Leaders call on Mao in challenging times
Xi Jinping is not the first president to invoke the late chairman for the purpose of establishing his own credentials - a move that carries risks
The celebrations of the birth and life of Mao Zedong yesterday were intended to help justify the policies of the current leadership of Xi Jinping , who faces challenges similar to the late leader's, analysts said.
By reciting Mao's famous quote that "we will never become Li Zicheng", a farmer rebel leader who overthrew the Ming dynasty (1368-1644) and ruled China for 43 days before he was driven out by the Manchurians, Xi was restating the Communist Party's resolve to maintain control.
Mao's remark, which he made before leaving for Beijing to see the People's Republic of China set up, was an effort to draw a lesson from history, said Pu Xingzu, a professor of politics at Fudan University in Shanghai.
Xi similarly quoted Mao in his speech in Beijing yesterday to warn the party of the same, or even greater, challenges facing its rule today.
"Mao had been questioned before whether he could end the cycle of changing dynasties and Xi is clearly troubled by the same question," Pu said. "The Communist Party has ruled China for more than six decades, but is still faced with the question of whether its rule will last. The situation now is even more challenging, with new scenarios."
What impairs the party's rule most is corruption and abuse of power, and that it serves a small fraction of society, Pu said. Xi has unveiled his own campaign calling on cadres to toe a "mass line", a Maoist organisational strategy that stresses close contact with the grass roots.
As such, Xi's speech commemorating Mao was largely to support his own agenda.
