At least 13 villagers - including three members of an election supervising body - have been detained and others are on the run almost a month after a dispute over the election of the village chief of Raolefu, a rural area on the outskirts of Beijing.
The trouble occurred on the evening of July 27 when villagers waiting for the result noticed that 51 ballots were missing in the final count of the election battle between challenger Song Jianzhong , who needed just five more votes to beat incumbent village chief and Communist Party secretary Wei Jiandong .
The villagers demanded a recount but Wei said no and ordered police to remove the ballot boxes. About 500 angry villagers blocked the doors until the next day. Local election officials promised to give an explanation, but it never came.
The stand-off ended around 2pm the next day when more than 200 regular police and riot police arrived to remove the ballot boxes. During the incident, four villagers were detained, allegedly for blocking a highway, an accusation the villagers deny.
Under mainland law, direct elections are held only for village leaders and local people's congresses. Other elections - for sending deputies to the legislature or the next level - are done by the people's congresses, which are controlled by the party.
In the ensuing weeks, nine more villagers were detained, including three election committee members and a villager who were taken away yesterday.
Liu Jinfu , chairman of the election committee, was among those detained yesterday. Liu called Wei a liar and said the election committee was blocked by Wei and the police from verifying the ballots. Another villager, Ma Huimei , was taken away last Thursday.