Videos showing residents at the centre of China's coronavirus epidemic haranguing a top Chinese official have highlighted persistent anger at how authorities have handled the crisis.
The clips, which have been circulating online since Thursday, show occupants of an apartment block in the city of Wuhan yelling "it's all fake" from windows during an official neighbourhood inspection by Vice Premier Sun Chunlan.
According to Chinese media, the complaints were an outcry against the community's property management, who were allegedly only pretending to have volunteers deliver vegetables and meat to inhabitants of the towers in the lockdowned city.
Surprisingly, China's censors,usually quick to scrub any criticism of government officials, have allowed the homemade videos to remain on Weibo, the country's Twitter-like social media platform.
But the central government appears to be seizing on the videos to craft a narrative that Beijing is listening to the demands of its people and that local authorities are to blame for the mistakes.
State news agency Xinhua reported late Thursday that Sun has asked for "in-depth investigations" to address problems raised by Wuhan residents, although there is no mention of the video.
The People's Daily, the Communist Party mouthpiece, shared an edited version of one clip on Twitter, though it deleted the post on its English account while the Chinese version was still online.
With no end in sight to the quarantine, which began in the city of 11 million people on January 23, many residents are depending on online group-buying services to get food. Some residents have told AFP that not everyone has been happy with the price and quality of mass-purchased food. Families have had to depend on themselves for resources, despite official reassurances that supplies were being channeled to the struggling city.
Observers said the edited video tweeted by People's Daily seemed to be downplaying discontent.
Carl Minzner, an expert on Chinese law at Fordham Law School, tweeted Friday that the clip suggested only one resident was shouting, instead of more heard in a longer version of the video circulating online. He added that this suggests Party authorities were "sufficiently worried" about the original clip and suggestions of mass discontent in Wuhan that they came up with an alternative narrative.
