After three decades of astonishing, double-digit economic growth, Guangdong party boss Wang Yang finally says it's time for people in the province - many struggling with high inflation, exorbitant taxes and unaffordable homes - to feel 'happy'.
'What does happiness mean? I've just searched it online and found 30 million results,' Wang told a plenary meeting of the Guangdong Communist Party committee early this month, after a quick search on his iPad. He vowed Guangdong would slow its annual economic growth rate from 12.5 per cent to 8 per cent in its next five-year plan in order to focus on 'real happiness' for its people.
Meanwhile, Chongqing party boss Bo Xilai , long regarded a political competitor, has vowed to hang on to the title of 'China's happiest city' by slowing its gross domestic product growth from 18 per cent to 12.5 per cent and focusing on people's livelihoods. The southwestern municipality was voted the mainland's happiest city last year after a year-long anti-triad campaign that resulted in the arrest of thousands of suspects.
One prominent Guangdong commentator poked fun at their ambitions. 'We have been ordered to be 'harmonious', and now they say we must be happy, too,' he said, adding that the 'Happy Guangdong' project was more like a thief shifting the public's attention by yelling: 'Catch the thief!'
The Southern Metropolis News, based in Guangzhou, has interviewed residents from seven major Guangdong cities. Most say incompetent government is the root cause of their unhappiness.
They say they'd feel happy when air pollution is reduced, inflation curbed, traffic jams eased, law and order improved, houses become affordable, government becomes transparent, and there is no more poisonous food, fake products or illegal land requisitions.