CPC’s centenary; its past, present & future
The Communist Party of China (CPC) celebrated its 100th year on Thursday ( July 1st). For long derided as a ruthless, authoritarian party that presided over a poverty-stricken country of a billion people, it today has political leaders in many countries in the industrialised West rattled by its recent economic and technological successes while those in developing countries like Sri Lanka fall at its feet in homage seeking favours.
Sri Lanka has already been touted around the world as a Chinese Protectorate on the verge of becoming a Chinese colony. That might still be somewhat an exaggeration but it has gone the extra mile to pay pooja, as reported in this newspaper last week, to issue a commemorative coin in the party's honour, the first time ever it has done so in recognition of a political party of any country. Party leaders across the board sang hosannas in praise of the CPC, never mind its repression of freedoms that are enjoyed in the democratic world, its annexation of Buddhist Tibet and so on. Leaders of the ruling party even want to model their party on the lines of the CPC.
Throughout the early years, the CPC faced severe odds, including foreign invasions. It faced anti-Communist forces, purged dissidents and killed thousands in a ' Cultural Revolution'. It ruled with an iron fist and the people remained poor, wretched and desolate. The turnaround came only after the death of ' The Great Leader', Mao with the advent of the pragmatic Deng Xiaoping. Seeing the collapse of the communist Soviet Union, Deng embraced a market economy for China and averted what happened to the other communist giant.
Today, the CPC is communist only by name. It has never received a mandate by the free will of the people and its General Secretary is the country's President for Life. Yet, it has delivered economic results to the people adopting a market economy under 'socialism with Chinese characteristics' and what they claim is a superior political system -- a one-party state. An oft-quoted saying of the late Singaporean prime minister Lee Kuan Yew was that Communism failed in China, but the Communist Party was a success.
Millions have been lifted above abject poverty under the directions of the CPC, bridges built, highways and skyscrapers, trains that run faster than any in Europe, moved into advanced technology, gone big time into Artificial Intelligence and become the second most powerful economic powerhouse in the world. And it has given a new self-confidence and pride to its people. In doing so, the CPC ensured the party did not promote a kleptocracy where leaders and their hangers-on amassed private wealth from their official positions.
What of the CPC's foreign policy and its relations with Sri Lanka in particular? A self-assured China now has a wider view of the world and entertains a foreign policy built round its Belt-and-Road initiative with a heavy footprint in Asia and Africa. So far, it has been an 'all weather friend' for Sri Lanka, but its recent relations have been more business-like.
When the Colombo Port City project was stalled in 2015, China played hardball and demanded compensation for project delays. It demanded a 99-year lease for Sri Lanka's inability to cough up the money it poured into the Hambantota harbour. The return on investment for projects it has funded, sometimes unsolicited, has put Sri Lanka in a massive debt trap like never before.
The CPC operates like an octopus more than a dragon, its many arms varying from diplomatic channels to semi-state, ostensibly commercial companies and banks, all marching to a single drum. They have no qualms in testing the honesty and integrity of local politicians and decision- makers in Asia and Africa where many, like dominoes, are falling one by one under its sphere of influence.
With Western powers reeling from the CPC's global juggernaut, its hardball policy towards Sri Lanka is sucking this country more and more towards China's welcoming orbit. The affixing of its name boards in Mandarin even in Government departments cannot be dismissed as unintended oversights. Nor its torpedoing of non- Chinese foreign funded projects like the Light Rail project. Its aggressive securing of contract after contract for public works, its currency swaps and now working on promoting an International Stock Exchange at the Port City. Its presence is overbearing, if not at least overwhelming and a clear pointer of its long-term strategy.