On October 16, China’s ruling Communist Party will hold its 20th Party Congress, during which President Xi Jinping is anticipated to be installed as the country’s most powerful leader in decades. Chinese President Xi Jinping raises his hand to show approval of a work report during the closing ceremony for the 19th Party Congress in Beijing
The Chinese Communist Party will hold its 20th Congress on October 16 in Beijing, where Xi Jinping is expected to earn a third term as president and a new top leadership lineup will be presented.
Xi, 69, is anticipated to be the most powerful leader in China since Mao Zedong.
The congress comes as Xi faces considerable political headwinds, including a faltering economy, poor ties with the United States, and a stringent zero-Covid policy that has exacerbated China’s inward turn from the globe.
It is largely predicted that Xi will be re-elected president for a third term, which would be unprecedented in modern times. Xi entered the Chinese leadership pantheon in 2012, two decades after breaking onto the scene as a graft-fighting governor.
What to expect from Chinese President Xi Jinping?
2018 saw Xi gain significant authority as China’s rubber-stamp parliament adopted a constitutional reform that eliminated presidential term restrictions. The action added another feather on the crown of a Communist “princeling” who is reshaping China in his own image and permitted Xi to retain power for as long as he pleases.
General secretary of the Communist Party, head of the central military commission, and president are Xi’s three major positions. At the Party Congress and the next National People’s Congress in March 2023, he is anticipated to maintain the first two positions as well as the president.
His two predecessors’ practise of stepping down after ten years, or two complete terms, would be broken if he were to serve a third term as party general secretary.
There has been no indication that Xi will assume the position of party chairman, despite the unprecedented consolidation of power he has achieved since Mao Zedong established the People’s Republic in 1949. Hua Guofeng and Hu Yaobang, the first two Chinese leaders to after Mao, held the chairman position. Since 1982, it has not been utilised.
First Chinese leader born after 1949, when Mao’s Communist troops seized power in the wake of a lengthy civil war, is Xi. Despite the years of hardship his family through as a result of his father’s purge, he advanced in the party’s ranks.
Beginning as a county-level party secretary in 1969, Xi advanced to the position of governor of the coastal province of Fujian in 1999, followed by the position of party chairman of the province of Zhejiang in 2002, and finally Shanghai in 2007.
