“The anticorruption storm has begun,” People’s Daily, the party mouthpiece, wrote on its Web site this month.

The flurry of revelations suggests that members of China’s new leadership may be more serious than their predecessors about trying to tame the cronyism, bribery and debauchery that afflict state-run companies and local governments, right down to the outwardly dowdy neighborhood committees that oversee sanitation. Efforts began just days after Xi Jinping, the newly appointed Communist Party chief and China’s incoming president, warned that failing to curb corruption could put the party’s grip on power at risk.

“Something has shifted,” said Zhu Ruifeng, a Beijing journalist who has exposed more than a hundred cases of alleged corruption on his Web site, including the lurid exertions of Mr. Lei [Zhengfu]. “In the past, it might take 10 days for an official involved in a sex scandal to lose his job. This time he was gone in 66 hours.”

The “astonishingly ranine” Lei took a starring role in Evan Osnos’ survey of the recent string of sex scandals at The New Yorker (via CDT).

© Mengyu Dong for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: anti-corruption, corruption, high-level corruption, lei zhengfu, local corruption, sex scandals, Xi Jinping
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Even many critics of the grave-razing program […] acknowledge that China needs to reform funeral practices (and, inevitably, encourage cremation) to meet growing land demands. What primarily offends these commentators is the brusque method used to clear away the graves in Zhoukou. On Nov. 19, Zhong Yongheng, a native of Zhoukou and a journalist with People’s Daily, the official, self-declared Communist Party mouthpiece, used his account on the Twitter-like Ten Cent microblog, to post his family’s experience with Zhoukou’s program. His family, he notes, no longer lives in Zhoukou but has relocated north to Beijing:

“You should give us notice at least before you damage our ancestral tombs, don’t you think? My family members are all in Beijing and didn’t get any advance notice from anyone. Then we suddenly received news that our ancestral tombs were leveled by an excavator. My parents turned toward the south, wailing.”

[…] So far, there’s no evidence that Zhoukou’s officials — or its government — will benefit financially from the grave- clearing program. On the contrary, the Beijing News has reported that some low-level government officials, under pressure to provide good examples for the farmers, have personally dug up their ancestors’ bones.

In one tragic case of a low-level official making an example of his ancestors, however, the digging dislodged a large tombstone that crashed onto two of his living family members, killing both. Sympathy was a rare sight in the several hundred comments left beneath the Beijing News story, many of which suggested that supernatural forces were at play. Meanwhile, other comments took a more vindictive approach, with one of the most repeated comments qualifying as the most direct: “Deserved it.”

At Global Times, Yu Jincui wrote that the “aggressive and showy tomb excavation campaign stinks to high heaven“, explained the depth of the taboo surrounding burial sites, and condemned the authorities’ heavy-handed attempt to overrule locals’ concerns.

In Chinese tradition, the removal of ancestral graves is the biggest insult one can endure, and those who excavate tombs are said to be subject to the most vicious curse.

[…] Considering the cultural and historical background of tombs and the importance they have for people, villagers’ resistance to their removal is not only understandable, but also predictable. In order for this plan to work, the government needs to both cooperate with and respect local residents.

[…] Those who excavate others’ tombs are traditionally considered to be cursed. The reputation of some historical figures is forever tainted by their merciless excavation of others’ tombs, such as Sun Dianying, a warlord in the 1920s who desecrated and looted the Eastern Royal Tombs of the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911). In light of strong public opposition, tomb removal in many cities has been halted, including in Zhoukou.

I am afraid the efforts of these local officials are doomed to go down in history as a bad example in the tale of China’s funeral reform. China’s local governments should understand that using force to promote reform is no longer effective today. Leaders in Henan and other provinces should take time to reflect on this.

Caixin’s Wang Yong acknowledged the economic and political pressures on local officials and the need for reform of burial practices. But, he argued, the “tomb-flattening campaign” epitomised the “typical” Chinese approach of using a huge and inflexible bureaucracy to shunt economic development forward at all costs.

First, there are usually serious legal complications. In the case of forced tomb removal, article 20 of the Mortuary Service Administration Act says that improperly buried remains can be forcibly removed. But according to the Administration Enforcement Law that came to effect last January, the act has no authority to enforce the provision. If enforcement is to be implemented, an administrative decision must be made by the civil affairs officials and executed by a court.

