Often we do not believe in our capabilities and refuse to implement any project, thinking that it is not available to us. Because we don’t have enough energy, money, or time, because we don’t have the knowledge or skills, and finally, because we just don’t think we can do it.
Do you know the biblical story of David and Goliath? When an untrained and weak shepherd, just because of his self-confidence, defeated a mighty and great warrior, with whom the other did not dare to engage in battle.
Unknown, made a parable about the Chinese farmer David van Anglin, who entered into a fight with a state corporation, but he won-thanks to self-confidence.
“I knew I was right…”
In 2001, the village of Yushu in China’s northeastern Heilongjiang Province, where Wang Enling lives, was flooded with toxic effluents from a chemical plant owned by the state-owned Qiqihar Chemical Group Co., Ltd with $ 300 million in assets.
The Qihua Group has polluted agricultural land before, producing up to 20,000 tons of industrial waste per year. The fertility of the Yushu people’s fields has deteriorated, the plants have started to grow poorly, and agriculture is an important, if not the only source of income for Wang Enlin and his fellow villagers.
The liquid and solid waste produced by the Qihua Group polluted not only the land, but also the nearby lake. Residents of Yushu said that the waters of the lake became quiet and almost lifeless.
After a chemical flood flooded his home, van Anglin filed a complaint with the Bureau of Land Resources in Chichikara, near which the village is located. However, officials were slow to respond to the complaint: they demanded that Wang Enlin provide evidence that the Qihua group poisoned the land on which the agricultural land of Wang Enlin and his fellow villagers was located with sewage.
Wang Enlin decided to fight for his rights on his own. “I knew I was right, but I didn’t know what law the other party broke and what the evidence was,” he told People’s Daily Online.
Corn in exchange for legal knowledge
Wang Enlin decided to go to court. But his application was not accepted, because it was not written according to the rules. Van Enlin didn’t have the money to hire a lawyer. The Chinese farmer was 60 years old at the time. He hadn’t even finished elementary school, so he didn’t have that much knowledge in law – Wang Hanlin couldn’t even read.
But that didn’t stop him. Neither did the lack of money. He made an arrangement with the owner of a bookstore in Zikihara, who allowed the stubborn farmer to read legal literature in the store’s hall and write down important points – because van Enlin did not have the money to buy books that interested him. In payment for the bookseller’s services, the farmer brought a bag of corn.
In 2007, Wang Enlin received support in the form of a free consultation from an environmental law firm. But the court did not take up the case until eight years later.
Wang Enlin won the case against Qiqihar Chemical Group at the first hearing, despite being opposed by a large corporation with a full staff of lawyers and huge capabilities. Sixteen years of studying the law from scratch took a stubborn Chinese man to get a court order to impose a fine on the company for environmental damage and compensation to the residents of Yushu village in the amount of 820,000 yuan ($110,000).
The court’s decision caused unrest in the country – this case became a precedent: previously, no one was able to succeed in the process with a claim for environmental damage against large corporations, which are large taxpayers, employers, and often local authorities.
Qiqihar Chemical Group has already filed an appeal, but Wang Enlin is ready to go all the way: “We will definitely win. Even if we lose, we will continue to fight.” He had spent sixteen years studying the law and legal niceties on his own, and so he had the right to say so.
A person can do a lot. Even if he is lonely, old, poor, and knows nothing. The main thing is to believe in your own strength.
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