Brenda Goh and David Stanway

SHANGHAI, (Reuters) – Elizabeth Liu and her husband were thrilled to leave their Shanghai residence compound after more than a month. The entire compound, except one, had just been upgraded to low risk status after only 14 days with no COVID case.

She said that her husband donned a hazmat suit to go and pick up groceries at the supermarket as our house was considered a precautionary area. We should be allowed to leave, according to law.

The couple were then visited by two members of the compound’s residential board and police, who encouraged them to return home.

Liu quoted a policeman saying “Listen, neighbourhood committee”

Residential committees, also known in Chinese as “juweihui” or “juweihui”, are made up of volunteers, who get a daily allowance. They have been active during pandemics, helping authorities to conduct mass tests, deliver food to those in dire need, and enforce strict lockdowns.

As Shanghai’s control measures drag on for a sixth week now, many of Shanghai’s juweihui face public discontent. Residents accuse them of being too cautious and taking arbitrary, unjustified steps.

The current Shanghai guidelines state that residents are allowed to leave the area they have been assigned if this area is considered “precautionary,” but does not limit their ability to move.

Rules also stipulate that residents must only exercise their rights to “appropriate activity.” However, what activities they can engage in depends on where the juweihui is located. While Shanghai’s government records show that more than 70% are in the precautionary zone, many residents have been restricted from leaving their gates.

Residents complain also that committees don’t disclose what they are allowed to do and change the rules as needed.

“The juweihui can interpret citywide policies with lots of power, so I have seen lots of unevenness in the ground,” stated Yifei Li a sociologist and assistant professor at NYU Shanghai. He has spent the month under lockdown.

He said, “But the thing that frustrates me the most is when they continue to change their rules about what’s permitted and what’s forbidden.” This just increases the uncertainty in an already precarious situation.”

Shanghai refused to answer Reuters’ questions about how the juweihui had not enforced rules in a uniform manner. In a Wechat post posted April 12, the Shanghai government stated that every district was able to impose stricter restrictions depending on their circumstances.

CHPERONED TO SHOPS

Residential committee members were also subject to lockdown, which pushed them beyond their capabilities. Some members of the committee were even removed after they were named by Shanghai for their failure to prevent COVID.

It has been difficult,” stated a volunteer from juweihui in Shanghai’s large central compound. He refused to be identified. The lockdown was also not expected to last as long.

As the Communist Party tried to increase its power after the unrest, residential committees were created.

Although they are “autonomous”, the law states that the committees have the responsibility for state policy implementation and state propaganda. A clause in the law states that they must not “make orders by force”. This is a provision some residents feel gives them no authority to confine individuals within their own homes.

Frustration grows in the interim.

Residents in central Shanghai told Reuters that a volunteer from the committee said she could not grant permission for them to move out of their apartment, despite having been free from COVID throughout the epidemic.

A second group of people from Shanghai’s Pudong was permitted to go shopping at the supermarket, but they were escorted back by the chief of their residential committee and taken home about 45 minutes later. One resident laughedly called it a “school trip”.

NYU’s Li stated that the juweihui believe they are doing us a tremendous service by restrainting our freedom.