SinoInsight 1
Key personnel reshuffles
June 22
Zhang Xiaoming, the Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office deputy director in charge of daily operations, was transferred to the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Consultative Conference to serve as deputy secretary-general, according to a report on the official CPPCC website.
June 24
The official website of the National People’s Congress listed Ministry of Public Security Party secretary Wang Xiaohong as public security minister on its appointments and removals page. On the same day, the “Leadership. Organization” column of the Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission’s official website listed Wang as deputy secretary of the CPLAC.
Hong Kong media outlets also reported that Wang Xiaohong will join the Central Leading Group on Hong Kong and Macau Affairs as deputy leader, replacing former public security minister Zhao Kezhi.
OUR TAKE
1. Wang Xiaohong’s appointment to his new positions and Zhang Xiaoming’s transfer out of Hong Kong and Macau apparatus affirm the analysis and information we laid out in earlier newsletters (Wang, Nov. 22, 2021 newsletter; Zhang, June 2, 2022 newsletter).
2. Our analysis of what Wang Xiaohong’s promotion entails remains unchanged from what we wrote earlier. In adding to that, Wang’s elevation to public security minister and CPLAC deputy secretary, recent provincial public security director reshuffles, and public security-related intrigue surrounding the Tangshan restaurant incident, further affirms our assessment that Xi Jinping is looking to “rectify” the public security apparatus and more tightly grip the Party’s “knife handle” (刀把子) before the 20th Party Congress.
The upcoming weeks and months could see an intensification of Xi’s “rectification” moves. In particular, all 31 provincial public security heads could be reshuffled to put in place personnel whom the Xi leadership trusts. Meanwhile, Jiang faction officials and those who resist Xi could be transferred out of their base of operations to facilitate probes (調虎離山) and pull the disloyal elements away from their established local power networks.
By appointing Wang Xiaohong as minister of public security, Xi Jinping also broke a personnel reshuffle norm from the Jiang faction’s era of dominance. Since the establishment of the PRC in 1949 to 2002, only one (Ruan Chongwu, 1985 to 1987) out of nine public security ministers was an official with no prior experience in public security work. Of the remaining eight, one (Tao Siju, 1990 to 1998) was a career police officer, while the other seven (Luo Ruiqing, Xie Fuzhi, Li Zhen, Hua Guofeng, Zhao Cangbi, Liu Fuzhi, Wang Fang) were all professional soldiers before the PRC took over China and had served various internal security roles or oversaw the extermination of traitors. This changed after the 16th Party Congress in 2002, with five civil officials (Jia Chunwang, Zhou Yongkang, Meng Jianzhu, Guo Shengkun, and Zhao Kezhi) lacking public security experience serving as public security minister.
Zhao Kezhi, the Xi ally whom Wang Xiaohong has replaced as public security minister, is still serving as CPLAC deputy secretary, a state councilor of the 13th State Council, and the fifth-rank deputy head of the Central Leading Group on Hong Kong and Macau Affairs. Zhao will formally relinquish his position as state councilor at the 20th Party Congress key personnel reshuffle and be replaced by Wang. Also, Wang has likely taken over, or is set to take over, Zhao’s position in the Central Leading Group on Hong Kong and Macau Affairs.
3. Our analysis of Zhang Xiaoming’s transfer out of the Hong Kong and Macau apparatus also remains unchanged from our previous assessment. To very briefly recap, Xi Jinping is clearing the leadership ranks of the Hong Kong and Macau apparatus of Jiang faction loyalists and has more fully consolidated his control over it.
As an addendum, Zhang leaving the Hong Kong and Macau apparatus could lead to organizational adjustments at the HKMAO. There was previously no HKMAO deputy director in charge of daily operations before Zhang was demoted to that position after Xia Baolong was “parachuted” into the HKMAO to replace him as director in 2020. It is now unclear whether the position of deputy director in charge of daily operations at the HKMAO will be retained following Zhang’s exit. If the position is discarded, then the HKMAO will revert to the old arrangement of having one director and three deputy directors (currently Huang Liuquan, Yang Wanming, and Wang Linggui) based in Beijing, as well as the Hong Kong Liaison Office director and Macau Liaison Office director concurrently serving as HKMAO deputy directors.
