Human Right for Prisoners

From the very outset, I would like to point out that the term China here does not include Hong Kong and Macau.

Resulting from 1978 economic reform from a Soviet-style centrally planned economy to a more market-oriented economy, China’s economy is always on the upward spiral. Early 1990s is China’s economic heyday, resulted from foreign direct investment, trade integrations and other like privatizations.

Today, almost everyday, we hear about China’s increasing economy, surprisingly for the last two decades China is the fastest growing economy in the world.The economy of the People’s Republic of China is the fourth largest in the world when measured by nominal GDP. Its economic output for 2006 was $2.68 trillion USD. Its per capita GDP in 2006 was approximately US $2,000 and rising rapidly everyday. And it’s global trade exceeded $1.758 trillion at the end of 2006.

Resulting the above very practical economic facts, we can presume that China’s economy is becoming more and more civilized. However, its “human rights” issues are still very uncivilized; I dare to say China’s human rights/civil rights always never grow at all.

According to different credible sources, China’s human rights and civil rights abuses are still ubiquitous and systematic.Human rights violations in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) remain systematic and widespread. The Chinese government continues to suppress dissenting opinions and maintains political control over the legal system, resulting in an arbitrary and sometimes abusive judicial regime. The lack of accountability of the government and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) means that abuses by officials often go unchecked. This fact sheet identifies the most common types of abuses, including arbitrary detention, torture and ill-treatment of prisoners, severe restrictions on freedom of expression and association and violations specific to women.

Until today, freedom of expression and opinion, press freedom, freedom of religions, rights of the minority groups and other democracy-oriented freedoms are still systematically and ubiquitously restricted. Despite this modern time and its praiseworthy economic growth, Chinese government still embraces its barbarian natures: capital punishment, organ harvesting and extrajudicial execution, racial/political discrimination, and other systematic human rights and civil rights abuses.

It now comes to the time that China needs to balance its economic growth to its human rights and civil rights issues. No matter how strong will its economy be, Chinese government is still barbarian, as long as its people’s human rights and civil rights are still systematically and ubiquitously violated.

Nelson Mandela is unquestionably South Africa’s most beloved leader, and the country’s most internationally recognised person. He is a hero to all those who believe in human rights and racial equality, and he is an inspiration to people who still live under oppressive governments. In the city of Cape Town Nelson Mandela is also a major tourist attraction.

Notorious Prison

Of course, people do not come to Cape Town to actually see the great man himself. Mandela is in his nineties, and lives in quiet retirement. But they do go there to take the ferry boat out to Robben Island, site of the notorious prison that was Mandela’s home for 18 years. For many visitors, this trip is more like a pilgrimage. Robben Island is a bleak, windswept outcrop of sand and limestone, covering just twelve square kilometers. It was here that Mandela, having been sentenced to life imprisonment on a conviction of treason because of his opposition to apartheid, laboured in the limestone quarries with criminals and other political prisoners. Of the tiny cell in which he was kept, Mandela wrote in his autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom, “I could walk the length of my cell in three paces… When I lay down, I could feel the wall with my feet, and my head grazed the concrete at the other side.” Even in prison the rules of apartheid applied. Black prisoners were allowed less meat in their rations than Asian prisoners. Not one to let stone walls and iron bars imprison his spirit, Mandela, who was a lawyer, educated other inmates, and even some guards. He and his fellow prisoners often looked across the water at Table Mountain towering above Cape Town for inspiration.

A Shrine

To many of the visitors who come over from Cape Town, Mandela’s old cell is like a shrine. It has been left just as it was when he was finally taken out of it to be transferred to another prison. The door is kept locked, so visitors can only look in, but other cell doors are open for anyone who wants to step inside and get the experience of being in a claustrophobic cage. As you wander around the island and feel the cold wind that continually blows up from the Antarctic, you keep in mind that the prisoners were never allowed to wear anything but light clothing.

Marketing Mandela

Cape Town, and South Africa in general, have been actively marketing Mandela; not all of which activity meets with his personal approval. Gift shops in Cape Town sell a Presidential Collection of shirts; that is, shirts designed like the ones he wore during his presidency. A hot item for tourists returning to Cape Town from Robben Island are tee shirts emblazoned with “466/64″, Mandela’s prison number. In Nobel Square at the V&A Waterfront Complex, visitors can see a statue of Mandela, along with South Africa’s other Nobel Prize winners; Desmond Tutu, F.W. de Klerk, and Albert Luthuli.