MCLC: citizen journalists

[Denton, Kirk]

MCLC LIST
From: kirk (denton.2 at osu.edu)
Subject: citizen journalists
***********************************************************

Source: The Guardian (4/11/13):
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/apr/16/china-anti-corruption-blogging-
weibo-citizen-journalism

China's citizen journalists finding the mouse is mightier than the pen
Chinese cyber-investigators find exposure on social media can protect them
from the corrupt officials they seek to uncover
By Brice Pedroletti

Days into his new mandate as Communist party chief and before his
ratification as the new president of the People's Republic, Xi Jinping
declared that one of his key concerns would be the fight against
corruption "under the people's supervision". Neither the "tigers" (bigwig
party leaders) or the "flies" (low-ranking cadres) would be spared.

Citizen journalists have taken the lead in tracking down corruption and
posting their findings on the internet and on Weibo, the Chinese
microblogging site. Zhou Lubao, 28, is an active cyber-investigator. When
not tracking down corruption he is a household appliance sales rep in a
coastal city of China.

Zhou became interested in the mayor of Lanzhou, the capital of Gansu
province in the summer of 2012. At the time Zhou was protesting about the
sentencing of Chen Pingfu
<http://humanrightsinchina.wordpress.com/2012/09/09/chen-pingfus-inciting-t
o-subvert-state-power-by-his-blogposts/>, a Lanzhou blogger accused of
"inciting subversion" – a serious charge in China. Chen was finally
released in December in a rare victory for free speech. Trawling through
the internet, Zhou observed that in official photographs the mayor could
be seen wearing five different luxury watches.

Using a technique that had already led to the demotion of an official in
Shaanxi, Zhou posted his discovery on Weibo and other online forums. The
scandal was picked up by the media. The official Chinese news agency,
Xinhua, even published an article entitled, "China's craze for online
anti-corruption".

Meanwhile Zhou had obtained other information about the mayor's conduct,
including the loan of a substantial amount of public money to a female
student when he was the director of the university, and contracts awarded
to a construction owned by his wife as part of the massive New Lanzhou
Area development project. Yet despite the public outcry, nothing was done.

In February, Zhou went to Lanzhou himself to submit a petition to the
provincial public prosecutor. The prosecutor was forewarned and Zhou
narrowly escaped arrest. He fled to Xining, in the neighbouring province
of Qinghai. But during Chinese New Year he tweeted "We must eliminate that
old cancer, Zhou Yongkang", referring to a former member of the party's
standing committee in charge of security. Zhou's Weibo accounts were
promptly closed and the internet buzzed with rumours that he had been sent
to a labour camp for re-education.

On 22 February, Zhou resurfaced, describing what had happened to him in
his blog before returning to Lanzhou to continue his investigations: "I
don't think they'll dare to arrest me because of the all the internet
mobilisation," he said in a telephone interview. "They would have to prove
that I've committed a crime, but I'm out in the open. They are the ones
working in the shadows. But who knows, they may catch me right after this
call!" And he added, "When young people like me fight corruption, we are
also claiming our rights and showing there is still hope in our society."

That faith is shared by another anti-corruption fighter, 43-year-old Zhu
Ruifeng, who set up a website called renmin jiandu wang
<http://www.jdwsy.com/> (the people's supervision network). Ever since the
sensational "sex videogate" affair in Chongqing made Zhu famous in the
autumn of 2012, he has given many interviews to both foreign and Chinese
media to protect himself. That scandal concerned a video of Lei Zhengfu, a
district party secretary, having sex with an 18-year-old woman; it led to
him being sacked along with a dozen other local cadres.

The event was filmed secretly in 2007 by a blackmailer who paid young
women to seduce officials and obtained lucrative public construction
contracts in return for his silence. Lei Zhengfu finally went to
Chongqing's police chief, Wang Lijun, for help. Wang promptly put the
blackmailer behind bars and recovered 50 more compromising videos.

Zhu had obtained the tape from a Chongqing police officer who was
disgusted that the affair was hushed up despite Wang Lijun's fall last
year, when he took refuge in the US consulate after being implicated in
another, far bigger scandal involving his superior, Chongqing party
secretary Bo Xilai.

Zhu acquired six more videos from the same policeman. Last January, he
prevented the Chongqing police from confiscating them at his home in
Beijing by calling the press. He claims to have copies in safe places.
"It's the first time in history that 11 cadres have fallen in one go. I
want to let things calm down and see if the authorities do their job," he
said in the north Beijing bookstore he uses as headquarters.
The question is, will the new Chinese president keep his word or will this
populist "opening up" end in widespread repression, as has so often
happened in the past?

"Intellectuals and civil society demand meaningful political reforms, not
just little amendments," explained Teng Biao, a lawyer and major player in
the Chinese civil society movement, who was imprisoned and tortured in
2011. "But change won't come from the top leadership. They have no
intention of giving up their privileges and immense power. Only pressure
from civil society will make them change."

Meanwhile, the cyber-investigators continue their work. "Sometimes I
wonder how they will have me killed. Perhaps a car accident or a murder …
But I'm not afraid. We have to fight this, even if I pay the price," said
Gao Qinrong after posting revelations about a family of crooked cadres in
Yuncheng, a town in Shanxi province.

This 57-year-old former journalist knows what he's talking about. In 1998
his paper, the Shanxi Youth Daily, exposed a fake irrigation project in
Yuncheng that had siphoned off millions in public money. He was kidnapped
in Beijing by the Yuncheng police and jailed on a trumped-up charge. His
informer, a Shanxi cadre based in Beijing, was also imprisoned. When he
was released seven years later he was beaten up now uses a wheel chair.

Gao continues to fight and he believes that the climate has changed: "The
Chinese media are freer now and their reports support mine, which proves
that they have not been censored." And he concluded, "Perhaps the Chinese
people have finally found their weapon: the computer mouse!"

• This article appeared in Guardian Weekly
<http://www.guardianweekly.co.uk/>, which incorporates material from Le
Monde