Gansu · Full chronicle and history

On October 30, a netizen posted a video claiming that a calculus teacher at Lanzhou Jiaotong University, upon seeing a student using a mobile phone during class, walked off the podium and called the student's parent on the spot, hoping for parental assistance in discipline, which sparked heated discussion among netizens.

On October 25, a netizen in Gansu posted a video titled "Who Isn't a Good Taxpaying Citizen," listing one by one the various tax rates embedded in everyday consumption such as food, utilities, transportation, home purchases and car buying, sparking heated discussion in the comments over hidden tax burdens.

On October 23, a netizen posted to expose that a university dormitory in Lanzhou, Gansu supplies electricity in four time slots per day, totaling 16.25 hours of power cuts, with a unified dormitory check at 21:30 pm prohibiting late returns; the class circulated a notice about students leaving evening self-study early, and warned that violators would not be considered for Party or Communist Youth League membership recommendations for the time being, and their grants would be reduced or even canceled.

Zhou Lubao, who had actively participated in public discussions and helped workers demand unpaid wages, was sentenced by a Lanzhou court to 14 years in prison for extortion. Netizens posted lamenting that the one who fought for others' wages was instead heavily punished.

According to Sound of Hope, a truck driver loaded with grapes recently got into a dispute with staff at the Liuyuan Toll Station in Gansu after the weighbridge results were contested. The driver stated that the weight data showed significant discrepancies when passing through three consecutive lanes; in one lane, the screen displayed "not overloaded," yet the system still flagged it as overloaded. The driver questioned the accuracy of the toll station's weighbridge and expressed dissatisfaction.

According to Twitter account @GFWfrog, regarding the recent lead contamination incident in Tianshui, Gansu, local officials offered the explanation that the cause of the contamination was painting paint being poured into vegetables. The claim was described as covering one's ears while stealing a bell, intended to find a scapegoat to cover up the truth of the contamination, provoking public dissatisfaction and questioning.

According to a post by X user QuanLujun, a tragedy occurred in Gansu on October 17, 2026, in which a mother and her three children were all found dead by a neighbor. The poster noted that this happened on the same day as a similar incident in Zhengzhou, and criticized the Chinese Communist Party's grand narrative for covering up the desperate plight of people at the bottom of society.

On October 16, the Lanzhou Intermediate People's Court handed down the first-instance verdict in the 2025 Tianshui kindergarten lead poisoning case: Li Huifang, the person actually in charge of the kindergarten, was sentenced to life in prison; Zhu Jinglin, the executive principal, was sentenced to 15 years; and the remaining 4 were sentenced to 6 to 8 years. The court found that the kindergarten's managers had instructed staff to mix toxic and harmful non-food raw materials into children's food, and that all 6 were guilty of the crime of producing and selling toxic and harmful food.

On October 15, Chinese media outlet Gangu Rongmei posted a video titled "Coffee Robot Goes Live," showing a robot creating latte art. Taiwanese netizens compared the footage and found that it appeared to be a stolen original work by a Taiwanese latte artist that had been altered with AI, with obvious suspicious details such as no reflection on the metal on the robot's chest. The Taiwanese latte artist has come forward to accuse the outlet of unauthorized theft and alteration of her work.

On October 3, Xiaoxiang Morning News reported that a car owner from Gansu arrived at the Luotang service area on the Lanhai Expressway at 10 p.m. on September 30, and didn't manage to charge until 5 a.m. on October 1. With nighttime temperatures around 14°C, he didn't dare turn on the air conditioning, while another vehicle ran out of power and had to call a tow truck. At the Baolun service area in Sichuan, a car owner queued for 4.5 hours, charged to 75%, and then had to leave.

On September 28, Gansu market regulators released a penalty decision: from April 2023 to September 2024, Zhangjiachuan Zhongyuan Gas used gas cut-offs to force residents to buy designated gas hoses, bundling sales to 2,052 households in total, selling hoses that cost 6 yuan/meter for 50-60 yuan/meter; the 9 resident commitment letters submitted by the company were verified as having been written afterward as required, and cannot prove the absence of bundled sales.

According to a submission, Lanzhou Wanli Aviation Electromechanical has arranged for no holidays during the Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day as part of a "100-day sprint," without paying overtime wages.

On the night of September 16, 2026, urban residents in Longxi County, Dingxi City, Gansu Province, noticed what appeared to be night training by the Chinese Air Force overhead, which continuously released decoy flares. The related sounds and commotion affected the rest of nearby residents, with some residents expressing confusion as to why flares were being dropped above residential areas. Currently, the provided materials do not include any explanation from the military regarding the nature of the training, the reasons for the deployment, or the safety perimeter.

