Sunday, February 09, 2014

Who are President Xi's Immediate Clique of Allies?

Fourteen months after the watershed 18th Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Congress, President Xi Jinping has emerged as a strongman whose power is deemed to be more extensive and entrenched than that of ex-presidents Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao. In January, Xi became Chairman of the party’s National Security Commission, which controls the nation’s police, intelligence and judicial apparatuses. One month earlier, he was named Chairman of another superagency, the Leading Group on the Comprehensive Deepening of Reform (LGCDR), which was established at the Third Plenum of the 18th Central Committee last November. These developments mean that in addition to party, foreign and military affairs, Xi is in charge of the labyrinthine state-security and law-enforcement establishment. And given that the main function of the LGCDR is to design and execute economic reform measures, Xi seems to have displaced Premier Li Keqiang as the final arbiter of economy policy. Even more significant is the fact that Xi has managed to build up a Xi Jinping Clique whose members are ensconced in senior slots in the party, government and military.

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