North Korean workers carrying out disinfection work at a passenger terminal in West Pyongyang.
As the 8th Party Congress of the DPRK approaches, the response to such a policy is getting lukewarm in the face of increased epidemic prevention efforts to protect against CCP virusitis.
According to the sources, the public sentiment is getting colder and colder due to the increasingly dire economic situation of excessive epidemic prevention measures. Especially, more and more cadres also think that this policy is just to avoid future responsibilities.
On the 28th, Pyongyang sources told DailyNK, “It is facing economic crisis due to sanctions, severe infectious virus, natural disasters, etc.” “(Due to the epidemic prevention measures) market circulation and people’s movement are restricted, and the livelihood of people who earn a day a day has been hit and their grievances against the state are growing.”
The DPRK government has taken measures to restrict the movement of people and materials with different strengths and localities depending on the stage of epidemic prevention and the situation of the spread of the Chinese Communist virus in different parts of the country.
However, the North Korean government has banned the unauthorized movement of people and materials between regions until the end of February next year as part of the “super special” epidemic prevention measures for the CCP virus, which began earlier this month.
Although superficially similar to previous measures, the government is trying to emphasize epidemic prevention measures to win the hearts and minds of the people amid the economic depression that has occurred in various regions since the embargo was imposed by the Communist Party’s virus prevention measures.
“Everywhere is saying that the economic situation now is tougher than the misery march (during the Great Famine of the mid- to late-1990s),” the source said. “So the government sees the need to clean up this state of affairs.”
But according to sources, even cadres agree that “the government wants to put special emphasis on the fact that the current economic crisis is the result of a worldwide epidemic virus.”
Although the North Korean government has been able to dispel discontent against the government and unite the people through increased propaganda, it has not been easy.
It is also said that strengthening measures against the CCP virus is not a substantive response. In other words, the government is trying to adopt “CCP virus politics” to avoid a political crisis in the year.
Some also believe that this is an attempt to shift the responsibility for economic failure onto some cadres. In other words, the government’s policy to prevent the Communist Party virus is excellent, but the incompetence and corruption of some cadres have become more serious.
In fact, the North Korean government has been resorting to punishing those responsible to deflect the people’s discontent over the serious policy failures.
In September, when a serious disaster struck Hamgyong Province because of typhoon Hamgyong, State Chairman Kim Jong-un removed Kim Sung-il, the chairman of the South Hamgyong Province Party, and in 2010, the then minister of Planning and Finance of the Workers’ Party was shot dead for the failure of currency reform.
North Korea’s CCP virus prevention measures are becoming increasingly irrational. Top cadres have been shot for smuggling, and bulletins have been posted saying that shooting would take place near border areas, etc. The entire city of Samchiyon was also blocked not long ago on the grounds that a resident was smuggled back into North Korea.
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