China’s myth machine and the Party’s autocratic rule
Grandiose theater and hot air make a mockery of what the CCP insists is ‘transparency and representation for all’
Premier Li Keqiang spouted more hot air than it would take to launch a fleet of spy balloons in his long goodbye.
During his farewell Government Work Report at the National People’s Congress in Beijing, he peppered his economic outlook by parroting extracts from President Xi Jinping’s “Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era.”
Nearly 3,000 delegates of the Communist Party of China packed into the Great Hall of the People to listen to policies that had already been decided by Chairman of Everything Xi.
Their job was to simply rubber-stamp them and add a touch of grandiose theater to the occasion. Not that you would know the deception from the propaganda poppycock rolled out on Sunday by the Party’s official mouthpiece, the Xinhua News Agency.
“The coming days will witness how these major decisions are made through a democratic process, ensuring transparency, accountability, and representation for all,” state-controlled Xinhua beamed in an editorial of pure fiction, dressing up autocracy as democracy.
The facts:
- Universal suffrage, or the right to vote for a democratically elected government, does not exist in China.
- The CCP took power by force in 1949 and has never allowed free and fair multi-party elections.
- Every aspect of life from the courts to academia is controlled by the CCP.
- Its only goal is to stay in power. Whatever the costs to ordinary Chinese people.
I characterize the CCP as a new type of totalitarian system.
Cai Xia, former professor at the Central Party School of the Chinese Communist Party
Delve deeper: In an eye-popping essay back in 2021, dissent and scholar Cai Xia outlined the sheer horror of the Party’s grip on power and the “personality cult” of Comrade Xi.
From Big Brother to big data: “I characterize the CCP as a new type of totalitarian system because it uses information technology, big data, and Artificial Intelligence to monitor the people 24 hours a day,” Cai, a former professor at the Central Party School of the Chinese Communist Party, said.
I spy: “This kind of precision surveillance, closely combined with severe repression by the police and national security departments, makes it extremely difficult for people to voice their opposition in China,” Cai, who has described Xi as a “mafia boss” and the ruling Communist Party a “political zombie” before being expelled from the CCP, added.
Personal experience: “Since 2013, seven friends of mine who voiced their opposition have been detained and imprisoned by the Xi regime, all on fabricated charges,” Cai, who has since fled China, pointed out.
China Factor comment: So much for Xinhua’s claims about the “democratic process” in the country, and the drive for “transparency, accountability and representation for all.”