A Letter of appeal

My name is Soyolt. I became a member of Chinese Communist Party in 1978 when I was in military service. I returned home after my demobilization. Since 1991, I have been the Gachaa secretary. As a member of the Communist Party, I have supported and participated in the victimized herders’ rightful activities in order to protect their interests and the natural environment. However, last December, with neither informing me nor showing me any official document, Cheng Guan Township Party Committee dismissed me from my post. With my dissent, I hereby am appealing to the higher Party authorities on this matter.

As the largest natural grazing land with the best quality in China, my homeland, -- Ujumchin Left Banner, should “develop animal husbandry and related industries by taking advantage of the particularly favorable natural condition” under the spirit of the Central Government policy. However, our Banner leaders have wrongfully made up a policy decision under the slogan of “developing Left Ujumchin as a leading industrial Banner”. In recent years, investors from other provinces have rushed into the grassland. Often they come with outdated heavy industrial equipments to go into operation without any equipments for sewage purification. They have no environmental assessment, and they would drive their industrial sewage directly into herders’ grazing grassland, resulting in serious pollutions to the natural environment and causing severe damages to the herders’ economical benefits.

Our Gachaa (or production brigade – Tr.) is located in the outskirt of the Banner capital. In 1984, or the second year of implementing the policy of “bi-contracting grassland and livestock out to the herders”, the banner government has unilaterally made decision to occupy 200 mu grassland of herder Damrinzav and others in order to set up the Ujumchin Left Banner Paper Mill. In 2000, the government rented the paper mill out to a private investor from Baiyangdian who built up a dam which would burst in the second year to flood a large area of surrounding grassland with paper mill sewage. An area of 15,000 mu (1,005 hecters) contracted grassland of a total of18 herder households was polluted, along with a serious livestock poisoning, death, and abortion, resulting in a direct economical damage of 200,000 to 300,000 yuan (25,000 – 37,500 US dollars). Because of the heavy pollution of drinking water, herders have felt serious symptoms such as dizziness and nausea. My predecessor, former secretary Mr. Damrinjav, had also led the herders to appeal to the higher authorities step by step for addressing the problem in a just manner, returning the uncompensated occupied grassland to the herders, stopping pollution, and compensating the economical damages.

From the standpoint of a party member, I and other members have many times appealed to the higher authorities on this matter. However, all these efforts could not harvest any fruitful result. Eventually, under the excuse of “mistaken land demarcation at that time”, key leaders of the banner bovernment have unreasonably decided to rent the grassland that was clearly demarcated as our Gachaa’s grazing land 15 years ago to the paper mill. As a result, with the accusation of “not subordinating to the organization”, the Township Party Committee dismissed me from my post of Gachaa secretary without showing me any official document and having talk to me on the decision.

I do not consider this only a matter of my post dismissal. As a Party member, I will submit to the Party Committee’s decision. Meanwhile, in order to uphold the truth and protect the herders’ interest, I am explaining my opinion to the higher Party authorities in accordance with the Party constitution and regulations.

Soyolt

Former Party Secretary

Enkh-jirgalang Gachaa, Uliyastai Township,

Ujumchin Left Banner, Shiliin-gol League, Inner Mongolia

March 27, 2003

---English translation by SMHRIC

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