Talal Wasif Qavi dwells upon a novel development
Protest season arrives in China was kept shielded from industrial action for years as the country’s political system extended its long arm to the economic life of the country as well. According to the tenets of the one-party state system there is no provision for public protestation in any field of activity and these tenets are strongly enforced. The state authority usually employs its full might to quell any public dissent and strictly suppresses any information and never lets it out. The result is that any civil protestation is unprecedented in mainland China and even when such disturbances erupt they are crushed with heavy hand. Successive Chinese regimes have ensured that people unquestionably accept the dictates of the political leadership and follow the policy laid down by the ruling Communist Party of the country. It is generally recognised that regimented working practice has tremendously contributed to the massive economic growth China has achieved over the years but critics point out that this development is attained on the expense of compromising basic human rights. Such hard-line attitude and practice of the Chinese authorities are deeply resented in the wider world and there is an unending criticism about them but the Chinese officialdom has not mended its ways.
This time round however the Chinese people are on the verge of breaking down the artificial barriers erected by the officialdom as frustration has mounted over the signature zero-Covid policy of President Xi Jinping even nearly three years into the pandemic. The Covid measures are also exacting a heavy toll on the world’s second-largest economy. China has stuck with Xi’s zero-Covid policy even as much of the world has lifted most restrictions. While low by global standards, China’s case numbers have hit record highs for days, with nearly 40,000 new infections, prompting yet more lockdowns in cities across the country. Beijing has defended the policy as life-saving and necessary to prevent overwhelming the healthcare system. Officials have vowed to continue with it. Since Shanghai’s 25 million residents were put under a two-month lockdown early this year, Chinese authorities have sought to be more targeted in their Covid curbs, an effort that has been challenged by the surge in infections as the country faces its first winter with the highly transmissible Omicron variant.
In this context, hundreds of demonstrators and police clashed in Shanghai as protests flared for the third day and spread to several cities in the wake of a deadly apartment fire in the country’s far west. Protesters also took to the streets in the cities of Wuhan and Chengdu and in Beijing, small gatherings held peaceful vigils, while students on numerous university campuses around China gathered to demonstrate over the weekend. A fire at a residential high-rise building in the city of Urumqi, capital of the Xinjiang region, triggered protests after videos of the incident posted on social media led to accusations that lockdowns were a factor in the blaze that killed 10 people. Urumqi officials abruptly held a news conference to deny Covid measures had hampered escape and rescue efforts. Many of Urumqi’s four million residents have been under some of the country’s longest lockdowns, barred from leaving their homes for as long as 100 days.
The vigil in Shanghai for victims of the apartment fire turned into a protest against Covid curbs, with the crowd chanting calls for lockdowns to be lifted. They chanted slogans against the Chinese Communist Party and President Xi Jinping that is construed a rare public protest against the country’s leadership. In the central city of Wuhan, where the pandemic began three years ago, videos on social media showed hundreds of residents taking to the streets, smashing through metal barricades, overturning Covid testing tents and demanding an end to lockdowns. Other cities that have seen public dissent include Lanzhou in the northwest, where residents overturned Covid staff tents and smashed testing booths, posts on social media showed. Protesters said they were put under lockdown even though no one had tested positive.
