Page 46 - MIN ON 8 DEC 2015
P. 46
WORLD NEWS A11
Tuesday 8 December 2015
Chinese parents go to court seeking to register 2nd children
LOUISE WATT which vary from city to city. Demonstrators urging the Chinese government to recognize unregistered children are stopped
Associated Press The hukou system predates
BEIJING (AP) — Wan Chan- the one-child policy, which by policemen along the side of a road near Tiananmen Square in Beijing. Nearly 14 million
gru’s 6-year-old daughter perpetuates inequalities
collects passes — for her not only between regis- people in China are unregistered according to official statistics, most a legacy of China’s 35-
dance school, English les- tered and unregistered
sons and other extra-curric- Chinese, but between ur- year strict family planning policy that limited most urban couples to one child though rural
ular classes, anything bear- ban and rural residents.
ing her name that she can “The one-child is just a pol- couples were allowed to have two if their first is a girl. The signs read “Please give 13,000,000
pretend is an identity card. icy that can be quite eas-
The girl is legally unregis- ily changed, like China has unregistered children an identity.” (AP Photo)
tered because her parents just done, while the hukou
broke China’s one-child is a much larger institution,” To create more public seven other mask-wearing to the backs of their shirts
policy in having her. They said Kam Wing Chan, a awareness of their cause parents cycled through pleading for unregistered
say they cannot afford geography professor at to have their second chil- Beijing on a recent smoggy children to be given “an
to pay a 200,000 yuan the University of Washing- dren registered, Wan and Saturday with signs stuck identity.”q
($30,000) fine that would ton who researches the
allow her to gain legal sta- hukou system. “It has been
tus. Without it, she can’t around for almost 60 years
visit a hospital or get on a now. It has all kinds of im-
plane to go on holiday to pact. It’s dividing China so-
Disneyland like her friends. cially, economically.”
With the government’s China’s ruling Communist
announcement in Octo- Party initiated the house-
ber that it would allow all hold registration system
married couples to have in the 1950s to control the
two children, Wan and her movement of people. It
husband have decided to ties them to their family’s
take family planning offi- hometown and the subsi-
cials to court to try to get dized health and educa-
her registered without pay- tion services available in
ing the fine. that area. Changing one’s
Wan’s daughter is one of hukou can be difficult, par-
nearly 14 million unregis- ticularly shifting residence
tered people across Chi- to big cities like Beijing and
na, most a legacy of Chi- Shanghai where many mi-
na’s 35-year strict family grants want to work.
planning policy that limited The system has barely
most urban couples to one changed even as millions
child, though rural couples of people have moved
were allowed to have two from the countryside to cit-
if their first was a girl. ies. Big-city governments
Those who are unregis- have balked at the costs
tered lack a “hukou” (pro- of delivering education
nounced HOO-koh) — a and health care to migrant
household registration en- workers and their children,
try in a small family book an estimated 253 million
and on a police computer people — almost a fifth
system. Without a hukou, of China’s population.
a person has limited ac- China last year announced
cess to health care, edu- a cautious reform of the
cation and other benefits, hukou system by allowing
and cannot get a perma- urban areas to give mi-
nent ID card. “Now that grants a residence permit
the country has relaxed with some social benefits,
the one-child policy, I think or a local hukou if they
it’s time for us to call upon meet a city’s own residen-
the public to realize that cy requirements. Shanghai
there are still a large num- and Shenzhen are experi-
ber of marginalized people menting with registering
in China who have no huk- migrants based on a points
ou,” said Wan, a 42-year- system related to educa-
old housewife. tional background and
The Ministry of Public Secu- their employment history in
rity said last month every the city, for example. The
citizen has the right to a government’s plan aims to
hukou and efforts should enable around 100 million
be made to register those people to settle in towns
without one. It gave no de- and cities by 2020.
tails on how, and no official None of those changes,
has so far publicly backed however, are aimed at
any amnesty for fines, helping the unregistered.
