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SunWuKong
08-30-2004, 01:11 PM
Hu Jintao and his bitter banquet of injustice
By Xia Xiangren
Translated by T Augustine Lo

HONG KONG - Sometimes bits of little-known personal history illuminate the character of major figures, in this case reformist Chinese President and Communist Party Chairman Hu Jintao, currently locked in a struggle for power with his predecessor Jiang Zemin. For years Hu has refused to visit his ancestral home in Jiangsu province because party officials there refused to rehabilitate his father, who was unjustly accused and imprisoned during the Cultural Revolution - and who perished.

More than 20 years ago, Hu sought redress from local party officials on behalf of his father, a tea-shop owner condemned and persecuted as a bourgeois capitalist. Hu even ordered a restaurant banquet for local Communist Party officials so they could sort out the case over delicacies and rice wine and agree to rehabilitate his father. They never showed up. Hu waited, and waited. Then he invited the kitchen staff, chef, cooks and dishwashers, to come and share the bounty. That was more than 26 years ago.

There is a story among Taizhou's citizens that when Hu departed Tai county, he swore a solemn oath that he would never return to the place where his father, Hu Ningzhi, was disgraced, and he himself was humiliated.

Hu Jintao has never returned. This spring, when local officials spruced up his birthplace and ancestral home in coastal Jiangsu province - undertakings unknown to Hu at the time - he never showed up, even when he was informed of the elaborate preparations. Here's the story, uncovered by Asia Times Online's Hong Kong staff:


more... (http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/FH27Ad02.html)
Faithless
04-09-2005, 11:14 AM
Such standing resentment. Of course --

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/GC22Ad06.html

Yet even now, Taizhou officials dream of Hu's presence at the completion ceremony for the new station, which is due in July.

Hu probably will once again let these officials down. Since Beijing raged at Taizhou's extravagance, Hu, impressing the nation with his refreshing people-first style, seems unlikely to put in an appearance in July. Meanwhile, as some informed sources put it, Hu always denies his ties with Taizhou, which reminds him too painfully of his father's torture during the Cultural Revolution (1966-76) - and local officials' refusal to rehabilitate his father, innocent like most other victims of the Cultural Revolution.

How significant an event would it be if Hu were ever to make this visit?
yoMAMA
04-09-2005, 12:09 PM
Hu is pretty hardcore in terms of control of information, so people that were hoping that he would be more democratic are probably very dissapointed right now.
tzemingdynasty
04-10-2005, 03:50 PM
That's a damn sad story. It's true: EVERY Chinese person has a miserable Cultural Revolution story. Except of course for that guy who posts as 'Cultural Revolution' (Wenhuadageming). Man, even Deng Xiaoping wouldn't do that - considering the Red Guards threw his son out a third-floor window. Every Chinese person also probably has a 'horrendously humiliated by people who you qing'ed to dinner not turning up' story. Both together though: they should put it in a movie.
SunWuKong
04-10-2005, 05:12 PM
That's a damn sad story. It's true: EVERY Chinese person has a miserable Cultural Revolution story. Except of course for that guy who posts as 'Cultural Revolution' (Wenhuadageming). Man, even Deng Xiaoping wouldn't do that - considering the Red Guards threw his son out a third-floor window. Every Chinese person also probably has a 'horrendously humiliated by people who you qing'ed to dinner not turning up' story. Both together though: they should put it in a movie.

actually i did meet one guy in college that said both his parents were sent to the country side during the Cultural Revolution and they didn't think it was that bad. he said they did not suffer and actually met each other because of that.
Faithless
04-10-2005, 07:00 PM
Hu is pretty hardcore in terms of control of information, so people that were hoping that he would be more democratic are probably very dissapointed right now.
He did recently appoint a US embassador from Jiangsu Province:

Zhou Wenzhong appointed ambassador to US (http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/2005-03/31/content_429769.htm)
(Xinhua) * Updated: 2005-03-31 08:38

President Hu Jintao has appointed Zhou Wenzhong as China's new ambassador to the United States of America.

The 60-year-old, father of one daughter, was in charge of affairs of America, Oceania, Latin America, Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan, Translation and Interpretation, and foreign-related security in his former post as vice minister of foreign affairs. ...