Chinese Marchers Honor Reformer : Pro-Democracy Rallies for Hu Yaobang Biggest Since ’87

In the biggest pro-democracy demonstrations since early 1987, thousands of students staged rallies and marches in Beijing on Monday and today in honor of Communist Party reformist Hu Yaobang, who died Saturday of a heart attack.

About 4,000 students from Beijing University and the People’s University of China held pro-democracy rallies at their campuses and in nearby streets in northwestern Beijing late Monday night.

Early this morning, about 2,000 students made a four-hour march to Tian An Men Square in central Beijing, carrying a banner that read: “Forever cherish the memory of Comrade Yaobang, the Soul of China.”

The students chanted slogans, including “Long live democracy” and “Down with corruption.” Upon reaching the massive square, they hung the 40-foot-long cloth banner next to wreaths honoring Hu at the Monument to the People’s Heroes.

Students in Shanghai also held pro-democracy memorial marches, according to reports from that city.

Hu, widely viewed as the most liberal member of the top Communist Party leadership, was dismissed from his post as head of the party two years ago for failing to suppress pro-democracy student demonstrations. He was allowed to remain on the policy-setting Politburo, but he ceased making public statements and did not appear to exercise significant power.

In the pre-dawn today, a young man who helped hang the banner on the monument shouted out a list of student demands: that the government re-evaluate Hu and give him proper credit for his accomplishments, that the government apologize for mistakes made in the course of reforms, that unspecified government leaders collectively resign and that Chinese citizens be allowed democracy and freedom.

Members of the crowd shouted out support and added demands for freedom of speech and press.

Speakers called for the students to remain in the square through the morning rush hour to press their demands. Hundreds appeared willing to comply, and groups sat down on the pavement to wait. Police monitored the march and rally but did not interfere.

Around sunrise, about 200 remaining students moved to the sidewalk in front of the Great Hall of the People, which faces the square, to stage a sit-in to press a revised list of demands: public disclosure of income of national leaders, a formal rejection of the two major anti-liberal political campaigns of the 1980s and rehabilitation of their victims, increased funding for education, abolition of restrictions on street marches, plus freedom of speech and press--and the original demand for a reassessment of Hu.

At noon, the students were still sitting in front of the Great Hall, looking tired and somewhat sullen. They were surrounded by hundreds of curious onlookers, a few of whom shouted out support.

The first major street demonstration after Hu’s death came Monday afternoon, when about 500 students from Beijing’s University of Politics and Law marched to the square to lay a wreath at the monument. They thrust their fists in the air and shouted “Long live Hu Yaobang, long live democracy, long live freedom.”

Thousands Watched

This rally quickly swelled to more than 1,000 participants, with several thousand onlookers. Hundreds of students remained at the monument throughout the evening, making short speeches advocating freedom and democracy.

Even before Hu’s death, authorities were worried that students would stage pro-democracy rallies late this month or in early May to mark the 70th anniversary of the May 4th Movement, a student-initiated campaign for democracy and science that began with a protest on May 4, 1919.

It was not clear whether the protests inspired by Hu’s death have peaked or whether they might continue to grow. So far, authorities have not taken strict steps to stop them, even though they have been unauthorized and thus illegal. Most of the dozens of wallposters praising Hu and democracy that have gone up at several campuses since Saturday were still up.

Students at the rallies appeared to be only slightly frightened by the heavy presence of plainclothes police. Several dozen of the officers could be easily picked out at the Monday afternoon and evening rallies, with a smaller number apparent this morning.

These officers, many of whom make no real attempt to hide their identity, play the role of reminding all present that they may be held responsible for their words or actions. Activist students, for example, may later be criticized in private by school officials, or they may experience difficulties in winning good job assignments after graduation.

This factor didn’t prevent a host of sharp anti-government barbs.

“He (Hu) wasn’t so very great, but he was greater than those who are alive now,” declared a young man in a fashionable black jacket at the Monday evening rally in the square. “When Hu Yaobang was in power, the Chinese people had hope. But now?”