Olympics: From PR bonanza to nightmare for Beijing
Friday, April 11, 2008 Free Headline Alerts
UNITED NATIONS — The route of the Olympic torch, what was set to be a scripted pre-games victory lap before this summer’s Beijing Games, has turned into an unpredictable fiasco opening a Pandora’s box of problems with protests from London to Paris and San Francisco. As pro-democracy demonstrators and Tibetan activists protest along the path of the Olympic flame from what games organizers called a “journey of harmony,” the relay looks more like the route of the Flying Dutchman.
Last month’s bloody suppression of Tibetan demonstrations by the Chinese communists set the stage for this showdown. Previously the protests centered on Mainland China’s widespread pollution problems as well as the People’s Republic of China’s political and military support for the Sudan regime in Darfur. Now the very organized Tibetan independence movement in Europe and California has been energized by the recent communist crackdown on Buddhist monks. Tibetan demonstrations outside the UN have kept up the drumbeat against China’s “cultural genocide” in the mountainous region.
Calls by Western governments for China’ to respect human rights and freedoms are one thing; threats by those government to actually boycott Beijing grand Olympic extravaganza are something else. When the Polish and Czech leaders said they would boycott the games opening ceremony Beijing could shrug; when France and Germany said they were considering staying away, Beijing began to sweat. But when Britain’s Prime Minister Gordon Brown pledged to a boycott, the political chips were down. So far President George W. Bush while calling for Beijing to enter into a dialogue with the exiled Dalai Lama, has said he would attend the Olympics.
As in Tokyo in 1964 or Seoul in 1988, the hosting the Olympics probably has less to do with sport than with national prestige and political standing. Thus the Summer Olympiad is set to showcase the People’s Republic as the New China of promise and prosperity. Never mind that Beijing’s political system rules repressively not only for the ethnic Tibetan minority, but for the majority Han Chinese as well.
Despite the overseas protests, most Chinese overwhelming support the summer games as a platform for their national pride and genuine achievement. And that’s ironically why the Beijing communists may profit domestically from the foreign protests. Such demonstrations are presented in the state-controlled media as an enduring insult and slap in the face to China’s pride. Others see the unrest as the “crude pranks by a handful of Tibetan separatists.” Beijing’s Ministry of Propaganda has little trouble in making the case that the outside world wants to see a weak China and a disrupted Olympics. An increasingly self-righteous Beijing will present itself as the victim of a global anti-China campaign.
At long last China has seen genuine economic progress, and its people are feeling confident, proud and increasingly nationalistic not communist. Thus how will China’s Marxist mandarins temper the red heat of emotion and nationalist rage which while brewing, can usually be controlled to suit political objectives?
A commentary in the state run Xinhua news agency stated, “Since the Olympic sacred fire set off in Greece, a small number of Tibetan independence elements put up one prank after another in a bid to obstruct the Olympic torch relay.” Some Chinese bloggers accuse foreign forces of trying to “hijack” the games.
An article in the government China Daily “A New Positive View of the Olympics,” presents a cleverly disguised party line. The author says he was not originally in favor of the Beijing Games and still has reservations about holding them given environmental issues. Still because of the protests, “ I have decided to do my part to contribute to the Games. This change, ironically, is due to a handful of people in the world who are not only making noises against the Beijing Olympics, but also agitating to spoil it.”
The commentary adds, “Those who are trying to hijack the Beijing Olympics are behaving like clowns, they will gain nothing. ..These agitators have incurred nothing but resentment from ordinary Chinese and people standing for justice around the world.”
The article written by a member of the ironically named “Chinese Society for Human Rights Studies” adds, “I am glad they are helping to improve the public relations efforts of our government, and its crisis management. Pretty soon our officials will learn to take things easy and smile.” Perhaps.
But even the normally circumspect IOC President Jacques Rogge called the issue a “crisis.” Speaking in Beijing Rogge stated, China should respect its “moral engagement” to improve human rights and to fulfill promises of greater media freedom.
The Chinese communists have demonized the exiled Dalai Lama, have habitually cracked down on human rights in Tibet, and used the bluff and bluster of the dragon to intimidate opposition in this toxic mix of politics and sports.