Civil Non-Cooperation Movement: Campaign to Buy My Vote Back (Part II)

[This is the second part of a rough, select translation of the original campaign material]

Section 2 of the original material is collection of statements by the 16 initiators of the action campaign. The statements are basically identical, except minor variations where the concerned individual wants to mark out specific conditions for taking or not taking part in the 2006-07 elections. [A sample of personal statement will be added later.]

Section 3 Open Letter from the Buying-Back Ballots Action Campaign to Voters Nationwide

Dear Respected Voter,

How are you?

If you have rarely voted, or have never voted at all;
If you yourself have never run for any public office;

If you believe the current representative cannot at all express your demands and solve any problems in your life and your work;

If you are worried that someone else may have filled the sacred ballot under your name without your conscience;

If you believe the current representative is unable to condition or monitor on offices of the government;

If you decide to give up your vote in the ongoing elections;

If you decide to vote for independent candidate(s) but are worried your vote may be eliminated by non-transparent election process;
If you are an independent candidate and have no chance to monitor the voting process;
If you do not wish being represented, or led, by people you are not satisfied or even not knowing at all;
If you do not wish to see the continuation of the situation where officials do not have to be responsible [or/and responsive] to voters;
If you do not wish to see repeated tragedy of corrupted individuals driving away honest people;

Please join us in our action campaign!

Voters with valid ballots are the true master of our country! The nature of being the master of our country lies in that, in peaceful times, voters have the rights, via their valid ballot, to select governmental officials; and in warring times, they can voluntarily pick up weapons to defend their homeland!

The only thing you need to do is to mail out a letter via the post office, or a message by your cellphone, a faxed letter, or a voice-mail, and you are part of the action campaign, to declare your sacred rights to the whole world!

To participate in the campaign means you agree that we may announce and count, either publicly or non-publicly, your personal statement. According to your actual experience in the ongoing elections and referring to our action instruction, you can decide for yourself in which way you want to take your own actions. Once your statement is issued, it cannot be invalidated. Please thinking carefully!

Please do not overlook the importance of the ballot in your hand. The same opportunity comes to you only once every five years! It is this opportunity that bestows the legitimacy of our governments at all levels, up to the nation's President!

Initiators and Volunteer Group
Buying-Back Ballots Action Campaign
September 28, 2006


Section 4 Launching Record of the Campaign
By Tang Jingling

A. Origins

The origin of the current action campaign may be traced back to the end of 2003, when I was still thinking of the possibility to run for representative of the People's Congress. That plan had to be given up later on, but continuing thinking along the line of elections eventually led to the idea of the current campaign, in the form of the following text.

1. Once I told a story to people who are interested in the question of citizen's rights to recall government officials.

2. [Once upon] there is a person with a piece of wonderful treasure at home. Unfortunately, as he doesn't know he has this treasure at home, it was purchased at a low price by someone else. The original owner learns about the value of the treasure only after seeing how it is presented by the purchaser. Now he understands how foolish he has been. Nonetheless, he is a good man and with the courage, and the determination, to get his treasure back. Will the buyer let you get it back at the same cheap price?

3. What is this invaluable treasure? It is none other than the citizen's rights as a voter. Recall an elected official is part of the rights.

4. In our People's Republic, as there is no direct elections of national People's Representatives and national government officials, voter's rights are the essential feature of citizens as the country's masters.

5. In a country where public offices are occupied through election process, elections are the foundation of the government's legitimacy to ruling.

6. The year 2007 is the year of "general" elections in the People's Republic of China. Though direct elections in China can reach the district and county levels only, it is this direct election that lays legitimacy foundations for all indirect elections above the district-county level thereafter. Therefore, each of our voters should recognize the sacredness of the potential ballot in our hand. Perhaps the one vote in your hand could not even affect a single name in a township election. Yet, up to the nation's highest government official, the President, all the ruling legitimacy depends on the authorization of your vote.

