KUALA LUMPUR, June 1 — Chinese social media users have questioned acclaimed film director Zhang Yimou if he dared to ask for a refund of his fine after Beijing approved a three-child policy yesterday.
Epochtimes reported that Zhang’s wife Chen Ting had shared a poster of the new policy following the government’s announcement and captioned it ‘Finish the task ahead of time’.
This prompted internet users to ask if Zhang would dare to ask for the return of 7.48 million yuan (RM4.84 million) fine he was asked to pay in 2014 for breaching China’s then one-child policy.
The 71-year-old Zhang had three children with Chen t born in 2001, 2004 and 2006.
Zhang, known for directing the Beijing Olympics opening ceremony in 2008, had in December 2013 apologised for violating the one-child policy, BBC reported.
The fine was calculated based on the income of Zhang and Chen when their children were born.
China had yesterday announced that married Chinese couples may have up to three children in a major shift from the existing limit of two after recent data showed a dramatic decline in births in the world’s most populous country, Reuters reported.
Beijing scrapped its decades-old one-child policy in 2016, replacing it with a two-child limit to try and stave off risks to its economy from a rapidly aging population.
But that failed to result in a sustained surge in births given the high cost of raising children in Chinese cities, a challenge that persists to this day.
