World Tibet Network News Sunday, June 7, 1998

London, 4 June (TIN) In a reshuffle of the top leadership in the Tibet Autonomous Region following the seventh TAR People's Congress last month, Gyaltsen Norbu has been replaced by another Tibetan, 54-year old Legchog, as chairman of the TAR regional government. Legchog's appointment further strengthens the authority of Ragdi, who himself has been re-elected chairman of the standing committee of the TAR People's Congress. It is not yet known whether the 66-year-old Gyaltsen Norbu has retired from service or whether he will be transferred to another post.

The expulsion in April of two Tibetan members from the regional Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) is being viewed as a continuation of Ragdi's campaign to "purify the ranks of party members and cadres" and a warning to other officials and party members that even their private opinions will be taken into account. Dorje Dramdul and Phuntsog were expelled from the CPPCC for activities described as "harmful to Tibet's stability and in serious violation of the CPPCC constitution".

The close links between Legchog (known as Lieque in Chinese), the new chairman of the TAR regional government, and 60-year old Ragdi were forged when they worked together in the "organisation" department of the regional government in the 1980s. This key political department supervises the records of Party members and cadres and Ragdi's then position as its head and Legchog's as his deputy indicate that they had the complete trust of the Party. Since then and up till last month's promotion, Ragdi has served as deputy secretary of the Party Committee of the TAR and vice-chairman of the regional government.

Legchog, who is from Gyantse in the TAR, joined the Communist Party in 1971, 11 years later than the older and more experienced Ragdi. Prior to that he had worked for seven years as a primary and middle school teacher in Gyantse. Most of that time was during the Cultural Revolution, when colleges were closed. Although schools were still open, virtually the only subject taught in schools during the Cultural Revolution between 1966 and 1976 was political studies.

>From 1973 to 1975 Legchog served as secretary of the Gyantse division of the Communist Youth League of China. His two key promotions came in 1975, when he was appointed secretary of the supervisory division of the organisation department of the Tibet Party Committee, and in 1980 when he took over as deputy chief of the organisation division within the same department. From 1986 to 1991 his job title was executive deputy head of the organisation department of the TAR Party Committee and he was secretary of the Lhasa City Party Committee from 1991-4.

Six years ago Legchog spoke out on key Party issues: "We must strengthen the leadership and mobilise forces to use the many methods of ideological education, discipline, administration, legal work and the economy," Legchog told a meeting organised by the TAR and the Lhasa Municipal Political and Legal Committees on 27 January 1992. According to a report in the Tibet Daily, he went on to say: "Because of the changes in the international scene, hostile forces have quickened their steps to carry out 'peaceful evolution' in our country. Tibet is in the forefront of the struggle against splittism and against 'peaceful evolution'. Therefore we must adopt effective methods to severely attack splittist activities."

In his opening address as the new chairman of the TAR regional government at the handing-over ceremony in Lhasa on 18 May this year, Legchog focused on economic issues. He praised Gyaltsen Norbu (known in Chinese as Gyalcain Norbu) for the achievements of the regional government under his leadership in "opening up and socialist reform". The most significant achievement by the government under his predecessor, he said, was the region's average annual economic growth rate of 13.2%. "Peasants in Tibet have reaped bumper harvests in consecutive years, state revenue has been increasing steadily, infrastructure facilities have been greatly improved and the people's living standards have risen by a great extent," Legchog was quoted by Tibet TV as saying. In a standard welcome greeting to the new leadership, the outgoing chairman Gyaltsen Norbu emphasised the importance of unity as "the fundamental guarantee for achieving victory in revolution". "The new leading group of the regional government must highly cherish t

he internal unity of the leading group," he said.

Since then, Legchog has criticised the slow development of an infrastructure in the TAR. "We must ... realise that, because of geographical conditions, Tibet's infrastructure construction remains slow and Tibet still has the practical problem of insufficient capital and proficient personnel," he said in an interview with the Chinese news agency Zhongguo Xinwen She on 23 May. "Therefore, improving people's living standards and ensuring a sustained, rapid and healthy economic and social development will remain formidable tasks for a long time to come." In stating his aims for the next five years, Legchog focused on the strengthening of the so-called 'three foundations': "agriculture and animal husbandry, basic industries and infrastructure; expediting reforms in three areas: state-owned enterprises, government organisations, and carrying out

comprehensive supporting reforms." He appeared to give the issue of spiritual civilisation only secondary importance by relegating it to the end of his speech following his statements on the economy, but the importance to the TAR authorities of the ideological struggle against separatists was emphasised elsewhere by official bodies, including the CPPCC.

