Following a stinging rebuke from the Party’s disciplinary inspectors when he was expelled from its ranks in February, former cyberczar Lu Wei has been formally indicted for criminal prosecution. From state broadcaster CGTN:
A procuratorate in Ningbo, east China’s Zhejiang Province, has filed indictments against Lu Wei, former deputy head of the Publicity Department of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and former head of the Cyberspace Administration of China, for multiple offenses including taking bribes.
According to the procuratorate, the 58-year-old has abused power and public resources for personal purposes and illegally accepted large sums of money. [Source]
Lu was abruptly replaced as head of the Cyberspace Administration of China in June 2016. The announcement of his investigation for “serious disciplinary violation” last November prompted a censorship directive, published by CDT, ordering sites and services to close comments and “find and delete negative comments attacking the system.”
The language with which state media reported his indictment this week appears markedly restrained compared with that found in the CCDI’s earlier verdict, which blasted Lu for “weak Party spirit,” personal enrichment, lewd and extravagant behavior, rampant self-promotion, selectively implementing and improperly discussing central policy, lying to higher authorities, and engaging in conspiracies. BBC Monitoring’s Kerry Allen noted the different tone:
Although many English-language papers highlight Mr Lu’s former key role, media in mainland China are playing down his prosecution.
Many official media highlight that he was “deputy minister of the publicity department”, rather than highlight his important online watchdog role.
The official broadcaster CCTV does not give prominence to Mr Lu’s prosecution, but instead mentions that the Supreme People’s Procuratorate has filed a public prosecution order against three officials, of whom Mr Lu is one.
Very few social media comments are available, and it is appears that government censors are removing posts. [Source]
Meanwhile, South China Morning Post’s Zhou Xin, Choi Chi-yuk, and Nectar Gan reported last week on the departure of Lu Wei’s successor at the CAC, former Shanghai propaganda chief Xu Lin, as part of a wider reshuffle amid concerns that the country’s propaganda has been too aggressive.
Xu Lin, who worked for Xi in Shanghai, is likely to take over as the party’s international propaganda chief.
Xu, 56, the head of the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) since June 2016, was expected to take charge of the State Council Information Office and the party’s external propaganda arm, the sources said, replacing Jiang Jianguo.
[… Political analyst Chen Daoyin] said Xu was a “Shanghai-style cadre” known for pragmatism, and was like to tweak China’s propaganda strategy to be less provocative and confrontational.
[…] Zhuang Rongwen, also a Xi ally, is expected to take over from Xu at the CAC, also known as the Office of the Central Cyberspace Affairs Commission.
Zhuang, 57, who previously worked for Xi in Fujian, has risen quickly in the official hierarchy, gaining promotion in April to head of the State Administration of Press and Publication. Earlier this month, Zhuang assumed a new title as the director for National Office Against Pornographic and Illegal Publications. [Source]
The Wall Street Journal confirmed Zhuang’s appointment on Wednesday. Researchers at New America wrote in March that “the background of Xu’s successor will be a key indicator of how CAC will prioritize work going forward. If his successor comes from a more technical and security background, this will signal that the national security aspects of cybersecurity will now be prioritized” over media content control. As co-author Graham Webster noted while highlighting that analysis on Twitter, Zhuang’s appointment would appear to signal continued emphasis on the latter.
While Lu may be gone, the internet “brakes” that he declared a necessity seem only to have been upgraded and more aggressively applied. One vocal critic of internet censorship, activist Zhen Jianghua, is expected to stand trial for inciting subversion soon following his detention last September. Meanwhile countless others are finding themselves “locked out of online life” for seemingly minor or unintentional transgressions, as Viola Zhou recently reported at Inkstone:
Inkstone spoke to five people whose WeChat accounts have been permanently revoked over the past two weeks. They had no warning before and no explanation after, except a vague accusation of “spreading malignant rumors.”
None of them are political activists or dissidents. Incidental mentions of political issues, which they suspect caused the problems, were tiny parts of their social media use.
[…] “The result is people don’t know where the red line is until they cross it,” says Lotus Ruan, a censorship researcher at the University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab. “When they are not sure what constitutes ‘sensitive,’ it increases self-censorship and over-censorship.”
[…] “That kind of experience also politicizes people by letting them learn about the state,” says the University of Georgia’s Professor [Rongbin] Han. “They previously thought that only political activists were punished: now they are also punished.”
“But as individuals, they are also powerless. What they can do is very little.” [Source]
Users who lost their accounts this month told me they reacted to reports about Xi Jinping or the Communist Party power struggles in the group chat, without saying anything provocative
— Viola Zhou 周易 (@violazhouyi) July 26, 2018
Hours later, they were locked out of WeChat and banned from talking to any of their contacts – they ended up calling their friends, family members, colleagues and clients to explain what happened
— Viola Zhou 周易 (@violazhouyi) July 26, 2018
They are angry and scared (one user insists talking to me by email only bc he believes he is being monitored now). But they cannot afford quitting the super app everyone else is using. That’s how powerless individual tech users are.
— Viola Zhou 周易 (@violazhouyi) July 26, 2018
Read more via CDT on the lack of options facing Chinese users in an environment where, as The Financial Times’ Louise Lucas reported earlier this month, the few ubiquitous key players are thoroughly entangled with the authorities.
Another recent account of unexpectedly harsh WeChat control came from software engineer Jackie Luo on Twitter:
the chinese government shut down my mom’s college wechat group. it included people in and out of china who would chat about social issues in the country—just ordinary people making conversation. thursday morning, when my mom checked it, it was silent.
— Jackie Luo (@jackiehluo) July 28, 2018
usually there were hundreds of messages every morning. that day, none. by thursday afternoon, they realized that none of people inside the country could see or post to the group anymore. for people outside china, everything appeared normal.
— Jackie Luo (@jackiehluo) July 28, 2018
my mom says in the past year, the crackdowns have been mounting, with tightened government control over all communications inside and outside of the country. it’s the worst she’s seen since 1976, the year mao zedong died.
— Jackie Luo (@jackiehluo) July 28, 2018
we get bits and pieces of what xi jinping’s ambitions are—removing presidential term limits was a pretty huge lead. more leads are that the media in china calls him mao’s successor; the savior of china. his picture is increasingly plastered everywhere.
— Jackie Luo (@jackiehluo) July 28, 2018
we don’t hear much about china in the us. we are busy with our own slide into authoritarianism, which i obviously get. but i think it’s worth keeping an eye open at what’s happening in the world’s most populous country, what’s happening to 1.4 billion people.
— Jackie Luo (@jackiehluo) July 28, 2018
they asked the person who started the wechat group to restart it. he lives in the us now. but he won’t; he’s afraid. he has relatives in china, and if the government is monitoring him, then it may well be unsafe. they understand. this social group of 136 people—it’s dead now.
— Jackie Luo (@jackiehluo) July 28, 2018
Finally:
As a tribute to Lu Wei, let’s play his anthem, “Internet Great Power” (网络强国) one last time. Warning: the tune is very catchy and will be playing in your head for days. Such is the power of China’s Great Firewall. @paulmozur https://t.co/yvoUtyPMph
— Mike Forsythe 傅才德 (@PekingMike) July 30, 2018
