Xi’s insights chart course for progress

Officials, experts underscore president’s stress on people-oriented approach to development

The top political advisory body of China, the 13th National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), started its fifth annual session on March 4 with the nation’s top legislature, the National People’s Congress (NPC), set to convene its plenary session on March 5 in Beijing, marking a significant time for the country’s 1.4 billion people.

For Li Guoqin, a national legislator from the Inner Mongolia autonomous region, the most anticipated moment of the NPC sessions over the past four years has been sitting down with President Xi Jinping to discuss top issues that face the nation.

A key message extended by the president during the deliberations, said Li, who is a village chief in Duolun county, was that the nation must give top priority to the interests of the people, closely rely on the people and keep delivering more tangible benefits to the people.

Xi, who is also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, was unanimously elected by the regional people’s congress as an NPC deputy in January 2018.

Li was among the five deputies who shared their insights with Xi during the delegation’s deliberations last year, during which Xi urged the region to stick to a people-centered development philosophy, prevent the recurrence of poverty and strive toward common prosperity. Xi has also spoken about the need to protect the region’s environmental ecology and promote ethnic unity over the past four years.

As the annual sessions of the NPC and CPPCC open in Beijing this week, officials and political analysts have highlighted the significance of Xi’s discourse, especially his strong emphasis on staying people-oriented, in charting the course of China’s development.

Wang Feng, an associate professor on the history of the CPC at the School of Marxism of Beijing Normal University, said Xi has always made the people his top concern, a consideration that has been evident in the president’s deliberations with national legislators and political advisers over the past nine years.

In March 2013, while speaking with NPC deputies from Shanghai, Xi emphasized the need to pay more attention to disadvantaged groups and enable the public to receive tangible benefits from the Party and government. The president has made poverty alleviation the centerpiece of his political agenda, and during the annual two sessions he has made strong appeals for measures to relieve the burden of disadvantaged people in rural areas.

During deliberations with deputies from Guizhou and Gansu provinces — areas where rural poverty has been more acutely felt — Xi called for unremitting measures to bring tangible benefits to poor people, while cautioning against false methods and work styles that only show statistical improvements.

Gong Mingzhu, head of the Inner Mongolia Development and Reform Commission, said Xi, as an NPC deputy, has paid close attention to the development of various causes in the region and mapped out strategies and action plans.

To beef up ecological protection, Inner Mongolia has classified half of its regions as key areas for ecological protection and come up with strong measures to treat air, water and soil pollution, he said.

Local authorities have also rolled out major steps to guarantee and improve public well-being, with the incomes of urban and rural residents up by 7.3 percent and 10.7 percent respectively year-on-year, he added.

Li, the legislator, said that inspired by Xi’s instructions, her village, which is made up of herders, has improved ecological protection after imposing a grazing ban to rehabilitate previously damaged grassland.

Even though herders are raising far fewer sheep than before, their incomes have increased substantially after the introduction of better breeds, she said. The yearly per capita income of villagers has increased from 18,000 yuan ($2,850) in 2018 to 22,000 yuan last year.

Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, Xi has put protecting the people and their health above all else, underscoring that the nation will protect the health of the people at any cost.

Xi set out requirements to solve problems in sectors including pharmaceuticals, medical equipment and vaccines.

As for the education sector, he emphasized socialist orientation in running schools, nonprofit education, and developing an education system that people are satisfied with.