Qiu Zhanxuan, head of the Peking University Marxist Society, was grabbed and forced into a black car outside the east gate of Peking University by a group of heavy-set men who identified themselves as police, according to students quoted by Reuters on December 28. Qiu Zhanxuan was on the way to attend a memorial for the 125th anniversary of Mao Zedong’s birthday that he organized. He had already been warned by a school adviser about the event on December 25. Qiu Zhanxuan was later removed from his post. On December 28, the protesting students held signs demanding that the university reinstate Qiu Zhanxuan and several other members. Song Yangbiao, a Beijing-based neo-Maoist freelance journalist, told Reuters that this year “the leftists have gone quiet” and with no signs of any major activities to mark the birthday. He added  “I think the backdrop is the atmosphere around the 40th anniversary of reform and opening up, Remembering Chairman Mao will lead to a major clash between the two streams of thought.” Xi Jinping gave a big speech on the occasion last week.

More than a dozen students from Peking University in Beijing, dared to flout authority and staged a protest  on campus on December 28, to draw attention to the university’s attempts to punish students for taking part in the campaign and demand that the university reinstate Qiu Zhanxuan and several other members. Videos posted online by students showed security guards shoving  protesters and teachers grabbing students so they could not leave.The students are part of a small but tenacious group of young communists using leftist ideology to highlight labour abuses across China and call for better protections for the working class.