A recent food safety scandal put the party to the test
Since March 12, when China’s National Congress was in session, China’s social media sphere has been buzzing with outrage over a food safety scandal at a local private school in Chengdu, Capital City of Sichuan province.
Posts with images showing rotten and expired food, which was spotted by parents in a school cafeteria’s storage room, were circulating widely on Weibo, a Twitter-like social media platform. Related hashtags were created to spread the latest development and quickly became trending items. From these posts, it appears that students’ parents were furious and showed up in force at the school after the discovery.
Several video clips on Twitter captured some disturbing scenes in which arriving police officers acted aggressively against protesting parents. Some witnesses claimed tear gas was deployed and several protesters were taken into custody but released shortly afterwards after “ being educated and showed remorse for their behaviour”, according to the official’s press release.
Other videos clips found online contained scenes in which protesting parents occupied the school, demanding answers while proclaiming their determination to bring those responsible to justice. Local officials in Sichuan quickly went to the scene and attempted to appease the fuming parents, only to be confronted…
