The headline on China’s state-run Xinhua news agency said it all: Xi Jinping the reformer! It came at the end of China’s “Two Sessions“, meaning the week-long annual meeting of the National People’s Congress or parliament and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, an advisory body. The meeting was notable for underscoring Xi’s tightening grip over the ship of state: the annual media briefing by the premier was cancelled and is likely to stay that way as long as Xi calls the shots. The premier’s state council has been sidelined along with him.
In case there was any confusion, the exhaustive 6000-word Xinhua report made it clear that reform remained on track under Xi, dispelling a growing view that China’s economy is “stagnating” or that it’s economy was “losing steam”. The report likened him to former paramount leader Deng Xiaoping, who is seen as the father of economic reform. It claimed that under Xi, “Over the past decade 2000 reform measures have been rolled out enabling the country to eliminate extreme poverty, promote urban-rural development, fight corruption, promote businesses, boost innovation and push forward a ‘green revolution'”.
It claimed that growth had more than doubled since 2012, “cementing the country’s global status as a major growth contributor.” It quoted Xi as urging his partymen and colleagues “to remove the barriers obstructing the development of new quality productive forces,” and that “Ultimately, high quality development depends on reform”. The intention was clear: to remove any doubts surrounding the country’s economic growth prospects.
The Xinhua report also sought to address the concerns of common Chinese, referring to “Rising protectionism, and suppression from Western nations, and risks associated with the real estate sector, local government debts and some small and medium-sized financial institutions.” In other words, all these issues were best left to Xi Jinping to handle.
Global Times in an opinion piece said much the same. “The most touching point of this year’s Two Sessions is probably China’s unwavering commitment to developing an open economy,” adding that “A greater pace of opening up and broader connections with the world have become a widespread consensus in Chinese society.” Of course there was no mention as to why the premier’s media briefing was scrubbed if China was so open as it claimed to be.
