VIJAY GOKHALE: COVID19: Reading the tea leaves in China
Two extraordinary ‘petitions’ have emerged
out of China in recent weeks: Ren Zhiqiang’s essay My reading of
February 23 and Xu Zhangrun’s essay Viral Alarm: When
Fury overcomes Fear. Both were written by former members of the
Establishment..
“Beneath the rule of men entirely great, the pen is mightier than the sword”, wrote Edward Bulwer-Lytton in 1839. Many centuries before these words became immortal, the idea of aggrieved subjects penning their petitions directly to the Son of Heaven was well established practice since the earliest times of Chinese Imperial rule. Known as xinfang, it was the means to draw the Emperor’s attention to the wrong-doings of his officials and to seek justice, but occasionally it also became a means to question and topple the Son of Heaven.
“Beneath the rule of men entirely great, the pen is mightier than the sword”, wrote Edward Bulwer-Lytton in 1839. Many centuries before these words became immortal, the idea of aggrieved subjects penning their petitions directly to the Son of Heaven was well established practice since the earliest times of Chinese Imperial rule. Known as xinfang, it was the means to draw the Emperor’s attention to the wrong-doings of his officials and to seek justice, but occasionally it also became a means to question and topple the Son of Heaven.
Two extraordinary
‘petitions’ have emerged out of China in recent weeks: Ren Zhiqiang’s
essay My reading of February 23 and Xu Zhangrun’s essay Viral
Alarm: When Fury overcomes Fear. Both were written by former
members of the Establishment; Xu was a Professor at Qinghua University in
Beijing which is like the MIT of China; Ren was a bonafide Red
Capitalist. Both have been subject to censorship. And both have disappeared
from public view.
Their contents are broadly similar - the rapier is pointed at President Xi Jinping. They hold him personally responsible for the devastation caused inside and outside China as a result of the poor handling of the COVID19 crisis. Labelled as the “Emperor” by Ren and “The Ultimate Arbiter” by Xu, the two essays are a searing critique of the Communist Party’s failure towards it’s own people in this crisis.
Ren Zhiqiang is
ruthless in his attack on Xi Jinping’s attempts, post-facto, to
ante-date his personal leadership in the crisis. He derides Xi’s claims of having
been on top of the situation in dealing with the pandemic since 7 January, and
ridicules the Party’s unconditional endorsement of Xi’s successful leadership
in a National Party Conference on 23 February, in these words: “Standing
there was not some Emperor showing us his new clothes, but a clown with no
clothes on who is still determined to play Emperor.”
Xu’s portrayal of
a helpless leader in the face of the challenge is equally damning: “Faced
with this virus the Leader has flailed about seeking answers with ever greater
urgency……” Ren and Xu allege a ‘cover-up,’ and pose fundamental
questions such as why there was no public announcement about the epidemic in
the days after 7 January, if, in fact, Xi Jinping had chaired a Politburo
meeting to give “directions” on handling it, why China permitted all manner of
national events in the two weeks after 7 January, and why millions of Chinese
were permitted to travel in the run-up to the annual Spring Festival Holiday as
a result of which it became a global pandemic... read more:
https://www.orfonline.org/expert-speak/covid19-reading-tea-leaves-china-64852/see also
Chinese human rights lawyer ‘totally changed man’ after being jailed
Patrick Cockburn: The US is losing its superpower status and it might not recover // Patrick Wyman: How Do You Know If You’re Living Through the Death of an Empire? // Tom Scocca: This Isn’t Trump’s Katrina. It’s Slow-Motion 9/11
A Final Warning by George Orwell
China:
Writing out the non-Han
China - The old regime and the revolution
My first visit to Gandhiji: Tan Yun-Shan (including Gandhi's first letter to China)
China - The old regime and the revolution
My first visit to Gandhiji: Tan Yun-Shan (including Gandhi's first letter to China)
