Chinese Leader Xi Convenes Political Meeting to Assert Party Support, Hinting at Internal Anxieties

Chinese Leader Xi Convenes Political Meeting to Assert Party Support, Hinting at Internal Anxieties
Chinese leader Xi Jinping attends a meeting during the 10th BRICS summit (meeting of the world's leading emerging economies, Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) in Johannesburg, South Africa, on July 26, 2018. Gulshan Khan/AFP/Getty Images
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After a 10-day tour of African nations, Chinese leader Xi Jinping returned to Beijing to immediately convene a political meeting.

On July 31, two days after returning to China, Xi hosted a meeting with the Politburo, a 25-member group of Chinese Communist Party elite. State media reports about the meeting’s topics of discussion provided hints that Xi needed to demonstrate Party support for his rule, amid criticism that he has not handled well the U.S.–China trade disputes.

According to the state-run Xinhua, the Party members discussed issues of “discipline,” “new challenges and obvious changes to the external environment” in relation to the economy, and “resolutely upholding the authority of the Party with comrade Xi Jinping as the core.”

China political commentator Shi Shi noted that this insinuates the Party leadership was concerned about two key issues: the challenges presented by the trade war, and the subsequent threats to the Beijing leadership.

“Because the Politburo is emphasizing upholding ‘Xi as core of the Party,’ that indicates there are Party officials who are not wholeheartedly behind Xi,” he said.

The Chinese economy has taken a hit since U.S. tariffs went into effect in early July. The yuan has depreciated and stocks have fallen amid investor anxieties, while foreign manufacturers are leaving the country in order to avoid U.S. tariffs from cutting into their profits. This hasn’t looked good for the Xi leadership.

In recent weeks, China observers have noticed a pattern of events suggesting that the Party leadership is displeased with the way Xi has handled the trade war, including unusual omissions of Xi’s name from the front page of the Party mouthpiece, People’s Daily, and a protester’s public disavowal of “authoritarian rule” being allowed to spread on the internet (albeit briefly, as posts on the statement were later censored).

Shi said the Politburo meeting and its emphasis on maintaining Xi’s leadership were tacit proof that those rumors were true.

This week, other dissenting posts criticizing China’s economic policies have also begun circulating on the internet. One by Chinese economist Xu Xiaonian, from a speech he gave in early July at an economic forum, analyzed how the Chinese regime has sought to attract foreign investment yet failed to establish internal sustainable growth.

Annie Wu
Annie Wu
Author
Annie Wu joined the full-time staff at the Epoch Times in July 2014. That year, she won a first-place award from the New York Press Association for best spot news coverage. She is a graduate of Barnard College and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
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