The Legacy of Tiananmen Square
Also by MICHEL CORMIER
Richard Hatfield: Power and Disobedience (with Achille Michaud)
Louis J. Robichaud: A Not So Quiet Revolution
English translation copyright 2013 by Jonathan Kaplansky.
Original title: Les Hritiers de Tiananmen.
Copyright 2011 by Michel Cormier.
Published in English under an arrangement with Lemac diteur Inc.
All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or used in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher or a licence from the Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency (Access Copyright). To contact Access Copyright, visit www.accesscopyright.ca or call 1-800-893-5777.
Cover and interior images: Flags at Tiananmen Square by Cronocious, Deviantart.com; and Tiananmen Square by WrappedUpInBooks, Deviantart.com
Cover and page design by Julie Scriver.
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Cormier, Michel, 1957-
The legacy of Tiananmen Square [electronic resource]/ Michel Cormier;
translated by Jonathan Kaplansky.
Translation of: Les hritiers de Tiananmen.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Electronic monograph in HTML format.
Issued also in print format.
ISBN 978-0-86492-764-4
1. China Politics and government 1949-. I. Title.
DS777.75.C6713 2013 951.05 C2012-907164-1
Goose Lane Editions acknowledges the generous support of the Canada Council for the Arts, the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund (CBF), and the Government of New Brunswick through the Department of Tourism, Heritage, and Culture.
Translated with the support of the Banff International Literary Translation Centre (BILTC) at The Banff Centre, Banff, Alberta, Canada.
Goose Lane Editions
500 Beaverbrook Court, Suite 330
Fredericton, New Brunswick
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To my sons, Philippe, Dominique, and Samuel
Prologue
A n overnight snowfall has blanketed Beijing, and Xi Xin Zhu struggles to find the site of his former home, of which only the foundation remains. He stops, looks up, finds a landmark, and sets off again, this time to the left. Beneath the snow, the ground is muddy. The neighbourhood where Xi Xin Zhu lived in West Beijing is now a vast wasteland, flattened to make way for luxury villas. The Summer Palace, where the emperors of China went to escape the heat of the capital, can be seen in the distance. Thats part of the reason real estate developers wanted to get a hold of this property, Zhu tells me, because of the view of the Summer Palace. The expropriation and demolition notices were delivered on the same day, a Friday. Xi Xin Zhu and his family had until the following Monday to leave the premises. He considered the compensation he was offered unacceptable. And he didnt see what gave them the right to demolish his house to build villas. He tried to appeal, but the municipalitys offices are closed on weekends. So Xi Xin Zhu decided to resist. He sent his wife and children to stay with relatives and barricaded himself inside the house. When the demolition workers arrived on Monday, Xi Xin Zhu tried to reason with them but to no avail. The power shovel moved in to take the first bite out of his property. But he couldnt bring himself to watch the destruction of what hed spent twenty years building. Desperate, Zhu doused himself with gasoline and set himself on fire. The workers intervened, called for help, then got back to their job. Xi Xin Zhu was rescued from the flames, but his house was destroyed, as planned.
Several months later he met me outside the hospital where he was still recovering to tell me his story and take me to what remains of his property. His scalp and part of his face are burned, as are both his hands. One hand is covered with a gauze dressing. The pain is still intense. Continuing his search, he finds the foundation of his former home. A low wall, about thirty centimetres high, can be detected beneath the snow. He opens his cellphone with difficulty and shows me the pictures of his house. This is what they destroyed, he says. They had no right. But theyre in league with one another, the authorities and the developers. They do whatever they like. Xi Xin Zhu went to court to try to have the expropriation order reversed. The judge refused to hear his case. Worse, he was accused of disturbing public order after he tried to stop demolition workers from doing their work. For illegally opposing the partys will.
Like millions of Chinese, Xi Xin Zhu felt he had laid part of the foundation of the new China. He had heeded the call of Deng Xiaoping, who at the end of the 1980s had urged the Chinese to get rich. The patriarch had thereby removed the economic shackles of Mao-style socialism and launched China on the road to its spectacular economic ascent. Xi Xin Zhu had opened a small furniture workshop. Over the years, the business had grown and he had saved enough to build a house for himself and his family on an attractive property in the western part of the capital. But his dream ended brutally when the authorities decided to seize the property and hand it over to developers. Today, the burns on his hands prevent Xi Xin Zhu from making furniture. Standing in the snow, hands aching with cold, he swears he wont give up. My spirit is still intact, he tells me. But deep down he knows he has no recourse.
Xi Xin Zhus story is the hidden face of Chinas economic miracle, of the China that managed to pull off the most spectacular economic transformation in the twentieth century, even as it upheld its authoritarian state. A China that not only offers little recourse to its citizens but also often brutalizes people who are victims of injustice, corruption, or even natural disasters. All those, in other words, whose grievances are liable to contradict the image of the harmonious society the Chinese government wishes the world to see. In almost five years of journalism in China, I have seen this face many times. Ive seen it on the woman who lived in utter poverty at the bottom of a chemical wasteland in what in China is called a cancer village. The factory overlooking her property on a tributary of the Yangtze River specialized in chemicals used in making computer screens and mobile phones. Shed turned up her pant leg to show me the lesion that appeared on her calf after her exposure to toxic waste. Even after seven years, it hadnt healed. She, too, had complained to the authorities. She, too, was accused of disturbing the peace. It is the face of the mother who lost her daughter when a poorly built school collapsed during the Sichuan earthquake. Shed agreed to meet me on a country road to talk about her anger at the authorities who wanted to silence her. Her phone had been tapped. When we met, she barely had time to greet me before plainclothes police officers got out of three unmarked cars and took her away by force. It is the face of the man who had come from northern China just before the Olympics, believing he could demonstrate to get answers about his daughters suspicious death in a military barracks. But he was refused permission to demonstrate. Hed set up a meeting with us in Tiananmen Square, where he unfurled a banner demanding justice. He, too, was immediately taken away by plainclothes police officers. It is the face of Zhao Lianhai, who wanted to set up an organization for parents of children poisoned by melamine-contaminated milk and was sentenced to two and a half years in prison for disturbing the peace. His crime: demanding an independent inquiry into the scandal.