It is widely known that any form of dissent has been all but eliminated under the rule of President Xi, forcing citizens mostly to vent their frustration on social media, where they play cat-and-mouse with censors. Frustration is boiling just over a month after President Xi secured a third term at the helm of China’s Communist Party. It is pointed out that this will put serious pressure on the party to respond and that there is a good chance that one response will be repression, and they will arrest and prosecute some protesters. It is however observed that as long as Xi had China’s elite and the military on his side, he would not face any meaningful risk to his grip on power. This analysis is almost proved by the call given by the secretary of Communist Party of Xinjiang for the region to step up security maintenance and curb the illegal violent rejection of Covid-prevention measures. TW
Protest season arrives in China
ByTalal Wasif Qavi
A barrister
Dated
December 3, 2022
Talal Wasif Qavi dwells upon a novel development
Protest season arrives in China was kept shielded from industrial action for years as the country’s political system extended its long arm to the economic life of the country as well. According to the tenets of the one-party state system there is no provision for public protestation in any field of activity and these tenets are strongly enforced. The state authority usually employs its full might to quell any public dissent and strictly suppresses any information and never lets it out. The result is that any civil protestation is unprecedented in mainland China and even when such disturbances erupt they are crushed with heavy hand. Successive Chinese regimes have ensured that people unquestionably accept the dictates of the political leadership and follow the policy laid down by the ruling Communist Party of the country. It is generally recognised that regimented working practice has tremendously contributed to the massive economic growth China has achieved over the years but critics point out that this development is attained on the expense of compromising basic human rights. Such hard-line attitude and practice of the Chinese authorities are deeply resented in the wider world and there is an unending criticism about them but the Chinese officialdom has not mended its ways.
This time round however the Chinese people are on the verge of breaking down the artificial barriers erected by the officialdom as frustration has mounted over the signature zero-Covid policy of President Xi Jinping even nearly three years into the pandemic. The Covid measures are also exacting a heavy toll on the world’s second-largest economy. China has stuck with Xi’s zero-Covid policy even as much of the world has lifted most restrictions. While low by global standards, China’s case numbers have hit record highs for days, with nearly 40,000 new infections, prompting yet more lockdowns in cities across the country. Beijing has defended the policy as life-saving and necessary to prevent overwhelming the healthcare system. Officials have vowed to continue with it. Since Shanghai’s 25 million residents were put under a two-month lockdown early this year, Chinese authorities have sought to be more targeted in their Covid curbs, an effort that has been challenged by the surge in infections as the country faces its first winter with the highly transmissible Omicron variant.
In this context, hundreds of demonstrators and police clashed in Shanghai as protests flared for the third day and spread to several cities in the wake of a deadly apartment fire in the country’s far west. Protesters also took to the streets in the cities of Wuhan and Chengdu and in Beijing, small gatherings held peaceful vigils, while students on numerous university campuses around China gathered to demonstrate over the weekend. A fire at a residential high-rise building in the city of Urumqi, capital of the Xinjiang region, triggered protests after videos of the incident posted on social media led to accusations that lockdowns were a factor in the blaze that killed 10 people. Urumqi officials abruptly held a news conference to deny Covid measures had hampered escape and rescue efforts. Many of Urumqi’s four million residents have been under some of the country’s longest lockdowns, barred from leaving their homes for as long as 100 days.
The vigil in Shanghai for victims of the apartment fire turned into a protest against Covid curbs, with the crowd chanting calls for lockdowns to be lifted. They chanted slogans against the Chinese Communist Party and President Xi Jinping that is construed a rare public protest against the country’s leadership. In the central city of Wuhan, where the pandemic began three years ago, videos on social media showed hundreds of residents taking to the streets, smashing through metal barricades, overturning Covid testing tents and demanding an end to lockdowns. Other cities that have seen public dissent include Lanzhou in the northwest, where residents overturned Covid staff tents and smashed testing booths, posts on social media showed. Protesters said they were put under lockdown even though no one had tested positive.
It is widely known that any form of dissent has been all but eliminated under the rule of President Xi, forcing citizens mostly to vent their frustration on social media, where they play cat-and-mouse with censors. Frustration is boiling just over a month after President Xi secured a third term at the helm of China’s Communist Party. It is pointed out that this will put serious pressure on the party to respond and that there is a good chance that one response will be repression, and they will arrest and prosecute some protesters. It is however observed that as long as Xi had China’s elite and the military on his side, he would not face any meaningful risk to his grip on power. This analysis is almost proved by the call given by the secretary of Communist Party of Xinjiang for the region to step up security maintenance and curb the illegal violent rejection of Covid-prevention measures. TW
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