Boy resembling Jack Ma draws public attention

Fan Xiaoqin, a 9-year-old boy from a destitute family in rural Jiangxi Province, resembles Jack Ma, China's prominent business magnate. [File photo]

Without an asphalt highway in Yanhui Village, Yongfeng, Jiangxi Province, a family that lives at the end of a muddy alley is too destitute to keep lights on even though darkness engulfs the entire town at night.

The poverty-stricken and desolate household of Fan Jiafa, the father who became disabled after losing one of his legs, the mentally impaired mother, the grandma who suffers from Alzheimer 's disease and two sons, may have never become known to society had it not been the resemblance of their youngest son to Jack Ma.

It was not until last year when a cousin of Fan's neighborhood returning from Anhui Province realized the similarities in appearance and posted the boy's photos online.

Fan Xiaoqin, a 9-year-old boy from a destitute family in rural Jiangxi Province, resembles Jack Ma, China's prominent business magnate. [File photo]

The poverty-stricken boy has educational difficulties, said his current head teacher from the Yanhui Primary School, where Fan is a grade-one student this year.

For unclear reasons, Fan stopped attending school a week after he enrolled two years ago and cancelled his schooling the second year when he suffered a hand fracture, the head teacher recalled.

During one extracurricular activity, he stared at his classmates playing eagle and chicks at the playground without any attempt to join in and his classmates seemed to totally ignore his presence.

Fan disagrees with the judgment that his younger son may be less smart than his contemporaries, saying his boy would be more intelligent if the family could send him to better schools. However, living on meager incomes, they are unable to do so.

Fan Xiaoqin and his family. [File photo]

The family relies heavily on the government subsidies, minimum incomes and pensions totaling about 700 yuan (US$102) a month. And the government also compensates them with an extra income of 5,000 yuan.

The turning point of the family began in November, when several philanthropists drove from Dongguan City, Guangdong Province, to Fan's house and helped him arrange electric wires and equipped the family with home appliances.

Urged by a considerable number of netizens, Ma last week agreed to finance Fan to cover his pedagogic costs till the day he graduates from university. But he also highlighted through the announcement issued by Alibaba, his online conglomerate, at their official account on Weibo (China's equivalent to Twitter) that it is easy to reimburse the education and livelihood of a single child, but much more is required to subside thousands of children living in poverty. Systematic change is needed so that a bright future can be brought to thousands of poverty-stricken children, the announcement proclaimed.