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Tibet's governor, top legislator set to resign

By Lucy Hornby | Reuters

Qiangba Puncog, chairman of the Tibet Autonomous Regional Government, in a file photo taken on 10 January 2009. Qiangba has tendered his resignation to step down from the post, according to China’s state-owned media.Xinhua/China

The governor of Tibet has tendered his resignation, Chinese state-owned media said on Tuesday, as Beijing convened a meeting to spur economic growth and quell dissatisfaction in the region.

Qiangba Pingcuo [pronounced Jampa Phuntsok], an ethnic Tibetan, was governor during demonstrations by Tibetans in their capital, Lhasa, that turned deadly on 14 March 2008.

The report by Xinhua did not give a reason for his resignation, which can also indicate a person is slated for another post.

“Everyone is looking to see whether an official will be made to pay for the policy failures indicated by the events of the spring of 2008,” said Robbie Barnett, a Tibet scholar at Columbia University in New York.

The Xinhua report did not indicate whether Qiangba’s resignation would be accepted, or who his replacement would be. He is 62, three years shy of China’s mandatory retirement age.

“Qiangba was seen as one of the heavier people in the administration, but not as someone who initiates policies,” Barnett added.

His resignation came as China convened a major policy conference on Tibet, that stressed increased industrial development and investment from Beijing as well as continued controls on religious institutions.

The most powerful official in Tibet is party secretary Zhang Qingli, a Han Chinese. Both Zhang and Qiangba were in Beijing when the 2008 demonstrations broke out.

The emphasis on greater investment at the meeting implies that China is recognising some of the economic causes of discontent by Tibetans, many of whom feel that Chinese migrants have benefitted more from large projects, including mining and a train line to Lhasa.

Tibetans demanded greater religious and civil freedoms during demonstrations in March 2008 in towns across the plateau, that China officially blamed on exiled Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama.

Also leaving his post is Legchok, the head of the People’s Congress in Tibet, Xinhua said. An ethnic Tibetan and former governor, Legchok turned 65 in October.

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