POREG VIEW: Trouble in Inner Mongolia has been sparked off by two small incidenta- the death of a herder, Mergen, who was struck by a coal truck on May 10 in the city of Xilinhot, and the death of an ethnic Mongolian during a protest at a mine on May 15. Both incidents were unrelated.
The government arrested two Han Chinese for the herder’s death, but instead of cooling tempers, protests engulfed China’s biggest coal producing region. And the demand is greater respect of the rights and traditions of the locals and their culture.
Only two factors could explain the flare up. One muddled handling of the situation by the officials. Two pent-up anger and frustration. Both factors appear to be at work, going by reports in a section of the Chinese and South–east Asian media.
Ethnic Mongolians are not known to hit the street at the slightest provocation like the Tibetans and Uighur Muslims. So it is possible the authorities did not take seriously the May 10 protests and blockade of coal trucks.
Imposition of martial law like conditions in the regional capital, Hohhot, especially around the main square, and the second biggest city, Chifeng, are a natural corollary of the surprise.
Internet access was blocked and cyber cafes were made to suspend business. This step was a sequel to protestors’ recourse to the Internet to spread the message at home and abroad.
High handedness has never paid dividends. The problem in Inner Mongolia from all accounts is political in nature. It must be addressed politically.
The Inner Mongolia’s Communist Party chief Hu Chunhua did the right thing by meeting with students and teachers who are in the forefront of the protests. He promised swift punishment to the four ‘villains’ charged with the death of Mergen. ‘Teachers and students, please rest assured that the suspects will be punished severely and quickly, in accordance with legal procedures, to resolutely safeguard the dignity of the law and rights of the victims and their families’, he was quoted as saying.
This is a good gesture. Timely too. China cannot afford any dislocation in coal supplies to thermal power plants ahead of the summer peak energy season. More so, when the country is reeling under power shortages.
The main grouse of ethnic Mongolians in China is that their traditional grazing lands have been ruined by mining and desertification. They also complain that the government has tried to force them to settle in permanent houses. And they are bitter that they have been reduced to minority by the flood of Han Chinese.
Ethnic Mongolians today constitute less than 20 per cent of the region’s population of around 24 million. And instead of the promised high degree of self-rule, they are subjected to the Han Chinese majority show in all walks of life. Han Chinese are the main beneficiaries of whatever development the region has seen.
Inner Mongolia is a sprawling area of pasturelands that sits atop northern China bordering the independent nation of Mongolia. It was the first autonomous region set up by the Communist Party. It was also meant to serve as a model for Tibet and Xinjiang in offering a high degree of self-government. Turn of events show the objective is not in sight even with a boom in the mining of coal and rare earths in recent years.
