Concern as Tibetan Homes are Replaced with Chinese-style Buildings

By Mary Trewartha / October 7, 2021;

Reconstruction of houses in Matoe County
Photo: Tibet Watch

Reconstruction is taking place following the devastation caused by the earthquake in Matoe County [Ch:Maduo] of Golog Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in eastern Tibet earlier this year. There is concern that the buildings that are being constructed to replace the homes, schools and monasteries destroyed in the 7.4 magnitude earthquake are being rebuilt in Chinese style, not replaced with traditional Tibetan-style buildings. In addition, local reports tell of Tibetan buildings being demolished to make way for more Chinese-style buildings, reports Tibet Watch, the UK-Dharamshala based Tibet research and advocacy organisation.

Over 1,200 children have been relocated to distant boarding schools when their school was demolished and the situation has given rise to the opportunity to deny pupils Tibetan-language education.

In September this year, the Chinese authorities in started demolishing Lungkya monastery, an unidentified nunnery and a number of Tibetan homes as part of infrastructure reconstruction in the wake of the earthquake. The Tibet Watch report continues, saying that the demolitions are being carried out regardless of whether or not the houses were damaged by the earthquake. All the monks, nuns and residents were forced to temporarily take shelter in the newly built camps with steel roofs.

Opening ceremony of the first campus for the transitional placement of Primary and Secondary students of Matoe County
Photo: Tibet Watch

Tibet Watch’s local source said that they have been told about “rebuilding a better monastery and its assembly hall.” Tibet Watch’s source added, “Local residents worry about how long they might remain under the steel-roof shelters. The main concern of local people is that they are uncertain if the Chinese authorities would reconstruct the monastery and Tibetan homes after everything is torn down. Many homes were neither damaged nor affected by the earthquake but the authorities forced the residents of those unaffected homes to move to the camps along with others and even proceeded with demolishing the houses.”

Local residents have been warned by the authorities not to share or post any pictures, videos or updated information about the demolition and activities currently underway on social media for “security reasons”.

Matoe County’s first transitional post-earthquake school campus
Photo: Tibet Watch

Chinese state media coverage of the earthquake and its consequences have focussed on schoolchildren, saying that students are continuing their classes in disaster relief tents, and that transitional schools are opening. Tibetan parents in the region however remain concerned about the lack of education in Tibetan in these new boarding schools: the local policy is for bilingual education which prioritises the national language [Putonghua], and it is Putonghua which is the medium of instruction in classes with minority pupils. Many pupils are being sent out of their home area to attend boarding schools some distance away.

The Tibet Watch report comments that the“life of resettlement after resettlement remains rife with uncertainty about their homes, places of religious faith, and Tibetan education for their children”.