7. There is no question that the multiple indirect elections in China today are limiting citizen's ability to participate in national politics. To a certain extent, the vote of our ordinary citizens is indeed like the treasure being bought cheaply by others, as told in the story, functioning with tremendous power in the hands of others, despite forever seemingly inconsequential when we speak through it. This is not to mention that, even with such highly limited voting power only, there are always people who work hard to further restrict the space for us to vote according to our free will.

8. Today, I want to tell everyone a method, by which we will be able to buy our invaluable treasure back!

9. Only a possessor of voting power (voting rights) is the true master of the country! Only one who dares using the voting power in hand, as well as knows how to use it, is the true possessor of a voting ballot!

10. If there is no independent candidates in your election district, or no current candidates matching your voting wish, or you simply do not want to vote this time but are still willing to express your political rights and will, please join me. Please join me to express your will of participation through the following steps.

11. One statement: Tang Jingling, registered voter of Longhu District of Shantou City in Guangdong Province, decides, in the local elections of 2007, to not go through voter registration, not take any ballot, and not participate in any manner in the elections of this round.

If you decide to participate in the elections and then vote for abstention, you can simply say so in your statement.

12. One letter: Please send out your statement through post office, e-mail, cellphone messaging, or faxing to the volunteers of our action campaign who are working in your province.

13. You may also help in your statement your relatives, friends and colleagues to defend their sacred rights. Of course, the prerequisites of doing so is to have their conscience and authorization in advance, after explaining the meaning of the action to them carefully.

If you are sending such statement(s) by letter through post office or faxing, you should have the personal signature or finger-print (when the authorizing individual is illiterate) of the concerned individual.

14. This will be the only way where we can take up the responsibility of a citizen and to express our determination not to be compromised into illegal cooperation with evil forces, when there might be someone trying to attack or suppress independent candidates, steal votes, committing in voting frauds and other ways, to coercively take the position to politically represent us.

15. Fellow citizens! If you do not wish to let this once of five-year election opportunity become a temporary reciting exercise by those who have been stealing our voting rights to strengthen their own ruling legitimacy, please take action, now!

16. Launching: Once the current action has collected 100 signature, the campaign is officially launched. If it is less than 100 signature before October 2006, Tang Jinglin will publish his own statement individually.

B. Launching Process

I [Tang Jingling] distributed the text pasted above, plus other related documents, to friends by private channels, inviting them to join me as initiators. At the beginning, my idea was to invite up to 100 people before October and then openly launch the campaign. After reading my text, a friend, who is a famous scholar, pointed out a pessimistic prospect that it would be lucky if the campaign could reach the targeted 100 by the proposed ending date. Even so, I was still not prepared to see how slow the campaign has been progressing. Finally, by September 27, 2006, some thirty people in total joined into the launching.

With feed-backs from friends and other initiators who had joined me in the project, I started considering the possibility of revising the launching conditions, as well as specific directions the campaign might eventually take.

By my original idea, it would not have been possible to launch the campaign realistically on a given date. In the process of inviting participants and revising the text, I became even more acutely aware that, if we don't treasure our own rights as the master of our country, we'll be indeed worth only to be ruled as slaves. The only difference is simply who will be our lord. Understanding like this further strengthened my resolution to carry on this action, even if there would be me myself as the only one left by the end. I will not stop at publicizing my own personal statement.

Fortunately, after I posted the revised version of the launching text, there were still 15 citizens who decided to stand by my side whole-heartedly.

I want to thank all the friends who took part in the process, especially those friends who voiced their suggestions and criticisms very frankly. To be frank is one of the noble features.

There are other friends, who contributed invaluable ideas and energy to the final text, and whose names are not appropriate to be mentioned here. I very much regret that these 14 citizens, who either didn't catch the stated deadline, or joined the campaign at first but later quited because of disagreement over the revised version of the text. Following the rules we set for ourselves in the text, I cannot publicly express my appreciation of and gratitude to them here. Their intelligence, courage, and open-mindedness are all truly admirable.

