‘Chairman of Everything’ sees off a tough year

Soon after the Chinese Year of the Dog was initiated, Xi Jinping was declared President for Life by the Chinese Communist Party leadership. Much of 2018 was about Xi’s seemingly inexorable climb to the peak of power.

His last few party rivals were jailed by the spring. The clampdown on public dissent was tightened further. Xi, as Chinese commentators noted, was now “Chairman of Everything for Life”.

The globe-bending Belt and Road Initiative, the worldwide praise for Xi’s defence of trade and globalisation, contrasted strongly with the farce being played out in the White House. While “Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era” wasn’t the catchiest of ideological labels, his talk of a “China solution” for the world’s problems seemed to make sense. There was unease as the first reports filtered out of China’s incarceration of one million of its Muslim minority. Yet because so many saw a new superpower in the making, Islamic leaders still lined up to kowtow before Xi.

Then it began to unravel. Xi’s misjudged US President Donald Trump. China didn’t believe he would keep tossing tariffs at them. Beijing tried blandishments, then bluster and even wooing Trump’s son-inlaw, Jared Kushner, in an attempt to end the trade war.

Xi was also caught unawares by the global revolt against BRI. Malaysia cancelled two multi-billion-dollar corridor projects. Australia launched a $2 billion fund to counter China’s South Pacific push. BRI projects began losing money, facing protests and coming under increased, generally negative, scrutiny.

The biggest gun was rolled out by the US, which created a new agency just to take on BRI. As the losses have piled up, Beijing is being touchy when countries like Pakistan try to leverage their BRI importance to extract bailout money. Imran Khan received nothing but a flea in his ear when he went a-begging to Beijing.

It was no accident that Xi started becoming closer to Narendra Modi and Japan’s Shinzo Abe. Beijing needed to focus on the US. His phrase “China Dream” was now about trying to escape an American Nightmare. Though Xi and Trump worked together on North Korea, it was clear China was not calling the shots the way it would have liked to. The year ended with its detention of three Canadians to scuttle a US extradition request for the Huawei CFO was a perfect metaphor for Xi’s deteriorating international position.

Xi could have focused more on a slowing economy at a time when the engine of Middle Kingdom power is sputtering. Xi was once accumulating power to carry out reforms. He spent 2018 promoting state ownership and ended it with a speech about the party’s need to “take control”.

The new year is beginning with China’s economy displaying the symptoms of a recessionary fever. But it’s hard to tell: Xi has gagged official statistics.

There were a few expressions of domestic discontent that signalled fears Xi may have bitten off more than China could chew by taking on the US.

It says something that many Beijing watchers say: China’s main prayer for 2019 is that the coming Trump vs Congress battle will paralyse Washington and give Xi some breathing space.