Had the Henan authorities followed this procedure, even if they had enforced their “tomb-flattening policy” for 10 years, they wouldn’t have achieved much. Sadly, the political movement is often in total contradiction with the rule of law in China.

Second, value and cost calculations follow the internal logic of bureaucracy. Career promotion is the incentive and “political achievements” are the yardstick. Officials follow this without thinking of the interests of the community as a whole.

This is why even when scholars such as Yao Zhongqiu, a research fellow at Cathay Institute for Public Affairs, call for the protection of traditional Chinese culture and people’s freedom to worship, tradition still bears no weight in the face of the pressure placed on officials.

It is difficult to calculate the hidden social cost of people’s mental suffering. It does not affect officials’ “political achievements,” therefore it does not enter into their consideration.

© Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: death, economic development, forced evictions, funerals, Henan, land reclamation, local corruption, local officials, tombs
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Local officials said Mr Wang, who was being investigated for corruption, had been removed from his post, it [the People's Daily] said.

Several reports cited 200m yuan ($31.5m; £20m) as the amount taken.

A report released by China’s central bank last year said more than $120bn (£74bn) had been stolen by corrupt officials who fled overseas, mainly to the US.

© Mengyu Dong for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: corruption, embezzlement, Liaoning, local corruption, United States
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Perhaps the most immediately urgent situation is that of Chen’s nephew. Chen Kegui is now being held on charges of attempted murder after he took a kitchen cleaver to guards breaking into his father’s house in the middle of the night.

Chen [Guangcheng], who is now receiving treatment in a Beijing hospital and preparing to go to the United States to study, said his nephew was a scapegoat of officials angered by Chen’s audacious escape and demands that they be investigated.

Asked why police in his home province of Shandong in east China would arrest his nephew, Chen said, “Revenge.”

“I think this is revenge gone wild, and it’s their final battle,” he told Reuters by telephone from the Beijing hospital where he is being kept ….

“They beat him savagely,” Chen said of his nephew. “He was beaten so badly that his face was covered in blood. I heard he was beaten so badly that three hours later his face was still bleeding,” Chen said,

The Washington Post’s Keith Richburg reported a tense atmosphere around Chen’s home village of Dongshigu:

“I don’t dare go over there,” one woman said, pointing across the cornfields toward the bridge that separates her village from Chen’s. “They don’t have guns, they use sticks. If you look like an outsider, like you’re not from the village, they beat you ….”

Interviews conducted in Xishigu, the nearby village, revealed a climate of fear. “We’re all scared,” said one young man, a farmer in his mid-30s with a young daughter. “They might come and arrest us.”

A 56-year-old man who gave his surname as Wang said Chen’s many relatives in the area are all under strict watch, including those not under house arrest. “Even if his family members are allowed to go out, they are followed by those thugs,” the man said.

Reprisals have not been restricted to Dongshigu and its immediate surroundings. Richburg described being chased from the village by vehicles bearing license plates from elsewhere in Shandong province (and one with no plates at all), while other incidents have taken place still further afield: David Bandurski at China Media Project reported a number of apparently related weibo account suspensions while, according to Reuters, one lawyer who had volunteered to represent Chen Kegui had his license suspended in Guangdong:

Chen Wuquan, a lawyer based in the southern province of Guangdong, told Reuters the Guangzhou Lawyers’ Association had confiscated his license “temporarily” last week during a standard annual renewal. The lawyer Chen is not related to the Chen family from Shandong.

The association told him it could not renew his license because it had to deal with a complaint about an article he had written about the Chinese legal system.

“It must be related (to the nephew’s case),” Chen Wuquan said. “Because this kind of complaint should be processed quickly. It’s not possible that they would have to confiscate my license and not allow me to handle new cases.”

Despite this, Chen Guangcheng himself has continued to draw a line between the actions of the local and central governments. Some of the detentions elsewhere in China do appear to have been much much less harsh than those in Dongshigu: escape participant He Peirong, for example, described her interrogators as “very polite”, and said that they watched the prison break film ‘The Shawshank Redemption’ together. In contrast with his warnings of local authorities’ “crazed” vengeance, and despite a lack of evident progress in his application for travel documents and permission, Chen told Voice of America that he was “very happy” with the central government’s handling of the case. He had faith, he said, in their assurances of an investigation into the local authorities’ actions.