On the evening of September 16, residents of Longxi County, Dingxi City, Gansu Province captured footage of what appeared to be military aircraft conducting night training over the urban area and continuously releasing large quantities of suspected interference flares. Authorities did not specify the nature of the training, and netizens questioned why it was being carried out near residential areas.

From September 8 to 11, 2026, Vice Chairperson of the National People's Congress Tie Ning led a team to Gansu, conducting research on legislation for the protection of historical and cultural heritage from Tianshui to Jiayuguan. The NPC website released the news on September 14. During the research trip, two vice chairpersons of the Gansu Provincial People's Congress appeared, while Provincial Party Secretary Hu Changsheng and Acting Governor Kong Shaoxun both did not appear.

On September 10, it was revealed that the Cybersecurity and Informatization Office of a university in Gansu monitored students' VPN use via the campus network, not only listing the names of students who bypassed the firewall, but also precisely recording the duration of their access to foreign social media.

On September 11, the Chengguan District Court in Lanzhou delivered its first-instance verdict: migrant worker Jing Shuren was found guilty of nine counts of picking quarrels and provoking trouble for reposting posts demanding unpaid wages and debt collection, and was sentenced to 4 years; Zhou Lubao, a co-defendant, received 14 years for picking quarrels and provoking trouble and extortion. Jing Shuren was the only one of the seven defendants who had not taken a single cent. Prosecutors had recommended a sentence of 7 years and 6 months; after the charge of leading an evil force was dropped and he was reclassified as an accomplice, he was still sentenced to 4 years. All seven stated in court that they would appeal.

On September 11, 2026, Jiayuguan police in Gansu reported that the widely circulated story of a man being threatened after stopping financial support for students was a self-directed and self-performed act by Yao Moumou to gain followers. Previously, commentary from Duowei Media was taken offline and deleted.

On September 11, 2026, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection announced that Lei Siwei, former standing committee member of the Gansu Provincial Party Committee and vice governor of Gansu, was expelled from the Party and removed from public office. He is the first provincial- and ministerial-level official to be placed under investigation since this year's Two Sessions.

On September 5, 2026, multiple departments in Yuzhong County, Gansu issued a joint report on the results of the investigation into online claims that lettuce was being dyed, confirming that 6 vendors in the county had illegally used the food additive malachite green (guolv) to dye lettuce during purchasing, and that cases had been filed for investigation and punishment across the board.

On September 5, a netizen reported that dyed lettuce was found in Yuzhong County, Lanzhou, Gansu, one of the recent vegetable safety incidents to be exposed.

According to the source material, Gansu Governor Ren Zhenhe resigned on September 2. The announcement cited a change in work assignments, without stating where he was headed.

On September 2, 2026, Kong Xun, deputy director of the CCP Central Committee General Office, was transferred to acting governor of Gansu Province. Overseas sources claim the move is a promotion in name but a demotion in reality, to keep him from interfering with and monitoring the venue and affairs of the Fifth Plenary Session of the CCP Central Committee in October.

The New Gansu client reported that an expanded meeting of the Gansu Provincial Government Party Leadership Group was held, presided over by Kong Shaoxun. Kong previously served as deputy director of the CCP General Office.

On August 29, 2026, Kong Shaoxun, deputy director of the CCP Central Committee General Office, was transferred to serve as deputy secretary of the Gansu Provincial Party Committee and secretary of the leading Party members group of the Gansu Provincial Government; on September 2 he became acting governor, moving to a position at the full ministerial level. The video interprets this as Xi Jinping's faction losing its eyes and ears inside the General Office.

On August 25, 2026, in front of an office building of a China Railway Sixth Group engineering project in Lanzhou, Gansu, multiple construction workers gathered to demand unpaid wages. On-site video sparked netizen discussion about widespread wage arrears in the construction engineering industry.

Cheng Xiaobo, member of the Standing Committee of the CPC Gansu Provincial Committee and executive vice governor of Gansu Province, was announced under investigation on August 14.

On August 6, a netizen submitted a report saying that after students reported their school for starting the semester early to the 12345 hotline and the Education Bureau, the Education Bureau leaked the students' list to the school, and school leaders pressured the students according to the list, demanding that they withdraw their complaints.

On August 6, it was widely circulated online that two minors in Jishishan County, Gansu, repeatedly and brutally beat an elementary school student with a belt for several minutes, leaving the victim's face covered in blood and clothes soaked through, and continued chasing and beating the victim afterward.

