Fury's Ground Xiro

Xi's zero-Covid policy has angered ordinary Chinese as never before. A dangerous moment for the state

- Anurag Viswanath

China is witnessing mass protests, from Xinjiang in the west to Zhengzhou in central China to Chongqing and Guangdong in the south to fresh protests in Shanghai early Sunday morning. In Shanghai, masses congregated at Urumqi Road shouting “CCP, step down” and “**** You, health code.” Social media reports say “It’s only getting more violent.”

Why such sudden mass protests and how are they different from before? It is estimated 160-1,80,000 incidents/year of social unrest take place, but are localised and limited. Today, it is largely one theme. Protesters stand united against a single grievance spanning the entire country – China’s “dynamic zero-Covid” policy.

Only China is stuck with Covid

The world has moved on to living with the virus, a fact not lost on the Chinese themselves. In a viral video, an unknown bespectacled man in Chongqing (November 2022) sneered that the Chinese were living on another planet as the rest of the world was into World Cup football.

• “There is only one disease in the world and that is being both poor and not having freedom. We have now got both. We are still struggling and suffering over a little cold,” he ranted, before he was led away.

• On November 24, China recorded 32,695 cases, the highest till then. That day, there was an accidental fire in a high-rise residential building in Urumqi, capital of Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region killing 10 and injuring several others.

• The fire was a tragic accident, but exacerbated by China’s arbitrary “zero-Covid” policy.