Recently, a news event that happened half a year ago has been exposed on the internet in mainland China, sparking heated discussions. Officials from the government of Yexian in Henan Province led a team of 400 people to violently demolish a university student’s entrepreneurial pear orchard, triggering public outrage.
According to recent reports from Chinese media, on April 2nd of this year, Hu Weizhe, the deputy county mayor of Yexian, led about 400 people from various departments including public security, traffic police, special police, urban management, and the Rendian Town government. They used over 100 vehicles including police cars and bulldozers, as well as three excavators, to forcibly demolish a pear orchard covering more than 30 mu that was contracted by a post-80s college graduate named Jia Ke in Rendian Town.
Before reaching the orchard, the demolition team cut off the power supply and blocked the surrounding roads. They confiscated the mobile phones of Jia Ke’s family members, prevented them from taking photos for evidence, forcibly took them away, and detained them in the local police station for a whole day.
Jia Ke, a post-80s graduate, returned to his hometown after graduating from university to start a business. He contracted over 30 mu of land in Rendian Town, Yexian, Henan Province, to plant golden pear trees and established Pingdingshan Pear Blossom Manor Limited Company. After nearly a decade of development, his orchard had obtained national green certification and became a base for university student entrepreneurship. His business had been positively featured in local media.
However, in June 2021, the authorities began a construction project of the Yelu Expressway which required occupying about 7 mu of Jia Ke’s orchard land. Due to disagreements with Yexian County government on compensation standards, no agreement was reached, leading to the violent demolition of the orchard.
The compensation standard negotiated by Rendian Town government with Jia Ke was based on Document No. 33 issued by Pingdingshan City government in 2017 regarding compensation standards for land acquisitions including young plants and attached objects above ground. However, this document had actually expired in 2020.
Jia Ke believed that the land he contracted met the standards for economic forests set by the Ministry of Natural Resources, while the local government based compensation on the revoked Document No. 33, compensating for farmland which he deemed unreasonable. If compensated based on economic forest standards, Jia Ke would receive over three million yuan, but compensated as farmland, he would only receive just over 180,000 yuan, a difference of about 20 times.
In June last year, Rendian Town government issued a “Notice of Deadline for Clearance,” requiring Jia Ke to clear the planted pear trees by the 14th of that month. The notice claimed that if not cleared by the deadline, the town government would clear it, and any resulting losses would be borne by Jia Ke himself. In response, Jia Ke sued the Rendian Town government to court. On September 6th last year, the town government withdrew the decision of the “Notice of Deadline for Clearance.”
However, on April 2nd this year, the authorities still forcibly demolished the orchard, causing anger among the local residents.
Wang Kexin (pseudonym), a resident of Rendian Town in Yexian County, recounted the situation to a reporter. He said, “It’s not easy for college students to start a business. In the first few years of planting the fruit trees, there was no income, and just as the fruit trees matured and started to yield income, they faced the government’s forced removal. Moreover, the scale of the demolition was huge, with a team of 400 people entering the village in a mighty manner, cutting off power and blocking the roads, leaving residents trapped in their homes. There were very few local people on the scene, and many people had their phones taken away, making it difficult to capture and share videos of the incident.”
He continued, “Policies from higher authorities change frequently, with many news reports encouraging college students to return to their hometowns for entrepreneurship, but none of those promises hold true.”
He further stated, “There are not many like Jia Ke who have developed their businesses to this extent. Just because a highway construction project needed to pass through the university student’s orchard, and the compensation standards could not be agreed upon, a ‘Notice of Deadline for Clearance’ was issued, and the deputy county mayor led the demolition of the student’s orchard without compensation, directly expropriating it. The people brought in were like gangsters, loudly forbidding the residents from taking photos.”
Local resident Song Jie (pseudonym) told the reporter, “In this small rural area, so many vehicles suddenly came in, along with hundreds of people, which frightened the ordinary folks. As soon as they opened their doors to see what was happening, they were loudly told to go back inside and not look. So, many people didn’t see the actual situation on-site, but could hear some sounds in their courtyards.”
Subsequently, the reporter contacted the Yexian County government to inquire about the compensation for Jia Ke’s orchard and how it was resolved. A staff member informed the reporter that, “The Pingdingshan City Committee and City Government have set up a joint investigation team, and the investigation team is still in the process of handling the investigation. We need to wait for the specific results of the investigation.”
Regarding the forced demolition, Deputy County Mayor Hu Weizhe openly claimed, “I was present at the demolition (of the orchard), and the deputy director of the County People’s Congress Standing Committee was also present. We did this for the progress of the project. I am willing to take responsibility. If you want to sue me, go ahead. I participated in the demolition because the key project could not proceed in Yexian County. On that day, as a leader of the many demolition teams, I’m not the biggest official.”
Hu Weizhe was exposed for falsifying his credentials. His resume published on the government’s website indicated that Hu Weizhe, born in May 1971, started working in the Xinhua District People’s Congress in March 1985. This implies that Hu Weizhe was only 14 years old when he started working.
On September 8th, 2021, the Yexian County government in Pingdingshan City, Henan Province, released the resume of the county committee member and deputy county mayor Hu Weizhe, stating that he started working at the age of 14. Amidst widespread doubt, on November 9th, 2021, Hu Weizhe’s resume on the Yexian County official website was amended to reflect that he began working in March 1988 instead of 1985. However, even if it was March 1988, he would not have reached 18 years of age when starting work.
Regarding questions from the reporter of Big News, county government staff stated that they were not aware of the situation.