were already exposed in the downpour on June 23, 2011.

Another target was the lack of timely warning of the disaster. From Charles Custer at Tech in Asia:

So why didn’t the Meteorological Bureau send out text warnings to Beijingers beforehand? It seems like texts would be a remarkably effective method of issuing a warning given that more than 95 percent of Beijingers own mobile phones and people are more likely to check text messages than they are to turn on the radio, watch TV, or look up weather on the web during any given day. But Bureau director Qu Xiaobo told the Beijing Morning Post that warning Beijingers by text was technologically impossible. While the Bureau does have a client for sending text-messaged weather alerts, it apparently sends just 400 text messages per minute, meaning that it’s essentially useless for warning Beijing’s population of more than 20 million.

[…] China Telecom has officially stated that there would be no technological problems with sending a weather warning text to all the Telecom subscribers in Beijing. However, company officials said, Telecom did not issue such a warning because they are not allowed to without being directed by the relevant government department.

So why didn’t the Meterological Bureau tell telecom companies to issue the warning themselves?

There were also, however, tales of city workers and police officers braving the elements to help people in trouble, with one policeman among the dead in Fangshan. Many private citizens and businesses also went to great lengths to help others, according to Stephen Chen at the South China Morning Post:

Hundreds […], including many from the Wangjing residential area near the Beijing Capital International Airport (SEHK: 0694), took to their cars in attempts to help some of an estimated 80,000 stranded travellers get home, as taxi and bus services had stopped, according to China Central Television. There were no reports online of people being charged for the rides. It was undoubtedly a dangerous offer, as almost every expressway into and out of Beijing was jammed and covered in standing water.

Several entrepreneurs stepped up in answer to cries for help, offering free shelter, drinks and food to people who were trapped on roads. Zhu Guofan, the owner of Beijing’s biggest spa franchise, Liangzi, announced on his microblog account that anyone who could not make it home on Saturday night could walk into any of the company’s 21 locations and receive free food, drinks, showers and a place to rest.

And from Tea Leaf Nation:

Of course, Weibo also became an important frontier for information sharing. Over the course of the evening, Weibo was flooded with tweets asking and giving help. Netizens tweeted weather forecasts, traffic updates and safety tips. Some even offered their apartments to those who could not get home. @书盟 is one of them. “I have a car and an apartment that can accommodate five people. I can provide food, drinks, Internet access and a change of clothes all for free.” He also tweeted his address and cell phone number.

Many said that they were moved by and proud of the love and bravery shown by citizens. Xu Xin (@徐昕), a legal scholar,comments: “I’m sleepless tonight thinking about the heavy rain, the lives lost, the injured people and the police’s rescue efforts; I’m also thinking about so many asking for help on Weibo, and so many offering their help. The spirit of Beijing is not reflected by grand, meaningless words but by the pictures of Beijing tonight. The carrier of the spirit is Weibo, on which energy of kindness is being paid forward.”

© Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Beijing, beijing flood 2012, disaster relief, floods, infrastructure, natural disasters, rainfall, weibo
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On June 23, a torrential thunderstorm hit Beijing, claiming at least three lives and paralyzing parts of the city. The storm exposed problems in the city’s emergency response system such as poor coordination among various departments and responsibility gaps. The question remains as to who, if anyone, should be held accountable ….

In fact, Beijing possesses what one could say is an extensive flood emergency response system. But according to Beijing Association for Disaster Reduction Deputy Chairman Jin Lei, the city lacks a real disaster relief and mitigation agency. Jin said that flood control command posts at all levels only function as coordinating bodies and there is a lack of convergence in terms of contingency plans, with many plans even being “copied back and forth” between various departments.

As a result, the June 23 thunderstorm exposed various problems such as poor coordination among departments and responsibility gaps. At the same time, the city lacks a complete urban storm water system to respond to heavy storms. A clear picture of the city’s pipe network is needed to ensure the ability to estimate flood water levels around the city in advance ….

Authorities have not yet conducted an assessment of the total losses incurred from the disaster. Hence it not yet clear exactly how much impact this storm had on Beijing resident’s lives and property.

© Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2011. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Beijing, disaster relief, floods, natural disasters, rainfall
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China’s prompt response to Japan’s earthquake allowed the Chinese government to explain to its people that its actions were those of a ‘responsible power,’ and should therefore be understood in the context of China’s increasing efforts to contribute to international post-disaster operations since 2003. Under Hu’s ‘New Historic Mission’ to enlarge the role of China’s military in the non-traditional security sphere, China has sent international rescue teams to Indonesia, Iran, Algeria and Pakistan among other countries. In addition, China has an international rescue training centre in Beijing, the largest of its kind in the Asia-Pacific. China’s assistance to Japan can therefore be understood as a part of its general effort to project the image of a benign rising power ….

In the event of a disaster, the host country decides which foreign contributions it will accept. According to Japan’s Asahi Shimbun, the Japanese government ranked the contributions of other countries in order of priority as determined by the Japanese government. Contributions from the United States were ranked highest at 1, while those from China were initially ranked 4. According to reports, those who deal with China policy within the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs attempted to raise the Chinese ranking, but could only get it as high as a 3.5. The Chinese government is said to have offered an 80-member rescue team and its naval hospital ship, Heping Wanshou, but these weren’t accepted ….

How did the Chinese respond to this rejection? Actually, the decision isn’t widely known about in China, with only those following the news very closely likely to have noticed. The low-key coverage may have been based on concerns within the Chinese government about the possibility of provoking anti-Japanese feelings.

The post does note, though, that the disaster may have had a deeper effect on Chinese views of the Japanese people:

A Chinese professor of public policy in Beijing told me earlier this month that he thought ‘the most important change in the Chinese people’s perceptions of Japan recently has been that the Japanese are increasingly seen to be ‘our fellow human beings, just like us’. He added: ‘The Chinese also suffer many natural disasters. Looking at the suffering of the Japanese people, we realise that we share the same suffering. We can therefore extend our sympathy to the Japanese people’.

© Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2011. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: diplomacy, disaster relief, Japan earthquake 2011, Japan public opinion, natural disasters
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