“To the Chinese government, I am very happy with the cool-headedness and restraint with which they’ve handled this case,” he said. “I hope the Chinese government, especially the central government, can continue to take steps towards further emancipating their minds, deepen reforms, and better address social injustices ….”

The activist told VOA he last spoke with Chinese authorities on Monday, and that they reaffirmed a pledge to investigate what he called the “illegal happenings” in Shandong.

“The important thing is that they will handle the case publically according to Chinese law – they expressed this very clearly. But they haven’t clearly said when this will begin,” he said.

Whether Chen’s professed faith in the central government is sincere or simply pragmatic, it gives Beijing room to co-operate without appearing to capitulate. The theme of officials abusing power behind a benevolent emperor’s back is traditional; it is found, for example, in the 14th Century classic The Water Margin, whose later chapters describe the outlaws’ amnesty and subsequent adventures as the emperor’s loyal soldiers. But The Economist dismisses this scheme as a poor reflection of the current reality:

Like many Chinese, Mr Chen portrays his own struggle as part of a wider gulf between an overwhelmed central government and maverick local authorities. After his escape, in a videotaped message, he implored the prime minister, Wen Jiabao, to investigate abuses in Linyi. Speaking from his hospital bed in Beijing, where he is recuperating from a broken foot suffered during his escape, Mr Chen says: “It is clear that the central government needs to turn over the Shandong soil in which the crimes of local officials have grown.” It is a modern rendering of an ancient countryside lament: “If only the emperor knew…”

But the emperor does know, and the emperor rewards. Although there has been an expansion of social and economic freedoms in many areas, under the Communist Party’s system of cadre evaluations, local officials are graded on the basis of a series of internal targets that have little to do with the rule of law. The targets are meant for internal use, but local governments have sometimes published them on websites, and foreign scholars have also seen copies. The most important measures are maintaining social stability, achieving economic growth and, in many areas, enforcing population controls. Cadres sign contracts that spell out their responsibilities. Failure to meet targets can end a cadre’s career. Fulfilling them, even if it means trampling laws to do so, can mean career advancement and financial bonuses.

At China Real Time Report, Russell Leigh Moses puts a similar point in a somewhat more optimistic context:

It would be wrong to think that Chen’s case is another example of local authorities getting away with bad behavior while the central government stayed ignorant. That’s as much a canard as the belief that Beijing’s refusal to lock Chen up represents a sudden concern about China’s image overseas. Chinese officials are aware that their reputation is under the microscope again; but most are far more concerned with being seen as hanging tough than they are with being generous. In this and so many other issues, the Party line remains the hardline ….

But there’s another scenario: There are cadres who might think that Chen Guangcheng has a point, and that the continuing harassment of him and his family are reckless acts by a Party that should know better. These officials might not agree with all of Chen’s opposition, but his complaints about cadres running amok surely resonate with those in the Party who continue to be anxious about what they perceive to be the stalled state of reform ….

Chen Guangcheng is yet another cautionary tale in the run-up to the leadership handover here later this year. The decision on his fate will not change China, but it promises to provide another clue as to where some want the Party to go.

© Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: central government, Chen Guangcheng, detention, house arrest, interrogation, lawyers, linyi, local corruption, local officials, Shandong, sina weibo, weibo
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Further details on the story, from Global Times:

Over 200 government workers in Yiwu, a manufacturing hub, were found holding rural hukou, which entitled them to a plot of land in the countryside. They could use the land to build a house or keep it and sell it to the government, Xinhua Viewpoint under the Xinhua News Agency reported Tuesday.

Government workers are not allowed to obtain rural hukou. But these workers used their authority to convince officials to give them the hukou.

It was unclear whether the rural hukou holders used their new land for any purpose. After the situation was exposed, they were forced to give up their rural hukou.

[...] “This is unfair because those civil servants not only have regular income but also enjoy all kinds of benefits,” said He Guofeng, Party chief of Guanqingfan village.

The situation has hurt the interests of genuine farmers. “The compensation money for collectively owned land is divided among villagers and whenever there is a new registered villager, the real farmers will get less,” said Liao Yongfa, head of the Yiwu’s Party organization department.

