Xi Jinping fuses the Communist Party with the state, removes power of State Council – MASHAHER

ISLAM GAMAL13 March 2024Last Update :
Xi Jinping fuses the Communist Party with the state, removes power of State Council – MASHAHER


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To put it in a crude Australian context, imagine the entire government being run by Labour Party powerbrokers at headquarters, with parliament and public servants charged with executing the party’s decisions.

The changes mean that rather than focusing on specific practical tasks that make society function such as taxes, education and healthcare, officials are first and foremost required to implement the ideological spirit of the party and its leader Xi.

Some of those policies might create better outcomes by redistributing wealth for example, but assessing them has become much more difficult as the veil of secrecy over Beijing’s decision-making grows ever more opaque.

Last week, the National People’s Congress announced that the once-a-year press conference of the head of the State Council, Premier Li Qiang, had been indefinitely cancelled. This week’s revision to the Organic Law officially eliminated rules that required the State Council to disclose “all matters involving public interests” in a “timely, comprehensive, accurate and specific manner”. Instead, the new law says matters discussed should be “promptly made public, except for those that need to be kept confidential according to law”.

Chinese President Xi Jinping, centre, and his Premier Li Qiang, to his right, leave the hall at the closing of the NPC on Monday. Credit: AP

Dr Willy Lam, a veteran Chinese elite politics expert from Hong Kong who is a senior fellow at the Jamestown Foundation, said the spectre of Xi’s domination was not enough.

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“His grip on power must be made clear to everybody. He wants the world to know beyond any doubt that he is running the show,” Lam said. “And Li Qiang is someone who serves at Xi’s pleasure.”

China’s regular threats to Taiwan mean the enshrining of the party doctrine in the Organic Law could yet have more ominous implications. The Chinese military is already loyal to the party, not the country. So too are its courts.

“The Organic Law is the preparation for the eventuality that Xi Jinping one day thinks it is necessary to run the country by decree because of war,” said Lam.

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The modified law, legitimised by the thousands of votes at the congress, gives the party and Xi the power to ensure their plans are implemented without question.

Until Monday, Xi’s influence over the State Council was omnipresent but unwritten.

Now his power is even more explicit.


Source Agencies

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