Valentin Popescu*

When will the real Xi Jinping stand up? The answer is not forthcoming ever since the Chinese president became the leader of leaders at the end of the 20th Party Congress last October. Since then, neither has the world noticed the true personality of Xi emerge on the international scene nor has there been a major policy shake-up to announce the country’s march in any particular direction.

Observers and analysts put down the delay in the surfacing of the president’s persona to the sudden surge of Covid, the growing unrest of the people that threatened to dare the Communist party leadership if the latter continued with its Zero-Covid policy, and the fact that China’s economic engine grew sluggish owing to a combination of factors.

Two otherwise innocuous events revolving around the 20th Congress throw enough hints about President Xi’s personality straining against the leash of patience.

One is the way Xi’s immediate predecessor Hu Jintao was treated at the party congress. The visuals showed Hu being physically removed from his seat next to Xi and out of the Great Hall of the People.

Some said Hu was actually ill and not physically able to sit for long, but others were quick to point out that he was reading from some papers in his hand and was probably protesting to Xi and that led to his expulsion.

Hu Jintao is the seniormost Chinese leader ever to face such a public humiliation. Was he the latest and most powerful victim of Xi’s purge?

The jury is out on the issue, but not before hinting at the intrinsic authoritarianism that Xi tries to hide from the public to date.

After a decade of Xi rule, it is easy to suspect the strongman of comparing himself with Hu.

Hu was the boss of the country for a decade. So is Xi.

The similarities end there.

Hu was conservative with political reforms and oversaw a decade of consistent, quality economic growth that positioned China as a manufacturing giant, in the process cementing the country’s place as a major world power.

Hu also introduced strongarm tactics to deal with internal dissent, whether it was ethnic minorities fighting for their rights, or people indulging in social protests and leaders expressing dissent.

It was Hu who was the first Chinese leader to project China as a soft power, and expanded China’s ties and influence in Africa and South America.

He liked consensus and collective leadership.

In sum, Hu Jintao is what Xi is not. But he gave a powerful China on a platter to Xi. The new president was always made aware of the fact that the cake he eats is prepared by Hu. This example is given often to explain why Xi may have liked the way Hu was removed from the party congress.

But the question is, wouldn’t that also indicate the presence of dissent, in the form of Hu?

Doesn’t that give birth to the idea that Xi, despite his purges and anti-corruption campaigns, is still not invincible and challengeable?

The second event was Xi, immediately after getting the third term of power, leading his newly constituted Politburo Standing Committee to Yangjialing in Yan’an.  

That is where Mao Zedong had confirmed his absolute power at the 7th Party Congress in 1945.

Was Xi indicating he is the Mao, possibly beyond Mao, in 2022 and thereafter?

With Covid behind him, Xi is currently busy nursing the economy back to pre-Covid years. That will take some time, but he is expected to reach there given the iron hand with which he has been handling economic affairs in the last few months.

He will gradually announce major policy measures which he will want his people to see as his style of economic dynamism. He had already given proof of his unchallenged power when he made a quick u-turn on his Zero-Covid policy. Since then, he has been opening up on the international front, his visits abroad and visitors to China indicating his urge to be make China an intrinsic and contributing member of the international community.

However, Xi is expected to witness creeping doubts about his leadership until he tackles the relations with the United States.

These ties are at their lowest; neither side is giving in an inch to improve them.

The tide, for the time being, is against Xi with the West and its sanctions keeping China’s hunger for new tech toys like semi-conductors unsated.

That is Xi’s bottom-line.

Unless the West extends an olive branch, he cannot take confident steps towards his new foreign policy – something China has not had since the outbreak of Covid.

His external march can, to some extent; an improving economy can erase some of his inadequacies.

The people’s unrest over Covid was a challenge to Xi’s leadership like never before in his reign. It spread across the country, from urban areas to the rural hinterland, as people of all ages, party faithful and dissidents, coming together to make their protests heard.

Even at the party congress, though Xi was elevated to the highest pedestal, words and phrases describing him as the most powerful leader of all times eventually were not included in the party constitution.

What does this mean?

Does it show that Xi is not yet free of resistance from within the country or the party? Or is it that Xi is keeping all cards close to his chest till he is in a position to unravel them?

The question is, is the Communist party adopting Xi Thought as its beacon light good enough for Xi to believe the time has come for him to equate himself with Mao?

Given the internal challenges he faces, observers assume it may no longer be possible for Xi to be the leader who takes the team and the country with him.

Given the Covid experience, he is now a leader who can be challenged.

And that is a good enough reason for Xi not to subscribe to consensus governance and try to rule with an iron fist.

The indications are already there for all to see.

At every opportunity, Xi insists that absolute control over the party and absolute loyalty of the citizens are necessary for the country’s progress—translating to the pre-eminence of Xi in China.

The real challenge Xi faces will eventually determine his character as a leader and projector of his influence across the world.

His views about China’s modernization and the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation can translate into his ambition to engage China with the United States on the issue of strategic global competition in the long-term.

What thereafter is still in the realm of imagination.

But, for him to reach the competitive world stage, President Xi Jinping has to first deal with domestic challenges that refuse to say good- bye.

–* The writer is a London based blogger with interest in South and East Asia.