China population: officials punished after allowing a family to violate one-child policy by having 15 children

China has punished 11 public officials after revelations they allowed a family to have 15 children in violation of population controls

The couple had four boys and 11 girls between 1995 and 2016 due to the local government’s ineffective family planning

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Chinese officials have been punished for allowing a couple to have 15 children over two decades. Photo: Baidu

Published: 6:05pm, 21 Mar 2022

Authorities in southern China have penalised 11 officials for allowing a couple to have 15 children over two decades after the large family aroused suspicion amid a public outcry over women forced to marry and bear children.

Liang Er, 77, and Lu Honglan, 47, from a poverty-stricken village in Rongxian county, Guangxi autonomous region, had four boys and 11 girls between 1995 and 2016 due to the local government’s ineffective family planning, the Guangxi government said in a statement on Sunday.

During the period concerned, China allowed each family to have just one child and later changed it to two. It has so far relaxed the limit to three in wake of a falling birth rate and an ageing population.

Fathered 15 children in breach of China’s strict population control laws. Photo: Baidu

The couple is not officially registered as husband and wife, but they have lived together and had the children by mutual consent, said the statement. It was issued in response to public suspicion that Lu might have been forced to do so after the high-profile chained woman case in Jiangsu province triggered an uproar over the state of disadvantaged women, especially in rural China.

In that case, 17 officials in Jiangsu were sacked, punished or were under investigation after a mentally-ill woman was found chained up by the neck by her husband, who bought her in 1998 and then had eight children with her, triggering widespread anger.

The case prompted the Ministry of Public Security to launch a nationwide operation earlier this month to check on women and children without identity details, especially those who are homeless or mentally or physically handicapped.

Authorities said the woman had not been sold or trafficked and the children were all healthy. Photo: Baidu

The Liang family became famous online as early as 2016 for the unusual number of children and the poverty this caused the family and triggered a new round of controversy recently amid the domestic slavery crackdown.