Front Page of the Day

Angry workers beat Tonghua Steel boss to death

xinjingbao.jpg
The Beijing News
July 27, 2009

Thousands of workers of a state-owned steel maker Tonghua Steel in Tonghua, Jilin Province went on strike in protest at the acquisition of the company by a Beijing-based private company called the Jianlong Group. The protest went awry when the angry mob surrounded and turned violent against Chen Guojun, the executive of the Tonghua Steel appointed by Jianlong on July 22.

According to a report in today's Beijing News, Chen demanded the workers resume work, which infuriated them even further. Chen received punches and kicks from the protesters and some people threw water bottles and stools at him and would not let him leave. One worker said that someone beat Chen with heavy boots worn by steel workers and shoved him off the stairs. Another worker put the time of of Chen's death at around six pm on the 24th. "There were medics and police who tried to force their way into the crowd (to reach Chen) but were pushed back."

Around nine o'clock the same night, Tonghua Steel made an announcement on a local TV station stating that the provincial government had ordered Jianlong to withdraw from the acquisition. The crowd dispersed around ten. The factory, after 11 hours of suspension, resumed production at midnight.

Links and Sources
There are currently 10 Comments for Angry workers beat Tonghua Steel boss to death.

Comments on Angry workers beat Tonghua Steel boss to death

Everyone of this piece of shit workers should be fired. You wanna protest over a company acquisition? Fine, but beat to death a innocent executive appointed by the company who has absolute no say over the acquisition? Down right criminal.

The offenders needs to be arrested and sentenced to death.

Worthless pieces of shit.

Every one of these piece of shit managers should be lynched. You wanna draw a wage as the lickspittle errand boy of a company stripping the assets of the Chinese working class? Fine, but to threaten the wholesale sacking of workers defending their jobs and pensions from predatory parasites? Don't be surprised if you get what's coming

The above commenter needs to be dragged out of his house and kicked to death in the street like the filthy shitehawk he is.

Worthless pieces of shit.

I salute the workers! this is direct action at its best!

death to capitalist pigdogs!

But it's the only way Chinese guys can fight. Fair odds in China is 70-1.

See the Xinjiang guys beaten to death by gangs of Han in Shaoguan and various videos on Youtube(!) of 50-1 gangups at factories in Dongguan...

LOL

Ha

Ha

It will be interesting to see in the next few months if the powers to be in Beijing block labor news coming from Europe - given the reports from France (i.e. kidnapping bosses and threating to blow up factories).

[quote]The above commenter needs to be dragged out of his house and kicked to death in the street like the filthy shitehawk he is.[/quote]

Please do, get a visa to the USA first.

There is a fine line between your "threaten[ing] the wholesale sacking of workers defending their jobs and pensions from predatory parasites".

Obviously the company was bought thru legal means, beating a manager to death, no matter how guilty you think he or she may be.. is physical assault. It is a CRIMINAL action, now beating him to death straight up murder. Which warrants police action and criminal prosecution.

There difference between China, and more developed nation is there it is ruled by law, not mob mentality. Beating this man to death is mob mentality. It is a sign of a underdeveloped, uncultured and uncivilized nation, where the rule of strength trumps the rules of law.

Now, you threatening my physical safety because you do not agree with my views just goes to show how you are a uneducated peasant.

Now being a ethnic Chinese, I feel this incident at Tonghua just shows the world the negative, uncultured and uneducated aspect of China, that no Olympic spectacle can hide.

Keep your racist comments to yourself.

This tragedy has nothing to do with race.

"But it's the only way Chinese guys can fight. Fair odds in China is 70-1."

Yes, this is mob mentality, and that is not good.

But these workers have been left completely out of the picture. They are treated with indifference by the high managers and financiers and government officials.

They are paid low wages while the profits go in the managers' pockets. Their livelihood could be stripped away from them at any time, for any reason, by these modern-day lords.

Should you be surprised when they say, enough?

A strike would be illegal, of course, and under Chinese law, the boss presumably had every legal right to tell the workers to get back to work.

But this system is not rule by law, mob mentality or not. Not when the law is constantly bent to the needs of the powerful, and when it only seeks to control the poor.

They will execute some of the workers, of course, within a couple weeks probably. But that will change nothing; these kind of workers have nothing to lose, and while an earlier generation might have been docile, the younger generation will not be as easy to control with happy words.

You're right "tom"...much easier to just hire some hooligans to do the dirty work for you rather than risk getting your shirt dirty.

A too common "fighting" method here in harmonyland.

cool, reminds of 1930's Shanghai factory "incidents." See if these things will get 2nd revolution started. After all, the nationalist had a second revolution just 2 years after the republican revolutions. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Republic_of_China#Second_Revolution), see if it's the communist's turn now.

Media Partners
Visit these sites for the latest China news
090609guardian2.png 090609CNN3.png
China Media Timeline
Major media events over the last three decades
Danwei Model Workers
The latest recommended blogs and new media
laomo2010x80.jpg
From 2008
Books on China
The Eurasian Face : Blacksmith Books, a publishing house in Hong Kong, is behind The Eurasian Face, a collection of photographs by Kirsteen Zimmern. Below is an excerpt from the series:
Big in China: An adapted excerpt from Big In China: My Unlikely Adventures Raising A Family, Playing The Blues and Becoming A Star in China, just published this month. Author Alan Paul tells the story of arriving in Beijing as a trailing spouse, starting a blues band, raising kids and trying to make sense of China.
Pallavi Aiyar's Chinese Whiskers: Pallavi Aiyar's first novel, Chinese Whiskers, a modern fable set in contemporary Beijing, will be published in January 2011. Aiyar currently lives in Brussels where she writes about Europe for the Business Standard. Below she gives permissions for an excerpt.
Front Page of the Day
A different newspaper every weekday
From the Vault
Classic Danwei posts
+ Korean history doesn't fly on Chinese TV screens (2007.09): SARFT puts the kibbosh on Korean historical dramas.
+ Religion and government in an uneasy mix (2008.03): Phoenix Weekly (凤凰周刊) article from October, 2007, on government influence on religious practice in Tibet.
+ David Moser on Mao impersonators (2004.10): I first became aware of this phenomenon in 1992 when I turned on a Beijing TV variety show and was jolted by the sight of "Mao Zedong" and "Zhou Enlai" playing a game of ping pong. They both gave short, rousing speeches, and then were reverently interviewed by the emcee, who thanked them profusely for taking time off from their governmental duties to appear on the show.
Danwei Archives
Danwei Feeds
Via Feedsky rsschiclet2.png (on the mainland)
or Feedburner rsschiclet.gif (blocked in China)
rsschiclet2.png rsschiclet.gif Main feed: Main posts (FB has top links)
rsschiclet2.png rsschiclet.gif Top Links: Links from the top bar
rsschiclet2.png rsschiclet.gif Danwei Jobs: Want ads
rsschiclet2.png rsschiclet.gif Danwei Digest: Updated daily, 19:30