The party committee meeting was just a few days away. Formally, Qi Tongwei had the right to make nominations, but the final decision still rested with Wang Kang.
Over the next few days, Qi Tongwei planned to head over to Qingping to scout the terrain, conduct some research, and walk around a bit—perhaps he would reap some unexpected rewards...
Chen Jian was humming a tune with a cigarette dangling from his lips. He never expected that young Qi Tongwei would handle a mass incident quite properly, though regardless of how it was handled, the core issue remained unresolved.
Still, it was bound to remain unresolved. This was something Secretary Wang was handling, and Secretary Wang had the executive deputy county magistrate backing him up. Even if Qi Tongwei had connections in the municipal government, his hands were tied. A strong dragon could not crush a local snake, and the municipal authorities wouldn't reach their hands this far...
At this thought, Chen Jian rushed off to claim credit. Qi Tongwei had stolen his position, and this time, he was determined to force Qi Tongwei out.
Chen Jian sat in the car, his mind racing with wild thoughts.
Meanwhile, Wang Kang was in an office with Executive Deputy County Magistrate He Changhua.
"Director He, before you leave today, I've already arranged everything regarding the brickyard," Wang Kang said. "This time, we'll let Qi Tongwei handle it. When the time comes, Qi Tongwei will do the work, but the profits will be ours."
He Changhua looked at Wang Kang and nodded with satisfaction.
In this day and age, embezzling collective assets was nothing new. When the time came, they would use someone familiar to transfer the property from their left hand to their right, and wouldn't it naturally become their own?
Still, considering that Qi Tongwei had been appointed by the municipal government, He Changhua cautioned, "Wang Kang, you still need to be careful. Qi Tongwei has powerful backers; don't capsize in a drainage ditch."
"Don't worry, Director He. The accounts for that brickyard are airtight. I guarantee that Qi Tongwei won't find a single flaw."
Hearing this, Director He smiled contentedly and said to Wang Kang, "If Li Dakang weren't so aggressive and making things difficult to manipulate in the county, we wouldn't have had to resort to meddling with a brickyard in your remote rural township."
"What belongs to the collective might as well stay in our own hands rather than fall into someone else's!" Wang Kang replied.
He Changhua laughed. "You practically *are* the collective, after all..."
"Once you get your hands on the brickyard and run it properly, you'll have both political achievements and profits to show for it. When the nomination meeting comes around, I'll be in a good position to recommend you."
Wang Kang hurriedly stood up to shake He Changhua's hand.
"Thank you, Director He! At my age, I didn't dare hope to go any further; I was just hoping to change my working environment."
"You know how to handle things, and you have the ability. Before long, Old Huang at the county power supply bureau is retiring. I'll recommend you to step into his shoes."
Wang Kang's smile widened even further.
The two men threw their arms around each other's shoulders and prepared to head out for a drink.
Meanwhile, some cadres who were actually down-to-earth were conducting field research in the countryside. For instance, Li Dakang, Yi Xuexi, and Wang Dalu were inspecting Kuwangji. Jinshan County was truly far too impoverished nowadays.
Li Dakang had managed to secure funding from the provincial government with great difficulty. Now, accompanied by several cadres and planners from the surveying bureau, he was mapping out roads across Jinshan. However, government funds were far from sufficient to connect every part of Jinshan. They had no choice but to focus on a few townships with development potential for Jinshan County's construction, which was why Li Dakang and the others had come down to inspect.
"This Kuwangji falls under Qingping's jurisdiction, and Qingping is practically the poorest area in a poor county. Shouldn't we reconsider the road here?" Yi Xuexi said, glancing at the surrounding dirt roads.
Li Dakang turned his head and asked, "This Qingping has virtually no industry or commerce. Even if we pave the roads, at best it will only make travel convenient without generating any economic benefits. In my view, we should put this on hold."
At that moment, Wang Dalu chimed in: "It's precisely because there is no industry or commerce that it needs government support. If we blindly pour all our resources into the wealthy districts and towns, how are these places ever supposed to develop?"
Yi Xuexi shared the same view, saying, "I think every child should be given some milk; we shouldn't starve one to feed another..."
Li Dakang's face darkened, and he remained silent. It wasn't that he failed to understand the logic in what Yi Xuexi and Wang Dalu were saying, but if they poured their already scarce funds into places like this, no results would be visible in the short term.
Li Dakang couldn't stay in Jinshan for long; he needed faster political results and couldn't afford a slow-simmering stew.
