Chapter 61: Resettlement Dispute

The villagers present, hearing this, smiled and shouted, "Great, great, it's still Su Zhenzhang who treats us well."

"Exactly, exactly, over all these years we've only seen one good official."

"He saved our lives and even helped us with disaster relief……"

Su Yang waved his hand and said, "I feel ashamed before you all! It's because our staff did nothing, making you all stay here these two days, exposed to wind and dew."

"Old Secretary, take a look and see if our village has any place suitable for resettlement, with level ground that can accommodate dozens of households at once."

"When the time comes, we'll resettle there; once the funds are in place, we'll start building houses."

The old secretary thought for a moment and said, "There is indeed a piece of land, and it's quite level."

"But this large piece of land has been occupied by Zhao Jiefang; it was originally village collective land, now they've planted some fruit trees and claim it as theirs. All told, it's at least over 200 mu."

Others also chimed in, "Yes, this is our village collective land, and it's quite level. The old secretary had mentioned before that if it were possible, or if our economic conditions were better, we would gradually move up there."

"Because the place we currently live in, strictly speaking, is in a ditch."

"But rebuilding houses costs money, and our conditions are indeed difficult, so we kept delaying. After the New Year, when the village party secretary was replaced by Zhao Jiefang, that piece of land became his private property."

"Even those two households with slightly better conditions who wanted to build houses up there were driven back by him."

"Only Zhao Jiefang, his own clan, and two other deputy heads in the village have built houses."

"So the courtyard houses you saw when you first arrived belong to those few families; everyone else lives in this ditch."

Su Yang, upon hearing this, became even more furious.

"Old Secretary, where is the place you mentioned? Why don't we go take a look now? After we've seen it, the fellow villagers can move over."

The old secretary's face showed a slight difficulty, for he knew exactly what kind of people Zhao Jiefang and his son were.

After pondering for a few minutes, he put away his pipe and said, "Alright, then I'll go with you to have a look."

Su Yang followed the old village party secretary down the mountain, then walked forward a long stretch before reaching a place he was familiar with—turns out it was near Zhao Jiefang's home.

This so-called place is behind the village committee office where a village committee sign hangs, but no one ever works there.

When Su Yang first arrived, he still thought it was someone else's apple orchard.

Only now did he realize that this was actually the situation.

He and the crowd walked over and took a rough look at the so-called apple orchard—what was visible before them—and upon going further in, there was nothing.

In other words, Zhao Jiefang had only planted a few token trees on the outskirts. This is clearly an act of enclosing land.

He made a decisive decision and said, "Let everyone withdraw, move all belongings here, and set the resettlement point here. This time, when building houses, I will follow a uniform standard and guarantee that the quality will be better than the original houses and more spacious."

Although Su Yang said this, the few villagers who came with him still stood on the ground, unmoving.

Liu Lao Han said, "Su Zhenzhang, Zhao Jiefang and his lot are not to be provoked, especially his son—put bluntly, he's a social hooligan; if you anger him, he might bring people to beat us up."

Su Yang said, "This is a society ruled by law; why fear his troublemaking? Go notify everyone to move over here. Besides, with so many of us, would they fear a single rascal and scoundrel?"

He spoke with vigor and conviction; Liu Lao Han and the old village party secretary nodded vigorously. The old village party secretary then told the half-grown lad behind him, "Then go notify everyone to come over and move. After all, this is also village land, not something Zhao Jiefang gets to decide."

He was also boosting his own morale; a few years ago he had been the secretary, but after Zhao Jiefang's family, together with his own clan's nephews and others, colluded with outsiders to strike back at him several times, he was forced down from that position.

At this very moment, Zhao Jiefang, who was playing mahjong at home, heard the news and flew into a rage.

"Damn it, what's going on? This is pushing one's luck! How is this normal? Can the town mayor just seize someone else's land at will? Can he just let others build houses on my land and walk away? Let's go find him and reason with him."

"By the way, give Da Yong a call and have him bring some people over."

Having said that, he brought a few deputy heads from the village and several of his clan's nephews and rushed over here.

As soon as he arrived here, he saw Su Yang waiting for him.

Before he could even open his mouth, Su Yang said, "Didn't I hear you were busy? How come you have time to come over now?"

"Well, I was just about to tell you—this village collective's… never mind, no need to tell you—I've already nominated your removal at the town party committee meeting; it should happen in the next couple of days, so you won't be the village party secretary anymore."

"By the way, I have another question I'm curious about: why do the villagers live on both sides of the ditch, while only your few families live here? Why don't you allow others to move up here?"

Zhao Jiefang had intended to question Su Yang, but before he could even open his mouth, Su Yang's barrage of questions left him dazed.

He collected himself and then said, "This was originally my family's land; I built a house here—what's the problem? Besides, back then it was said that anyone could come and build houses up here, but they had no money; can that be blamed on me?"

Su Yang gave Zhao Jiefang a cold glance and then said nothing.

Instead, he told the old village party secretary, "Wait a moment; let's first go over and confirm the location, then break ground within three days."

Seeing that Su Yang meant business, Zhao Jiefang immediately said, "Whoever tries to build a house will get beaten out—even if it's the town mayor, he can't bully us."

Accustomed to his overbearing, domineering ways, even with Su Yang present today, he gave no face at all.

Upon hearing those words, Liu Lao Han involuntarily shuddered all over; it's not hard to see that Zhao Jiefang used to bully these smart folks plenty.

Su Yang said, "How dare you? You dare to commit violence against me? In broad daylight, to assault a government worker?"

For a moment, Zhao Jiefang actually found himself unable to save face; though he is usually overbearing, he is not a mindless brute, and charging forward to deal with Su Yang now would be a taboo.

No one could protect him.

Moreover, there's no justification for violence now, since Su Yang merely had the villagers come over; they haven't actually entered yet.

After waiting like that for half an hour, the villagers came over in a mighty throng.

Seeing they were about to enter, the already hot-headed Zhao Jiefang shouted, "I dare anyone who dares to go in—I'll beat whoever enters."

As his words fell, Zhao Da Yong appeared before everyone's eyes, leading several dozen people wielding short sticks.

The villagers who had been about to go in, upon seeing this show of force, suddenly dared not move.