Xi Jinping has been handed an unprecedented third term as president, capping a rise that has seen him become China’s most powerful leader in generations.
The appointment by China’s parliament comes after he was handed another five years as head of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the military – the two more significant leadership positions in Chinese politics – in October.
Since then, 69-year-old Xi has faced challenges including mass protests over his zero-Covid policy and its subsequent abandonment that saw countless people die.
This week’s National People’s Congress (NPC), is a carefully choreographed event that is also set to appoint Xi ally Li Qiang as the new premier.
The lawmakers have focused instead on a sweeping revamp of Beijing’s science ministry and tech capabilities in the face of what one NPC deputy described as foreign attempts at “containment and suppression” of the country’s rise.
Beijing also unveiled during the parliamentary meeting a growth goal of “around 5%” – one of its lowest in decades – as well as a modest increase in defence spending.
Xi’s reelection is the culmination of a remarkable rise from a relatively little-known party apparatchik to the leader of a global superpower.
His coronation this week sets him up to become modern China’s longest-serving head of state, and will mean Xi will rule well into his seventies and – if no challenger emerges – even longer.
But the beginning of his unprecedented third term leading China comes as the world’s second-largest economy faces major headwinds, from slowing growth and a troubled real estate sector to a declining birthrate.
Relations with the United States are also at a low not seen in decades, with the powers sparring over everything from human rights to trade and technology.
In a speech to delegates at the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), which runs alongside the NPC this week, Xi criticised Washington’s “containment, encirclement and suppression of China”.
China, he said, must “have the courage to fight as the country faces profound and complex changes in both the domestic and international landscape”. (The Guardian)
