A handshake and a face-to-face talk with Premier Wen Jiabao in October 2003 made Xiong Deming a media star in China.

 

However, Xiong, a 42-year-old ordinary country woman from a remote village of southwest China's Chongqing Municipality, never expected she would encounter the mania of the Chinese media towards herself following her talk with Premier Wen.

 

She won the title of China's Figures of Economics 2003 and the Public Service Prize from the country's flagship television channel of CCTV on Dec. 28, 2003, standing side by side with former Chinese trade negotiator Long Yongtu and China's richest man William Ding Lei, founder of popular Internet portal NetEase.com.

 

She made a complaint about the default of her husband's 2,240 yuan (US$270) wages by a local construction company to Premier Wen in October 2003 when Wen made a surprise inspection of Xiong's Longquan Village of Yunyang County, Chongqing.

 

"I hardly have time to feed my pigs now, as reporters from across the country flock to my home and asked for an interview," Xiong said. "I'm a little flustered when strangers come to see me."

 

About 70 reporters from across the country have interviewed Xiong, who hardly anticipated her simple complaint would cause such a fuss.

 

The Chinese media's enthusiasm was sparked by Xiong's honest disclosure of a local employer's defaulted payment of her husband's wages directly with Premier Wen, who pledged to help migrant workers retrieve their defaulted payment on the night he visited Xiong's village.

 

Defaulting of payment for migrant workers has long been a problem staggering the income rise of the rural population and a "chronic illness" affecting and undermining social stability.

 

"Xiong Deming represents that the man in the street can also change the status quo of China's economy," said Professor Hu Xingdou with Beijing University of Science and Engineering.

 

"However, the protection of migrant workers' interests depends on the laws and the full-pledged system rather than top leaders' concern," Prof. Hu said.

 

Analysts say Xiong became famous overnight because she spoke up about a grave situation affecting millions of people in this world's most populous country.

 

China has about 94 million migrant rural laborers, whose employers are in arrears up to some 100 billion yuan (US$12 billion), according to statistics from the All-China Federation of Trade Unions.

 

Trade union statistics show over 70 percent of the payment default comes from construction enterprises, followed by the catering industry.

 

"I'm a celebrity now," Xiong said. "Even some migrant workers came to ask me for the premier's telephone number."

 

The changes within such a short period of time were so big for Xiong to adjust to that she is now a little wary to answer the phone when it rings, fearing it might be another request for interview.

 

"I'm a little annoyed," Xiong acknowledged, "because working is my fundamental means to earn a living since I can't turn my medal into food."

 

"All I want to do is to continue my normal life and expand my pig-raising industry," she said.

 

(Xinhua News Agency January 28, 2004)