Press Statement: On the Peoples Republic of China's 75th Year Founding
For Immediate Release:
Press Statement from Visual Artists Guild
Ann Lau, Chair, Visual Artists Guild, alau@visual-artists-guild.org
On the anniversary of the People's Republic of China's 75th year founding.
It have been 75 years since mainland China proclaimed the establishment of the People Republic.
What has it accomplished so far?
Some of what China's CCP had done was the mass starvation of an estimate of 40 million people as a result of the policy of the Great Leap Forward; the only mass starvation during peace time in the history of mankind.
Added to that the deaths during the early days against landlords, the bourgeoisie class, the anti-rightists movement against intellectuals, the Cultural Revolutions and the Tiananmen Massacre as well as other mass incidents, the total deaths is estimated to be no less than 70 millions.
The 70 millions deaths do not include those of unborn babies who died as a result of more than 40 years of one-child policy of forced abortions and forced sterilizations. An estimate of 24 million girls missing. Such a policy brought about the gender imbalance, low birth rates and aging population within China.
When China was at the verge of economic collapse, the CCP under paramount leader Deng Xiaoping had to change its policy and allow foreign investments as well as internal entrepreneurship. It was the Chinese diaspora, especially those who had previously escaped to Hong Kong who initially returned to China and helped to restart its economy and jumped start it to become now the second largest economy of the world.
The failed policy of Xi Jinping's Zero-covid caused the deaths of unconfirmed millions. The only way people could estimate the deaths was smartphones that were not renewed and the long lines of people trying to obtain the ashes of their loved one. It is estimated that 30 million less smartphones were sold. Even if we were to take into considerations that half of those people did not have the money to buy the smartphones, at least 15 million had died during those times.
With the current Chairman Xi Jinping, control became the number 1 priority.
For years, economists had brought out the unsustainability of China’s runaway debt. This is shown in our Los Angeles downtown three high rise unfinished buildings abandoned by China’s that caused our taxpayers to spend $4 millions in security, fencing and maintenance.
China’s constant failed policies is due to the leadership’s control on dissent. Even advice on the economy would cause well respected economist to disappear as in the case of Zhu Hengpeng ,朱恆鵬Deputy Director of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.
In Hong Kong, with China’s imposed National Security Law and Hong Kong’s recent addition of Article 23 have caused a mass exodus of people from Hong Kong including children, teachers, medical personnel. This exodus greatly impacted on Hong Kong’s economic and demographic situations.
Hong Kong’s current Chief Executive John Lee should learn from the former Chief Executive Carrie Lam who even though she followed Xi’s directive closely, she failed to secure a second term and she wasn’t even invited to join China’s political high echelon.
With Hong Kong losing professionals and the economy losing investments, it will be difficult for Hong Kong to maintain its past glory.
As the history of China clearly demonstrated, China's leadership in ignoring advice and punishing dissent only brought misery to the Chinese people.
The only way for China to go forward and avoid the calamities of the past is to honestly review its own history and recognize its mistakes. Otherwise, China will only see more misery in the future and the Chinese people will be the ones to pay for it.
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