From Xinhua. Translated by CDT:

At the beginning of this year, Yiwu’s municipal organization received many letters reporting on a strange phenomenon: in order to “become peasants,” some civil servants gave up their household registration permits [hukou, 户口] to move to the countryside. One Yiwu cadre explained why some government workers would be willing to “become peasants”: “One shouldn’t despise a rural hukou — the economic benefit it has in the countryside is enormous.”

In recent years, with the rapid economic development and new quickened rural construction, Yiwu rural hukou holders translated compensation into benefit in their old villages. According to Yiwu Discipline and Inspection Committee deputy secretary Hu Aifen, if a person held a rural hukou, the village could be divided into 108 square meters of residential land, which could then accommodate a four-story home. This carried enormous earnings: on the one hand, the residence could be exchanged, and the local market price of each square meter would exceed 20,000 yuan; on the other hand, home construction could take advantage of Yiwu commercial products and the geographical position of nearby cities, develop transportation logistics, property rents and other kinds of business. It would be possible to earn higher monthly salaries than those of many city dwellers.

“Besides getting residential land and building homes, a rural hukou can also bring in land requisition compensation fees. There is a profit to be gained by using the village collective to rent the property and conducting other affairs,” said one villager.

Lastly, brief commentary via Southern Metropolis Daily. Translated by CDT:

Government workers aren’t seeking hukou, but the benefits they bring. This is the conflict that comes from powers seeking profit: wherever profit lies, power-holders will rush there. That is to say that the developed region of Zhejiang Province, the double-identity phenomenon of “peasant government workers” does not only appear in Yiwu. Yiwu’s Public Security Bureau personnel stated that in order to truly block the leaks that allow “government officials to fight to become peasants,” one must “separate the rural hukou from its enormous underlying benefits.” Truer words have never been spoken!

In Beijing and Shanghai, where the hukou are valuable, it seems that people disdain holding a rural hukou because the benefits that come from an urban one are far too great. When university graduates apply and take tests to become government workers in Beijing and Shanghai — the benefits of being a government worker per se, aside — the hukou is likely a large consideration. In contrast, in small or mid-sized cities, more people are choosing rural hukou. This shows that in the eyes of the public, it’s not the urban hukou, but whether the hukou itself harms or brings benefits.

© Paulina Hartono for China Digital Times (CDT), 2010. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: hukou, land reform, land rights, local corruption, local power
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A deputy Party chief of a district in Guangdong province has been sacked from his post in the wake of the online exposure of a 14-day overseas group trip at public expense, a local disciplinary authority said Monday.

Tan Rigui, deputy Party secretary of Duanzhou district of Zhaoqing city in the southern province, led the group consisting of 13 district officials to Africa and the Middle East between February and March 2007, the Zhaoqing disciplinary inspection committee said on its website.

The committee has asked all members of the tour group to accept responsibility and repay the cost, estimated at more than 450,000 yuan ($65,800).

News of the trip was made public last week when a citizen from Luoding in Guangdong posted a 17-minute video on the Internet.

AFP remarks on the role of the Internet in this and other similar incidents:

However, without an independent media or judicial system, corrupt cadres have often been able to act with impunity.

In recent years, though, the Internet has emerged as a powerful tool for ordinary Chinese to expose their corrupt rulers.

[...]And in December, an official in the eastern city of Nanjing was sacked after bloggers posted photos on the Internet showing him wearing a designer watch and smoking expensive cigarettes.

Other Internet postings suggested Zhou Jiugeng, head of a district housing bureau, had other habits well beyond a civil servant’s means such as driving to work in a Cadillac.

A newsclip featuring some of the video’s scenes. The full 17-minute video can be found here.

Undoubtedly, many netizens are frustrated with rampant local corruption. One blogger, Jade Pen Beacon (碧翰烽), writes on his reaction to the 17-minute video in a post entitled “Fortuitous finds or intentional indulgence? Who can believe that traveling officials are actually going on inspections?” (无意捡到还是有意放纵？谁还相信官员出国是为了考察？). Selectively translated by CDT:

This video records in detail the 14-day trip of the inspection group. Its degree of luxury is astounding. Once again, the video was a “fortuitous find.” Not only does it start recording from the first expenditure, but it also gives the trip a realistic quality: we can clearly see the inspection team members’ true faces.

