119 days to the Olympics
April 11, 2008
There are only 119 days to the Olympics and in truth it has been been a surprising couple of months since I last wrote from Beijing. The nasty pollution that chokes pedestrians on the streets of Beijing has been matched by the nastiness of the atmosphere surrounding the torch relay, creating an increasingly polarised sentiment around the Olympics.
Apparently the torch relay was masterminded by Goebbels, Hitler’s Minister of Propaganda, in 1936 to demonstrate Nazi supremacy in Europe, and it has been used to highlight the plight of Tibet, invaded by the Chinese in 1959. Coverage of the attempts to snuff out the torch in London, Paris and San Francisco on CNN were interrupted on our screens, and the papers have been critical of the nations that are hosting these demonstrations. Over lunch a friend told me that one of her young female Chinese staff asked “why are people foreigners doing this to us,” while a group of more militant Chinese set up www.anti-cnn.com to “expose the lies and distorted facts in the western media. This promoted a wag to set up anti-anti-cnn.com. On a more serious note one of our American clients that purchased a Shanghai based banking finance software company last year found itself on national television accused of using its software to undermine the Shanghai stock market which fell by 5.5% this week.
It can be no great surprise that the official sponsors of the Olympics are getting rather nervous, previously annoyed that the pollution problem is leading to atheletes withdrawal, and now being asked about their position on Tibet. In PR circles the talk is of clients who are caught in a dilemma; western consumers potentially knocking their support of a country accused of human rights abuses and shareholders demanding profits from one of the last remaining economic hopes on the planet. As the US$ hits 1:7 against the RMB, down 15% over the year, and Foreign Direct Investment figures record a 61% increase in the first quarter, it is clear which way companies are voting.
The real politik is that the Olympics will go on but under heigthened security. We have all had to register with the local police station, register our car, and work visas for visiting staff have not been issued beyond June 30th. On March 22nd it was World Pillow Fight Day, an event that I didn’t have in my calendar but one that had the stuffing kicked out of it beforethe first pillow cases were off. A bunch of young people hugging drool-marked pillows gathered at The Place, an upmarket shopping centre, ready to swing at each other, only to be met by 50 uniformed police at 10:00 and dispersed. I was in a now respectable bar the following weekend when 6 uniformed police entered and walked up to a middle aged Chinese woman sitting with an older western male; some embarrassment followed the harrassment and they left leaving the bar silent and edgy.
Among the people that I know who are running companies in Beijing, this edginess is as palpable as the pollution. One chap told me of fire inspectors threatening fines or closure unless he paid their contractor to fix their emergency exits. The recent employment law changes and tax law changes are, as always, promulgated with a minimum of consultation or consideration. “Our clients are deciding not to increase their presence in China, preferring instead to go to Indochina, Malaysia, and India because of the costs and the uncertainty in China,” one accountant confided. Doing business in China is now on a par with Singapore in terms of costs once adminstration, labour costs, and services are taken into account, but without the efficiency.
As long as we have the tension in Tibet and some on the ground, I suspect more pillows will be bitten over the coming 3 months.
Manzou
