Is keeping Xi Jinping in power the answer to China’s economic woes or a recipe for disaster?
The two-term rule for presidents was designed to prevent empire building, but could lifting it give Xi the power he needs to really ‘get things done’?
Beijing’s plan for President Xi Jinping to remain in office indefinitely could provide the answer to China’s deep-rooted economic woes, analysts said, while others warned that an increasingly centralised power base could create new problems at home and abroad.
The move to scrap the two-term limit on presidents and their deputies comes at a time when the country is busy trying to defuse a variety of financial risks and rebalance the economy against a backdrop of increased protectionism in the United States.
Robert Carnell, chief Asia economist with ING, said that the lifting of the restriction provided some upsides “from an investment perspective” as it would enhance “China’s ability to get things done”.
Economic endeavours such as the transition into a consumer economy and Xi’s pet “Belt and Road Initiative” were “more likely to be successful with a strong and steady leadership”, he said.
The proposal to remove the clause – added to the constitution by the late paramount leader Deng Xiaoping in the early 1980s in response to the empire building he had witnessed during the Cultural Revolution – is expected to be passed at the annual legislative sessions that open in Beijing next week.
