- Title: Profile of Chinese President Xi Jinping ahead of 20th Communist Party congress
- Date: 10th October 2022
- Summary: Xi Jinping led out his predecessors Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao at the opening of the Chinese Communist Party's 19th Party congress before addressing delegates. Xi pledged to build a "modern socialist country" for a "new era" that will be proudly Chinese and steadfastly ruled by the party but open to the world. Soon the Communist Party enshrined Xi's political thought into its constitution putting him in the same company as the founder of modern China, Mao Zedong. No other leader since Mao has had an eponymous ideology included in the document while in office. Deng Xiaoping's name was added after his death in 1997. BEIJING, CHINA (FILE - OCTOBER 18, 2017) (REUTERS) XI WALKING AHEAD OF FORMER CHINESE PRESIDENTS JIANG ZEMIN AND HU JINTAO DELEGATES CLAPPING XI STANDING AND LOOKING ON
- Embargoed: 24th October 2022 01:40
- Keywords: Beijing China President Xi Jinping politics profile
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- Country: China
- Topics: Asia / Pacific,Government/Politics
- Reuters ID: LVA00J862201011970RP1
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: China's ruling Communist Party will hold its five-yearly congress beginning on Oct. 16, with President Xi Jinping poised to secure an historic third leadership term and cement his place as the country's most powerful leader since Mao Zedong.
Xi, 69, has steadily consolidated power since becoming party general secretary a decade ago, eliminating any known factional opposition to his rule. He is expected to exert largely unchallenged control over key appointments and policy directives at a Congress that many China-watchers liken to a coronation.
Despite headwinds that have buffeted his path to a third term - from a moribund economy, the COVID-19 pandemic and rare public protests to rising frictions with the West and tensions over Taiwan - Xi is poised to secure a mandate to pursue his grand vision for the "rejuvenation of the Chinese nation" for years to come.
Xi, who has established himself as the most powerful Chinese leader since Mao, is widely expected to be confirmed for a third five-year term at the 20th Party Congress and elect a new leadership team.
The son of Communist Party revolutionary and one-time deputy prime minister Xi Zhongxun, the younger Xi spent decades working his way up party and government ranks, but his consolidation of power since becoming head of the party in 2012 has been unprecedented.
Xi's ascent culminated this March in parliament's passing of a constitutional amendment that eliminated term limits for the presidency, discarding a rule that had helped keep leaders in check and underpinned collective decision-making for 35 years.
Xi was born in Beijing in 1953. After his father's imprisonment during the Cultural Revolution, Xi was sent to work in the remote village of Liangjiahe in Shaanxi Province at the age of 15.
In March 2007, the tall and portly Xi secured the top job in China's commercial capital, Shanghai, when his predecessor, Chen Liangyu, was caught up in another huge corruption case. Seven months later, Xi was promoted to the party's Standing Committee - the ruling inner-circle.
Married to famous singer Peng Liyuan, Xi has waged a campaign against corruption and excess since assuming office, responding to widespread public anger that party members are both above the law and wasteful. He has warned the party's very existence is under threat from pervasive graft.
Xi's iron fist hit Bo Xilai, Zhou Yongkang, Xu Cairo and other leaders who held key posts in the party and the military.
As leader of the most populous country on earth, Xi took up his post as president in 2013 in the second planned, orderly transition since the Communist revolution in 1949. - Copyright Holder: FILE REUTERS (CAN SELL)
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