A netizen in Gansu reported that some subdistrict residents' committees require ordinary residents to hand over their passports to grid workers for safekeeping; another netizen said that even the passports of temporary hospital staff were confiscated.

According to Southern Metropolis Daily, this 18-year-old girl from Gansu was previously betrothed by her parents without her knowledge. After receiving the bride price, her parents forcibly interrupted her schooling, prompting her to flee her hometown and go to Shenzhen to work.

In August 2026, several migrant workers from Henan posted videos exposing that they worked up to 15 hours a day picking goji berries in Yumen, Gansu under harsh conditions, and that when they tried to quit, their wages were docked and they were blocked from leaving.

On July 26, 2026, sudden rainstorms, flash floods and mudslides struck the Shuangshimen Scenic Area in Weiyuan County, Dingxi City, Gansu Province. Mud, sand and massive boulders instantly engulfed campsites and vehicles. Official reports say at least 10 people were killed and 23 injured.

A sudden flash flood caused by short-term heavy rainfall at the Shuangshimen Scenic Area in Weiyuan County, Dingxi, Gansu, has left 10 camping tourists dead and 23 injured.

On July 14, 2026, a large area of road surface suddenly collapsed in Qilihe District, Lanzhou, Gansu. A bus traveling normally fell into the sinkhole, and shortly after the incident, the road surface was hit by another secondary collapse hazard.

A severe landslide occurred in Dangchang County, Gansu Province, completely burying a village and resulting in 21 deaths. The anchor expressed deep sorrow over the incident and criticized the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) government for its negligence in disaster response and public welfare.

The Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes were decorated with red themes related to the 105th anniversary of the founding of the CCP, sparking discussion among netizens.

On June 13, 2026, a video posted online by a netizen in Gansu showed that when they used a China Telecom campus phone inside a school to dial the 110 emergency number, the device's screen displayed a message prohibiting calls to this number.

Rumors online say that Kong Shaoxun, former director of the Secretariat Bureau of the CCP Central Committee General Office, has been transferred to a post in Gansu.

The Lanzhou Institute of Biological Products applied on December 17, 2025 for a patent concerning the stable and large-scale production of the Yersinia pestis F1 antigen.

An official report on the Tianshui kindergarten lead poisoning incident claims it was caused by the kitchen cook making three-color sponge cake with painted dipping sauce, shifting the blame onto kitchen staff.

A netizen claiming that their cousin works in the kindergarten's kitchen said that the auntie in question earns less than 2,000 yuan a month, does not know what lead is, and has nothing to do with the supply chain or procurement, and that the authorities urgently need someone to take the blame.

Media reports say that in Jiayuguan, Gansu, a 14-year-old student was handed over by his parents to a non-professional surnamed Zhao, who had a criminal record, for discipline. Zhao and others took the boy to the Gobi Desert and a residence, where they beat him, causing hemorrhagic shock and asphyxiation that led to his death.

The Lanzhou procuratorate recently brought a public prosecution against Jing Shuren, accusing him of using his influence to repost Zhou Lubao's so-called false negative posts, with a sentencing recommendation of 7 years and 6 months.

Jing Shuren, a migrant worker and self-media creator in Gansu, was criminally detained by Lanzhou police in 2024 for repeatedly reposting posts by his friend Zhou Lubao that exposed companies' unpaid wages.

On the afternoon of August 30, 2023, Li Keqiang, who had been retired for half a year, made a public appearance at the Mogao Caves in Dunhuang, Gansu. This was his first public appearance after a long period of no public activities, and also his last public footage. The highest-ranking official accompanying him was identified as the Party Secretary of the Dunhuang Academy. Citizens at the scene spontaneously gathered around and shouted "Hello, Premier" to Li Keqiang.

When Bai Yansong responded to students' questions about their future and employment pressure during a speech at a university, he rhetorically listed hypothetical scenarios such as low housing prices and being able to find a job easily. The remarks triggered widespread mockery among netizens online the following spring.

After the Cultural Revolution, Chen Shunyao, deputy secretary of the Party Committee of Tsinghua University, recommended Hu Jintao to her husband Song Ping, and Hu Jintao was promoted from an ordinary technician to secretary of the Communist Youth League Gansu Provincial Committee.

Wen Jiabao, who graduated with a graduate degree in 1968, was labeled a rightist and sent to a farm in Jiuquan, Gansu for a year of reform-through-labor after speaking out against physical violence at a struggle session.

In 1968, Hu Jintao left Tsinghua and was assigned to the Liujiaxia hydropower project unit in Gansu, where he worked for many years as an ordinary technician and worker with no chance of promotion.