Focus

Law professor won't stop at one

By Ou Lu and Yang Wanli (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-04-27 08:02

Yang Zhizhu, shown here in front of the Beijing Youth Politics College, was fired by the institute earlier this month. The school says Yang defiantly challenged China's one-child policy by having a second child and refusing to pay the resulting fine.[ Zhan Min / For China Daily]

Yang Zhizhu, 43, refuses to pay fine for having second child

Yang Zhizhu taught law at the Beijing Youth Politics College until he was fired earlier this month. The school says the law professor defiantly challenged China's one-child policy by having a second child and refusing to pay the resulting fine. But Yang, 43,says his firing is unjustified and that he is taking a stand against an unfair 30-year-old family planning policy.

Yang's case has drawn a lot of media attention and in the past two weeks Yang has given interviews to reporters not just from around China, but also from foreign countries, including the Netherlands, France, the US and Germany.

Some are calling Yang's case the most prolific one-child-policy protest since the country adopted the policy in the late 1970s.

"Since my story was reported earlier this month, I've only taken one short break, last Saturday. It seems I've already became a model protestor against the current family planning policy," he told METRO.

The media reports have helped Yang win tens of thousands of hearts across the country. In a survey carried out by www.qq.com, a prominent Chinese website, 75,331 people (91 percent of the survey's respondents) supported Yang.

This is not the first time the law professor has taken a public stance against Chinese laws he says are "unreasonable".

Three years ago, when a "nail house" celebrity in Chongqing Municipality (who refused to vacate a home her family had inhabited for three generations to make way for development) generated a lot of media attention, Yang wrote online stories in support of her family. Now he jokes that he has become a "nail" in the country's one-child policy.

Yang's wife, Chen Hong, 39, gave birth to their second daughter, Yang Ruonan, on December 21, 2009. On the same day, the university officials formally announced guidelines outlining punishment for employees who violated the city's family planning regulations, which included such sanctions as a three-year ban on promotions and a one-year salary freeze.

There was conflict almost immediately and the school fired Yang on April 9 after he refused to pay a fine in accordance with the new guidelines.

Many of Yang's supporters on www.qq.com say family planning regulations are no longer strictly enforced and that there are plenty of legal exceptions - including allowing a second child for many rural families, almost all ethnic minorities and families in which both parents are only children.

Other Yang supporters on the site said that the one-child policy is more strictly enforced in Beijing than many other parts of the country, but parents can get around it by paying fines or not obtaining a Beijing hukou for their second child.

"If you don't want a Beijing hukou for your second child, its no problem. You can send the second or third child to a private school, send him or her to an overseas university or go to Hong Kong and give birth there," a Beijing blogger said.

Hukou (or permanent residency) documents grant citizens access to public services, including education, medical facilities and Beijing-based jobs.

Yang could have avoided all the drama by paying a fine of 200,000 yuan ($29,283). However, he refused to do so, not because he couldn't afford it, but because he refused to abide by policy he regards as "ridiculous", he said.

"Why should I pay money for having my own kid? It's not human trafficking. It's our right as citizens. There's no need for birth control in China, because the birth rate is already quite low in big cities such as Beijing and Shanghai, and China is an aging country," he said, adding that the fine he refused to pay is 10 times higher than the price of a baby sold by human traffickers.

Law professor won't stop at one

Even though Yang said he could have afforded the fine, he conceded it would have saddled him with a considerable debt. He had a monthly income of 5,000 yuan before losing his job and his wife has been unemployed since getting pregnant.

Now Yang makes a living by writing for various publications and websites, which, in a good month, brings in about 2,000 yuan.

He got a severance package from the university that included 3,000 yuan a month from January through March (when there was conflict but before he had formally been fired) and 1,500 yuan a month from April through June (after he was formally fired), but after that the family's only fixed income will be subsistence allowances.

Recent Chinese media reports have highlighted an increasing number of well-to-do couples in China who have more than one child and simply pay the fines. Many of these stories imply that having extra children in big cities such as Beijing has become a privilege for the rich.

Yang said he refused to consider taking a job in a remote part of the country, which may have made it easier to have a second child. Such a move would imply the second child is something to hide or be ashamed of, he said.

He also denied that his wish to have a second child was influenced by the traditional Chinese preference for sons (since tradition dictates that boys look after their aging parents, while girls help look after their husband's parents).

Yang said he loves his first daughter, Yang Ruoyi, and is happy to have a second. His second daughter's given name, Ruonan, implies that the girl is as strong as a boy.

Chen said she was uncertain if she wanted a second baby when she found out she was pregnant again.

"At first I thought that if I gave birth to a second child, I would not be able to work for a long time and that because I was already 38 when I learned was I pregnant, I would struggle to get a good job after the maternity leave due to my age," she said.

"But my husband was certain he wanted the child - he loves children and thinks it is better for them to grow up with siblings, rather than as only children," said Chen.

Ruoyi, who was then only 3 years old, helped the couple make up their minds. She seemed keen on having a younger sibling, said her parents.

The now 4-year-old girl is sometimes jealous of her younger sister but overall gets along with her quite well, said her mother.

"There's a bond between siblings, which will surely help them become more tolerant and nice to other people in the future," said Yang.

The young girl still does not have a Beijing hukou.

The parents can't get medical insurance for Ruonan without the hukou.

"I only pray that she doesn't come down with some drastic illness before the family planning policy changes," said Yang.

And he said he firmly believes the policy will change, possibly within two years.

But a social issue expert, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that such a change faces considerable obstacles.

"The National Population and Family Planning Commission in China, a country-level ministry, employs about 508,713 public servants across the country, according to a figure published in late 2005. If the one-child policy is scrapped, the whole commission will be useless, so there will be a considerable degree of institutional resistance to changing the policy," he said.

Law professor won't stop at one