Poor life under rule of Dalai Lama

Lobsang, a former Tibetan serf who began to drive a donkey-drawn wagon for a feudal lord at the age of 15, is satisfied with his life which has been getting better "day by day" since the democratic reform in Tibet in 1959.

"We lived a dog's life under the rule of the Dalai Lama. Now we're the master of Tibet, and our life is improving day by day," said 63-year-old Lobsang, who is here attending the on-going annual session of China's top legislature, the National People's Congress (NPC), as a deputy.

More and more Tibetan people have come to see the true color of the Dalai Lama and his clique, he said, adding "None of us is willing to return to the dark days."

Lobsang recalled the day his father was beaten to death by the feudal lord, or serf owner, simply because he could not repay 36 kg of grain owed to the lord. Lobsang was 12 years old that year.

Life becomes better and better

The former serf is now head of a neighborhood committee in a residential quarter at the foot of the Potala Palace. There are 1,800 people living in Lobsang's residential quarter, one of the 28 residential areas in Lhasa, capital of the Tibet Autonomous Region.

Living in new houses

The residents live in two- or three-storeyed Tibetan style houses built at the expense of the local government and have access to power and tap water supply and paved roads.

"Some places around our houses are as beautiful as in Beijing," he said.

Income on rise

He said 550 of the 1,800 residents work for a dozen enterprises each with an annual income of more than seven million yuan (US$ 840,000), and 300 more others run their own businesses, with 23 of them engaged in transportation with their own motor vehicles.

"The per capita net income of the people in my neighborhood is 3,900 yuan (US$ 470) a year, 99 percent of the families have TV sets, and 40 percent of them have access to telephone and mobile communications service," Lobsang said.

Children have school to go

The primary school in the neighborhood, with 1,100 students, is the biggest in Lhasa, and all the kids of school age there have access to schooling. As it is in other schools in Lhasa, the children learn Tibetan and Chinese languages as well as English.

Living conditions better than what Dalai Lama claimed

According to Lobsang, some of his neighbors have relatives living abroad. Every time they return from trips to see their overseas relatives, they say the living conditions of their relatives are far poorer than in Tibet and many of them want to get back.

"The people in my neighborhood are disgusted with the Dalai Lama's claim that the life is not good in Tibet today," Lobsang said. "They say the so-called independence the Dalai Lama has been advocating is not for the Tibetan people, but for the serf owners."

( People's Daily March 11, 2002)