But I was left perplexed. Why is it that our netizens are always the ones making these “fortuitous finds” while our political bureaus can’t intentionally uncover them? Is it because of their “intentional indulgence”? It’s really a mystery; I think they’re the only ones who know.

From this 17-minute video, we can distinctly make out the actual itinerary of the observation team: first, the places they’re inspecting are the countries’ famous landmarks and scenic spots. Perhaps they’re going to inspect their tour industry development, then? They went to an ostrich park, then the Cape Town Peninsula, and then a seal preservation zone. Out of the entire trip, there was only one instance that was relevant to the government observation team. Second, the degree of luxury on this trip is flabbergasting. They went on sumptuous tours, visited a gold mine, and a diamond factory. Furthermore, everyone purchased South African Diamonds. Third, I am struck by the trip’s vulgarity. For example, their going to see a belly dancing performance, and so on.

In regards to this situation, I don’t care if it’s real or fake; I fully believe that this sort of thing happens. This reminds me of a time when a few leaders spoke together. Between them, there were a few Party secretaries, some bureau chiefs, etc.

They said that these past few years, you can’t give out too much money to cadres — after all, policies up above are kind of strict — and there are no leaders who would take on too much responsibility, so they would write about tours. Hey, not giving out money is okay — just let the cadres take trips! One Party secretary said that nowadays inspection tours are not inspection tours; they’re just cover-ups for the real goal of sight seeing. He said that these past two years, every year there could be 2-3 “inspection tours,” and not one of them would be real. The year before last year, some village cadres organized trips to Hong Kong and Macao. Last year, they again went on a trip, this time to Hainan Island. What can you “inspect,” there, huh? It’s just having fun. And then he said last year he went two more times on “inspections.” All of them had a bit of the content of inspection, but the time spent on that was only one day. Moreover, it was just listening to introductory talks by some people, and then checking out some companies. The remaining time was spent at a number of scenic spots.

On Sohu, a detailed list of the itinerary is given. Translated by CDT:

14 days, 13 people
Amount spent: 450,000 yuan

2/26: Depart from Hong Kong for Johannesburg, South Africa. Fly Cathay Pacific Airways. Flight time is 12 hours, 50 minutes.

2/27: Visit an ostrich park, Tafelberg.

2/28: After breakfast, go to Cape Town Peninsula, see seal preservation zone. After lunch, go to penguin beach. Go again to Cape of Good Hope.

3/1: From Hopetown to Sun City. Get on a plane.

3/2: Go by jeep to see a wild animal reservation, Sun City.

3/3: Depart for Cairo. Visit a gold mine, diamond factory, purchase diamonds, watch a dance.

3/4: See the pyramids and the Sphinx.

3/5: Cairo — Alexandria. Pompeii pillars.

3/6: After breakfast, get on a plane for Istanbul. The flight’s duration is 2 hours and 10 minutes. After arriving, go to the Hagia Sophia and Blue Mosque.

3/7: After breakfast, view the Istanbul Strait. During the trip, there is a performance, during which several members of the group act like fools. After lunch, see local palace. At night, board plane for Dubai.

3/9: Take a luxurious drive to a desert zone. At night, partake in a large Arabic feast, and enjoy a belly dance performance.

3/10: Visit 7 star restaurant.

3/11: (14th day). End of trip. From Dubai, fly back to Hong Kong.

There are currently over 4892 comments on the Sohu posting. Here is a selection translated by CDT:

Prohibit human flesh search engines! Clearly, there are some officials who fear being found by this method. Now, online anti-corruption is the only method. How sad!
禁止人肉搜索！明明是有的官员怕有一天被搜出来而采取的手段！现在反腐就只有网络一个手段了！可悲！

Actually, a lot of cadres are the same. This is only the tip of the iceberg!
其实很多干部都一样，这只是冰山一角罢了！

Intentional and unintentional “finds” [see above] of corrupt happenings are too common.
有意和无意都可”捡到”腐败的事，太多了

While he’s been exposed, how many countless other officials are still in hiding? They’re living in comfort.
他是被曝光了的，还那么多无数的官没有被曝的呢？？就享福了吧

We officials go to the desert to play “eluding the cat“~~
俺们公仆去沙漠躲猫猫~~

We should let them organize an inspection trip to Sichuan’s disaster areas
应该让他们组团到四川灾区去考察考察

The people’s sweat and blood money has been used to help the economy of large deserts.
老百性血汗钱就这样帮助了大沙漠经济增长

