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As the largest resettlement operation in the history of dam-building speeds up, Chinese media report a fatal accident, a forced eviction – and an official’s chilling threat that next year floodwater could be used to oust reluctant migrants.

Two workers were killed and two others injured when a high-rise building being demolished in downtown Fuling, 480 kilometres upstream of the Three Gorges dam, suddenly collapsed on Sept. 18, the Chongqing Evening News (Chongqing wanbao) reported.

Five demolition workers were on the eighth floor of a food company’s staff dormitory when the building came down without warning. One man who clung tightly to a window frame managed to escape serious injury, but the four others who plunged to the ground were buried under heavy debris. It took rescue workers more than five hours to pull them out, by which time two of the men had died.

Since the accident, Fuling officials have decreed that all buildings six storeys and higher must be brought down in controlled explosions, and that professional demolition teams must also be involved in demolishing smaller buildings.

The remaining demolitions in Fuling are expected to be completed by the end of this year, the newspaper said. Earlier this year, China’s state-run media hailed the removal of 14,500 people from Fuling in less than 3 months as the biggest, fastest and "most efficient" relocation of people since the dam-related resettlement began. Officially, 1.2 million people are being uprooted for the Three Gorges project, though critics believe the real figure is close to two million.

Meanwhile, a tailor in Zhongxian county who refused to move from the lively town centre where he had built up a successful small business had to stand and watch as his three-storey building was levelled by force, Chinese television reported last week.

Fifty uniformed officers were there to ensure the demolition of Zhou Kangfu’s building went ahead in Shibao town, about 370 kilometres upstream of the dam, China Central Television Network (Zhongyang dianshi tai) said in its Sept. 17 report.

"The most disappointing thing for me is that I have lost forever a great location for my business," Mr. Zhou complained to the TV reporter as demolition equipment destroyed his shop. "But I won’t move because I feel the new offer made by the resettlement bureau is still not a reasonable deal."

Mr. Zhou, whose business had been located on a busy shopping street in the old town of Shibao, has been offered a site that he feels is far inferior in the new town built on higher ground a couple of kilometres away. He has refused to accept the replacement site, and in the meantime is renting temporary accommodation for himself and his family.

An official in charge of the Shibao resettlement operation said that local authorities had no option but to demolish Mr. Zhou’s building against his wishes, as a warning to others not to resist the tight resettlement timetable imposed by higher authorities.

From July to October this year, resettlement officials in Chongqing municipality alone must dismantle 36,600 square metres of housing every day, he said.

Prime sites in the new town centre are reserved for office buildings, not small shops, the official explained. "Zhou deserves what happened because he attached so much importance to his own interests that he ignored the resettlement law. I have to point out that nobody can be a ‘special citizen’ above the law."

And, he warned ominously, "Without using some coercion now, next year we would have to close the dam and use floodwater to force the people out."