By Makhdoom Babar
(President & Editor-in-Chief)
People’s Republic of China’s Communist Party the CPC is starting its high-profile 20th Congress today which is being described as a landmark moot during which it is expected to elect President Xi Jinping for another term as China’s President which is though unprecedented yet very much required and supported by the people of China who have seen a huge administrative and governance success for China under the 2 successive tenures of Xi, for both China and the CPC that eventually ended up in the phenomenal uplift and dramatic development of the people of China. Xi’s wisdom and vision and his actions both in China’s internal matters as well as regional and international affairs transformed him into a real icon and made him simply inevitable to continue serving China as a visionary and sincere President with this all accounting for creating THE Xi FACTOR.
The Xi FACTOR, however, became a sign of frustration and annoyance for western leaders, particularly the US presidents and its intelligence agencies as they found it very hard to digest the way China started marching on the road of prosperity, international development, and technological progress advancement under Xi’s visionary leadership.
All these western forces joined hands to start creating one hurdle after another to block this march of the great Chinese nation under Xi Jinping. starting from raising controversy over the South-China sea issue, getting a sham arbitration through an unauthorised and jurisdiction- less Tribunal, and moving to the absolutely faceless accusation of human right violation while the Xi government in Xinjiang province, these forces left no stone unturned to create all sorts of hurdles for Xi Jinping and his China. In this madness to neutralize Xi, these forces have lately spread rumors that Xi Jinping has become very unpopular in China and was even put in house arrest by the Chinese army.
Despite all these odds, the Xi FACTOR continued to glitter, making a mockery of all these conspiracies and machinations, Xi continued to deliver for his people as well as for the people of the world.
The BRI
While talking about Xi’s wisdom and mega vision, one cannot forget his extraordinary step of launching the belt and road initiative (BRI) which has actually started reshaping the economies of Asian Nations and particularly the people of these countries. An initiative that was supposed to be warmly welcomed by the entire world surprisingly invited the wrath of the US and its allies including England, India, etc. BRI itself is a concept that speaks very highly of Xi’s vision and wisdom to introduce human development and infrastructure as well as economic uplift of the entire mankind with a future of shared destiny. The initiative was conceived to bring peace, harmony, and development, aiming to create friendship and togetherness but it actually earned Xi a lot of enemies from West and India. However, the Xi FACTOR remained solid in the successful implementation of the BRI and the initiative continued to impress and attract billions and billions of people across the world.
Xi’s INTERNAL
ACHIEVEMENTS
Xi and his communist party leaders have always been standing close enough to their people in every moment of trouble and tragedy. From snow storms to earthquakes, Xi FACTOR remained very visible in rescuing and supporting people in trouble. In the words of former UN High Commissioner of Human Rights, Michele Bechelet, China made tremendous progress in all fields, pertaining to people’s welfare and uplift. She highly appreciated Xi Jinping’s initiative of poverty alleviation under which over 850 million people were dragged out of poverty and that too 10 years ahead of its target date. She also highly appreciated Xi government’s initiative of health care and almost universal unemployment insurance scheme that was to go a long way in ensuring the protection of the right to health and broader social and economic right of every citizen of China. She highly lauded Xi Jinping’s government for pushing the multilateral 2030 Agenda and Sustainable Development Goals, both back home and internationally. There had been important legislative and judicial reforms in China under Xi’s vision of gender equality and the law of protecting women’s rights and interests was revised by the Xi administration said which is said to bring about several improvements in the protection of women’s rights. Recently, the Xi government introduced reforms to the Civil Course that ensures the blocking of Sexual Harassment as well as domestic violence.
Under Xi’s leadership, China saw efforts for ensuring quality development, closely linked to strengthening the rule of law and respect for human rights. In the Xi era, China also formulated Human Rights Action Plan which shows Xi administration’s commitment to respecting Human Rights. Xi administration also introduced a mega program for advancing gender equality and the rights of people with disabilities and elder people.
Apart from this, the whole world witnessed how Xi Administration handled the issue of COVID-19 and not only saved millions of lives in China but also contributed to saving billions of precious human lives across the globe.
