Vice-president stresses integrity, says analyst, but Beijing not about to loosen its grip Beijing leaders are using yesterday's commemoration of late party secretary Hu Yaobang to educate party members, one veteran China-watcher says. 'The speech by Vice-President Zeng Qinghong has asserted [Hu Yaobang's] work and his integrity,' Hong Kong-based Johnny Lau Yui-siu said. 'It has also served to address the issue of declining party discipline as well as to urge members to learn from Hu. 'The Chinese leadership also wants to take the opportunity to bolster their credibility.' Mr Lau said there were growing calls from party elders to redeem Hu as soon as possible. But, he said, the move did not signal further easing of the party's controls on political freedom. 'The leadership does not want to see a domino effect which might eventually lead to full-scale vindication of the June 4 incident.' Messages linked to Hu flooded popular mainland-based online bulletin boards yesterday, but officials regularly shut them down, allowing only infrequent access. Some messages praised Hu for clearing obstacles on China's reform path and for his contribution in rehabilitating cadres and officials purged in the Anti-Rightist Movement and the Cultural Revolution. Others praised him for his honesty and called him the 'Conscience of the Communist Party'. One message read: 'Justice often comes late but it will come eventually.' Exiled student leader Wang Dan , meanwhile, said in an article that although Hu lost the political struggle 16 years ago, he was widely remembered by the people. 'They [officials] won in the political turmoil in 1987, but lost to Hu Yaobang,' Mr Wang wrote, referring to Hu's dismissal for promoting the western ideas of democracy and rule of law in the mid-1980s. 'Today, there are too many pragmatic people who can calculate and are smart in China. But we are short of people who have ideals and integrity. Let's hope that the mention of Hu Yaobang can wake us up.' Bao Tong , who was a top aide to purged party leader Zhao Ziyang , said Hu's spirit should be integrated into China's politics and literature. 'The spirit of Yaobang should be incorporated into China's politics and literature to eradicate dictatorship, corruption, hypocrisy and the suffocating atmosphere in the party,' he wrote in an article to commemorate Hu. 'We should nurture more people like Hu Yaobang but not to destroy someone like him.' Faced with forces of graft in the party, Hu confronted the problem rather than ignoring it, he wrote. Mr Bao, whose telephone has been cut for months, wrote that Hu had tried hard to discourage party members from blindly adhering to the party line. 'If it's a misjudged case, even if the verdict is handed down by Mao Zedong , Hu would not just look on without intervening.' Mr Bao was jailed for seven years after the 1989 crackdown and remained under surveillance after his release.