There’s one common trait shared by the three most conspicuous omissions from China’s new Communist Party leadership: all arose through its Youth League and they all were considered members of a once-powerful faction whose influence Xi Jinping has now practically crushed.
Xi Jinping closing down the youth league faction: Victor Shih
Premier Li Keqiang and Vice Premier Wang Yang, both are of age 67 and young enough to get appointed again to the elite seven-member Politburo Standing Committee, were actually left off the wider Central Committee as well, because Xi during the recent twice-a-decade leadership reshuffling has installed loyalists in top party posts.
One-time high-flyer and fellow vice premier Hu Chunhua, who at the age of 59, had been seen as a candidate for premier by some party watchers and for once even as a future president, did not really make it to the 24-man Politburo.
Analysts said the omissions have shown Xi Jinping has succeeded in his many years of efforts to remove the faction.
Victor Shih who’s a professor at the University of California in San Diego and an expert on elite politics in China said, “On Hu Chunhua, I genuinely think this has been the main tactic of Xi Jinping closing down the youth league faction, He has impeded the careers of many cadres in that faction”.
Hu Jintao, Xi Jinping’s predecessor
Xi Jinping’s predecessor, Hu Jintao, who is 79 years old and a Youth League veteran, In a very dramatic incident that is widely viewed as symbolic of the demise of the faction, was escorted unexpectedly at Saturday’s Congress party’s closing ceremony from the stage.
Exactly what happened still remains not clear, but Xinhua state news agency in their two English posts on Twitter said that it was connected to Hu’s health. China’s social network is blocked.
Cheng Li who’s a specialist in China, on the transformation of political leaders, in reference to the sidelining of the Youth League faction said, “They are completely defeated”, Li, who’s with the Brookings Institution in Washington added, “It means Xi can do a lot of things he wants to, and day by day opposing forces have got weaker”.
“We can read it as he didn’t really want the Western-style balance of power and he wanted to showcase more about the centralization of his power,” he added.
Xi faces a lot of problems, as Xi kicks off his third leadership term with more power than any other leader since Mao Zedong, to his own Covid-19 policy from a dismal economy that has backed China into problems, and soured relations with the West.
Training ground
Traditionally acting as the party’s feeder organization, the “faction” means the officials in leadership roles in the Youth League, which trains a few of China’s intelligent, mainly university and High school students after recruiting them.
Dali Yang, a political scientist at the university of Chicago said, “The CYL, as a party-led organization, has lost its clout as their place for grooming leaders”. “But to adapt to the changing political circumstances has already been working hard”, adding that a social media presence had been built by the Youth League which is engaged in civic functions, and appealing to nationalistic pride.
The Youth League remains active in attacking foreign brands in China that are accused of misbehavior, like false advertising.
Western journalists said last year they were getting death threats after its branch which is in the central province of Henan asked their social media followers to pass on the whereabouts of a BBC reporter who was covering serious floods there.
The Youth League on Wednesday did not immediately answer a request for comment.
Its political image lost some of its shine in 2012, when a top aide to Hu Jintao, Ling Jihua, tried to cover up the situation around his son’s death, who was killed in Beijing while driving a Ferrari that crashed.
Later, Ling was set accountable for corruption and was jailed for life.
‘Zhijiang New Army’ of Xi Jinping
Cliques, factions, and power bases have existed since the party’s founding a century ago, with varying levels of influence. They famously incorporated the so-called “Shanghai Gang” of Jiang Zemin, a former leader who is now 96 years old.
The so-called “Zhijiang New Army“, Xi’s faction, was set up during his years between 2002 and 2007 as party chief of the eastern province of Zhejiang.
John Delury, Seoul’s Yonsei University professor of Chinese studies, said that the new leadership somehow reflects Xi’s predominance. He said, “But history would make us remember that no political system on earth has eliminated the existence of rivalry, internal disagreement, and power struggles”. “It can take some time, but after one particular faction is eradicated, another faction emerges eventually,” he added.
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