C. Questions and Answers (E-mail exchanges omitted)


Section 5 Instructions of the Buying-Back Ballots Action Campaign (Excerpt)

D. Campaign Period

Starting Date: September 30, 2006
Ending Date: January 31, 2008

According to government announcements, the current round of China's local elections will last to December 31, 2007.

Accordingly, our campaign will continue up to January 31, 2008, to leave enough time for all voting-age citizens to be able to join the action.

All volunteers will stop accepting individual statements by the ending date. The final statistics will be published by the action campaign and be based on all the data collected up to the ending date.

Citizens issuing similar statements after the ending date listed above will not be considered as participating in the current action campaign.

However, for every citizen following the instruction of our campaign to issue her or his statement of the same effect, such statement has the legal binding power according to Chinese laws during the time period before the next round of local elections in 2011-2012.

This last note is particularly important to those whose statements indicate that they are not taking part in the current round of local elections only.

Section 6 Biographical Information of the Initiators and Some Volunteers

Tang Jingling

December 1971 Born at Yaojia Cun village, Mishi Township, Jingzhou City in Hubei Province

Sep 1978 - June 1989 Attending elementary and secondary schools at hometown
Oct 1989 Shanghai Transportation University, study chemistry.
July 1993 - Dec 1995 Industrial engineer in a company at Shantou City, Guangdong Province.

Jan 1996 - Nov 1997, Transfer to another firm in Shantou; promoted to management position(s).

July 1997 Take part in training program run by the Law School at Shantou University
Oct 1997 Take Bar qualification examinations and pass all the tests.

Nov 1997 - July 1998 Transfer to a HK invested retail company, in charge of selling and management.

Aug 1998 Receive certificate of being a lawyer.
Sep 1998 Start intern training in a law firm in Guangzhou
Nov 1999 Awarded license of lawyer; start working as an independent lawyer.
Mar 2000 Join Hua-zhi-jie Law Firm as a licensed lawyer.

July 2004 Defense lawyer in two cases of labor dispute in Dongguan, Guangdong Province; Ten workers were released on New Year Day, 2005, after being detained for more than nine months; Later, help all the ten workers receive "humanitarian compensations from their former employer.
2005 Defense lawyer in cases of cadre-recall dispute in the Shibi san cun village.
Aug 2005 Lawyer in the recall dispute taking place in Taishi Village. Secretary of the law firm resigned due to official pressures over the case.
Nov 2005 The law firm released me from my job contract prematurely; All those arrested in Taishi were released.
April 2006 Accepted by another law firm at first, but then rejected me, refusing to complete the registration process of my Bar license.

Present: No license returned to me since last spring; engaged in activities promoting legal education to migrant workers; public appeals over cases concerning freedom of speech; working as legal consultant and translator of English and Chinese, to make a living.

Living in Qilin gang, Shatai Lu Road, Guangzhou City.

Liu Dejun

April 14, 1976 Born in a peasant family at Suizhou City in Hupei Province; Experience real lives of the disadvantaged social groups; Giving up studies in physics to devote to social activism aiming at social equality and justice.

1996 Graduation from Police College and start working in Xiangfan City, Hubei Province.

2000 Resigned from previous job; devote main energy to activism of promoting citizen's consciousness, with determination to devote the whole life to it.

Section 7 Contact Information (Excerpt)

Tang Jingling, initiator and volunteer
E-mail: bashifen@gmail.com
MSN： ginlian@hotmail.com
QQ：11160916
Skype：don_gin

Liu Dejun, initiator and volunteer
E-mail: liudejun76@yahoo.com.cn
MSN：josephliu76@hotmail.com
Cellphone: 13997862065

Wu Yiran, initiator
E-mail: zmdd89@hotmail.com

Section 8 Report on Progress

By November 3, there were 50 people in total signing up to the action, by issuing their individual statements.

(Details omitted)

===THE END===