Cox Washington Bureau
May 6, 2001

Yunyang, China — He Kechang retired to a village above the Yangtze River hoping to spend his last years with his family working their half-acre of land.  But as construction started on the Three Gorges Dam about 200 miles downriver, the former ship worker found himself slowly drawn into a morass of deceit and corruption.

The government sent millions of tax dollars to the town of Gaoyang to relocate 13,000 farmers and make way for the dam. But He and his family never saw their share. Instead, they saw officials spend the money on impressive new buildings for the government and police. He turned up evidence that officials artificially inflated the number of residents and amount of land in order to collect more money from the central government while denying farmers their rightful compensation.

He, who is 61, felt compelled to act. He collected documents, got petitions signed and traveled several times to Beijing to lodge complaints and seek out journalists. Sometimes he went at his own expense, sometimes with donations from villagers who gave what they could afford, even as little as 25 cents each.

"My son tried to tell him, if a farmer tries to seek justice from the government, the only possible outcome is failure," said his wife, Xiong Dezhen, "but he didn’t listen."

For his troubles, He is sitting in jail with three other men, all in their 50s and 60s, all informally elected as village representatives and now charged with disturbing the public order. Wen Dingchun was arrested last month in Yunyang county while hiding from police. The others — He, Ran Chongxing and Jiang Qingshan — were arrested in Beijing as they prepared to meet reporters. They are awaiting the outcome of a trial in Yunyang.

The four are among thousands who have traveled to Beijing and provincial capitals to expose graft and appeal for help. However, He and his colleagues are the first to be arrested for doing so.

Coercion, intimidation In an area that is already seething with anger at official corruption, the arrests may serve only to increase the tension. While the state-run Chinese media gushes about how smoothly the resettlement is progressing, demonstrations and clashes between peasants and officials have been reported in the foreign media. One local official in charge of resettlement has been killed.

The controversial $25 billion Three Gorges Dam has drawn worldwide attention for the potential environmental problems it may cause. Now, as China carries out the huge task of resettling 1.3 million to 1.9 million people by 2009, almost half of them farmers, experts fear the relocation issue could boil over into a volatile social problem.

Many of those being forced to move say they are not opposed to the dam itself. It will generate electricity, help flood control and improve navigation, the government says. When completed in 2009, it will be 1.4 miles long, making it the world’s largest hydroelectric dam.

But as the deadline draws nearer, farmers say officials are increasingly resorting to coercion and intimidation to get them to move. In Gaoyang, located in Yunyang county, many said they recently started spending their days hiding in the fields to avoid being detained or forced to agree to compensation they believe is less than they are due.

A Beijing sociologist who uses the pseudonym Wei Yi for fear of government retribution warned that the area could become "a hotbed for constant social instability." Wei’s blunt comments, published two years ago in a mainstream political journal, offered rare criticism of a government program.

Local officials were emboldened to take an even harder line in February after Beijing issued new regulations saying people are not allowed to resist moving.

"The local leaders have taken this to mean you’re a criminal if you resist," Wei said in an interview. "The new motto of Yunyang officials is ‘resettlement by legal means,’ meaning they reserve the right to use police to chase the people out."

Probe International, a Canadian group opposed to the dam, and Human Rights Watch have begun jointly monitoring the issue.

"The reason this case is such a bad precedent is, if they arrest a person as mild as He Kechang — which means they can’t accept peaceful means (of protest) — then they’re just waiting for the extreme means, murdering a corrupt official or burning down government buildings," said Dai Qing, a former journalist who is China’s most outspoken critic of the Three Gorges project. "These things will all happen."

In an interview more than a month after the arrests, Qi Lin, director of the government’s Three Gorges Resettlement Bureau, said no one has been detained for resisting resettlement or filing complaints.

"That’s ridiculous," he said. "No government at any level would do something so stupid."

Promises found to be lies The dam’s opponents say it is simply a political project designed to give China’s leaders the international prestige they crave.

By turning a huge section of the surging Yangtze River into a giant lake, critics say that countless archaeological treasures will be lost and the ecological damage will be immense. As work proceeds, construction quality has been compromised by corruption and lack of oversight, they say.

Yet the leadership has so far proved impervious to criticism. The state-run media are barred from scrutinizing the project, and opposition voices are kept from speaking out. Dai, the former journalist, once tried to organize a panel discussion on the project, but hotels were warned not to rent their conference rooms to her and participants were individually pressured not to attend.

Of all the project’s problems, relocation has been the most politically sensitive. While the small number of environmentalists, engineers and archaeologists in China can be silenced, the peasants cannot.

Eight hundred people from Yunyang county were moved to Jiangsu province in eastern China last year. They discovered that most of the promises they had been given — such as free schooling for their children and welfare for the elderly — were lies. Several dozen people returned to demand redress and inform their old neighbors, according to farmers interviewed in Gaoyang.

