Standing Committee visit milestone in Mao’s revolutionary win
Happens after Xi stacked the key leadership positions with loyalists
Last week, the first day of the 20th Congress of the Chinese Communist Party was also the anniversary of something that happened over a thousand years ago.
On this day 1332 years ago, Wu Zhou, the empress dowager, became the Empress Regnant of Zhao. It was the first and only time a woman was in charge of China.
Last week, the first day of the 20th Congress of the Chinese Communist Party was also the anniversary of something that happened over a thousand years ago.
On this day 1332 years ago, Wu Zhou, the empress dowager, became the Empress Regnant of Zhao. It was the first and only time a woman was in charge of China.
Last week, the first day of the 20th Congress of the Chinese Communist Party was also the anniversary of something that happened over a thousand years ago.
On this day 1332 years ago, Wu Zhou, the empress dowager, became the Empress Regnant of Zhao. It was the first and only time a woman was in charge of China.
The former paramount leader, who is 79 years old, was sitting calmly at Xi’s left hand one moment and being dragged out of his seat the next. One of the two people who took him away is in charge of Xi’s personal security. Xi sat and watched without caring. China’s media kept quiet about the event. People outside of the party heard that Hu had been feeling sick.
People who follow China closely are full of questions: Was Xi trying to get rid of the former leader in the most humiliating way possible, or was it a real health scare?
Barme says, “No one knows.” No matter what the reason is, the main point of the event is that “it shows everyone what these cold-hearted party men are like” because everyone can see how Hu is treated and how Xi brushes it off.
He shows when Hu stops on his way out, presumably to ask for help from Li Keqiang, the outgoing premier, who is sitting on the other side of Xi. The old man touches Li on the shoulder and says, “Hu is clearly weak, but Li, one of his students and the second most powerful man in China, doesn’t even turn to look at him. He’s frozen. That moment shows that men have no empathy, no humanity, and no sense of basic courtesy.” Only one person tried to help, but he was dragged back by the one person who had already moved.
Barme tempers his sympathy by pointing out that Hu was once called the “Butcher of Lhasa” for the brutal way he treated Tibetans when he was the party secretary of Tibet. “When you start to feel sympathy for that thug, you know you’re in trouble,” Barme says.
Outside of China, most news stories have said that Xi now has more power than anyone since Mao Zedong, who started the People’s Republic and was known as the “great helmsman.” This is not true, says Barme. The New Zealand-based publisher of chinaheritage.net and former head of ANU’s Australian Centre for China in the World says that Xi has done more than Mao. “Mao doesn’t have as many titles or as much power as him.”
This is not true, says Barme. The New Zealand-based publisher of chinaheritage.net and former head of ANU’s Australian Centre for China in the World says that Xi has done better than Mao because he has more titles and more power than Mao. “Mao didn’t even want to get rid of them all.
He was a thinker, a philosopher, and a poet who didn’t want to be dragged down by the business of running the country.” In the beginning of their book, they say that the German version of the book was going to be talked about in two workshops at Confucius Institutes in Germany.
But a few days before the event, the heads of the institutes called authors Stefan Aust and Adrian Geiges to tell them the workshops were cancelled. Their Chinese partner universities had told them to: The head of one of the German institutes said, “You can’t talk about Xi Jinping like you talk about any other person.” “From now on, he shouldn’t be touched or talked about.”
Some Chinese commentators are going back to the old way of criticising with satire because they can’t talk about real issues. Barme has translated some anonymous poems about the new emperor that were going around in China last week. These poems were written in praise of the new emperor.
For example, “You who are busy with: 10,000 weighty matters each day, long-suffering one bad habits die hard and overworked to the point of illness done too often can be habit-forming shouldering heavy responsibilities speeding through the skies powerful and unrestrained preventing disaster and helping the poor expelling the evil and evicting the heterodox, you who get rid of rheumatism and cold sweats, strengthen the yang, and wake up the spleen and brain.
“Chinese commentary can be so funny and right on,” says Barme.