Externally, he’s had his job removed, but wait a few days — is he just going to get transferred to another position?
对外是免职，是否会瞒天过海稍后调职任用呢？

Ah, what a lovely situation. Let people around the world know that our country’s got money! Keep doing your inspections.
很好的事情啊,叫地球人都知道咱国家有钱啊.继续考察啊

The system won’t change, it’ll always govern outwardly without caring about the root of the situation!!!
There are lots of these types of people — you could say that all officials are like this!!!!
体制不改，永远治标不治本！！！
这样的人何其之多，可以说公务员都是这样！！！！

© Paulina Hartono for China Digital Times (CDT), 2009. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Guangdong, local corruption, Tan Rigui, tourism, Zhou Jiugeng
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A few days ago, there was a random telephone survey of residents in the Qidong, Haimen, Tongzhou and other districts of Nantong city in Jiangsu province. The purpose was to determine the prosperity level of the people and to listen to their feedback. Local cadres asked the interviewees to use previously distributed standard answers. Many elementary and secondary schools even had a day off so that the students can memorize the answers and “assist” their parents to deal with the telephone poll. Our in-depth investigation showed that this brazenly rigged public opinion poll was the work of certain individual cadres who wanted to show that the people have reached the prosperity target goals.

At the Seventeenth Communist Party Congress, the goal was bring about a fully prosperous society. Jiangsu province proposed a high-level of prosperity in which the masses will benefit and accept. Public opinion polling was part of this process, whereby a county/city needs more than 60% agreement from the public before it can be declared as reaching the full prosperity standard. In late 2008, Qidong city under Nantong city attained a 94.8% approval rate in the random telephone poll conducted by the Jiangsu province Bureau of Statistics. However, many local villagers told our reporter differently:

Village 1: The wholis thing was faked! It was all faked in our village! It was certainly faked!

Village 2: This is using money to buy lies.

© Paulina Hartono for China Digital Times (CDT), 2009. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Jiangsu, local corruption, polls
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Police in China’s capital took away at least eight people trying to air grievances in front a government building Friday, days ahead of a key review of the country’s human rights record by the United Nations.

The eight were part of a loosely organized group of about 30 people from all around the country who had come to Beijing in hopes the central government would help them with a variety of problems, mostly centered around local corruption.

They gathered in front of the Cabinet’s information office Friday morning as more than a dozen officers and several squad cars stood by. Some carried banners but did not unfurl them. One said “Safeguard human rights. I love China,” while another was painted with the Chinese character for “injustice.”

© Paulina Hartono for China Digital Times (CDT), 2009. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Chinese Grievances, human rights conditions, local corruption
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Chinese media reports said more than 50 officials had been investigated and six had been jailed or punished.

The officials lost the money gambling at casinos in Macau, on cruise ships off Hong Kong, and betting on football matches, reports said.

[...] The heaviest sentence was given to Wu Xingkui, the Communist Party of China (CPC) number two in the town of Yunfu.

Mr Wu was handed a four-year jail term for embezzling large sums of public money to finance his gambling habit, the state-run China Daily newspaper reported.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2009. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: embezzlement, gambling, Guangzhou, local corruption
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Described by the party as the most significant land reform package in three decades, the measures are intended to ensure that farmers receive compensation for land lost to development, without slowing the breakneck pace of industrial growth. They do so by allowing farmers to directly transfer their land, still technically owned by the state, to developers or other businesses.

But here in the rice-and-corn-growing region of Guangdong province, where tensions are still running high weeks after the protest, farmers say the changes do not address their main grievance: corruption, much of it directed by local party officials far below the radar of the central government in Beijing.
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“I don’t think this will give us more protection,” said a farmer in the village of Xianyi, two hours’ drive from Hebu, who gave his surname as Li. “We have no expectations. We just hope the government will not further take away our land, because we live on the land. If it’s sold, we will lose our livelihoods.”

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2008. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: farmers, Guangdong, land rights, local corruption
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The party secretary came at dinnertime one evening and announced that we have to demolish our house because it was in the middle of a road that would be built for the Beijing Olympics. We got a little panicky, fed him some more wine, and tried to get him to help us to keep the house. He said he could probably help us. After all, there are three families whose houses sit in the middle of the road. Maybe the road should take a detour.

