SOUTHWEST CHINA: MIGRANT LABOR, DIALECTICS, AND LIES

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 CHENGDU 000275

SIPDIS

DEPT FOR EAP/CM

E.O. 12958: DECL: 12/3/2033
TAGS: PGOV ELAB CH
SUBJECT: SOUTHWEST CHINA: MIGRANT LABOR, DIALECTICS, AND LIES

REF: A. CHENGDU 267

B. CHENGDU 251

C. CHENGDU 249

CHENGDU 00000275 001.2 OF 002


CLASSIFIED BY: James A. Boughner, Consul General, U.S. Consulate
General, Chengdu.
REASON: 1.4 (b),(d)




1. (C) Summary: An excursion arranged by an influential
Southwest China businessman for some of his employees that
ConGenOff was invited to join provided a rare opportunity for
informal exchanges on challenges faced in a relatively
underdeveloped part of eastern Sichuan Province. Many of the
area's residents have left to find work elsewhere. One local
official who denied to ConGenOff the existence of arbitrary fee
collections from local farmers or restrictions on religious
practice later vented about being fed up by "having to tell lies
all the time." Local party cadres and some peasants may be
getting training increasingly via the Internet. End Summary.

Visiting Neijiang City with Migrant Workers
--------------


2. (C) ConGenOff recently accompanied a well-connected local
business contact and 17 of his workers on a "team building" road
trip to Neijiang City at Sichuan Province's eastern border with
the Chongqing Municipality. The business contact (strictly
protect) is a major real estate investor in the Sichuan
provincial capital of Chengdu and controls a bakery chain, much
of the product of which is sourced from local military bases and
sold from storefront properties owned by People's Liberation
Army (PLA) personnel. The two urban districts and three rural
counties of Neijiang City have a total population of 4.2 million
people and, like most of rural Sichuan, are major exporters of
migrant labor to both the China coast and to Chengdu, just two
hours away by highway or rail. The bakery employees with whom
ConGenOff traveled to Neijiang City were themselves mostly young
migrants from different parts of Sichuan province outside the
Chengdu area.

Dialectics Protects Against Spiritual Pollution
-------------- -


3. (C) According to a local county Party Secretary with whom
ConGenOff had the opportunity to speak, Neijiang's Zizhong
County has an official population of about 1.2 million people,
300,000 of whom are usually away working in Chengdu or on the
coast. The 38-year-old Party Secretary was an administrative
dean at a university in Chengdu for eight years before coming to
Zizhong. He noted he has never been overseas and that getting
official permission these days to travel abroad is increasingly
difficult since the government is cracking down on junketeering.


4. (C) Switching into more political jargon, the county Party
Secretary said people in China today can talk about new ideas
and not be afraid of "spiritual pollution" since a knowledge of
"dialectics" makes it easy to hold on to one's own beliefs while
discussing the views of others. He also commented it is
remarkable the United States has achieved so much in a little
over two hundred years, something amazing to Chinese who think
of themselves as coming from an old country. When ConGenOff
observed that the People's Republic of China has just a 50-year
history, the Party Secretary retorted the Chinese Communist
Party has a history of over 80 years.

Lies All the Time!
--------------


5. (C) A Neijiang City foreign affairs office representative, in
response to questions from ConGenOff about restrictions on
religious practice, noted religious affairs bureaus work to
facilitate worship, not its restriction. The official asserted
that ConGenOff's descriptions of restrictions on religious
venues in other parts of China could not be true. He also
denied that arbitrary collection of fees from farmers is a
problem in the Neijiang area. Later that evening, the Chengdu
businessman who led the excursion to Neijiang described to
ConGenOff how the local official had subsequently vented to him,
"What I hate about this job is that I have to tell lies all the
time!" According to the businessman, the local official, who is
originally from Chongqing, feels very frustrated at having gone
several years in a relative backwater like Neijiang without a
promotion. The official has only "apparatchik" skills and so
feels trapped without any real other employment opportunities.


6. (C) ConGenOff's business contact also commented that people
from Chongqing are popularly viewed in China as being relatively
straight-talking and it is thus, perhaps, more difficult for
officials originally from there to rise up through Party ranks.

CHENGDU 00000275 002.2 OF 002


The businessman, also a lawyer who advises companies in Chengdu,
observed that people from Chengdu on the other hand tend to be
"excessively clever." He mentioned as an example the
magnificent new municipal headquarters the Chengdu government
was ordered to move out of by central government authorities
because it set a bad example of extravagance following the
Sichuan earthquake. The city government, however, is quietly
disobeying orders and staying put (see ref b).

Confucian Temple and CKS Calligraphy
--------------


7. (SBU) Building tourism is one of Neijiang City's current
development strategies. According to local officials, the
Confucian Temple at Zizhong, restored after severe damage during
the Cultural Revolution, has the only statue of a standing
Confucius in China because one of Confucius's teachers came from
the area. Calligraphy from seven Qing Emperors and Republic of
China President Chiang Kai-shek hangs near the statue of
Confucius. This calligraphy was protected from marauding Red
Guards, who destroyed the original Confucius statue, by pasting
Cultural Revolution slogans over the boards.


8. (SBU) Local officials also showed our group an out-of-the-way
hillside village restored to look much like it did 50 or 100
years ago in order to attract tourists. One of the buildings
had a faded 1958 "Great Leap Forward" slogan painted on it. A
landlord's manor house was restored to its 1950 appearance. A
sign outside noted that, "after the owner left," the house
became state property. When ConGenOff asked about a sign near
the entry to the village pointing towards the "Government and
Party Cadres Remote Education Room," a Neijiang City official
observed that high speed internet connections help villagers
learn new skills, especially in the building trades, that can
assist them later to find good jobs as migrant workers in other
parts of Sichuan or outside the province.


9. (C) Comments: As discussed in ref c, informal conversations
with government and party officials can provide some insights
into their careers and frustrations they feel as individuals
working within the government and party bureaucracy. An issue
certainly worthy of further follow up is how the possible return
of migrant laborers from the coast (ref a) could impact areas
like Neijiang. General background information on Neijiang City
can be accessed online at the Neijiang City government website
(www.neijiang.gov.cn ) and
baike.baidu.com/view/25208.htm.
BOUGHNER