Beijing Faces Criticism, Doubt After Floods

Beijing faced criticism after the devastation of deadly floods over the weekend as well as some doubts around the official death toll.

Saturday\'s floods, the result of the heaviest rain the city has seen in six decades, led to more than 10 billion yuan ($1.6 billion) in damages, state media reported. As of Monday night, the official toll of flood-related deaths remained at 37, unchanged from Sunday.

Although that number initially struck many as high for a city that prides itself on world-class infrastructure, the scale of damage in areas outside the city center, combined with persistent doubts among some Internet users about the veracity of Chinese disaster statistics, led to some speculation that the actual death toll is higher.

In contrast to the city center, which appeared almost back to normal on Monday, parts of hard-hit Fangshan district on the southern outskirts were still struggling to dig themselves out on Monday.

In the mountains above the town of Zhoukoudian, roughly 60 kilometers southwest of downtown Beijing, floodwaters had washed away several bridges, taken out long stretches of road, and turned a previously dry riverbed into a frothy stream littered with chunks of concrete, dead pigs and the chewed-up husks of at least seven cars. Photos of similar or worse devastation in nearby towns circulated online.

\'The death toll is definitely higher [than 37],\' said a man surnamed Li who was found standing by the side of the road in Shuangma Zhuang village next to a white sedan, its shape twisted by the waters. Mr. Li, who declined to provide his given name, said he was called to Shuangma Zhuang to identify the body of his older brother, who had been discovered inside the car when police pulled it out of the water on Monday afternoon.

As Mr. Li pointed to where police had sawed through the metal to remove his brother\'s body, a friend standing nearby also cast doubt on the official number. \'The government says 37 died. It\'s probably more like 370,\' he said.

A short way up the road, Wang Jinlei was pleading for help in locating his 25-year-old nephew, whose minivan he\'d found abandoned higher up in the mountains. \'More than a dozen members of my family are out searching for him. We\'ve looked everywhere,\' Mr. Wang, from Laishui county in nearby Hebei province, said while trying to convince an excavation crew to help him in his search.

Skepticism surrounding the death toll comes as the Beijing city government is already fielding criticism from residents and Internet users who are asking how a city that spent billions building facilities for the 2008 Olympics could struggle so in dealing with a thunderstorm. Urban areas of Beijing were hit with roughly nine inches of rain over 16 hours, causing lakes to form at intersections─some several meters deep─as the sewers were overwhelmed.

Reached by phone Monday, the city\'s spokeswoman, Wang Hui, said she agreed with Internet users\' comments that Beijing\'s sewer system wasn\'t equipped for the storm and said the city will work to improve it. \'We need to strengthen this area going forward,\' she said.

Beijing municipal propaganda authorities didn\'t immediately respond to a separate request for comment about the accuracy of the death toll.

State-run Xinhua news agency put the death toll from rain storms in the rest of China at 39, which appeared to mark Beijing as the region hardest hit by floods.

Ms. Wang said microblogs played a \'crucial\' role in dealing with the floods over the weekend. But even as she praised social media, flood-related posts that were critical of the government were disappearing online, the apparent victims of online censors.

Among their targets: a widely shared list of more than two dozen recent disasters, including fires and coal mine explosions, in which 37 people had died ─put forward as evidence of a theory that Chinese officials deliberately report death tolls less than 40 to avoid reprimand from central authorities. Its not clear whether any such death-toll threshold actually exists.

Controversy over the flood arrives at a sensitive time for Chinese authorities, who are trying to maintain social stability in the face of a slowing economy and looming leadership handover.

That such disruption is hitting Beijing is particularly problematic, as the capital is assumed by many to be country\'s most advanced and best protected city.

Beijing authorities attempted to head off criticism online, with Ms. Wang using her verified account on Sina Corp.\'s Weibo microblogging service to post messages about people helping strangers cross flooded streets. She also responded to complaints that police were leaving tickets for abandoned vehicles.

\'All such tickets will be made invalid,\' she said.

The more pressing issue for many, however, was the city\'s sewer system, which consistently gets overwhelmed by heavy rainfall. \'Beijing built its sewage system based on the model of Soviet Union,\' said Ming Jiang, director of environmental and ecological planning in China for Aecom, a technical and management-support services company. \'The main problem here is that the design standards were not up to scratch, which is made worse by lack of maintenance and upgrades.\'