China puts Xi Jinping on course to rule for life
Mao once said 'power grows out of the barrel of a gun' and the chairmanship of the world's largest armed forces – also assumed by Xi in 2012 – is considered the all-important muscle backing up the party chief's power
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China’s Xi Jinping on Sunday secured a path to rule indefinitely as parliament abolished presidential term limits, handing him almost total authority to pursue a vision of transforming the nation into an economic and military superpower.
The move reverses the era of “collective” leadership and orderly succession that was promoted by late paramount leader Deng Xiaoping to ensure stability following the turbulent one-man rule of Communist China’s founder Mao Zedong.
The historic constitutional amendment cleared the rubber-stamp parliament with 2,958 in favour, two against, three abstentions and one invalid vote, despite an unusual bout of online criticism that censors have scrambled to extinguish.
Xi stood up first at the imposing Great Hall of the People in Beijing to cast his paper ballot in a red box, as delegates of the National People’s Congress applauded after each vote on the constitutional amendment to lift the two five-year term limit for the presidency.
The first constitutional amendment in 14 years had been expected to breeze through the legislature, which has never rejected a Communist Party diktat in its half-century of existence.
“This is the urgent wish of the common people,” Ju Xiuqin, a delegate from northeastern Heilongjiang province, told AFP, echoing party claims that lifting term limits had the unanimous support of “the masses.”
But the vote sparked some negative comments on Twitter-like Weibo, with one user defying censors to write “we’re over” while another said “we are back in the Qing Dynasty,” referring to China’s last imperial era.
The package of amendments included major provisions to inscribe Xi’s eponymous political mantra in the constitution, give the Communist Party an even larger role in the country’s affairs and expand the president’s anti-corruption campaign.
Xi, 64, has consolidated power since 2012 when he was appointed to the country’s top office: general secretary of the Communist Party.
While the position has no term limits, his two predecessors both gave it up after two terms as part of an orderly process established by Deng.
