It is only natural that the rich invest in their personal security in case of kidnapping, blackmail or robbery as these are things that happen to the rich. As a result, the occupation of private bodyguard, not seen on the labor market for a long time, is showing up again.

More and more of the rich hire those who have excellent fighting skills or know kung fu to be their bodyguards. According to Xia, who is a bodyguard and works in Guangzhou City, there are more than 5,000 bodyguards in Guangzhou.

What do bodyguards do? What are their worries? What about their future?

Bodyguard clients are showbiz folk and entrepreneurs

According to a senior entertainment journalist in Guangzhou City, showbiz folk and entrepreneurs are the main customers of bodyguards. These customers include movie stars, famous singers, and bosses from foreign companies and Chinese-foreign equity joint ventures. Private bodyguards are also popular among bosses of the hotel sector and real estate business. Most bodyguards appear in public as their boss's driver or secretary. The number of bodyguards most customers hire is among one to eight. For example, Zhao Wei, a Chinese movie star, once employed eight bodyguards, while attending a party in Guanghzou. Another movie star Liu Xiaoqing employed at least two bodyguards to protect herself when coming to Guangzhou.

According to some enterprising people, having a bodyguard can show dignity as well as a concern for safety. Some bosses hire bodyguards just for dinner parties, where drinking will take place.

Customers like to hire permanent bodyguards

Xia, who is now 36 years old, has been working as a bodyguard for a hotel sector executive for five years. Although the boss has developed his business in different places over this time, he still hires Xia as his bodyguard. Xia also companies his boss from one city to another. According to Xia, his boss will bring two bodyguards and one driver with him every time he goes out. Xia and another bodyguard appear in public as his boss's driver and secretary.

Zheng also works as a bodyguard in Guangzhou. Zheng's first client managed a nightclub and employed two bodyguards. Zheng had to work as a bodyguard and driver. At the same time he accompanied his boss to dinner parties. After one year's hard work, Zheng changed client. Now, his new boss works in the construction business and has hired more than 10 bodyguards. He brings three of them every time he goes out.

According to Xia and Zheng, it becomes a habit for these customers to employ bodyguards. In order to keep their bodyguards permanently, some customers will employ their bodyguards as employees. Xia's boss, for example, opened a store for Xia's wife. Now, Xia's family has steady income.

Most citizens accept bodyguard business

Most wealthy entrepreneurs and citizens accept the private bodyguard business. According to Wu Mingde, a Shifu or instructor, of Pengnan Yongchun Wushu Center in Fushan City, Guangdong Province, most bodyguards are kung fu lovers. Many rich people come to Foshan, a city with more than 100,000 people learning kung fu, and look for a bodyguard with excellent fighting skills. He said that he wouldn't be surprised if someone asked him or his students to be a bodyguard. He thinks it natural for the rich to employ bodyguards for their own safety.

Increasing violence at the rich promotes bodyguard business 

The personal security of entrepreneurs has become the focus of public attention due to the murders of business executives earlier this year.

On January 22, 2003, Li Haicang, vice chairman of the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce, was shot dead in his office in Shanxi Province. The suspect committed suicide after the murder.

On February 12, 2003, some outlaws stabbed to death Zhou Zubao, a billionaire in Wenzhou City, in eastern Zhejiang Province, in front of his home.

Local gangsters had intimidated Liu Jianri, board chairman of Shanxi Datong Yungang Industry Co. Ltd, since 2002 because he refused to pay protection money. Then, the criminals threatened to kill him and his family and they asked for 100 million yuan (US$12 million). In July 2002, about 30 criminals attacked him and his relatives on their way home from his father's graveyard. With the help and protection of friends and bodyguards, he escaped after running in the wild for five hours.

Recently, in Guangdong Province, blackmail and extortion is used by sending wealthy entrepreneurs letter bombs, or sending letters (usually putting in bullets and poison) and phoning the victims. Guangdong Supreme People's Court recently publicized a case where a crime ring, an organization of about 20 thugs, had caused injury and death to many people since 1995 in Guangzhou, Dongguan and Shenzhen. They used intimidation, robbery, false arrest and intentional injury.

According to Xia, a woman employee was killed in his boss's house in 2003 and the valuables were stolen. An investigation showed that the murderer was one of his business partners.

