Ding Ding! Question - how are they going to get to Lingling if they burn the busses?
Posted on 03/12/2007 11:02:54 PM PDT by Zhang Fei
Something as simple as opening of the local bus lines to open competition could have prevented this riot. But this is China, where the government grants of lucrative monopolies (in exchange for kickbacks and bribes) are a several-thousand year tradition.
(Excerpt) Read more at zonaeuropa.com ...
[in translation]
Guaranteeing orderly prices in rural China is an important function of the Price Regulation Bureau towards the construction of a harmonious new rural China. As such, they must actively monitor prices and pay careful attention to healthcare and medical fees, education fees, transportation fares in rural China, prices for water, electricity an coal. They must look for various arbitrary and secret fees and fines ...
One of the task is the re-organization of rural transportation fares. Since 2005, the rights to run these transportation routes are privatized, so that these routes became de facto monopolies with serious problems of arbitrary price hikes. As a result, the masses are reacting strongly. Therefore, cleaning up rural transportation has become a major sore point. In the second half of 2005, the Price Regulation Bureau obtained the approval of the government leaders and came up with a plan that was led by a joint task force from the government, the Price Regulation Bureau, the Ministry of Transportation and three other departments to enforce the law. Based upon the price of petrol as well as the characeristics of the vechiles, we set new prices for the various rural routes in Lingling district. Three bus routes refused to implement the prices mandated by the government; we went to court to obtain an order to enforce the prices. As a result, all prices in the district are now under the government0mandated level. This project resulted in savings of over 400 RMB for the rural peasants living in this district.
(Salvaged from the Baidu cache) 零陵区珠山镇车费胡乱加价引发民愤
9日，10日，因珠山至零陵车费无乱收费，任意加价，激起民愤， 8日，珠山至零陵车费加至9块，并且对学生携带的被子及胶桶各加收5元，态度恶劣， 部分学生及家长无耐，包租一辆车前往零陵，但受到该线路承包商责难威胁，9日该线继续加价，继续对学生的各种携带物品进行收钱，引起学生家长愤慨，引来上千人指责，愤怒的人群推翻了1台中巴，
在零陵听到信息祁阳老板装两车人来到珠山，扬言要铲平珠山，更加引起愤怒，继而再推翻3台中巴。
在各方协调下，线路承包商答应票价第二天降至7元，并研究进一步降价空间。 然而第二天即10日，从珠山至零陵为7元，而零陵至珠山仍然维持是9元，并且态度恶劣，再次激起民愤，愤怒的民众烧毁了一台中巴。
珠山至零陵去年原票价为5元，后加至7元，继而加至9元，由比较中看出：相同公里数的tyle="COLOR: black; BACKGROUND-COLOR: #ffff66">零陵至冷水滩却只有4元，然而零陵至珠山却要9元。
至今有关部门并没对民众做出答复。
[in translation]
On March 9 and 10, the arbitrary raising of bus fares from Zhushan to Lingling inflamed public anger. On March 8, the bus fare from Zhushan to Lingling was raised to 9 RMB. Furthermore, the students had to pay 5 RMB for bringing a blanket and also 5 RMB for brining a plastic bucket with them. This was very bad attitude.
Some of the students and parents felt that they had no choice but to rent a vehicle to go to Lingling by themselves, but they were threatened by the company that owned exclusive rights to that route. On March 9, the line continued with the price increase as well as additional fees on accompanying items. This infuriated the students' parents and about 1,000 persons showed up to condemn the bus company. The angry crowd overturned a mid-sized bus during the process.
When the Qiyang boss heard the news in Lingling, he brought two carloads of men to Zhushan and he said that he would raze Zhushan to the ground. This caused the crowd to get angrier and overturned three mid-sized buses.
With mediation from various sides, the contractor agreed to reduce the price back down to 7 RMB the next day as well as to give consideration to even more price cuts. On the the next day (March 10), the fare from Zhushan to Lingling was indeed lowered to 7 RMB but the fare from Lingling to Zhushan remained at 9 RMB. Furthermore, the boss carried on with a bad attitude which infuriated the crowd once again. Another mid-sized bus was torched.
