media - Openess after Heilongjiang spill shortlived

Chinese media went on an unprecedented rampage, looking for the truth, after the benzene spill in the Songhua river shocked Heilongjiang, the central government and the world. Both foreign and domestic media speculated that this disaster in the way state-controlled media would report about this kind of disasters.
It would make sense since most cases of the media censorship are efforts by local or provincial governments to avoid problems with the central government. It would not be the first time. When the central government ordered an end to the cover up of mine accidents, coverage has gone up dramatically. It does not really help the miners, who still get killed in unprecedented numbers, but the media to report about it.
But early conversations with Chinese colleagues show that the Chinese media have been put back in their cage again. Media looking for the truth might be more dangerous for those in charge than benzene.

Update: Howard French addresses the same issue in the International Herald Tribune and quotes comments at the internet:

A glance at the proliferation of blogs and other online commentary here makes that clear. Chinese censors have been busy blocking comments like these, but they have simply been too numerous.
"Any government that lies to public does so for two reasons: incompetence and shamelessness," read one Web posting. Another read: "The reason for the panic was that the public was not sure how many other serious facts the government had concealed."Yet another, sounding downright Lincolnesque, read: "When a lie comes into being, there must be more lies to cover it up. The result is serial lying. However, these lies, like numberless other lies, will all eventually be revealed."