Saturday 17 May 2008

[Updated: NOT fraud] Donation fraud at school in Guangdong

This video, hosted on Chinese portal Paopao (泡泡俱乐部) shows administrators at the No. 3 Middle School in Huizhou, Guangdong, filming their teachers making donations to Sichuan earthquake victims. Then they take out the money and film themselves making rather big donations, using the same wad of cash.
Not finished yet: they then hand out the same money to a batch of students and film them, yet again putting the same money in the box. The video was shot by one of the students from the second floor. He reports that he dare not go back to school now. The administrators (principal, etc.) apparently told him that he could come back to school if he tells everyone his video is fake. Everyone who's seen this video on various Chinese websites, is shocked and disgusted at this cynical behaviour. Expect death threats.

If the first link doesn't work for you, the video can also be seen here at Sina.com.

UPDATE: According to the Southern Metropolis News the school held the donation ceremony on the 15th but then just re-enacted it for the media on the 16th. They did in fact raise RMB112 979 and didn't act against the students who took the video. The school acted very quickly after this video began circulating and posted a notice explaining the event. The students who took the video also posted an apology.

I will follow suit: I should not have jumped to conclusions so quickly. This was a valuable lesson in engaging with China based on misinformed preconceptions. Credit to the Southern Metropolis News for investigating this.

1 comment:

  1. Link doesn't work. It looks like the video has been yanked.

    ReplyDelete