We heartily agreed, and told him that he was the best party secretary. He drank some more wine, commented about how he likes this foreign liquor called X.O., and told us that a getting a detour would cost us. We stuffed two bottles of X.O. (cognac) in his bag and paid him $10,000 and sent him on his way to make the road bend.

About four months later, the party secretary came again at dinner, and announced triumphantly that the road would be detoured and that we would get to keep our house. We were happy, so we gave him some wine and food, and as he was wiping his mouth with his shirt sleeves, he said, “But there is another problem.”

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2008. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Hung Huang, land rights, local corruption
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China’s fiercely vocal online community latched on to Zhou’s photo evidence, hyper-analyzing it and exposing it as a paper tiger — an old poster propped up among the trees.

But outraging the Internet activists even more were the local officials, whom they accused of supporting the doctored photos to boost tourism to the arid, poor province of Shaanxi.

“In my opinion, this is the struggle between the truth and government interest,” said Yu Hai, a sociology professor at Fudan University. “Zhou’s just a normal farmer who was inspired by money. The big boss behind this is, of course, the officials of Shaanxi province.”

The scandal reinforced popular disgust with government corruption and showed that public opinion, amplified by the Internet, can occasionally win out in authoritarian China.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2008. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: local corruption, online activism, online opinion, South China tiger
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The Chinese central government has been widely applauded for quickly and effectively mobilizing national resources for rescue and relief efforts, but the magnitude 7.9 quake and its aftermath have sparked anger toward local governments. In several cities and towns, residents have accused officials of corrupt acts, including taking the best tents for themselves and underreporting the extent of quake casualties so as not to draw scrutiny from Beijing.

Protests and complaints against local officials aren’t rare, but what’s different is that the grievances are being captured on television or being reported by a press that has traditionally been tightly controlled but has had more freedom in the immediate aftermath of the natural disaster.

As well, parents whose children were killed are protesting the failure of local leaders to provide answers about why so many schools collapsed while structures around them, including government buildings, remained standing. Some believe local officials are trying to cover up shoddy construction.

For more on how this topic is playing out on the Chinese Internet and media, read this CDT post. See also “China’s top procuratorate vows to crackdown on quake relief corruption” from Xinhua.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2008. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: 2008 Sichuan earthquake, disaster relief, local corruption
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“There’s no denomination and no real issuer, but it’s money.”

Vouchers from the supermarket chain Trust-Mart (•ΩÂèà§ö) have become a favored currency of petty corruption in Fujian, says a local entrepreneur who carries a stack on him. In the course of a recent interview about unrelated topics, by way of demonstrating how he greases the palms of tax, commerce, customs and other officials, he opened his glove compartment and whipped out the bills. Each was worth 100 yuan. “That right there is 3,000 kuai.”

Evidently, party inspectors in the free-wheeling province can catch on to more glamorous enticements like cash, apartments, junkets and jade mantelpieces. But these gift certificates are conveniently untraceable and unmarked but for the stamp of the company and carry the down-home label tihuodan ÊèêË¥ßÂçï, literally “bills of lading”, evoking tickets people used to trade for commodities like rice and pork in the state-planning days. “If you don’t believe me, I’ll sell you one,” he said. “If it doesn’t work, I’ll buy it back!”

(...)
Read the rest of It Don’t Look Like A Red Envelope – Jonathan Ansfield (201 words)

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2007. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: bribery, Fujian, local corruption
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Xiantang’s angry villagers took control of the village council’s opulent five-story offices on July 1, after officials had refused to open their accounting books. They have been there ever since, mounting a 24-hour guard over a pile of cardboard cartons they believe contain the accounts that will prove their allegations.

They threaten to stay there until regional authorities send auditors to check the books, and their demands have also taken on a political tone. “We want to elect a good village leader” to replace the current head of the council and Communist Party Secretary Lai Zhenchang, who was appointed by the government, says one of the protesters, Lai Jiawen. [Full text]

The story is accompanied by an audio report by Peter Ford about why the government has allowed the protests to continue for so long. Read also a Toronto Star report on Xiantang from last week, “It takes an angry village to revolt in rural China“.

[Image: Lai Niu points to the village leader he and fellow peasants accuse of fraud, via CSM]

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2007. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Foshan, local corruption, protest, Xiantang
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