Committee expels Tibetans for "harmful activities"

The highly unusual expulsion of two Tibetans from the CPPCC Regional Committee was announced on 27th April at a meeting of the Committee's standing committee presided over by Phagpalha Geleg Namgyal (known as Pagbalha Geleg Namgyai in Chinese), re-elected chairman of the CPPCC of the TAR. Dorje Dramdul was expelled from the CPPCC regional committee and its standing committee and Phuntsog from the CPPCC regional committee. Although the specific reasons for the expulsions are not known, the political explanation given by the committee was that the two men had been involved in activities "which are harmful to Tibet's stability and in serious violation of the CPPCC constitution".

The expulsions, unprecedented in recent years, indicate that the authorities are maintaining a hardline stance on the political attitudes of cadres and are seeking to set an example to other regional officials who might be secretly disloyal to the Party. The most high-profile expulsion from the CPPCC in recent years was that of Chadrel Rinpoche who, as head of the search team for the 11th Panchen Lama, was subsequently charged with "plotting to split the country". On 22 May 1996, Chadrel Rinpoche was expelled from the Sixth TAR CPPCC and removed from his position as vice-chairman. He was sentenced to six years in prison with his political rights deprived for three years. Samdrup, a Tibetan businessman involved in the case, also lost his position as a member of the standing committee of the regional Party committee and secretary of the Shigatse Prefectural CCP Committee. Samdrup was also imprisoned but according to unofficial reports he may now have been released.

Ragdi warned of the "problems" caused by cadres who privately supported the Dalai Lama in a speech to a conference on Regional Organisation and Personnel Work in Lhasa earlier this year. These "problems", he stated at the meeting on 10-11 January, were caused by some people who "sympathised with and supported the Dalai's secessionist statements and activities in their minds....or they looked upon religion as something sacred and the Dalai as someone supreme in the depths of their hearts though they were party members or even leading cadres". Ragdi's comments, reported in the Tibet Daily of 12 January, were the latest steps in the "total war" against the Dalai Lama that he had launched late last year. As he said in a speech shown on Tibet TV on 26 November 1997: "We must recognise that Tibet's most extraordinary circumstance lies in the existence of the struggle against the Dalai clique....We must declare a total war - in thinking and theory and in the ideological realm - on the Dalai and his separatist force

s. This is the ideological and political foundation for Tibet to advance to the new century." A week before, during a meeting of the Fifth TAR CCP Committee on 20 November (reported in Tibet Daily on 26 November), Buchung (Buqiong in Chinese), Secretary of the regional Discipline Commission, had also

criticised cadres who sided with the Dalai Lama.

The Tibet regional CPPCC led by Phagpalha Geleg Namgyal closed its recent conference with a denunciation of the Dalai Lama. The fifty-eight year old Tibetan Phagpalha, who is from Sichuan, was reported by Tibet TV on 16 May as saying: "CPPCC members and organisations at all levels in Tibet should take an unequivocal stand in continuing to expose and criticise the Dalai Lama. We should bring into play the CPPCC's strengths in assisting Party committees and governments to conduct publicity exposing the Dalai clique's reactionary nature so as to educate cadres and the masses to see through the disguises and illusions created by the Dalai clique".

Phagpalha also stated that the CPPCC, which is mainly expected to give public endorsement to all China's political policies in Tibet, should play a more active role in the reform and development of the TAR. The CPPCC committees at all levels should play active roles in the region's economic and democratic development, he told the conference (Xinhua, 17 May).

New batch of cadres to Tibet

Six hundred and twenty one Chinese cadres are returning to their provinces after serving in Tibet for three years. They will be replaced by a second group of 637 officials, according to Xinhua on 28 May. The new cadres will work for three years in 44 cities or counties in the TAR. Some cadres from Shandong province and Shanghai have already arrived in Shigatse.

The first group of cadres were described by Ragdi at a meeting last year (25 March 1997) as: "young, highly educated and of good political quality". The Tibet Daily of 24 April 1997 reported him as saying of the group that they had "provided an injection of fresh blood into the ranks of the cadres in Tibet and added a new vitality". According to Ragdi, 615 specialist technical personnel had also been sent to the TAR between 1995 and 1997, while 507 Tibetan cadres had been accepted to go to inland Chinese provinces for training. "It is only by uniting closely with brotherly nationalities within the great family of the Chinese nation that the Tibetan people will be able to develop, progress and be prosperous," Ragdi told the meeting, which was aimed at making arrangements for the new cadres. "To implement the Party's general plan for governing Tibet and for border strategy, it is important properly to carry out the work of cadres,

staff and workers entering Tibet and to retain in Tibet a long-serving and stable contingent of cadres, staff and workers of Han and other nationalities."

Formal plans for officials to be sent from inland government departments to work for a fixed period in different areas of the TAR were drawn up at the Third National Forum on Work in Tibet held in Beijing in July 1994. One of the aims of the scheme was to increase unity in the TAR and cement ties between Tibet and other provinces. According to Xinhua on 27 May, more than 110,000 cadres have joined the "aid-Tibet" work since 1951.