Newspapers released a wrong report on school cafeterias to be built for halal purposes. (Photo : Getty Images)
Fallacious reports on authorities ordering to transform all school cafeterias into halal facilities in Yongning were debunked by Party-run newspapers in the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region.
Locals became skeptical of the correction issued by the Yinchuan Evening News and Yinchuan Daily on their Sina Weibo accounts.
Yongning County has 60 schools and kindergarten centers, which are allegedly required to have new halal facilities aside from the present non-halal cafeteria. In addition, all the food from the school cafeterias would be certified "halal," according to the order of Bureau of Ethnic and Religious Affairs. Both statements were discredited by the newspapers.
The report also said that the aim of having halal cafeterias was to uphold the rights and interests of teachers and students. Hui Muslims account for 18 percent of all Yongning residents.
The newspapers admitted their failure to review the materials sent over by the bureau. They also said that the vagueness in the wording of the related materials from the bureau contributed to the mistakes in the report.
Some citizens were suspicious of the newspapers' act of taking back the reports. They believed that there were members of the authorities that coerced the newspapers to make the correction. Some people also pointed their finger at religious organizations that would like to get in the way of the affairs in schools, as reported by the Global Times.
According to researcher Mei Xinyu of the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation, it is unusual for the two Party-run newspapers to release such erroneous report.
A Weibo user was skeptical of the role of religious and ethnic authorities on the issue. He said that perhaps some of the Yongning schools which are not capable of constructing new halal facilities might be forced to turn their existing cafeteria halal if the report was true.
