For weeks, Shanghai’s 25 million residents were assured that they would not be locked down. Then when the order came, the lockdown was supposed to last only seven days. It is now almost into its fourth week, and the government is struggling to suppress the chaos.
Last week, 82-year-old Yu Wenming called his neighbourhood committee to say he had run out of medicine and food. Rather than reassure him, the local official despaired. ‘I am really helpless,’ he admitted. ‘I’m more sad than you are, because you are just one person. I see countless families…’ The elderly Mr Yu ended up comforting the worker. When a recording of their conversation was posted online, it was shared rapidly. By the time it was deleted, the damage was done.
As health workers battle omicron, China’s infamous censors have their own fight – and it’s not one that they are winning. On Weibo and WeChat, people post videos, phone call recordings and lengthy blogs to protest and humiliate authorities into doing better. A video showing mothers separated from children in hospital caused national outrage. Another filmed in Shanghai’s Minhang district showed residents chanting ‘We want to eat’ and ‘We want freedom’. One young man recorded his phone call to the police, asking: ‘If I break lockdown and you arrest me, will I at least have some food to eat?’
It’s not easy to censor a billion internet users.
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