Cina's elders defend party charter from Xi onslaught

 

 

The recently closed national congress of the Chinese Communist Party may not have been as one-sided a victory for Xi Jinping as initially thought. It turns out that the general secretary fell short of his goal to amend the party constitution.
 
The document has not been altered to refer to him as the "people's leader." It does not shorten his 16-character eponymous ideology, which would have put Xi on par with Communist China founding father Mao Zedong. Most importantly, it does not "establish" Xi Jinping Thought as the guiding principle of the party.
 
Instead, it upholds "the Central Committee's authority and its centralized, unified leadership" - hardly a glorification of Xi.
 
These failures can be chalked up to a quiet resistance that seems to have begun five months earlier when retired party elders were told by the central leadership to keep quiet on general policies and to not spread negative remarks.
 
It backfired.