Comment

No tears for cheated cheaters

By Earle Gale (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-03-17 07:56

My patience wore as thin as Donald Trump's comb-over after I read recently about people who ran to the authorities in search of justice after their own attempts to beat the system left them out-of-pocket.

There have been dozens of these sorts of incidents recently but two stories tipped me over the edge and made me want to write about the issue.

The latest story was in the March 9 edition of METRO and told of the many "victims" of a gang of so-called lottery scammers.

The gang allegedly advertised in the media, offering people the chance to fork over 6,000 yuan each and get "must win" lottery numbers in return.

With hindsight being such perfect vision, it's hard to believe anyone would be dumb enough to fall for such a ruse but apparently lots of people were because the gang reportedly pocketed 2.9 million yuan as a result.

The so-called scammers - there were 11 in the gang - boasted in their ad that they had an "expert squad" working in the welfare lottery center.

Clearly, every one of the "victims" of this gang thought they were buying into a scam - they just wrongly thought they would be on the winning side of the equation.

Well, I'm sorry but I think each and every one of you got exactly what you deserved.

You thought you were smart enough to beat the system and cheat your way to millions and, in the end, you were so dumb that you were tricked out of your money by a gang that was allegedly led by a 35-year-old migrant worker from Hunan province who had only completed a junior school education.

While this gang and its leader may deserve some jail time for the venture - the matter is still before the courts - I think the "victims" should be charged as well.

After all, they thought they were paying to participate in a scam to rip-off one of China's national lotteries and essentially steal from all the people who play the game fairly and in good faith.

The other story that ticked me off in METRO's pages recently was the one in which a group of migrant workers were claiming that they had been ripped off by the daughter of a well-known Chinese geology academician.

Again, the so-called victims were crying to the authorities about money they claimed they had lost. Again, the money was cash they had spent in a bid to cheat.

In this case, the four "victims" said they handed over 1 million yuan to Liu Feifei, daughter of Liu Jiaqi, a prominent member of the Institute of Geology and Geophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences.

The victims claimed Liu told them she could arrange for them to have the winning bid in the race to secure a prospecting license in Inner Mongolia.

Liu, it must be said, vehemently denies the allegations, which were made to the police and in the public arena on the Internet.

She is hitting back at the so-called victims, suing them for violating her privacy and damaging her father's reputation. The matter is before the courts.

Whether the claims of the four "victims" are proved in court or not will not change the way I feel about them. They are parasites.

Either they are liars who are ruining a respectable man's good name with barefaced lies or they are low-lifes who tried to cheat their way into winning what was supposed to have been a transparent bidding process for a prospecting license.

Either way, they should be in some sort of trouble.

It's no secret that one of the challenges faced by this great nation at the moment is that of corruption.

And that the back scratching and favor-currying that goes on is stopping China from reaching its full potential.

People who try to get ahead by paying for special treatment are as guilty as those who take the money.