Will Xi Bend Retirement 'Rule' to Keep Top Officials in Power?
- Drafter of Xi policy documents calls guideline ‘pure folklore’
- Remarks add new uncertainty to upcoming leadership reshuffle
Top leaders Xi Jinping, Li Keqiang, Zhang Dejiang, Yu Zhengsheng, Liu Yunshan, Wang Qishan, Zhang Gaoli are present at a symposium attended by ministers and provincial officials in Beijing, capital of China, Jan. 18, 2016. (Xinhua/Liu Weibing)
Photographer: Xinhua News Agency/Getty ImagesA senior Communist Party policy official dismissed as “pure folklore” a retirement rule widely used to predict Chinese leadership changes, calling into question key assumptions about who will step down after President Xi Jinping’s reshuffle next year.
Deng Maosheng, a director with the party’s Central Policy Research Office, told reporters at a government-organized news briefing in Beijing on Monday that retirement rules for senior officials needed to be flexible and revised if circumstances required. He was responding to a question about “seven up, eight down,” shorthand for the party’s convention of retiring officials age 68 or older from the Politburo’s supreme Standing Committee.