Presently, HKMAO deputy director Huang Liuquan is the only official in the leadership ranks of the organ to have prior work experience in the Hong Kong and Macau apparatus. This could be due to the fact that he did not see prominent career advancement at the HKMAO during the Jiang faction’s era of dominance and did not appear to be favored by the Jiang faction. For instance, Huang spent 15 years (2001 to 2016) serving as deputy director, and later director, of the HKMAO’s law department before being finally promoted to HKMAO deputy director (vice ministerial rank) during Xi’s first term.
With Jiang faction official Zhang Xiaoming transferred out of the HKMAO, Xi Jinping seems to have finally mostly wrestled the Hong Kong and Macau apparatus out of the hands of the Jiang faction after almost a decade in office. None of the senior officials in the Hong Kong and Macau apparatus appear to have close connections with the Jiang faction or power networks in the apparatus established when the Jiang faction was in complete control; the Xi leadership has extended its supra-authority national security apparatus to Hong Kong; and the new Hong Kong chief executive John Lee has a background which suggests that he will be obedient to Party Central.
SinoInsight 2
Personnel adjustments at State Council ministries and commissions
June 17
1. Luo Wen (age 58), former deputy Party secretary of Sichuan Province and Sichuan executive vice governor, was appointed Party secretary of the State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR) and is slated to become SAMR director. Luo’s predecessor Zhang Gong was transferred to Tianjin to serve as mayor on May 28, 2022.
Luo Wen spent his formative years in the Ministry of Electronics Industry, as well as the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) and its affiliated companies (Nov. 1997 to Jan. 2019). Before the 19th Party Congress, Luo was promoted to MIIT vice minister (July 2017 to Jan. 2019) and his later career trajectory indicated that he was being groomed by the Xi leadership. Luo was transferred from the MIIT to serve as a deputy director in the National Development and Reform Commission for about a year (Jan. 2019 to March 2020) before being “parachuted” into Sichuan Province for over two years to gain local government experience (March 2020 to June 2022). Now Luo has returned to the central government (SAMR Party secretary) and was promoted to the ministerial rank.
2. Ni Hong (60), vice minister of the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development, was promoted to minister. His predecessor Wang Menghui (62) was appointed Hubei Party secretary in March 2022.
Ni spent the early part of his career at the Ministry of Construction (Aug. 1983 to April 1996) and in urban construction-related posts in Anhui Province (April 1996 to Dec. 2010), eventually serving as head of the Anhui Provincial Construction Department (Jan. 2006 to Dec. 2010). After that, he was transferred to the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development where he served as director of the ministry’s department of housing reform and development (Dec. 2010 to June 2015), vice minister (June 2015 to June 2022), and now minister housing and urban-rural development.
Ni can be considered to be a technocrat official. Ni was sent to the provinces for grooming during the Jiang faction’s era of dominance, but his career progressed modestly later and he did not become a very prominent official.
June 18
Pan Yue (62), deputy director of the Central United Work Front Department and director of the State Council’s Overseas Chinese Affairs Office, was appointed secretary of the State Ethnic Affairs Commission’s Party group. On June 24, he was officially appointed by the National People’s Congress as director of the State Ethnic Affairs Commission.
Pan Yue served in many different organs and apparatuses over the course of his official career. Before Xi Jinping took office, Pan held various positions in propaganda, state-owned assets management, the quality control authorities (defunct after state and Party institutional reforms in 2018), the economic reform office at the State Council (dissolved in 2003), and the environment protection bureau (upgraded to a ministry in 2008). Pan was vice minister of environment protection (2008 to 2016) during Xi’s first term.
Pan was later transferred to the Central Institute of Socialism where he was promoted to secretary of the institute’s Party Group and its first vice president (ministerial rank; March 2016 to July 2021). He joined the 19th Central Committee as an alternate member at the 19th Party Congress in 2017. In October 2020, Pan was transferred to the Central United Work Front Department where he served in the posts stated above, and recently, and was recently transferred to the State Ethnic Affairs Commission.