The fare from Zhushan to Lingling used to be 5 RMB. It was raised first to 7 RMB and now to 9 RMB. By comparison, the fare from Lingling to Lengshuitan which covers the same number kilometers was only 4 RMB whereas the fare from Lingling to Zhushan was 9 RMB.
The relevant departments have not provided an answer so far.
(Boxun) Mass clash occurred in Yingzhou city, Hunan. By Zhang Zilin. March 12, 2007. [Similar reports at Ming Pao (Hong Kong) and Zaobao (Singapore)]
[in translation]
During the spring travel season, the Anda Transport Company which manages the bus line between Zhushan town and Lingling raised the ticket price from 6 RMB to 10-15 RMB. At around 10am on March 9, 2007, a large group of people gathered at the bus station to demand the ticket price be lowered.
The boss of Anda Transport Company arrived at the scene in the company of a carload of people who were ready to threaten the people. But they were prevented from doing so. The boss then announced to the assembly: he was going to take his buses away, which stirred the crowd to stronger dissastisfaction. The crowd then overturned four of the buses belonging to the Anda Transport Company. The event had escalated.
On March 10, the ticket price had not come down. The bus company boss came with dozens of unidentified men to intimidate the crowd, who became more incensed. At around 2pm, about 10,000 people were assembled and some of them set one of the Anda buses at the station on fire. At the time, the bus company boss said: "I'll offer 20 million RMB to raze Zhushan town to the ground." This really made the people at the scene very, very angry. More and more people showed up and things got worse. The fire department came to put out the fire.
In the evening, the Lingling district government sent more than 100 anti-riot police to control the scene. The Lingling district pubilc security bureau deputy director Liu Jingsong ordered the anti-riot policemen to begin arrests and four people were seized during the melee. Afterwards, three of them were released and claimed to have been violently beaten. This made the crowd angrier and they began to throw bricks and stones at the windows of the police station. The police used batons to charge the crowds. At the time, the anti-riot policemen were armed with one-meter long steel bars. During this clash, more than a dozen people were injured, including four students (one of them had a broken leg). The criminal police squadron deputy director Jiang Fu kicked and injured a Xinjiang person who was selling lamb shish-kebab by the side.
On March 11, people who came to the scene to take photographs were assaulted and their cameras vandalized. The cameras at the Zhushan town photography studios were confiscated by the police who did not want any photographs take of the incident. Local citizens called CCTV Focus Interviews\Hunan Daily\Hunan Economic Television and were told that this incident was out of bounds for reporting. I went to the scene at noon and the clash was continuing, but I did not have any equipment to record the happenings. I used my handheld mobile phone camera to take some photographs after the crowds had been dispersed by the police. The Lingling district government is broadcasting to ask people to stop the clashes and they defined the event as a crowd attacking government offices. The Lingling district government is referring to this as the 310/311 incident.
As I am writing this report, more clashes are taking place. The police have allegedly injured several dozens of people. The incident is not over because it is still ongoing and developing.
Ding Ding! Question - how are they going to get to Lingling if they burn the busses?
If they've taken out the whole fleet, this will presumably starve the bus company of the funds needed to hire thugs to prevent private minibus services from operating along the route. The problem isn't the lack of vehicles - it's the monopolization of bus routes, with hired muscle to back it up. Think of the Chinese government as the Mob running protection rackets, but with an army and nukes backing it up, and you've got the general idea.
there's an awful lot of that going on in the world...
Side story. In Beijing, government employees are visiting bus stops trying to teach the citizens to line up so that next year during the olympics you won't have to turn getting on the bus into roller derby.
This is probably an image thing. Foreigners are probably going to cab it, mostly. A 20-minute cab ride goes for about $2. The big advantage of a cab is that you don't have to share it with pickpockets and petty thieves.
Ping Should you be thinking of traveling to China
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.