During the Spring Festival, many Chinese logged on the Internet
to express their gratefulness to the leaders who, once again, spent
the most important festival for family reunion with ordinary
citizens.
President Hu Jintao, also general secretary of the
Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee, spent the Spring
Festival in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region and Premier Wen Jiabao spent the Lunar New Year's eve in
Jiangxi Province. Both regions had been heavily hit by the worst
winter storm in five decades.
President Hu Jintao talks with local
villagers in Bafang Village of Ziyuan County in southwest China's
Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region during his inspection tour of the
disaster-hit regions from Feb. 5 to 6, 2008.
"I was moved by the scene on TV that the general secretary
helped a squad of soldiers to load relief supplies onto a
helicopter," wrote a netizen on Xinhuanet.com. "It is truly
admirable for the 66-year-old to do this for the sake of the people
affected by the disaster."
It was the fifth year in a row that the president and the
premier spent the festival outside Beijing with ordinary
citizens.Hu spent the previous festivals in Hubei, Guizhou, Shaanxi
and Gansu provinces, and Wen in Henan, Shandong and Liaoning
provinces.
"We have no idea how many households they have visited in the
past five years, but their traces were all over China, and their
hearts were with us ordinary Chinese," wrote another netizen on
Xinhuanet.
On the same page, however, many netizens took the chance to call
on local officials to learn from the leaders.
"There is only one general secretary and one premier, but
thousands of ministers, provincial heads, mayors, county heads,"
one wrote. "The country will be full of hope had all of them been
like Hu and Wen."
"In contrast to Hu and Wen, some lower-level officials are more
distanced from the public. Their relations have been extremely
discordant at grassroots levels," wrote one netizen.
(Xinhua News Agency February 12, 2008)