In some provinces, the rate of cases of trespass occupies 90 percent of criminal penal cases. 

Statistic shows that there are more than 1,000 billionaires and 3 million millionaires in China. In addition, a large amount of sports stars and movie stars need bodyguards because of their special circumstances.

The boss or the law?   

In China, the law does not recognize the bodyguard business. Most of the time, there are conflicts between the behavior of bodyguards and the law. Some say that private bodyguards are people who walk a fine line between staying on the right side of the law and committing a crime. Xia and Zheng both say that a popular topic among bodyguards is: which comes first, the boss or the law? Some bodyguards get fired because they refuse to do what their bosses want. Most of the time however bodyguards have a brush with the law.   

Bottom line: Don't commit crime

Zheng said many private bodyguards including himself have the experience of being taken into custody by the police. He once fought back against a guy who attacked his boss in a nightclub. The police arrived soon after and took him to the police station for interrogation. He seriously injured the other party. Ten hours later, his boss arrived and "redeemed" him.

Zheng said he still had a lingering fear of that experience but would do the same thing again to protect his boss in similar situations.

"As a bodyguard, getting an order from the boss means following his order and the law comes second to that," Zheng said.

But some private bodyguards do try to seek a balance between the will of their boss and the law.

"If it was murder or arson, I would certainly refuse. But I will follow my boss's words if I think the consequences won't be serious. At the worst, I might pay a visit to the police station," Zheng said.

Xia echoed Zheng's view saying that he is willing to make minor irregularities that doesn't constitute a crime.

"For example, most bodyguards would follow their boss's request to 'teach someone a lesson' who offended them. For me, I would beat the guy but I wouldn't beat him too hard. It's just a warning.”

Identification embarrassment

Xia complained that no guild or law protects the interests of him and his colleagues.

"We always face the risk of being fired or summoned by the police. We haven't even legal identification and have to identify ourselves as drivers or security guards to other people."

Both Zheng and Xia said they think the public is prejudiced or even hostile to private bodyguards.

"We feel pressure and always hope to be recognized by society," they said.

A remedy for loopholes of public security

Dr. He Jiahong with the Beijing-based Renmin University of China is the country's predecessor studying private bodyguards. He said in his 1991 book: "The birth of private bodyguards from private investigators marks the maturity of the profession of private investigation." Dr. He takes a positive attitude towards private bodyguards, saying they serve as a remedy for the shortages in the official police force.

But some other scholars regard private bodyguards as a kind of regression of history because, they say, "they might infringe upon civilian rights when safeguarding the security of their bosses, which should be prohibited in a modern democratic country."

Professor Zhang Shuguang, also from the Renmin University, said that bodyguards are just ordinary citizens and they should never attack but only defend. They should restrict all their force in the scope of "self-defense" defined in Chinese Criminal Law otherwise they breach the law.

Xue Yunhua, a Guangdong-based attorney, said that all legal workers are aware of the existence of private bodyguards but none of them regard the job as a profession. He also said that private bodyguards should be deemed as legitimate since no existing Chinese laws ban them. He suggests the state should legislate on the activities of private bodyguards.

"Rules, no matter if guild regulations or laws, will keep the profession on a tight rein," Professor He said.

Xia said people dealing with illegal businesses like smuggling, fraud and gambling hire many private bodyguards, as hatchet men while most ordinary businessmen don't need private bodyguards. He worries that it's hard for those hatchet men to become law-abiding but said it's better to have a law than not.

Trademark≠License

Both Zheng and Xue support the idea to establish bodyguard organizations.

Zheng once set up a "bodyguard company" in Guangzhou in May 2002 but was soon dismissed by local public security departments.

At the end of 2002 the Trademark Office of the State Administration of Industry and Commerce expanded product and service registrations to include names of security services such as private body guarding, private investigation and people searching. But a successful registration doesn't mean that the registrant is entitled to do businesses that his/her registered trademark signifies because a license issued by local business administrative departments will further limit his/her company's operations.

Guangzhou business registration officials ruled out the existence of bodyguard companies in the city but he suggested that some underground "bodyguard companies" operate there.

(China.org.cn by Wu Nanlan, Chen Chao and Daragh Moller, January 9, 2004)