Chinese leader told he can rule for life
After winning landmark vote by 2,958 to 2...
PRESIDENT Xi Jinping was given the go-ahead yesterday to rule China for the rest of his life.
The country’s parliament voted overwhelmingly to abolish the 35-year-old law limiting leaders to two consecutive terms in power.
The decision marks a leap back in time, reversing the system of ‘collective leadership’. And it elevates President Xi to the same supreme position enjoyed by Chairman Mao, the founder of the Chinese Communist Party.
The National People’s Congress backed the constitutional amendment yesterday by voting 2,958 in favour – with only two voting against and three abstaining.
President Xi led the way by placing his orange ballot paper in a red box in the massive congress hall. Rank and file deputies then rose to vote as music was played. The process took just ten minutes.
To polite applause, the announcer declared: ‘The constitutional amendment item has passed.’ Xi, who would have had to step down in 2023, showed little emotion.
The slide towards one-man rule will fuel concerns about a return to the excesses of autocratic leadership and the possible economic consequences.
President Xi’s confident leadership style and tough attitude towards corruption has won him popular support.
Now aged 64, the unchallenged leader of the world’s most populous nation worked his way up from the poverty of a rural commune. Xi – married to Chinese soprano Peng Liyuan, 55, with whom he has one daughter – was appointed leader of the Chinese Communist Party in 2012 and has moved to concentrate power in his own hands. He has appointed himself to bodies that oversee security, finance and economic reform.
Critics fear the lessons of history are being forgotten. Zhang Lifan, a Beijing-based political commentator, said: ‘This marks the biggest regression in China’s legal system since the reform and opening-up era of the 1980s. I’m afraid that this will all be written into our history in the future.’
In a sign of the issue’s sensitivity, government censors have aggressively cleared social media of expressions ranging from ‘I disagree’ to ‘Xi Zedong’.
Xi’s control has crushed hopes for reform among China’s embattled liberal scholars and activists, who now fear even greater repression. China allows no political opposition and has relentlessly persecuted groups seeking greater civic participation.
The country’s growing economic power also means world leaders are unlikely to make too much of the developments.
Only last month Theresa May visited China in what was seen as the first step towards a post-Brexit trade deal with the country. Commercial deals worth a total of £9billion were said to have been signed during the trip.