China’s Communist Party wrapped up its bi-decade congress on Saturday, approving changes to its constitution aimed at cementing Xi Jinping’s core status and unveiling a new Central Committee that is missing two key officials with no close ties to Xi .
The party’s new Central Committee does not include Premier Li Keqiang or Wang Yang, a sign analysts say suggests the next Politburo Standing Committee, to be unveiled around noon (0400 GMT) on Sunday, is likely to be made up of people close to Si .
Li, who will step down in March as premier, and Wang, who heads China’s People’s Political Consultative Conference, are both 67 and therefore meet China’s age requirement to have served another five years on the powerful seven-member standing committee.
Neither is believed to have longstanding ties to Xi, who is likely to bring four new faces to the Standing Committee, according to analysts and media reports. Current members Wang Huning, 67, and Zhao Lezhi, 65, who are considered close to Xi, were re-elected to the 205-member Central Committee and are expected to be reappointed to the PSC.
Two other members of the KPS are of retirement age.
Former President escorted by Congress
In an unusual moment, former President Hu Jintao was unexpectedly escorted from the closing ceremony of the congress.
Hu, Xi’s immediate predecessor, was seated to Xi’s left. The 79-year-old man was led off the stage of the main hall of the Great Hall of the People in Beijing by two stewards, a Reuters witness told the convention.
Video footage released by AFP showed a flight attendant repeatedly trying to lift Hu from his seat, drawing concerned looks from staff seated nearby. Hu then placed his hand on a piece of paper placed on top of Xi’s folder, but Xi quickly placed his hand on the piece of paper.
WATCH | Former President Hu Jintao left the congress ceremony:
Former Chinese President Hu Jintao is escorted from the ceremony in Congress
The 79-year-old predecessor of current leader Xi Jinping was led off the stage of the main auditorium at the closing ceremony of the Chinese Communist Party Congress.
China’s top lawmaker Li Zhangshu, seated to Hu’s right, gave the former president’s folder to a steward, wiping his head with a towel after Hu finally stood up.
Looking upset, Hu appeared to resist leaving as stewards ushered him out, at one point turning back to his seat. On his way out, he exchanged words with Xi and patted Premier Li Keqiang, sitting to Xi’s right, on the shoulder.
Video of the incident, highly unusual given the meticulous stage management of most such events, was widely shared on Twitter but could not be found on China’s heavily censored social media platforms.
On China’s Twitter-like Weibo, several social media users alluded to the incident by commenting on old posts featuring Hu, a common tactic used to evade censors in cyberspace.
By Saturday evening, however, the comments section of nearly all Weibo posts containing Hu’s name was no longer visible, according to a Reuters review.
State media coverage of the ceremony did not include the scene that unfolded as journalists entered the hall.
Hu looked slightly unsteady last Sunday as he was helped onto the same stage for the convention’s opening ceremony.
He is trying to consolidate his position
Li and Wang – who were seen by some party watchers as candidates to succeed Li as premier – both have ties to the Communist Youth League, a once-influential group that experts say has lost power under Xi.
“Xi Jinping is trying to consolidate the position of prime minister, not just that of general secretary,” said Srikanth Kondapalli, a professor of Chinese studies at Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi.
Also on Saturday, the party approved amendments to its constitution aimed at cementing Xi’s mainstream status and the guiding role of his political thought in the party after it wraps up its twice-a-decade congress.
The congress ended on Saturday. (Lintao Zhang/Getty Images)
The new Central Committee will elect the elite Politburo Standing Committee on Sunday, with Xi, 69, expected to secure a third leadership term.
A third five-year leadership term will cement Xi’s place as China’s most powerful ruler since Mao Zedong, the founding leader of the People’s Republic.
Among the amendments to the party’s constitution, the “Two Establishments” designate Xi as the party’s “core” leader and enshrine his ideas as the guiding principles of China’s future development. The “two safeguards” guarantee Xi’s “core” status in the party and the party’s centralized power over China.
New leadership is about to be unveiled
The vote was taken by a show of hands in the vast hall of the National Assembly, where much of the proceedings of the party congress took place behind closed doors.
The Congress ended with a military band playing the Internationale.
At its first plenum on Sunday, the party’s new central committee will elect the next Politburo, which normally consists of 25 people, and its new standing committee.
The new leadership will be unveiled when Xi, who is expected to be reinstated to China’s highest post as party general secretary, enters a room of journalists in the Great Hall, followed by the other members of the Standing Committee in descending order of rank.
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