Journey to Hong Kong

It is reported that at a Shenzhen university, some 40 professors competed for the post of Chuzhang (處長)，a mid-level official title in the mailand’s bureaucratic system. Why is it that the professors are so keen to be an official? In most other countries, the professors and scholars are usually happy to be left focusing on their research and teaching. They don’t want to bother with administrative work. Not in China. The average basic salary in China for a professor is less than RMB25,000 (US$3,700) a year. If you are an official in the university, you will have much more, including large expenses allowances, fully paid overseas trips and even personal chauffeurs.

And they have power too – great power. The officials in the university have the biggest say on everything, from deciding which staff and courses to stay to funding distribution. So who is the top man in the university? You would think it is the President or Vice chancellor. Nope. It is the communist party secretary. Every public university, even now, has a communist party secretary who is the “decider” of the university.

For mainland’s universities to be world-class, they have a really long way to go. Not until there is revolutionary change in the society when it values free thinking and democracy.

China’ most prominent dissident Liu Xiaobo was sentenced by the court to 11 years in jail on Christmas Day.

This is the fourth time he has been imprisoned because of his political position and his writings. He was researching in the US while the student democratic movement broke out in China in 1989. He rushed back to China and gave support to the students. He was jailed afterwards by the Chinese government.  

But that marked only the first sentencing he, as a dissident, received of a series to follow. Each time he was released, he kept on writing and speaking his mind about how to make China a better and democratic country, and each time he was sentenced to imprisonment or a labour camp.  

How Liu’s wife, Liu Xia, supports him is touching. She married him when he was in the labour camp. She sent him books when he was in prison so that he knew what her thoughts were and it was a way of communication between them, Liu Xia said. They also wrote poems to each other.

After the latest jail sentence was announced, Liu Xia told reporters in a clam voice: “If he (Liu Xiaobo) can persevere in the face of the ordeal, so can I.” Liu will be over 60 years old when he is released, she said.

She has had her head shaved. She is such a strong and steel-willed woman, just like her husband.