The price of Xi’s hubris

The government in Beijing has overreached itself by continuing with its deranged policy of shutting down entire cities whenever there is an outbreak of Covid. At the weekend, demonstrations that began in Urumqi spread as people fed up with being locked away made their anger apparent.

In Shanghai, crowds calling for Xi Jinping’s removal clashed with riot police, and students have protested in Beijing and Nanjing. The outbreak in Urumqi came after 10 people died in a fire because strict controls to suppress the virus meant they could not escape.

The zero-Covid policy is very much President Xi’s own creation and he has vowed to pursue it. If the protests grow and force a reversal then his credibility will be seriously undermined.

He has resorted to a crackdown that only seems likely to compound his difficulties.

Xi has boxed himself in by choosing to pitch the state against a respiratory disease and by measuring success as something he cannot possibly achieve – its total eradication.

This exercise in autocratic hubris may well be followed by nemesis for President Xi unless he changes course soon. The ruthlessness of the Communist Party should never be underestimated, but this is a battle it cannot win.

This opinion is not necessarily shared by Stuff newspapers.