Hechi villager Lu Yu feels frustrated and angry that his forgotten village on the right bank of a tributary of the Pearl River has been left to deal on its own with the massive toxic metal spill in Guangxi.
Nearly a month after one of the worst cadmium contaminations on the mainland in decades, the 21-year-old and his parents, who make a living from fishing, still depend on the water from the polluted Longjiang for their livelihoods.
Lu says he has many questions about the pollution, which was caused by the illegal upstream dumping of industrial waste containing the little-known but life-threatening element, but that no one in the government bothers to hear him out or explain.
'We are worried and are very concerned about the health impact of the contamination,' said Lu, a migrant worker in Guangzhou. 'But no government officials have come to our aid, either by offering alternative water sources or by answering our questions.'
Like Lu, residents of Beiji in Yizhou city, under the jurisdiction of Hechi, also felt concerned about the government's seeming evasiveness. Many key questions have gone unanswered.
Some 200 Beiji villagers have accused Hechi authorities of deliberately denying the fact that their village was affected by the spill and keeping them in the dark about the health hazards posed by cadmium, one of the most toxic metals on earth.
Beiji villagers are particularly bitter that while they are left helpless, two villages sitting on the opposite river bank have enjoyed freshwater supplies and full media attention.