A Chinese driver, driven mad with rage over the fact that his house has been demolished without him knowing it, has done a suicidal jump in the lake by his bus with several passengers on board.
Mass casualty has happened, with 21 people drowning and 15 being injured. The incident took place on July 7, the bus crossing multiple lanes before crashing through a guard rail and diving straight on to the water-filled reservoir below. The police force from the city of Anshin, Guizhou province, also announced that out of those casualties, there were 12 students in the bus, five dead from the tragic incident. Some of them were about to go to their gaokao, the Chinese version of SAT. The driver is currently being identified by the state authorities as only ‘Zhang’.
“Zhang was unsatisfied with his life and with the demolition of his rented public house. In order to get noticed, he committed an extreme criminal act,” the Anshun police statement said.
Zhang’s story starts when his house and property lent by his previous workplace had been selected for demolition as part of a “shantytown reconstruction project”, for which he was previously offered $10,360 for losing the house. He never rose to claim it and was turned down for new accommodation, state media said. On the day that the incident happened, it was then that he knew that his house had been demolished, rendering him homeless.
This was why when he finally realized his fate, he bought a strong traditional Chinese liquor, put it in a container and then drank the whole content before he carried out his abrupt act. Before the crash, he sent his girlfriend a voice message on popular messaging app WeChat, expressing “world-weary” feelings.
The tragedy brutally shows the reality that the Chinese people, who are being kicked out for renovation and gentrification of their native area is living in.
A demolition without proper compensation is a common issue in China, especially for those rural areas up for new construction sites to meet over-crowded demand from nearby cities. The residents are mostly unable to pay for the new houses that would come in stead of their original abode, while they would have almost nowhere to go in the process.
China currently does not provide proper housing facilities nor right amount of compensatory payments for these people
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Replaced!