Was watching a clip on BBC World by Rupert Wingfield-Hayes reporting from Petitioners Village in Beijing, an area of run-down now demolished housing that used to house people from all provinces heading to the capital to have their voice heard. As the viewer I thought ‘how nice’, and that it’s great to see the media now being able to roam around China reporting such issues freely and speaking openly to locals on such topics – despite the report citing that these people are often arrested and sent back to their home provinces.
But then the police arrive – and yet again the government, as the accompanying article mentions, never fails to shoot themselves in the foot: the police arrive and reporters get shooed away.
Likewise Rupert’s visit to TaiShi in Guandgong province, where residents were given unfair compensation for the sale of their land not long ago, attracted similar attention.
When will the Chinese authorities learn that the foreign media will obtain their desired reports regardless – the only issue is whether the authorities end up making an ass out of themselves in the process. Particularly during this Olympic period, where the police now will not confiscate videos, the image they will then portray to the world is footage of interference, lack of tolerance, and blatant failure to ensure open reporting throughout the games.
In the case of TaiShi the BBC were free to report – but clearly the locals did not want to talk. I suppose this is free media Chinese style: “record what you want, but we’ll just persecute your subjects”.
It this really the image China wishes to portray to the outside world?
As i’ve mentioned time and time again I do support China for most of its policies, and the fair contrast is that it’s development (in terms of openness and freedoms) have come a huge way already. But the foreign media are biased too, not always objective, and the government needs to learn how to optimise its PR methods to improve its image towards this media, and ultimately the international community.
Suppression of international media during the Games is not the answer.