Chinese village in thrall to Mao sees successor in strongman Xi
President’s abolition of two-term cap on leadership dismays middle classes, but is backed by communists
BENEATH the towering skylines of modern cities such as Shanghai, a generation who have grown affluent from China’s economic rise are quietly alarmed.
Plans by Xi Jinping to scrap presidential term limits, due to be formally signed off during China’s annual meeting of parliament starting on Monday, sit uneasily with the country’s new middle classes.
But in Nanjie, a communist model village frozen in time in central China, the move is being celebrated with the kind of zeal expected of a community that still clings to the dogma of Beijing’s last lifetime ruler – Mao Tse-tung.
“It’s my conclusion that people are happier under strong leaders,” Wang Hongbin, Communist Party secretary and leader of Nanjie, told The Sunday Telegraph in a government office decorated with an elaborately crafted wooden carving of Mao the size and shape of a large dustbin lid.
“And I think if an official can work for a long time, it can solve many problems,” added Mr Wang, who has been Nanjie’s leader since 1977. Mao’s death in 1976, after the decade-long violence and chaos of the Cultural Revolution, prompted deep reflection in China, leading to a new constitution which bound future leaders to checks, balances – and a two-term limit.
Beijing is now set to abolish that cap at a meeting of the National People’s Congress and China’s new middle classes are questioning where the country is heading.
There are no such concerns, however, for the 3,700 residents of Nanjie, where Mao is worshipped and officials have erected a civic square which pays homage to strongmen communist rulers who have made their bloody mark on history. Huge pictures of Stalin and Lenin overlook a towering statue of Mao, saluting into the distance. In the background, the words “Mao Tse-tung thought grows ever brighter” arches over the road behind East is Red Square.
Nanjie, in central Henan province, rejected capitalism as it took hold elsewhere in China in the Eighties and emerged as the country’s model communist village under Mr Wang.
For Mr Wang, the death of Mao heralded a new age of greed and complacency in China as a generation of weak leaders took the helm.
The country’s fortunes were only reversed with the arrival of Mr Xi in 2013, Mr Wang said, citing his campaign against corruption and excess among officials. Unlike elsewhere in China, healthcare and housing is free in Nanjie. However, workers only receive as payment 30 per cent of what they earn.
The village’s many factories seemed busy during The Telegraph’s visit, and Mr Wang boasted that Nanjie had achieved a sales income of 2.2billion Yuan (£250million) last year under its anti-capitalist system.
But he admitted that the village owes debts and it is unclear how much of Nanjie’s supposed success is real, or part of a propaganda drive.
But the villagers believe they are living in a communist paradise and many would welcome Mr Xi ruling for life. “He can lead for ever, as long as he leads politics in China has resulted in many being suspicious of Mr Xi’s power grab.
Mr Sun, a Chinese tourist who travelled to Nanjie from Zhengzhou, Henan’s provincial capital, said: “Dictatorship could easily emerge if someone is president for too long.”
For many elderly citizens, the social upheaval of the Cultural Revolution remains a painful memory. And younger, educated Chinese are delving deeper into uncensored Chinese history, discovering how people suffered during Mao’s 27-year reign due to policies such as the Great Leap Forward, which resulted in millions of deaths.
As concern heightened among China’s urban middle classes following the announcement of Mr Xi’s power grab last week, the authorities censored a number of sensitive words from the internet, including one of the most searched topics: “emigrate”.
But in the surreal village of Nanjie, where Mao’s speeches are played endlessly through loudspeakers on East is Red Square, there is a sense that China is not on a collision course with history, but that it is merely returning to a normal state of affairs.