China's Communist Party Meeting To End With Xi Jinping Set For 3rd Term

China's five-yearly Communist Party Congress will end Saturday, with President Xi Jinping likely to seal a norm-breaking third term in power.

The Chinese Communist Party's five-year congress will end on Saturday, and President Xi Jinping is likely to conclude an anti-standard third term in power.

The closing ceremony at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing culminates a week of largely rubber stamp meetings among 2,300 Party delegates,

Who will approve the cabinet reshuffle of the party's top leadership is likely to have been predetermined

.

It is widely expected that Xi will be unveiled as Party general secretary on Sunday, shortly after the first meeting of the newly elected Central Committee, a body of 200 senior Party officials.

That would allow Xi to move to a third term as China's president, due to be announced during the government's annual legislative sessions in March.

Xi had previously abolished the two-term presidential limit in 2018, paving the way for him to rule indefinitely.

The weekend will also see a new Central Committee approval of a 25-ministerial reshuffle.

Politburo member, in addition to the Politburo - the pinnacle of power in China - of about seven people, analysts expect it to be full of Xi's allies.

At the opening ceremony of Congress on Sunday, Xi delivered 105-

The minute "work report" praises the party's achievements and ignores internal problems such as the faltering economy and the damage caused by its harsh anti-Covid policy.

Heavy on ideological discourse, light on politics.

The defiant Chinese president also urged Communist Party members to resist many challenges including a hardening geopolitical climate.

"We must ... be prepared to withstand high winds, choppy water, and even dangerous storms," ​​he said.

In the face of drastic changes in the international scene, in particular the attempts of external blackmail,

containment and (and) siege ...

China, we put our national interests first."

Security was also a major focus of the speech, with Xi hailing Hong Kong's transition from "chaos to rule" and vowing to "never commit to relinquishing the use of force" to seize the self-governing island of Taiwan.

David Bandorsky, editor of the China Media Project at the University of Hong Kong, wrote that the work report is "a carefully written play in which the power of the party, its leader, and its ideas are reinforced and amplified."

- grab power -

Congress this week is likely to cement Xi's position as the most powerful Chinese leader since Mao Zedong, with analysts predicting he is almost certain to reappoint him for a third term in power.

But some key questions remain unresolved, including whether Xi, 69, was a

He will name a potential successor to the Politburo Standing Committee and whether a richer form of his distinctive political philosophy will be enshrined in the party's 96 million-strong charter.

Steve Tsang said, the latter would make Xi Jinping Thought "the latest translation in the twenty-first century of Marxism (and) China's state ideology",

Director of the Chinese SOAS Institute, University of London.

"Xi's power will be similar to that of the dictator of China, and there will be no room for anyone to advise him to try to correct course," Tsang told AFP.

BY
ProBuzzFeed