Analysis-Shanghai COVID crisis puts political spotlight on key Xi ally

By Yew Lun Tian

BEIJING (Reuters) – If Shanghai Communist Celebration main Li Qiang has been politically bruised by the city’s wrestle to tame a COVID-19 outbreak that has infuriated people and brought on critical financial harm, there is little signal of it.

A shut ally of President Xi Jinping for many years, Li has extensive been seen as destined for the effective Politburo Standing Committee this calendar year, tracking a nicely-worn route from Shanghai’s prime spot that many analysts say seems risk-free regardless of the city’s COVID crisis.

Outbreaks have derailed the careers of some area Chinese officers. But they did not share Li’s stature or historical past with Xi, beneath whom the boss of China’s most populous city has risen steadily as a result of the get together ranks.

And although Xi may well be China’s most potent chief considering that Mao Zedong, he wants a core of staunch loyalists on the 7-member Standing Committee.

To be confident, the opacity of Chinese politics and Xi’s willingness to break with precedent – he scrapped presidential term limitations – make predictions tough for the after-in-5-several years Communist Celebration congress this autumn that will figure out Xi’s upcoming management lineup.

Li, 62, has not been directly associated in public with the “slice-and-grid” technique to fighting COVID, in which Shanghai authorities sought to isolate the coronavirus in certain neighbourhoods to permit the town as a complete to avoid a disruptive lockdown.

That approach failed. A spike in infections prompted an about-transform, a more-than 5-week lockdown of the town of 25 million.

Now Shanghai is tightening its lockdown in a contemporary thrust to get rid of bacterial infections exterior quarantined places by late this thirty day period, individuals familiar with the matter reported instructed Reuters.

Practical ‘CHESS PIECE’

Social media buyers have directed some of their ire at Li, with posts on the well-liked Weibo web site this sort of as “Shanghai party secretary should really just accept his oversight and resign,” and “Shameless politician ruined Shanghai”.

Tale carries on

Li and the Communist Party’s Organisation Department, which is in cost of personnel, did not answer to requests for remark.

The occasion bosses in Wuhan, exactly where COVID was to start with detected, and encompassing Hubei province, had been replaced in 2020. At minimum 31 officials in the northwestern town of Xian were punished this calendar year just after an outbreak that led to lockdown.

Shanghai has punished at least 25 officials in the course of its outbreak.

But none of individuals Shanghai officers were being above the district stage and the most senior Xian formal punished was the health chief.

“The men and women who will be blamed for the debacle in Shanghai will be individuals who are politically dispensable,” reported Charles Parton, a previous British diplomat and senior affiliate fellow at the Royal United Providers Institute feel tank.

Alfred Wu, associate professor at the Lee Kuan Yew College of Public Policy in Singapore, mentioned officers in other places “would’ve been absent by now”.

“But due to the fact of Li’s closeness with Xi, his opportunity usefulness to Xi as a chess piece in the new management lineup, and mainly because the Shanghai party manager is of a a great deal better rank than the social gathering bosses of most other cities in China, Li is heading to be protected.”

‘STEADFASTLY PERSIST’

Li has regularly appeared on point out media traveling to residential compounds and hospitals, sporting an N95 mask, black jacket and pants – the de facto uniform for get together leaders in the subject.

At every single look, he reiterates the message: “We have to resolutely put into action the spirit of the critical directions by Occasion Secretary Xi Jinping and steadfastly persist in the dynamic-zero technique”.

Although the metropolis however studies 1000’s of COVID circumstances everyday, the Standing Committee stated on Thursday it thinks the party can “certainly win the fight of Shanghai”, run by Xi’s COVID coverage.

“If Shanghai’s COVID battle ended up to be billed as a achievement, then why should really Li, steadfastly employing Xi’s solution foremost to this success, be punished?”, claimed Chen Daoyin, former affiliate professor at Shanghai College of Political Science and Legislation, now a commentator centered in Chile.

No senior officials have publicly questioned Xi’s zero-COVID policy, which has been significantly strained by the infectiousness of the Omicron variant and additional isolated China as the rest of the planet learns to dwell with the coronavirus.

Irrespective of the headwinds, China is extensively envisioned to adhere with its hard-line solution at minimum until eventually the social gathering congress, exactly where Xi is poised to safe a third management phrase. He has claimed China’s battle towards COVID as a significant political achievement that exhibits the superiority of its socialist design to the West.

In the long run, Li answers to one manager.

A indigenous of Zhejiang province, Li was Xi’s main secretary – a job for the most trusted confidants – from 2004 to 2007 when Xi was get together boss in the eastern coastal province. Li was promoted to governor of the economic powerhouse province in 2013, the yr Xi became president.

When Xi eradicated numerous officials in neighbouring Jiangsu province as section of a corruption crackdown and needed an individual trustworthy to fill the political vacuum, he despatched in Li in 2016, elevating him to provincial bash chief.

The subsequent yr, Xi promoted Li to Shanghai celebration manager.

All but 1 Shanghai bash main since the late 1980s, including Xi, has ultimately been promoted to the Standing Committee.

(Reporting by Yew Lun Tian in Beijing Added reporting by David Stanway in Shanghai Editing by Tony Munroe and William Mallard)