Xi Jinping set to secure historic 3rd-term as Chinese President

TIL Desk/World/Beijing/ The Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) 20th National Congress is likely to re-elect General Secretary Xi Jinping for a historic third term, setting a new precedent for the country. President Xi Jinping, who has been occupying the top post since 2012, was unanimously chosen as a delegate to the ruling party’s 20th national congress at the CPC Guangxi regional meeting on April 22.

‘The announcement of Xi’s unanimous election won a burst of sustained and warm applause at the regional congress on Friday morning,’ . CPC leaders are effectively chosen in China, and Xi’s appointment as a delegate was more like a formality, Policy Research Group (POREG), a think tank said in a report.

“This may not mean that his election as the general secretary is 100 per cent certain, but it is a very firm step,” Alfred Wu, an associate professor at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy was quoted as saying. Earlier, Hu Jintao was also chosen as a representative to the 18th National Congress in 2012 when he handed over the baton to Xi.

In April 2017, Xi was chosen as a delegate to the CPC’s 19th National Conference by a unanimous majority at the 12th CPC Guizhou provincial congress. Thereafter, Xi’s selection of Guangxi as a delegate is important, as Guangxi was one of China’s poorest regions until 2017, the report said.