Beijing ( AsiaNews) - The campaign of " criticism and self-criticism " launched by Chinese President Xi Jinping in Hebei province has sparked the irony and anger of cyber- users, who compare the government's efforts against corruption "to two children who fight without ever touching. Lots of fuss over nothing". The campaign is one of the flagships of the new leader of China who has imposed it on the 25 permanent members of the Politburo during a secret session .
The sessions of "criticism
and self-criticism" was one of the key pillars of the policy of Mao Zedong,
used with violence during the Cultural Revolution to purge even the great
communist leaders - potential opponents of the president - who were accused of
being "bourgeois" , "
counter-revolutionaries" or " revisionists ." Many
innocent religious leaders also paid dearly during the great purges. Maoist
-style Xi urged national officials to "get back in step with the
masses," or apply a model of government "in close contact" with
the grass roots of the population.
The
Secretary-General himself led the first public session (see photo) , imposed on
the members of the Provincial Communist Commission of Hebei. During
four consecutive afternoons , which began on September 23 , Xi urged officials
to denounce their " political sins " and those of their colleagues. One
of them, interviewed by the official Xinhua , said: " While I was
preparing my confession I realized what kind of person I've become, and I
started to cry ."
The
sessions do not seem to have convinced "the masses" , who, at least
on the internet, have used controversy and irony to avert this attempt at
indoctrination. On
Weibo , the microblogging site that has become hugely popular as a stage of
national discontent ,one user writes: "This campaign is a perfect example
of bureaucracy for its own sake . Why not start criticizing the size of their
bank account and assets that they have in all the
country? " .
Lighter
than the comment of another user , which compares Xi Jinping sessions to a joke
in which a woman calls her husband and her lover in the same room : the lover tells
her husband to better control the woman, who is behaving "strangely
" . Another
clip posted on line has gone viral, it shows two young children, kitted out for
taekwondo, flapping about trying to hit each other with no success. The
commentary reads: "criticism and self-criticism like much ado
about nothing ."