Chinese education officials sacked for investigating four-year-olds in anti-mafia crackdown
- Parents in Jiangsu province were shocked by a form that said a kindergarten class had been investigated and ‘no pupils were found to be involved in organised crime’
- Officials fired or disciplined for ‘causing serious negative publicity’
Education officials in eastern China have been sacked or disciplined after targeting kindergarten pupils in a crackdown on organised crime.
Residents in Wuxi, a city in Jiangsu province, were shocked when a note saying that 35 pupils aged four and five at Xinguang Kindergarten had been investigated as part of the wider crackdown on mafia-style gangs was leaked online.
The form, signed by two teachers, concluded: “No pupils were found to be involved in organised crime”.
Copies of the document started circulating on social media, triggering a widespread backlash and ridicule.
Some social media users accused the kindergarten of box-ticking and questioned whether staff would have been capable of discovering whether any parents were involved in organised crime.
One said that if officials really wanted to nip criminal tendencies in the bud, they were starting too late, adding: “Why not start when they are in the womb and crack down in the maternity hospital?”