The former in-house censor of China’s leading liberal newspaper
Southern Weekly died on Wednesday - just three days into his
retirement. Zeng Li had become a prominent figure during the weekly's
protest against censorship in January. His farewell letter has been shared on Weibo thousands of times on Thursday and caused
widespread soul-searching about the state of
the media in
China.
Patrcik Boehler, South China Morning Post, 04 April, 2013
“Looking back on the last four years, I made mistakes," Zeng wrote
in his farewell letter, dated March 28. "I have killed some drafts
that I shouldn’t have killed, I have deleted some content that I shouldn’t
have deleted, but in the end I woke up, I preferred not to carry out to end
my political mission and go against myconscience, I don’t want be a sinner
against history.”
In January, Southern Weekly with its long tradition of
liberal journalism had been caught up in the most vociferous protest against
censorship by Chinese newsmakers in recent Chinese history.
For three
days, the weekly's staff protested outside their Guangzhou offices against
the traditional new year's editorial having been replaced by provincial
censors without consulting the editors. Thousands expressed their support
online.
An in-house censor's job is to make sure articles published by a
newspaper do not go against provincial and central government censorship
regulations. Zeng wrote in his blog in January that his job was to help the
paper avoid political risks.
In his farewell letter, Zeng wrote that
he did not regret openly supporting the journalists in their rotest against
censorship. “In the Southern Weekly new year’s editorial incident, I
stood up and spoke up ut of sense of justice," he wrote. "I have a clear
conscience, no regrets.”
The farewell letter was shared by Chen
Zhaohua, the editor of Southern Metropolis Weekly, another Southern Media
Group publication. Even though Zeng's death was a private matter, the
outpouring of grief reflected the shared values he stood for, Chen
wrote.
"This letter is surely an important document in China's history,"
Ma Yong, sociologist and history scholar at the Academy of Social Sciences
wrote after Zeng's passing.
"He used to be an in-house censor for
Southern Weekly, he was entangled, but justice always dominated his mind,"
wrote Li Chengpeng, a prominent writer. "When this thing happened some time
ago, he behaved beautifully. Now that he's gone, he will continue to edit
this country in heaven."
"He showed the strength of character and
dauntlessness typical of a Southern Weekly newsman," wrote Qian Gang, a
former managing editor of the newspaper and now a scholar at the University
of Hong Kong. "Everyone has a choice."
