China's top economic official for ten years, the former premier Li Keqiang, passed away on friday from a heart attack. He was sixty-eight. Li, who supported private enterprise and served as China's No. 2 leader from 2013 to 23, was left with little influence as President Xi jinping cemented his position as the most powerful Chinese leader in decades and tightened control over the country's economy and society.

Li suffered a heart attack on Thursday, according to CCTV, after recently relaxing in Shanghai. He went away on friday at 12:10 a.m. Li, an economist who speaks English, was a front-runner to replace Hu Jintao as head of the Communist party in 2013, but Xi was chosen instead. Xi consolidated authority in his own hands, reversing the consensus-oriented leadership of the Hu period and giving Li and other members of the ruling seven-member Standing Committee minimal sway.

As the head of the economy, Li pledged to support business owners who create wealth and jobs. However, under Xi, the governing party tightened control over the IT sector and other businesses while increasing the dominance of state enterprise. After Xi and other authorities urged economic self-reliance, increased the scope of an anti-spying law, and searched consulting business offices, foreign corporations expressed dissatisfaction.

At a party conference in october 2022, Li was removed from the Standing Committee even though he was two years under the 70-year-old informal retirement age.

On that day, Xi broke with precedent by accepting a third five-year term as party head, replacing the one that required his predecessors to stand down after ten years. By appointing loyalists to the top party positions, Xi put an end to the consensus leadership era and may have established himself as the party's life leader. Li Qiang, the shanghai party secretary, took the No. 2 position. He didn't have the national level expertise of Li Keqiang and subsequently told reporters that his role was to carry out Xi's decisions.
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G GOWTHAM

27/10/2023 08:58 AM