Party leaders are nervous as time ticks down to the anniversary of the quake - civil disorder is their first and foremost worry. Hu Jintao's newly-anointed successor Jia Qingling discussed the quake at length in his speech to the China People's Conference in Beijing in March (the 11th National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference - CPPCC) in classic party-speak: "The CPPCC resolutely carried out all policy decisions of the Central Committee concerning earthquake relief, and acted promptly to adjust its work agenda to make participation in earthquake relief efforts its most important and pressing task," carefully avoiding any mention of collapsed schools or dead children.

Persistent reporters buttonholed Wei Hong, the executive vice-governor of Sichuan, outside the CPPCC about the long-expected "official investigation". His response? "The scale of the earthquake was very great and the intensity was very strong, so that was the most important cause of the damage of the school buildings and other facilities. We need to conduct a series of calculations and checks, especially of the locations and basic information of those missing. Before the exact final death toll has been confirmed, it is very hard to determine the correct number of schoolchildren who died."

A skilful non-answer, though it is interesting that Wei said anything at all - and said so to reporters at the CPPCC. Will the communist party ever become truly accountable to China's people, even for disasters like the Sichuan schools scandal? Perhaps, as Chou En-lai famously replied when asked for his assessment of the 1789 French Revolution, "It's too early to tell." For the parents of Fuxin, the answer is clearly, "Not yet."