A wave of Internet-based self-nominations in local Chinese “elections” has made the Communist Party nervous. Editorials in the official press have been issued to throw cold water on aspirants, and when that hasn’t worked the authorities have resorted to old-fashioned arrests.
The “candidates” are seeking low-level and relatively unimportant positions in the Chinese regime’s obscure system of representation, called the “People’s Congress,” which exist at district, township, and county levels. The system is connected to the National People’s Congress, the highly visible rubber-stamp legislature that convenes in the capital every year.
Candidates using Sina Weibo, a Chinese version of Twitter, are attempting to gain audiences and be elected as representatives in these local People’s Congresses. The phenomenon has drawn the attention of the Chinese media, scholars and online public opinion—as well as the Communist Party.
Independent candidates need to gain support from at least 10 voters from their district to become tentative candidates, according to China’s electoral law. After that it becomes opaque about how they are to gain their positions, but it is mostly a “rigid system of appointment,” according to the China Elections and Governance website.
Representatives, or deputies, to the local People’s Congresses may have a small degree of influence over local policies, though the real power still resides in the hands of the local Party chiefs, according to experts. The moves by independent candidates are mostly symbolic efforts at democracy.
When independent candidate Xie Runliang from Wuxi in eastern China’s Jiangsu Province tried to get in on the act, the local authorities had a “talk” with him. He was told on May 29 that he had made “seemingly questionable remarks” on his Weibo account.
Soon after he announced that he will “refrain talking about politics and completely give up running for deputy to the National People’s Congress,” according to a Radio France Internationale (RFI) report on May 31.
The case of Liu Ping, a female candidate who was initially disqualified by the authorities for running for candidacy, has also attracted attention.
Liu is a retired steel company employee from Xinyu City, Jiangsu Province. She is also a rights activist who has been summoned by police for petitioning in Beijing, and was for that denied the right to run for candidacy.
Not taking no for an answer, she continued to give public campaign speeches in streets and parks. Local authorities then took her into custody for “disturbing public order,” two days before her local district’s election.
Wei Zhongping, another independent candidate in her district who campaigned with her, was also summoned by police and afterwards went missing.
Liu has received support from media and online commentators and was called “the bravest woman” in China. Some microblog celebrities, including law professor Yu Jianrong, have launched an Internet appeal for the “Support Liu Ping Campaign,” though her elections prospects are no longer on the cards.
Li Fan, director of the World and China Institute, an NGO in Beijing, told The Epoch Times two months ago that he predicted ten times more independent candidates would run for election this year.
The election campaign has just started, and many counties’ election dates are set to take place in September and October. As of this writing, about 30-50 people have made candidacy declarations on their microblogs.
Opinion writer Li Chengpeng announced a few days ago that he would run for candidacy in the Wuhou District of Chengdu City in the southwest province of Sichuan.
A campaign team including law professors Yu Jianrong and He Weifang, popular blogger and writer Han Han, movie director Feng Xiaogang, and journalist Wang Keqin, has already been formed. Prominent attorneys Chen Youxi and Si Weijiang have also promised to provide legal advice.
Scholar Xiong Wei also announced that he will run for deputy to the National People’s Congress in the Haidian District of Beijing. He commented that this year’s participants and the way they’ve participated are different from last year. He believes the trend will determine if reform is feasible in China.
Xiong observed that this year’s participants are dominated by public intellectuals but very few entrepreneurs. “The independent candidate’s ability, political knowledge and social network support are more mature this time,” Xiong said in a June 3 Voice of America (VOA) article.
But for all the eagerness of the new candidates, the Communist Party has given a cold welcome.
The Central Propaganda Department in Chengdu and Beijing banned media from covering several independent candidates, including Li Chengpeng. Others said they were summoned by security forces for a “chat,” while others simply went missing.
“The constant setbacks in citizens’ political participation is not only because of lack of formal regulation,” says Hainan University Associate Professor Wang Lin, in Caijing Magazine. It’s because “Local authorities’ fear grassroots level democracy, and fear that the non-appointed deputies will be hard to control.”
Wang added: “Even if independent candidates follow all the legal procedures, the authorities will put forward various reasons to hinder the realization of civil and political rights.”
The Global Times, a nationalistic media outlet overseen by the Party’s main mouthpiece, People’s Daily, published an editorial on May 30. It drew on the common refrain about “hostile foreign forces.”
Independent candidates were warned not to touch the authorities’ “red line.” The piece said: “the momentum of independent candidates has been magnified by microblogs, which tends to bring people with a common political preference together, including sympathizers from overseas.”
According to the editorial, the most popular independent candidates are constantly learning from the West, trying to change Chinese society from being “inclusive” to “adversarial.”
Choi Yung Mei, Executive Editor of the Hong Kong-based Open Magazine, believes that what the independent candidates are doing is significant for China.
“Although independent candidates have very limited influence to China’s democratic reform, in the long run, they will lay a solid foundation of a civil society for the future democratic China,” Choi told VOA.
Some Chinese bloggers agree. One wrote: “No more self-immolation, kneeling on our knees, or petitioning. Let’s fight and get our legal right to vote, starting from today.”
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