I graduated from college in 1989, the year of the Tiananmen Square Massacre in Beijing.

Then-leader Jiang Zemin dictated that every company and work unit must require new hires to write a statement saying that they were opposed to the student movement, the student movement was a riot manipulated by a few people with ulterior motives, and that they support the Chinese Communist Party's brutal suppression of the student movement. If we didn't write such a statement, no agency could hire us. My parents lived in the countryside and were impoverished. It was difficult for them to support my education. I needed to find a job to support my family. I was forced to write this statement, which had been put in my permanent personal file held by the local Public Security Bureau.

However, I actually participated in the student demonstrations and was quite supportive of the student movement's efforts. I wrote the statement only for survival. Because the statement was written against my will, I have felt greatly bothered and humiliated for a long time.

I thank The Epoch Times' website for giving me a chance to speak the truth. Here I would like to solemnly state that the statement contained in my permanent personal file is annulled. It did not reflect my true feelings. I call on those Chinese people with conscience to step forward to encourage the government to change its verdict on the student movement. I also hope the tens of thousands of college and vocational school graduates from that year could publicly make a statement about this. Of course, everyone is entitled to his or her own freedom of thought. Those who truly agreed with the CCP on the massacre also have the right to maintain their own positions.

When I was in my teens and had little understanding of society, I joined the Communist Youth League. I would like to declare my withdrawal from that organization as well. At work, I play an important role, and the local CCP branch also tried to convince me to join the Party. However, as I thought about how tens of thousands of people died from the CCP's riots and wars prior to 1949, how innocent business owners and farmers were killed right after 1949, how tens of millions were starved to death in the late 1950s during the Great Leap Forward movement, how the CCP treated people like pigs and dogs during the Cultural Revolution (1966 – 1976), how the Open and Reform policy created many corrupt officials yet the ordinary people still lived in poverty, and how it has consistently banned people from speaking their minds, including on the Internet, I had to say no to the CCP.

I truly hope that freedom of speech, democracy, rule of law, and a multi-partisan political system can be soon established in China. I will try my best to help achieve progress no matter how much pressure and threat I receive from the Chinese government.

By Li Fang
Mainland China

December 9, 2007