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shanghaiceltic
Shanghai Royalty
Joined: Sep 20, 2005
Posts: 8287
Location: Perth WA
Status: Offline
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 Posted:
Apr 19, 2008 - 09:31 AM |
 
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| Post subject: Nanjie bankrupt.. |
No surprises at all really...
China's last Maoists submit to capitalism
By Richard Spencer in Beijing
Last Updated: 1:47am BST 19/04/2008
China's last Maoist collective, where villagers held out against capitalism, is to privatise after its prosperity was found to have rested on a mountain of hidden debt.
While the rest of the country abandoned the commune, pursued personal fortunes and dismantled state industries, the village of Nanjie in central China renationalised its land, set up factories and paid all residents £20 a month.
Advertising was banned and instead, propaganda banners hung in streets which led to a 30ft statue of Mao built in 1993. Annual "profits" from the 26 village businesses paid for a mass wedding ceremony and honeymoons in Beijing.
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Nanjie also provided free housing, schooling and health care, supporting a standard of living so much better than surrounding towns that many who visited were awestruck by its egalitarianism.
Ten years ago, The New York Times noted its well-kept apartments and spacious schools - although it added that the state of its finances could not be verified.
More recently, one of the nostalgic Chinese tourists attracted to the village as its fame spread enthused to the BBC: "Mao's slogan 'Serve the people' is really put into practice here. It's not just empty rhetoric."
Unfortunately, few of the visitors were accountants. In the past two months, newspapers in Hong Kong and Guangzhou have unravelled a tale of Enron-style woe.
The village's triumphs were built on £120 million of secret loans from the Agricultural Bank of China, which is now calling in its loans as it prepares to list its shares on the Hong Kong stock exchange.
According to one report, the bank had been instructed to support Nanjie at all costs by a conservative in the Communist Party leadership after the crackdown on the T1annamun Square prοtests in 1989.
The village had already begun to unravel when the village head died with the equivalent of a million pounds in cash in his safe, along with the deeds to several properties. A number of women came to his funeral, claiming to be his mistresses and dem-anding a share of his wealth.
In a late effort to save Nanjie's struggling noodle factory and its livelihoods, the village committee has finally bitten the bullet of privatisation and turned its holdings into equities. The irony will not be lost on Nanjie's party secretary, Wang Hongbin, who has ended up with nine per cent of the shares. |
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