Xi Jinping’s Power Grip: Loyalty in the Name of Anti-Corruption

At a recent meeting of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, Chinese Communist Party leader Xi Jinping stressed that anti-corruption efforts need to target both "flies" and "tigers," referring to lower and senior level officials. Ed Jones-Pool/Getty images

Xi Jinping is toughening his talk to the leading cadres in the Party, a typical power play of the regime’s leader before the national meeting of its rubber-stamp legislature this fall.

In a recent address to the top leaders of the central committee of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), Xi warned the cadres to conduct self-reform to guarantee the success of his anti-corruption campaign, which he claimed was promised to China’s people.

Self-Reform

State mouthpiece Xinhua News reported that Xi made an important remark in a study session of the CCP’s politburo on June 17.

Xi emphasized that anti-corruption is a fight that the CCP can’t lose, and a war to ensure the CCP will rule forever, according to the report.

Xi demanded the cadres to conduct self-reform, which he also mentioned earlier this year in a meeting with his anti-corruption watchdog, Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI).

Self-reform is a communist term used to warn and attack a political opponent. “It’s the CCP’s way to kill the opponent before the opponent threatens the leader’s rule,” current affairs analyst Li Yuanhua explained.

Xi targeted not just the leading officials who “should strictly discipline not only themselves, but also their family members and people around them,” Xinhua reported.

Former Chinese Communist Party head Jiang Zemin attends the closing session of the 18th National Congress on Nov. 14, 2012 in Beijing. during which Xi Jinping, who pursued members of Jiang's faction with corruption charges for 19 months, was voted Party leader. Feng Li/Getty Images

Absolute Loyalty

In the talk, Xi also demanded the absolute loyalty to the Party of the CCDI leading officials. He insisted on zero tolerance to cadres who “feigned compliance and practiced duplicity.”

Law expert and activist Yuan Hongbing said that the so-called loyalists are actually those who are duplicitous.

For instance, among the corrupt officials who were purged in recent years, many of them were also the leading cadres of the CCDI, and at least three of them were at the deputy ministerial level.

According to the CCDI 2021 year-end report, there were a total of 247,000 inefficient governmental arrangements identified and corrected throughout the nation while Xi’s instruction was implemented.

Tang Jingyuan, a Chinese affairs analyst, said that the number of inefficiency cases being corrected suggests wide-spread resistance in the regime to Xi’s anti-corruption campaign.

Haizhong Ning contributed to this report.