Seeing Li Dakang keep quiet, Yi Xuexi and Wang Dalu understood what was on his mind and refrained from bluntly undermining his authority.
"I heard from He Changhua that Qingping has a brickyard—fairly sizable for a local enterprise making clay bricks. It's currently undergoing reform. Who knows, once the roads are paved, this brickyard might even take off."
"What future does a brickyard have?" Li Dakang retorted. "If it fires a million bricks a year, the environmental impact alone won't be small."
Yi Xuexi argued, "Environmental protection is important, of course, but Qingping hasn't reached the point where environmental concerns outweigh everything else. At the very least, we need to ensure the ordinary people have enough to eat."
Wang Dalu countered Li Dakang: "Well, for Qingping, that would still count as decent development... Besides, didn't Qingping just get a young mayor? Who knows, maybe he really can make something happen."
Li Dakang still didn't speak, silently gazing at the surrounding landscape. In his view, townships could wait; urban areas should be developed first, and then used to drive the development of the surrounding townships...
Yi Xuexi and his colleagues believed in achieving a balanced approach rather than focusing development on just one spot, planning for the long term.
Although their ideas differed, their ultimate goal was to make Jinshan a little better. Each of them was looking at things from a different angle, but neither Li Dakang nor Yi Xuexi and the others were wrong.
For a moment, the atmosphere grew somewhat heavy.
Wang Dalu broke the ice: "Shitou Village is just ahead. Let's go take a look; it won't take much effort."
Li Dakang nodded.
"Let's go take a look..." The group got back in the car and headed toward Shitou Village.
At that same moment, Qi Tongwei was also conducting research in Shitou Village. He really wanted to figure out what was going on with this brickyard, as it was one of Qingping's few enterprises.
The Party Secretary of Shitou Village, wearing a pair of green rubber boots, came running over to meet Qi Tongwei.
"Mayor Qi! Mayor Qi!"
Looking at the burly man running toward him, Qi Tongwei smiled and said, "Don't rush, don't rush! The road is slippery, and I'm not running away!"
Panting heavily, Zhang Hongshan said, "I was in the village yesterday... Mayor Qi, I'm so sorry about what happened yesterday. It was a dereliction of duty on the village's part..."
Qi Tongwei patted Zhang Hongshan on the shoulder.
"Tell me all about this brickyard!" Qi Tongwei said firmly.
Speaking with a heavy local accent, Zhang Hongshan explained, "The soil in Shitou Village isn't like other places; it has a high clay content that makes it ideal for firing bricks. As far back as before liberation, there were small and large earthen kilns all over here. After liberation, it flourished even more. Around the 1960s, the village collective built this brickyard, and it developed quite well.
"After the reform and opening up, people's lives gradually improved, and the demand for bricks surged, so profits were good. Seeing that production couldn't keep up, the previous mayor took the lead in importing a set of equipment from the provincial capital.
"Yet, ever since that equipment was introduced, the profits went from bad to worse, and we still had to make monthly payments for the machinery. Eventually, it was contracted out to an individual.
"As a result, that person ran it for a while, found it completely unviable, and simply fled.
"The brickyard sat idle for a few months. Then, because we couldn't pay off the equipment debt, the authorities repossessed the brickyard. With all this tossing and turning, the village collective lost both its property rights and its money.
"Now the villagers hate my guts..."
As he spoke, Zhang Hongshan started to cry.
Watching this, Qi Tongwei said, "You're a grown man, what are you crying for?"
"You don't understand, Mayor Qi. I can't even hold my head up in the village anymore," Zhang Hongshan sobbed. "People throw bricks at my house in the middle of the night, cursing me for colluding with outsiders to ruin their brickyard. Yesterday, I don't know where they heard it, but word got out that the brickyard was going to reopen. I wasn't even there at the time, and those people wanted to smash the machinery. They said it was the machine that ruined them."
Hearing all this, Qi Tongwei formed a rough judgment in his mind. Most likely, this was a setup, and the crux of the setup lay in the issue with the equipment.
Still, Qi Tongwei asked, "How many kilns are there, and how many bricks do they turn out a day?"
Zhang Hongshan replied, "There are five kilns inside. Each kiln fires two thousand bricks, and they can be fired four times a day..."
Qi Tongwei nodded.
"What is the market price of a single brick?" Qi Tongwei asked.
"Generally speaking, the market price is sixteen cents. Good quality can fetch twenty cents..."
Qi Tongwei did some mental math and tallied the figures in his head.
Turning around, Qi Tongwei said, "Zhang Hongshan, go gather the main workers from this plant, and bring your village accountant to see me."