Elderly man in China demands daughter’s child take his surname as he provides for whole family or he will ‘die’
- It is uncommon but legal for children to take their mother’s surname instead of their father’s in China
- According to the Ministry of Public Security’s yearly report on names, around 7.7 per cent of newborns in 2020 took their mother’s surname
A man who supports his daughter’s family has demanded his granddaughter adopt his surname as the price of his support.
The man’s daughter, from Shanghai in eastern China, called a local family conflict resolution programme on July 16 to complain about her father’s demands.
“I have recently been hounded to death by my father,” the woman, whose name was withheld to protect her identity, told a mediator. “My child is already 10 years old, but my father insists on changing her surname to his, or he claims he will die,” she said.
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According to the woman, her family of three rely on her father for food and housing.
“My father feels exploited as his granddaughter does not have his surname,” the mother told the mediator.
Many people online expressed support for the grandfather, saying his request was “fair.”
“It appears that the son-in-law is unwilling to lose any advantage,” one person commented.
“He (the son-in-law) doesn’t have the means to provide for his family’s basic needs, but he doesn’t want his daughter to take the surname of the person who does.”
Another said: “Adopting her grandfather’s surname is the same as adopting her mother’s surname, which makes perfect sense.”
Under Chinese law, a child can take either the surname of their father or mother.
There have been cases of children taking surnames from their maternal side in some high-profile Chinese households.
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Meng Wanzhou, also known as Cathy Meng, and her younger half-sister, Annabel Yao, for example, do not bear the surname of their father, Ren Zhengfei, the founder and CEO of tech giant Huawei.
According to Wang Xuming, a former president of a local district court in Shanghai, the biggest concern for children adopting either their mothers’ or fathers’ surnames is family unity.
“When parents choose surnames for their children, we primarily consider family harmony so that there is no conflict in the families,” Wang explained.
“There are various solutions available, such as using double-barrelled names as the child’s surname.”
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Following the implementation of the two-child policy in mainland China in 2016, more families with two children choose to allow one child to adopt the father’s surname and the other the mother’s.
According to the Ministry of Public Security’s yearly report on names, 7.7 per cent of newborns in 2020 took their mother’s surname. In certain major cities, such as Shanghai, the number is greater, with 8.8 per cent of babies taking their mother’s surname in 2018.