Given that Pan Yue is reaching the retirement age for ministerial rank officials (65), his current appointment is likely to be a transitional arrangement. Both the Overseas Chinese Affairs Office and the State Ethnic Affairs Commission are subordinate to the Central United Front Work Department, and handling ethnic policies is regarded as less important than overseas united front work.
June 21
Wang Yonghong, deputy director of the National Government Offices Administration, was promoted to director and Party secretary of the organ, replacing the retiring Li Baorong (64).
There is limited publicly available information about Wang Yonghong. Wang appears to have spent his entire career at the National Government Offices Administration and can be considered to be a technocrat.
June 23
1. Wang Guanghua (59), Party group member and vice minister of the Ministry of Natural Resources, was promoted to minister and Party group secretary of the ministry.
Wang is a technocrat who spent the bulk of his career at the State Land Administration (now defunct) and the Ministry of Land and Resources. Before state and Party institutional reforms in 2018, he served as vice minister and Party group member of the Ministry of Land and Resources (July 2015 to March 2018). Wang would retain those positions after the ministry was reformed into the Ministry of Natural Resources.
2. Lu Hao (55), former minister of national resources, was transferred to the Development Research Center of the State Council to serve as secretary of the center’s Party group. Lu’s appointment means that he will soon officially become director of the Development Research Center.
Lu is Communist Youth League (團派, tuanpai) official. In August 1999, he was transferred from a state-owned enterprise in Beijing to serve as an official in the Beijing municipal government, and would eventually become deputy mayor of Beijing municipality from January 2003 to April 2008. Lu’s career prospects were bright during the second term of the Hu-Wen leadership, seeing him become the youngest ministerial rank official in the PRC and a full member of the 18th Central Committee.
When Xi was trying to build up his shaky political foundation during his first term, Lu Hao was transferred to Heilongjiang Province to serve as acting governor and governor (March 2013 to March 2018). Lu was then transferred back to the central government after Party and state institutional reforms in 2018 to head the Ministry of Natural Resources (March 2018 to June 2022).
The Development Research Center is a public institution directly under the State Council that is responsible for policy research and consultation work. Lu Hao’s transfer there suggests that he has not gained the Xi leadership’s trust over the years and is now being left to “idle” in a ministerial-rank sinecure position. On a related note, former Beijing mayor and Jiang faction official Wang Anshun was also sent to the Development Research Center, where he serves as deputy director (ministerial rank).
June 24
1. Pei Jinjia (59), former deputy director of the Taiwan Affairs Office of the Central Committee and the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council, was appointed minister of veteran affairs. Pei’s predecessor Sun Shaocheng was appointed Inner Mongolia Party secretary in April 2022.
Pei is a native official of Xiamen City in Fujian Province. When Xi Jinping was transferred from Fujian to Zhejiang to serve as provincial Party secretary in 2002, Pei was serving as deputy Party secretary and district head of Kaiyuan District in Xiamen City. Pei continued to serve in Fujian, eventually becoming Xiamen Party secretary (Sept. 2016 to Nov. 2018).
In Nov. 2018, Pei was transferred to the central government to serve as deputy director of the Taiwan Affairs Office of the Central Committee and the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council. In April 2022, he succeeded Sun Shaocheng as Party secretary of the Ministry of Veterans Affairs. The following month, Pei was appointed deputy director of the Office of the Central Integrated Military-Civilian Development Commission.
2. Zhou Zuyi (57), former deputy head of the Central Organization Department, was appointed minister of human resources and social security. Zhou’s predecessor Zhang Jinan (65) was moved to a “second-line” post in the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, serving as deputy director of the CPPCC’s population, resources and environment committee.
Zhou is a native Shanghai official. He spent his formative years in Shanghai’s Tongji University (April 1994 to Nov. 2008), eventually becoming the school’s deputy Party secretary (July 2002 to Nov. 2008) and vice president (Dec. 2004 to Nov. 2008). Xi Jinping was Shanghai Party secretary (March 2007 to Oct. 2007) when Zhou was at Tongji University.
