By Wang Zhenghua

This year marked my first time to join the army of reporters at the NPC/CPPCC sessions.

But I wasn't the only newbie - three new faces made their debut appearances at the nation's most important meetings.

Zhu Xueqin from Shanghai, Hu Xiaoyan from Guangdong and Kang Houming from Chongqing were elected as NPC deputies.

This marks the first time that the deputies picked to represent the farmers-turned-workers who have received so little in exchange for the sacrifices they have made to drive the country's economy have been able to sit down with the nation's decision makers.

But now that they have seats in the Great Hall of the People and have had their voice heard by State leaders, several questions come to mind.

For example, were there systemic or legal barriers in the election process that prevented migrant workers from being represented in the past? Are these three deputies able to speak for a labor force of some 200 million people? Are they personally qualified?

By law, deputies to congresses at the city level or below are elected directly by their constituencies, while representatives to higher-level congresses are elected by the lawmaking bodies at the next lower level.

In practice, deputies emerging from direct elections are chosen by people who are registered as permanent residents of a given area, which effectively bars most migrant workers from being elected.

Such barriers were not removed until the NPC session last year, when the highest lawmaking body made it clear that there should be migrant worker deputies from regions with large concentrations of farmers-turned-workers.