Wanted: Candidates for the position of Linfen Municipal Communist Party Secretary [2]: Must be able to tolerate hardship, the worst pollution in China, and accept responsibility for the deaths of hundreds of miners.

Ever since the last Linfen Party secretary was dismissed in September 2008, following the Tashan iron ore mine disaster [3] in Xiangfen county in which 276 people died, China’s most notorious and polluted coal town has been without a Party boss. And given that, since 2005, the central government has held senior local government and Party officials liable for any mine accident on their patch, it is little wonder no one is queuing up for the job.

Of the 192 major coalmine disasters officially recorded in China between 2003 and 2008, 45 occurred in Shanxi, and nine of those were in Linfen municipality. And this is only major accidents involving more than ten deaths; the vast majority of accidents (often unreported) involve less than ten deaths.

The terrible accident and death rates in Shanxi and Linfen specifically has led to four provincial governors and four mayors being replaced between 2005 and 2008. One mayor was dismissed after 105 miners died in an explosion at a mine in Hongdong county on 5 December 2007. And after the Tashan disaster last September, the Shanxi governor “resigned,” and the Party secretaries of Linfen and Xiangfen were dismissed.

The government has closed down thousands of small and unlicensed mines [4] over the last two years but all this has done is put pressure on the larger mines [5] to produce more coal, and consequently increase the risk of accidents. Linfen, at the very heart of coal country, is a volcano waiting to explode, and the new Party secretary, if and when he is appointed, will be sitting right on top of it.