Qi, the resettlement official, acknowledged the peasants have complaints.

"In one place I visited, more than 100 people surrounded me to ask questions. (On my next trip,) I bet there will be 300 people," he said. "One time, someone grabbed my leg and started crying on my pants."

But he said grievances can be addressed through education campaigns, and regular auditing has reduced fraud. By the end of last year, close to 84 percent of the $3 billion allocated so far for resettlement had been audited. Of that, $244 million had been misused or embezzled, Qi said.

One official has been executed, two have gotten life sentences, 133 have received varying other sentences and another 140 have been punished with administrative measures — such as losing their job or party membership.

Still, the temptation is almost irresistible for many officials.

"They know the real disaster won’t come for five to 10 years, by which time they won’t be around, so they take as much money as they can," Dai said. "When has a county chief ever seen so much money fall into his lap?"

The state has allocated about $4,000 per person for resettlement, but much of that goes to building roads, hospitals and other public projects. Less than half is intended to go directly to individuals. The main complaint of those being displaced is the total lack of any open accounting of how the money is being spent.

"I trust the (Communist) Party, and I trust the party has a good policy," said Zhao Heying, the wife of Ran Chongxing, one of the four men in jail. "All we’re asking is for (the local officials) to carry out Beijing’s policy."

But Wei, the sociologist, believes the root of the problem is China’s political system itself.

"Under our current political system, it’s impossible to resolve the Three Gorges problem," he said. "We don’t have a free press, and officials are not accountable to the people. The central government does not listen to opposing views."

The greater Chongqing municipality, which includes Yunyang, Wanxian and several other counties, is home to 80 percent of the people whose homes will be submerged by the reservoir. The remaining 20 percent live in Hubei county.

This section of the Yangtze River valley has long been one of the most impoverished regions of China. It has seen repeated flooding and lack of investment in infrastructure. According to state statistics, the average per capita income of rural households in Chongqing is $210 per year, less than half the level in Guangdong, a prosperous province bordering Hong Kong.

Peasants say they have already suffered for years under the excesses of local officials, who spend public money on lavish banquets, levy artificially high taxes and sometimes beat those who don’t pay.

"At a village meeting recently, each person got 6 renminbi (72 cents) and two popsicles (for coming), but the village leaders were all drinking Sprite," said Zhou Dexing, 58. "So I asked the party secretary, ‘Did you buy that with relocation funds?’ He didn’t answer."

No faith in local leaders In late March, the Gaoyang government started issuing notices to people who have resisted moving, saying their rights would be forfeited unless they gave a written reply within one day. If they didn’t sign, they would be moved to higher land in Gaoyang, which is the worst option for farmers because higher land means steep hillsides that are difficult to cultivate. Frequent announcements on village loudspeakers warned that those who didn’t comply would be subject to criminal detention.

Like many in Gaoyang, Jiang Zhuhua, 55, said he’s afraid to go home.

"Yesterday, I took some peanuts and a bottle of water and hid in the hills all day," he said. "I’ve been supporting the dam project and government policy from the beginning, but they just don’t act according to the policy."

Residents of urban areas are unhappy as well. In an old area of Wanzhou, when some laid-off factory workers and retirees who were passing the afternoon chatting with neighbors were asked about relocating, bitterness quickly surfaced.

"We barely have enough money to eat," complained Yu Zongjing, 80, a retired schoolteacher. "It’s not that we’re unwilling to move. They don’t give us any information. They don’t say how they’ve spent the relocation funds. We trust the central government, but the local government is rotten."

Xiong, 56, and Zhao, 48, said they have not been allowed to see their husbands in jail. One week after they were arrested, 40 officials came to Xiong’s house for two hours and seized dozens of items, including name lists and address books. They also confiscated photos Xiong and her husband took of themselves at Tiananmen Square on one of their visits to Beijing and suggested the two traveled on public funds for personal reasons.

The displaced peasants are confused and frustrated. Many have a fatalistic outlook.

"I’m waiting for the central government to come fix the problem," said 52-year-old Wang Anxiu, the mother of two sons who are too poor to find wives. And if they don’t? "Then I’ll drown," she replied.

Asked his opinion of his local leaders, farmer Zhou Dexing sighed and suggested that corruption is inevitable. He quoted a well-known saying of the architect of China’s economic reforms: "Deng Xiaoping said, ‘It doesn’t matter if the cat is black or white, as long as it catches mice.’ So I guess all the village cadres are good cats."

-END-

For more information see:
"Imminent trial of Three Gorges dam protesters," Human Rights Watch and Probe International joint press release.
and
"Amnesty International issues appeal for Three Gorges dam protesters," Amnesty International urgent action appeal.