MAY 21, 2003 WED
By Ching Cheong
HONG KONG – China has paid a heavy price for mishandling the Sars epidemic,
but has its leaders learnt the right lesson?
Beijing seems to be moving in the right direction so far, but there also
appears to be obstacles preventing it from tackling the root cause of the
crisis.
Ten well-known scholars who attended a major symposium on Sars recently came
up with at least half a dozen factors leading to the outbreak, including the
lack of a crisis-management mechanism and rampant officialdom that blinded
the administration to the imminent threat.
But these are only peripheral factors.
What sparked the crisis was, in fact, an official circular issued to all
Chinese media last October. This told state media to black out negative news
so that the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) 16th party congress in early
November could be convened successfully.
A similar circular was sent out to the media before China’s parliament, the
National People’s Congress, started its annual session in March.
When Sars struck, it was regarded as a flu outbreak and was dismissed as
something that happened every year during the winter and spring months. It
went unreported.
The news blackout cost the world five precious months, during which the new
and deadly virus wreaked havoc not only in China but also around the world.
The stark fact is that the blackout was carried out on orders from the very
top for a clearly political purpose.
The two events taking place five months apart saw Mr Jiang Zemin
relinquishing, as expected, his post as party general secretary in November
and the state presidency in March.
More importantly, they sealed his position as strongman when he was allowed
to retain the chairmanship of the powerful Central Military Commission and
succeeded in putting his own men in top party posts.
He was accorded the ultimate honour for his 13-year rule when his ‘Three
Represents’ theory was enshrined in the CCP constitution.
It can thus be argued that the root of the Sars crisis lies in a political
system which gives the ruling party absolute and unrestrained authority.
In such a system, the one at the very top could pursue his personal
interests at the expense of people’s lives and health.
Yet none of the discussions in China so far has focused on this point.
Even Premier Wen Jiabao, who is playing a prominent role in the fight
against Sars, called the crisis ‘a sudden occurrence’ at a time ‘when there
is a government transition’.
He pleaded for international sympathy and understanding.
One might argue that governments throughout the world, regardless of
political system, have a tendency to hide undesirable news.
The United States, arguably the world’s leading democracy, is guilty when it
came to news about the spread of Aids.
This drives home another important lesson, which is that there must be
sufficient checks and balances in any political system, especially by a free
and responsible press, to prevent an erroneous policy from developing into a
major crisis.
The US government’s attempt to hide the HIV crisis was eventually foiled by
a free press.
In China’s case, the government- orchestrated cover-up about the deadly Sars
crisis continued until retired army doctor Jiang Yanyong broke his silence.
He sent a letter exposing the cover-up to China’s state broadcaster CCTV and
to Hong Kong-based Phoenix station, but both failed – or did not dare – to
run the story.
Dr Jiang then turned to Time magazine, which ran the story and eventually
that led to the Chinese government coming clean.
It is sad that it took an American publication to expose the Chinese
government’s wrongdoing.
Some reformists within the CCP have long recognised the need for a free and
responsible press to exert some restraints on the party, which committed
some dreadful mistakes such as the Cultural Revolution in the late 1960s.
With the support of former CCP chief Zhao Ziyang, a draft law on news was
prepared more than 15 years ago to give the media the right to report the
truth.
Unfortunately, this draft was shelved during Mr Jiang’s time.
The Sars episode again underscores the need for a free and responsible
media.
If governments throughout the world, regardless of the political system,
have a natural tendency to withhold facts from the public, especially when
these could cause public panic or put those in power in a bad light, then it
is imperative that society can fall back on a free and responsible press to
provide the necessary checks and balances.
If these lessons are learnt, then the Sars crisis could indeed be turned
into an impetus to improve the Chinese system.
But there are worrying signs that the Chinese have not learnt the right
lesson.
In website discussions, many netizens, who are supposed to be the more
educated, active and sophisticated segments of the population, blame others
for the epidemic. Some claim that it is the result of the Americans
launching biological warfare against China. Even senior politicians claim
that the virus was created by the US to divert world attention away from its
invasion and occupation of Iraq.
Many people also believed that the World Health Organisation (WHO) travel
advisory against parts of China was part of a conspiracy since it echoed the
call by the American media to quarantine China.
These irrational views, and the inability to see that China itself was at
fault, explain why there was a fierce campaign to bash Singapore after Prime
Minister Goh Chok Tong cancelled his trip to China because of the Sars
outbreak, with many describing the move as ‘stabbing a friend in the back’.
If China fails to draw the right lessons from the crisis, and continues to
blame others for its troubles, then the heavy price the country and its
people have paid would have been in vain.
http://straitstimes.asia1.com.sg/commentary/story/0,4386,190177,00.html
Posting date: 22/May/2003
Original article date: 21/May/2003
Category: Media Reports