Before moving up to the Central Organization Department (Aug. 2014 to May 2022), Zhou Zuyi served as deputy director of the Shanghai municipal Organization Department (bureau rank) and Party secretary of Tongji University (vice ministerial rank). He was promoted to deputy director of the Central Organization Department (Oct. 2016 to May 2022) about two years after his transfer from Shanghai.
There are several possible reasons for why Zhou was promoted up the ranks, including his education system background, indistinct associations with the Jiang faction, and Xi’s familiarity with him as a former subordinate.
3. Cong Liang (51), former deputy director of the National Development and Reform Commission, was appointed Party secretary of the National Food and Strategic Reserves Administration. Cong’s appointment indicates that he will soon be made National Food and Strategic Reserves Administration director. Cong’s predecessor at the National Food and Strategic Reserves Administration and 19th Central Committee member Zhang Wufeng was formally investigated on June 15, 2022.
Cong Liang is a technocrat. He previously served in the National Development and Reform Commission and its predecessor commission (April 1997 to June 2022), and was appointed National Development and Reform Commission deputy director in June 2020.
Local officials ‘retreating to the second-line’
1. Wang Zhimin (65), former deputy director of the Central Institute of Party History and Literature and former director of the Hong Kong Liaison Office, was appointed vice chairman of the National People’s Congress’ ethnic committee.
2. Xin Chunying (67, female), deputy secretary general of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, was appointed vice chairwoman of the NPC’s constitution and legal affairs committee.
3. Wang Dongfeng (64), former Hebei Party secretary, was appointed vice chairman of the NPC’s financial and economic affairs committee.
4. Shi Taifeng (66), former Inner Mongolia Party secretary, was appointed vice chairman of the NPC’s education, science, culture, and health committee.
5. Fu Ziying (65), former director of the Macau Liaison Office, was appointed vice chairman of the NPC’s foreign affairs committee.
6. Xian Hui (63, female), former chairwoman of the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region government, was appointed vice chairwoman of the NPC’s overseas Chinese affairs committee.
7. Qiu Shuijing (60), former Peking University Party secretary, was appointed vice chairman of the NPC’s environment and resources protection committee.
8. Peng Qinghua (62), former Sichuan Party secretary, was appointed vice chairman of the NPC’s agriculture and rural affairs committee.
OUR TAKE
1. Xi Jinping’s intensive personnel reshuffles in the lead up to the 20th Party Congress appear to be aimed at replacing the bulk of senior officials in the provincial governments and the ministries who rose rapidly up the ranks during the Jiang-Hu period (and may have questionable factional allegiances) with those who are more likely to be loyal to him.
Aside from the various ministerial-rank reshuffles listed above, many officials at the sub-provincial and sub-ministerial level have also been rotated recently. There are also many personnel adjustments in provincial Party Committees.
2. The various personnel changes listed above mostly adhere to Xi’s reshuffle “formula” that he has stuck with over the past 10 years (see here and here).
To briefly recap, the Xi leadership:
- Purges Jiang faction officials and those who were swiftly promoted during the Jiang-Hu period, or sends them to “idle” in sinecure positions, or moves them to “second-line” posts earlier than their career trajectory warrants. For instance, Lu Hao was sent to a sinecure post and Peng Qinghua was moved to the “second-line.”
- Promotes officials and colleagues whom Xi Jinping has either worked with or is acquainted with, as well as officials whom Xi’s allies are familiar with. Examples in the recent reshuffles include Pei Jinjia and Zhou Zuyi.
- Promotes officials who moved slowly up the official ranks during the Jiang faction’s era of dominance (1997 to 2012). Examples from above include Luo Wen and Ni Hong.
- Promotes technocrats who tend to have weaker or indistinct factional associations. Examples include Wang Yonghong, Wang Guanghua, and Cong Liang.
3. Based on our research, the provincial Party secretaries and governors of many provinces have reached or are approaching retirement age since the second half of 2021. Many of these retiring senior provincial officials will likely move to take up sinecure positions in the NPC or the National Committee of the CPPCC. Those whom the Xi leadership believes have rendered meritorious service (like Shi Taifeng with his “retroactive investigations” in Inner Mongolia) could even be promoted to vice chairman of the NPC or the CPPCC National Committee at the 20th Party Congress.
