Huawei draws ire after ex-employee wrongly detained for 251 days

On Dec 3, 2019

Huawei has come under fire on Chinese social media after a former employee of the embattled Chinese telecom giant was wrongly detained for 251 days, relating to a company gratuity from last year.

Why it matters: Weibo users expressed anger at Huawei’s treatment of the former employee, undoing some of the firm’s positive sentiment generated online following its US blacklisting.

The Shenzhen-based company’s smartphone shipments surged in the past two quarters, which analysts said was driven by patriotic fervor.

Details: Shenzhen authorities detained Li Hongyuan, a former Huawei employee of more than 12 years, last December before his official arrest in January for alleged blackmailing and extortion, according to a procuratorate filing circulating on Chinese social media.

Li confirmed to Chinese outlet Jiemian News on Monday the credibility of the file and claimed that he didn’t put it out on purpose.
Li resigned from the company in January 2018, but there was an ongoing dispute with the company over his gratuity. In March, a Huawei human resource manager with the last name of Zhou remitted RMB 304,743 ($43,272) to Li via his own bank account, according to the filing.
Li walked free in August after the prosecutor decided to drop the case because of “insufficient proof.”
On Nov. 20, the procuratorate decided to pay Li compensatory payments totaling RMB 107,522 and send letters to Li’s father’s company and Huawei for vindication purposes.
Huawei called the police before the arrest, Li told Jiemian. Law enforcement told him his charge was embezzlement, which later changed to the leaking of trade secrets.
In April, a prosecutor told Li that his arrest was for blackmailing and extorting, citing a Huawei HR manager with the last name of He.
Li expressed a wish to meet Huawei CEO Ren Zhengfei personally to talk about the matter.
The news sparked outcry on Weibo, with many users asking Huawei to apologize.
The hashtag #HuaweiExEmployee drew 280 million views and 260,000 posts at the time of publication.
A Huawei representative declined to comment when contacted by TechNode on Monday.

Context: Chinese tech companies have been drawing the ire of China’s netizens for their harsh employee treatment this year.

Last month, Chinese gaming company NetEase received widespread condemnation on social media for laying off an employee with a serious heart condition who claimed that he was fired without cause.
In March, a group of Chinese developers protested online against tech firms’ “996” work schedule, which requires employees to work from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., six days a week.