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Sunday 15 November 2009
China’s enforcement officers turned thugs
A highly publicised case of injustice has led to calls for the reform, or even abolition, of a law enforcement agency found in every Chinese city, and which is notorious for its thuggish behaviour.
Calls for reform mount after latest case of abuse involving city bureau officials
By The Straits Times China Bureau 30 October 2009
A highly publicised case of injustice has led to calls for the reform, or even abolition, of a law enforcement agency found in every Chinese city, and which is notorious for its thuggish behaviour.
Attention is focused once again on the chengguan, or City Urban Management Enforcement Bureau, after bureau officers in Shanghai falsely accused delivery truck driver Sun Zhongjie of using his vehicle as an illegal taxi.
The incident, which outraged the nation after the 19-year-old driver chopped off part of his left little finger on Oct 14 to protest his innocence, followed a bout of negative publicity for chengguan officials.
Chengguan was introduced in the late 1990s to take care of a broad range of street-level issues in China’s rapidly growing cities, such as cracking down on illegal vendors, unlicensed cabs and fly-by-night tourist guides.
But the enforcement agencies of many cities have mutated into havens for bullies running a lucrative network extorting money from offenders.
In March, hengguan officers in Beijing hit a 53-year-old illegal fruit-seller who had tried to stop them from seizing her three-wheeled cart, leaving her with a concussion and a broken finger.
In a more serious case in January last year, officers in central Hubei province beat a man to death after he filmed them clashing with protesters opposed to the site of a new garbage dump. His killers were given jail terms ranging from three to six years.
In April this year, the work manual of one enforcement bureau was leaked online, revealing instructions such as how to beat up offenders without leaving any physical marks.
One angry netizen hacked into the lexicon site of top Chinese search engine Baidu and changed the meaning for the entry ‘chengguan’ to read: ‘an adjective meaning violent, bloody or terrifying’.
The Shanghai case may be the last straw for a society fed up with these marauding ‘gangsters in uniform’ - the nickname for chengguan coined by a local newspaper.
Trouble for Mr. Sun, the driver at the centre of the latest case, began when he picked up a chengguan hand who pretended to be a hitchhiker. The man tossed him a 10-yuan (S$2) note upon alighting and sprinted away while other officers moved in to book Mr. Sun for allegedly using his truck illegally as a taxi.
Since the uproar over the case, similar reports of such set-ups have surfaced in other cities, including southern Guang-zhou and central Wuhan.
Many chengguan officers reportedly maintain a network of skilled conmen who beguile drivers and then accuse them of operating illegally as taxi drivers. Part of the fines would go to the officers involved in the form of kickbacks.
China’s state media and social observers are saying that enough is enough.
The state-run China Daily was among the first to fire a salvo, publishing an editorial on Wednesday calling for a ‘serious review’ of the functions of the agency.
‘The chengguan problem is a long-standing one,’ said Prof Yu Xianyang of Renmin University. ‘The Sun Zhongjie incident has merely served to further expose it. What every city needs to do is to come up with a set of rules to govern the chengguan’s behaviour, and then make these rules transparent to residents.’
Others called for the abolition of the agency, arguing that its existence is legally questionable in the first place.
Some high-profile cases had in the past been a catalyst for change in China. In 2003, the practice of detaining and repatriating migrant workers to their hometown was scrapped after university student Sun Zhigang was beaten to death at a detention centre in Guangzhou.
Some scholars now hope that the chengguan will come to the same end.
Mr. Hao Jinsong, a lawyer who represented Mr. Sun Zhongjie at no charge, said there had been no law or executive order formally sanctioning the existence of the agency.
‘Its powers have simply been conferred by some municipal government departments, and this is illegal,’ he told The Straits Times.
‘The agency should be abolished and its functions returned to the various municipal branches, such as the police.’
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China’s enforcement officers turned thugs
Calls for reform mount after latest case of abuse involving city bureau officials
By The Straits Times China Bureau
30 October 2009
A highly publicised case of injustice has led to calls for the reform, or even abolition, of a law enforcement agency found in every Chinese city, and which is notorious for its thuggish behaviour.
Attention is focused once again on the chengguan, or City Urban Management Enforcement Bureau, after bureau officers in Shanghai falsely accused delivery truck driver Sun Zhongjie of using his vehicle as an illegal taxi.
The incident, which outraged the nation after the 19-year-old driver chopped off part of his left little finger on Oct 14 to protest his innocence, followed a bout of negative publicity for chengguan officials.
Chengguan was introduced in the late 1990s to take care of a broad range of street-level issues in China’s rapidly growing cities, such as cracking down on illegal vendors, unlicensed cabs and fly-by-night tourist guides.
But the enforcement agencies of many cities have mutated into havens for bullies running a lucrative network extorting money from offenders.
In March, hengguan officers in Beijing hit a 53-year-old illegal fruit-seller who had tried to stop them from seizing her three-wheeled cart, leaving her with a concussion and a broken finger.
In a more serious case in January last year, officers in central Hubei province beat a man to death after he filmed them clashing with protesters opposed to the site of a new garbage dump. His killers were given jail terms ranging from three to six years.
In April this year, the work manual of one enforcement bureau was leaked online, revealing instructions such as how to beat up offenders without leaving any physical marks.
One angry netizen hacked into the lexicon site of top Chinese search engine Baidu and changed the meaning for the entry ‘chengguan’ to read: ‘an adjective meaning violent, bloody or terrifying’.
The Shanghai case may be the last straw for a society fed up with these marauding ‘gangsters in uniform’ - the nickname for chengguan coined by a local newspaper.
Trouble for Mr. Sun, the driver at the centre of the latest case, began when he picked up a chengguan hand who pretended to be a hitchhiker. The man tossed him a 10-yuan (S$2) note upon alighting and sprinted away while other officers moved in to book Mr. Sun for allegedly using his truck illegally as a taxi.
Since the uproar over the case, similar reports of such set-ups have surfaced in other cities, including southern Guang-zhou and central Wuhan.
Many chengguan officers reportedly maintain a network of skilled conmen who beguile drivers and then accuse them of operating illegally as taxi drivers. Part of the fines would go to the officers involved in the form of kickbacks.
China’s state media and social observers are saying that enough is enough.
The state-run China Daily was among the first to fire a salvo, publishing an editorial on Wednesday calling for a ‘serious review’ of the functions of the agency.
‘The chengguan problem is a long-standing one,’ said Prof Yu Xianyang of Renmin University. ‘The Sun Zhongjie incident has merely served to further expose it. What every city needs to do is to come up with a set of rules to govern the chengguan’s behaviour, and then make these rules transparent to residents.’
Others called for the abolition of the agency, arguing that its existence is legally questionable in the first place.
Some high-profile cases had in the past been a catalyst for change in China. In 2003, the practice of detaining and repatriating migrant workers to their hometown was scrapped after university student Sun Zhigang was beaten to death at a detention centre in Guangzhou.
Some scholars now hope that the chengguan will come to the same end.
Mr. Hao Jinsong, a lawyer who represented Mr. Sun Zhongjie at no charge, said there had been no law or executive order formally sanctioning the existence of the agency.
‘Its powers have simply been conferred by some municipal government departments, and this is illegal,’ he told The Straits Times.
‘The agency should be abolished and its functions returned to the various municipal branches, such as the police.’
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