2016-05-23
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A man surnamed Liu arrives at a hospital after his self-immolation protest in Beijing, May 20, 2016.
Photo courtesy of a rights activist.
A man is receiving treatment in a Beijing hospital after he set fire to himself in protest of his daughter’s exclusion from local schools, officials and local activists said on Monday.
The man, who was identified only by his surname Liu, attempted self-immolation last Friday outside government offices in Changping county, part of the Beijing metropolitan area after failing to secure a school place for his daughter.
Sources who knew Liu, whose hukou household registration is not in Beijing, said he had appealed several times since to be allowed to register his daughter for a school place at the local neighborhood committees, as well as his district government office.
“I think he has been sent to hospital for treatment,” an official who answered the phone at the Changping county government offices on Monday told RFA when asked to confirm Liu’s self-immolation protest.
But he declined to comment further. “I don’t know about this,” the official said. “We have specialist departments for these things.”
Liu was taken to the Changping District People’s Hospital, before being transferred to the Jishuitan Hospital in Beijing for specialist care.
A source told RFA he had suffered burns to 80 percent of his skin surface.
His protest drew a gathering of angry migrant workers who facing similar problems finding schooling for their children.
New rules in effect since the end of last month require parents to show evidence of two-months of rental tax totaling 5,000 yuan (U.S. $ 763) paid in advance to gain a school place for their child.
A fellow parent activist surnamed Zhang said the Beijing educational authorities are trying to limit the number of applicants to the city’s highly sought-after schools, which are seen as “feeder” schools to the best universities in China.
“A government department exists to fulfill its duty, to serve the population,” Zhang said. “They really should tell parents clearly, once and for all, what the requirements are.”
“Self-immolation isn’t productive, but it’s an extreme act in the face of total helplessness,” he said.
Rights activist Jia Pin said Liu’s action came out of “despair” at not being able to find a school place for his daughter.
“Theoretically, people from out of town are supposed to be able to [get schooling for their kids], but in reality, there are so many obstacles in their path than many of them never manage it,” Jia said.
“Then they are left without a school place for their child, anywhere in China,” he said.
“The criteria they have to fulfill actually exclude some people, and even when they meet the criteria, then there are often new conditions they have to meet that haven’t been made clear to them before,” he said.
“There are just countless hoops and obstacles they are made to jump through in Beijing,” Jia said.
A source in China’s education system, who gave only a surname Chen, said parents who move to Beijing in search of work have faced problems finding schooling for many years, with some suing the Beijing municipal education committee, to no avail.
“This has been going on for out-of-town parents who have been kicking up a fuss about it for many years now,” Chen said. “I know of some cases where they even sued the Beijing education committee.”
He said jailed dissident Xu Zhiyong, who headed the New Citizens’ Movement civil rights campaign group, had run afoul of authorities for assisting parents involved in such a lawsuit.
“Xu Zhiyong got into trouble because of this,” Chen said. “There is no equality in China’s education system, and no fairness,” he said.
“Those in positions of power continue to enjoy special privileges, and it makes no difference if the parents make a fuss about it,” he said.
He said that millions of migrant worker parents are having similar problems to Liu’s family.
“There’s not much any of them can do about it,” he said.
Incomplete school applications
Jia said that migrant workers aren’t correctly informed of the paperwork that is needed to secure a school place, and some 80 percent of them fail to find one because of incomplete applications.
“In the end, some of them just go back to their hometowns,” he said. “The government is deliberately messing them around, putting on a show of equal treatment while practicing discrimination.”
According to Jia, people not born in the capital account for more than 50 percent of Beijing’s 20 million population.
China‘s hukou system has been widely criticized for creating an internal immigration system for tens of millions of migrant workers, and a socioeconomic pecking order for cities, with those at the top receiving the lion’s share of resources.
In spite of partial reforms, access to education in top-tier cities remains largely restricted to those whose children were born there, and who can present the right documentation, most of which depends on the hukou registration.
A household registration document is issued in the town of a person’s birth, and anyone without it is excluded from social subsistence and healthcare reimbursement schemes.
Even where migrant workers are encouraged to apply, schools will often place huge bureaucratic burdens on parents applying for a place, including requiring temporary residence permits, health insurance, local tax receipts and other documentation.
