Li Qiang, the former Communist Party chief of Shanghai, took office on Saturday (March 11) as China's premier, the country's No.2 post, Reuters reported. Xi Jinping, 69, is installing a slate of loyalists in key posts as he further consolidates power after being unanimously elected president, for an unprecedented third term on Friday. Li, who has been a firm Xi loyalist, replaces outgoing Premier Li Keqiang, Xi Jinping’s second-in-command since 2013, whose power has steadily declined with Xi centralising all authority to himself. Widely perceived to be pragmatic and business-friendly, the 63-year-old Li Qiang faces the daunting task of shoring up China's uneven post-pandemic economic recovery. With his close relationship with President Xi, it is expected that he will be given greater leeway to operate while remaining loyal to his longtime patron in the Party, a Reuters report suggested. Li was put on track to become premier in October 2022 when he was appointed to the number-two role on the Politburo Standing Committee during the twice-a-decade Communist Party Congress. A career bureaucrat While Li Qiang has been in public service for almost all his life, he will be the first premier since the founding of the People's Republic never to have served previously in the central government, Reuters reported. A career bureaucrat, Li joined the Communist Party in 1983, at the age of 24 and rose to be party secretary of the prefecture-level city of Wenzhou by the time he was 43. In 2004, Li became the secretary-general of Zhejiang's Provincial Party Committee and earned a seat on its Standing Committee the next year, serving under then Zhejiang's party secretary, Xi Jinping. He was Xi’s de-facto chief of staff from 2004 to 2007, a fact which experts have cited as being instrumental to his political rise. In 2013, Li would rise to the post of governor of Zhejiang, a position he would hold till 2016. During his time as governor, Li would develop a reputation for being business-friendly. A project he started which sought to create small towns that have a “pro-business climate” and “good physical environment”, was so well received that it would get Xi Jinping’s endorsement and would be expanded to other parts of China as well. Starting in 2016, Li would serve as party secretary of Jiangsu province for a brief while before being appointed as the party secretary of Shanghai. He was also appointed as a member of the CCP Politburo in the same year, portending his national rise. In charge of Shanghai: praise and criticism During his time in charge of Shanghai, Li was praised for his pro-business outlook, inviting significant foreign investment into the city. In his reign, Tesla built its first gigafactory outside the United States in the city. Tesla has sole ownership of that factory, becoming the first foreign automaker in China to wholly own its plant, a CNN report says. In 2019, Li opened the Shanghai Stock Exchange STAR Market. Touted as Shanghai's equivalent to America’s NASDAQ, Chinese state media has stated that its goal is to give Chinese science and technology companies greater access to capital markets. Li also introduced popular policies like lowering the threshold for internal migrants to obtain residency permits and creating five new townships to lessen Shanghai’s land supply shortage. However, the Covid-19 pandemic and China’s zero-Covid policy was economically deeply damaging for Shanghai and Li’s handling of the situation invited significant criticism. He oversaw a harrowing lockdown which brought the bustling city to a dead stop and left citizens angry and frustrated with Li. But reports have since emerged which show Li to be far more open to western vaccines as well as more lax Covid norms. Li was instrumental in pushing for China’s unexpectedly sudden end to its zero-COVID policy late last year, Reuters reported this month. A tough task ahead People who have interacted with Li say they found him practical-minded, an effective bureaucratic operator and supportive of the private sector, Reuters reported. These credentials will be put to test as Li faces some massive challenges ahead. According to Reuters, China's economy grew just 3 per cent last year, and on the opening day of parliament Beijing set a modest 2023 growth target of around 5 per cent, its lowest goal in nearly three decades. Two years in which the country focussed on “Covid containment” has led to a shattering of consumer confidence which will be hard to rebuild. Add to that abrupt crackdowns and regulatory hurdles against some of China’s most successful private sector companies such as Alibaba, Li has his work cut out.
