Small city southeast of Beijing typifies plight of flood-hit region as top official vows to serve as ‘moat for the capital’
Hong Kong Free Press
A small city in China’s Hebei province, where some 130,000 people have been hit by torrential flooding, illustrates the plight of residents in the region around Beijing, which recorded its heaviest rainfall in at least 140 years after Typhoon Doksuri swept through.
Zhuozhou, with a population of around 718,000, is sited to the southeast of Beijing at the confluence of multiple rivers. It groups 10 towns and over 400 villages.
Online photos showed the entire city swamped with dirty brown floodwater on Thursday. Hundreds of online posts since Tuesday have appealed for help amid shortages of clean water, food and electricity.
Ni Yue-feng, the communist party secretary of Hebei, has sparked anger among some social media users after vowing on Zhuozhou’s official WeChat channel on Thursday to strengthen measures to hold back water to “alleviate the flood pressure on Beijing.”
The aim was “to serve well as a moat for the capital,” Ni said after paying visits to the city of Baoding, some areas of Zhuozhou and Xiongan New Area.
Ni’s remarks came amid online questions about whether Zhuozhou had been “sacrificed” by being used as a water detention area to protect the capital city.
The comments sparked intensive discussion on Weibo, with some describing the party secretary’s remarks as “cold-blooded” amid so much suffering in Hebei.
“You can go be the moat yourself. Don’t involve us!” read one comment.
Residents of Zhuozhou were still trapped at home, or in schools and factories, on Thursday after dozens of civilian rescue teams and armed police arrived in the city with inflatable boats, local media reported.
Rarely used tool
The Hebei government announced on Wednesday evening that it had utilised seven “flood detention areas” across the province. These are mostly farm and village areas near rivers planned as the last tool to prevent flooding elsewhere, according to the Ministry of Water Resources.
The government has relocated 857,200 people from the flood detention areas.
From 8 pm on July 27 to 8 pm of August 2, Hebei province suffered 144 hours of heavy rain, with the volume of precipitation twice the capacity of reservoirs in the province, the provincial government said on Wednesday.
The state-owned China Daily said the use of flood detention areas was a “rarely used tool.”
Farmers and villagers in these areas can get compensation for damaged crops, livestock and homes but people vented criticism online that the rate was too low.
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