No successor as Xi unveils his Standing Committee
FRONTRUNNERS EXCLUDED Chen Min’er, Hu Chunwa fail to make it to body
BEIJING: Chinese President Xi Jinping on Wednesday unveiled the new members of the Communist party’s highest decision-making body who for the next five years will rule the world’s second-largest economy.
On Tuesday, Xi himself got a renewed mandate to continue as the general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC), the world’s largest political party, for another five years.
The five new members in order of seniority were: Li Zhanshu, director of the party’s general office who serves as Xi’s chief of staff; vice premier Wang Yang; Wang Huning, director of the party’s central policy research office; Zhao Leji, head of the central organization department responsible for job assignments; and Shanghai party leader Han Zheng, a veteran manager of the country’s financial hub.
Zhao is expected to head the CPC’S corruption watchdog body, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI), which was at the forefront of Xi’s anticorruption campaign since 2013.
Two of the front-runners – Chen Min’er, the Chongqing city party secretary and Hu Chunwa, the Guangdong province party chief – didn’t make it to the body.
Both leaders, however, made it to the Politburo, the 25-member group of senior most CPC leaders.
State councilor Yang Jiechi, who is the special representative for border talks with India, found a place in the Politburo as well.
Not including Chen and Hu could be an indication that Xi has delayed indicating a successor at this year’s Congress, the key CPC event where leadership changes are announced.
All the new members are in their 60s and would retire by 2022 when Xi’s term would end.
China’s new leaders face tough internal and external challenges comprising a slowing of the economy as well as increasing levels of local debt besides a more belligerent North Korea at its doorstep.
“China has a problem of a slowing economy besides an ageing society and whole lot of unresolved issues in the society,” AK Kantha, former Indian envoy to China told HT. But Xi also sees the present as a great opportunity for China, he said.
“This point of time with the US distracted and in temporary retreat from the region, Xi sees an opening, which might not last for too long,” Kantha said.