Former Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao published a remembrance article of his mother in the Macau media earlier, but was blocked by Xi authorities for some sensitive remarks. The real relationship between Wen Jiabao and Xi Jinping has also attracted much attention. Some commentators say that Wen Jiabao and Xi Jinping have a long history of so-called line struggle, and the two have been at loggerheads since before Xi became general secretary.
On the eve of the Qingming Festival this year, Wen Jiabao published an article in the Macau Herald in memory of his late mother, in which he said, “The China I have in mind should be a country full of fairness and justice,” and also mentioned the devastation of the Cultural Revolution. The article was then banned from being shared by WeChat and the media’s reprint was also deleted.
Many netizens believe that Wen Jiabao’s statement that the China in his mind “should be” a country full of fairness and justice, instead of “already is”, shows his dissatisfaction with the reality under the Chinese Communist Party. The fact that Wen wrote about the scourge of the Cultural Revolution is also contrary to the authorities’ recent move to whitewash the Cultural Revolution.
This year is the 100th anniversary of the Communist Party’s so-called founding, and the Communist authorities have taken a more “positive” approach to the Cultural Revolution. Following the official launch of the new 2021 edition of the “Brief History of the Communist Party of China” (CPC History), which downplays the sins of the Cultural Revolution and Mao Zedong, the Vice Minister of the Propaganda Department recently openly claimed that the so-called “first 30 years”, including the Cultural Revolution, had been a “great achievement. The Vice Minister of the CPC Central Propaganda Department openly claimed that the so-called “first 30 years”, including the Cultural Revolution, were a “great achievement. Some Maoist leftists hailed the authorities’ characterization of the Cultural Revolution as a “great breakthrough”.
On April 27, the National Revival Network, a propaganda forum for Maoist leftist theory on the mainland, published an article by ultra-leftist figure Zhang Hongliang titled “The New Version of Party History Makes a Great Breakthrough”, saying that the new version of Party history has made a “qualitative breakthrough” compared to the old version in affirming Mao and a series of other issues. “The most significant breakthrough is the “first comprehensive affirmation” of the so-called “great achievements” in the 27 years between the founding of the CCP and the end of the Cultural Revolution, which will surely be recorded in the history books.
In a May 3 article by Radio Free Asia contributor Gao Xin, it was pointed out that the far-right forces in China that Zhang Hongliang was referring to included Wen Jiabao. In the Politburo and the Politburo Standing Committee, Wen Jiabao refused to go along with the tide and stood up for Bo’s resurgence of the Cultural Revolution in Chongqing, which made him a thorn in the side of Mao’s leftist forces, represented by Zhang Hongliang.
According to the article, when Xi Jinping, in his capacity as a member of the Standing Committee of the Politburo of the CPC Central Committee, Vice President and successor to the Party’s General Secretary, made a special trip to Chongqing 10 years ago to stand up for Bo and Wang Lijun’s “singing of red and fighting against black”, the “Maoist left” wrote articles praising them.
In 2010, when Wen Jiabao was a member of the Politburo Standing Committee and Premier of the State Council and Xi Jinping was waiting to take over, Zhang Hongliang published an article in mainland China entitled “The U.S. Media’s Contrasting Attitudes Toward China’s Two Leaders.
Zhang Hongliang’s article stated, “I recommend this article about public opinion in the West and would like to draw your attention to two Chinese Communist Party leaders who have caused very different reactions in the West, one is Premier Wen Jiabao and the other is Vice President Xi Jinping.” The piece was banned as soon as it appeared in print that year.
But after Xi Jinping came to power, Zhang Hongliang published the article again publicly in July 2015 on NationalRecovery.com. The article said, “Since 2010, the U.S. has named Premier Wen Jiabao four times in a row as one of the ‘Top Ten People Responsible for Saving the U.S. Economy,’ the ‘Top Ten Most Important Leaders in the World Today,’ and the Top 10 Most Respected Leaders in the World Today’ and recently selected Premier Wen Jiabao as the cover of U.S. Newsweek, pushing Premier Wen Jiabao to the pinnacle of honor four times in less than a year.”
Zhang Hongliang’s article continued, “But for Vice President Xi Jinping, who is also a member of the Standing Committee of the Central Politburo, the Western media has shown diametrically opposed extremes of emotion.”
He concludes his article by writing, “We should pay serious attention to and consider the contrasting extreme reflections of the two Chinese leaders in the U.S. and other Western media: extreme praise for Premier Wen Jiabao; extreme disparagement of Vice President Xi Jinping. Why do the U.S. and other Western countries do this?”
According to Gao Xin’s article, Xi Jinping, in his second year as CCP General Secretary and just a few months after Wen Jiabao resigned as Premier of the State Council, was eager to criticize Wen Jiabao, without naming him, in an internal speech for “making an enlightened gesture” to “win the praise of various public opinions overseas “He also asked the entire party to be like him, Xi Jinping, and “not be afraid of being stigmatized”.
In 2013, on the eve of the Third Plenary Session of the 18th CPC National Congress, a text of Xi Jinping’s “8.19 internal speech” was hotly circulated on the mainland internet, in which Xi called on “the whole Party to show its sword and seize the position of public opinion”. Xi said: “I once said that leading cadres can not engage in the ‘love of feathers’ set. Some cadres are skirting around the big issues, ambiguous attitude, and keep to themselves, afraid of losing points, afraid that people say they are not enlightened. This is not allowed! What is this feather? What kind of image is this? Pretend to be enlightened posture! There is no enlightened gentleman on the battlefield, and there is no enlightened gentleman on the big issues of right and wrong, so we must fight. Who then besieged our comrades, we propaganda and ideological departments to speak out, the party committee to speak out, all aspects of the voice! To send out a unified and clear signal, to form a one-call situation, do not be afraid of being stigmatized.”
Gao Xin said in his article that it can be seen that the “line struggle” between Xi Jinping and Wen Jiabao began when Wen Jiabao was still the Premier of the State Council and Xi Jinping was still in charge of party affairs as a member of the Politburo Standing Committee, waiting to take over the leadership for five years, that is, between the 17th and 18th Communist Party Congresses. The “line struggle” between them began.
Since about 2011, Wen Jiabao has been speaking out in public for reform of the political system, especially for reform of the top leadership of the CCP.
According to Gao Xin’s article, Wen Jiabao’s warning at his last press conference as premier of the State Council nine years ago that the Cultural Revolution could be revived in China at any time was ostensibly aimed at the Chongqing authorities represented by Bo Zilai and Wang Lijun, but it also implied a strong concern that the entire political situation in China would be completely reversed after Xi Jinping took power.
In 2019, when the anti-China movement broke out in Hong Kong, the Communist Party’s Hong Kong government stepped up its efforts to suppress it. At that time, there was also some insider information released that some former top Communist Party members opposed the crackdown, such as Hu Jintao’s harsh words at the meeting, while former Communist Party Premier Wen Jiabao, stacked the deck against Xi Jinping’s side, saying, “We’ve said everything we need to say, you watch what you do.”
According to commentator Chen, Wen meant that if something goes wrong, Xi will be solely responsible for the measures taken by his side and the resulting consequences.
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