China’s Xi clinches third term, packs leadership team with loyalists By Reuters

By Yew Lun Tian

BEIJING (Reuters) -China’s Xi Jinping secured a precedent-breaking third management time period on Sunday and launched a brand new Politburo Standing Committee stacked with loyalists, cementing his place because the nation’s strongest ruler since Mao Zedong.

Shanghai Communist Get together chief Li Qiang adopted Xi onto the stage on the Nice Corridor of the Folks as the brand new management workforce was launched, that means he’s more likely to succeed Li Keqiang as premier when he retires in March.

The opposite members of the seven-man Standing Committee, China’s high governing physique, are Zhao Leji and Wang Huning, who return from the earlier committee, and newcomers Cai Qi, Ding Xuexiang and Li Xi. Li Qiang can be new to the Standing Committee.

All are perceived to have shut allegiance to Xi, 69, who was additionally re-appointed on Sunday as chairman of the Central Navy Fee.

“An abnormally lopsided victory for one faction, which is uncommon within the custom of the Communist Get together, prior to now there can be a tough stability of energy,” mentioned Willy Lam, Senior Fellow at U.S. assume tank the Jamestown Basis.

“It means there gained’t be any checks and balances. Xi Jinping additionally has whole management over the bigger Politburo and Central Committee,” he mentioned.

The revealing of the Standing Committee and the bigger 24-member Politburo comes a day after the closing of the ruling Communist Get together’s twentieth Congress, the place amendments have been added to the occasion constitution aimed toward cementing the core standing of Xi and the guiding function of his political thought inside the occasion.

The Standing Committee lineup is additional affirmation that Xi’s grip on energy is undiminished by the occasions of a tumultuous yr, together with a pointy financial slowdown, frustration over his zero-COVID coverage, and China’s rising estrangement from the West, exacerbated by his assist for Russia’s Vladimir Putin.

“By way of policymaking, it does imply that there’s more likely to be extra deference to Xi Jinping’s personal views about the best way to transfer the nation and the financial system ahead,” mentioned Alvin Tan, head of Asia FX technique at RBC Capital Markets in Singapore.

“I can think about that zero-COVID coverage is probably going extra entrenched, and there’s going to be additional push on this challenge of frequent prosperity and the like,” he mentioned.