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Deja vu as Beijing marks one year since the Olympics
Published in Saudi Press Agency on 07 - 08 - 2009

As the Beijing's Bird's Nest stadium dusts off its
feathers for the one-year anniversary of the Olympics Saturday, a
strange sense of deja vu has settled on the city, according to dpa.
While the paint fades on leftover Olympic signs and logos, a grey
smog has stubbornly refused to lift, and the authorities are again
tightening controls over voices of dissent.
In 2001, when it won the Olympic bid, Beijing was a city in
desperate need of an upgrade, and China was a country in need of a
new international image. The government subsequently spent 40 billion
dollars on infrastructure, including new subway lines, roads and
cleaning up the city's air, according to the National Audit Office,
and an additional 2.84 billion dollars on Olympic venues.
A year after the big event, and the Beijing environmental
protection administration insists that the air has stayed cleaner,
with the city on track to meet its 2009 target of 260 "blue sky"
days. "The government has paid lots of attention to environmental
issues, and traffic control measure have played a key role," Chen
Zhongming, from the Peking University College of Environmental
Sciences and Engineering, told German Press Agency dpa.
Restrictions on cars, which were put in place for the Olympics,
have remained, and last month further limits were placed on vehicles
from outside Beijing entering the city.
But depending on which data you believe, Beijing's air on any
given day can be just "slightly polluted", or "hazardous" to human
health.
While the lungs of Beijing's residents are still struggling with
the pollution, the government is using the Olympics anniversary to
promote health. August 8 has been declared "National Fitness Day",
and to mark the occasion there will be a number of sporting
activities at Beijing's Olympic Green, the largest of which will be
the Italian Super Cup final between Inter Milan and Lazio at the
Bird's Nest stadium.
This will be the first sporting event at the stadium since the
close of the Paralympics, and comes amid growing concerns about the
use and upkeep of Olympic venues. In the first five months of the
year, the Bird's Nest attracted 3.5 million visitors, bringing in
44.1 million dollars, according to a report by the Beijing Times. The
91,000 seat stadium costs at least 30 million dollars annually to
maintain, the report said, and debate continues over how to best
cover the cost.
Plans by the operator to sell off the venue's naming rights, which
reportedly could have brought in 300 million dollars, were halted due
to public concern that the stadium's status as a national icon would
be lowered by commercialism, state-run newspaper, the Global Times,
reported in June.
The Bird's Nest is now up there with the Great Wall and the
Forbidden City in the national psyche, according to Greg Groggel, an
American who has studied the legacy of the Games in six Olympic
cities.
An "autonomous management bureau is required to generate the best
social, economic, environmental, and financial returns from the
government's investment," says Groggel, echoing sentiment found in a
recent report by the Tourism Research Centre of the Chinese Academy
of Social Sciences.
Olympics venues aside, some say a lasting legacy of the Beijing
Games is the way it has promoted tolerance and communication between
the Chinese public and people from other countries.
"The Olympics was a chance for Chinese and foreigners to come into
close contact. Perhaps both sides were nervous, especially the
average Chinese person," said Luo Qing, from the Communications
University of China, who conducts research into China's national
image.
Luo believes the Olympics promoted a new openness amongst Chinese
people and within the government.
"Now people at all levels feel stronger and are more tolerant. The
government is also looking to change," she said in a phone interview.
But while the physical and psychological landscapes of Beijing may
be significantly different, concerns persist about the government's
pledge to improve human rights, a key part of its Olympic bid.
"The bottom line is it was a huge missed opportunity, that is the
legacy of the Games in regards to human rights," Phelim Kine, a
researcher with Human Rights Watch, told dpa on Friday.
Kine said there's been a triumph of form over substance with "no
real let up in Chinese Government's crackdown on civil society,
freedom of association, and freedom of expression."
The government's tough approach to voices of dissent has continued
in a year of sensitive anniversaries, including twenty years since
the Tiananmen crackdown. The country's legal community has been the
most recent target, with human rights groups condemning the detention
of legal scholar, Xu Zhiyong, and the barring of more than 50 lawyers
from practice.
As the October 1st anniversary of 60 years of the People's
Republic approaches, there's a sense of deja vu. Reminiscent of the
lead-up to the Games, the government has again toughened visa
restrictions for foreigners, tightened controls on the internet, and
made it clear that petitioners seeking a hearing are not welcome in
the capital.
While the Olympic anniversary celebrations are a chance to reflect
on how much the landscape and people of Beijing and China have
changed, the government's renewed rhetoric about maintaining "social
harmony and stability" are a sign that some things are still very
much the same.


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