Xi is ‘core’ of party, Chinese military told
BEIJING : China’s top military officials have called on the armed forces to rally behind Xi Jinping, describing him as the “core” of the Communist Party of China (CPC) at the annual session of the country’s Parliament in yet another sign that the president is emerging as the country’s strongest leader in decades.
The National People’s Congress (NPC), the rubber-stamp Parliament, is meeting for the first time since Xi was anointed the “core” at a CPC plenum last October.
Xi is the CPC general secretary, the chairperson of the powerful Central Military Commission (CMC). Technically, China’s armed forces are under the CPC and not the government.
One of the first to speak out for Xi during the session was Fan Changlong, a vice-chairperson of the CMC. He said the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and the armed police must “implement Xi’s decisions and instructions in pushing forward military building, reform and combat preparedness, and embrace the 19th CPC National Congress with military achievements”.
“The troops must resolutely safeguard the core and follow the leadership of the CPC,” Fan was quoted as saying by official Xinhua news agency.
Fang Fenghui, chief of the joint staff department under the CMC, coined a new phrase — the “CMC chairman responsibility system” — and said this chain of command must be ensured.
The call to rally behind Xi came as China didn’t announce its allocation for defence when Premier Li Keqiang delivered the government’s work report at the NPC session on Sunday.
It was left to the finance ministry to announce that the defence budget for 2017 would grow at 7% to be around the 1.04 trillion RMBmark or about $152 billion.
China will strengthen its maritime and air defence as well as border controls as part of efforts to safeguard its sovereignty and security, according to the work report.