The way Xi Factor glittered during the COVID Pandemic , every Chinese national in any part of the world could walk with pride and honor of having such a visionary, able, strong leader at the helm of affairs. The creation of COVID-specific hospitals overnight, the mass mobilization of medical and paramedical staff to every nook and corner of China and to create of a highly effective vaccine and its follow-up supply to all parts of the world by Xi government, just came as phenomenal and made to the Chinese nation proud of its leadership.
In the direction of Scientific advancement, China saw a new vibrating era under XI’s leadership. During Xi’s leadership, China has by now created a portfolio of highly impressive Space Missions, including Robotic Missions to the Moon and Mars. The Tianwen-I orbiter and rover mission, which launched for Mars in July 2020, and Chang’e-5, which gathered the youngest lunar samples ever collected and delivered them to Earth later that year, are now delivering exciting scientific results. The new data and results emerging from the missions sparked a call for a special session at this year’s Lunar and Planetary Science Conference (LPSC), held in Texas, US. Similarly, the Chang’e-5 Mission has opened a new era of China’s lunar and planetary sciences. At the same time, China’s first interplanetary mission, Tianwen-I, which includes the Zhurong rover in the plain of Utopia Planitia, is also exciting the science community.
On global front
On the International front, Xi has also been playing a very active role the Xi Factor continued to glitter all around. The energy and vibration that the Xi Factor brought to the mega-regional platform of The Shanghai Cooperation Organization SCO, has been amazing.
The Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) is a permanent intergovernmental international organization, the creation of which was announced on 15 June 2001 in Shanghai (China) by the Republic of Kazakhstan, the People’s Republic of China, the Kyrgyz Republic, the Russian Federation, the Republic of Tajikistan, and the Republic of Uzbekistan. It was preceded by the Shanghai Five mechanism.
The Shanghai Cooperation Organization Charter was signed during the St. Petersburg SCO Heads of State meeting in June 2002, and entered into force on 19 September 2003. This is the fundamental statutory document which outlines the organization’s goals and principles, as well as its structure and core activities.
The SCO has been delivering with efficiency to the cause of its formation right from its formal inception. It contributed a lot for regional peace, prosperity, trade and economic integration. However, when Xi Jinping became President of the People’s Republic of China in 2013 and started handling the affairs of the SCO from Beijing, the SCO started getting much more vibrant and effective. it was the Xi Factor that completely changed the complexion of the organization and brought it to par with all the contemporary world bodies.
It was just the extraordinary leadership ability of Xi Jinping that transformed the SCO into a tremendously vibrant and comprehensively prosperous body of the Eurasian region.
The Xi Factor pushed such a spirit into the SCO that just within less than 2 decades, certain analysts have already started equating the stature and status of SCO with NATO, a world body, formed way back in 1949.
It remains a fact that the charter and nature of business of SCO are by no means similar to those of NATO, yet, if one desires to draw a comparison of the stature and credibility, the Xi Factor has made this merely 17 years old body as effective and as comprehensive as 70 years old NATO.
It has been the Xi Factor that brought Pakistan and India to the Forum as the Full Member States despite the fact that both were desirous of becoming full members of the SCO for long while the Xi Factor is attracting current Observers, Iran and Afghanistan to join the club as Full Members. It is surely the Xi factor that both Pakistan and India have agreed to hold joint military exercises for the first time in history from the platform of SCO which could bring far-reaching effects for regional peace and security.
At a juncture when the global community is facing a new round of major developments, great change, and profound readjustment, Xi says that humanity has a major choice to make between openness and isolation, and between progress and retrogression. The vivacity of the Xi Factor could be gauged from merely one example the President brought forward a new vision and ideology of cooperation amongst the SCO States and the concept is now being regarded as the Five Pillars of Cooperation.
The vision of Xi Jinping under which he has not only introduced a rather global project of One Belt One Road or the Belt and Road Initiative, the vision through which Xi has given a guideline for the next 100 years for the sustainable development of China, the vision originating from his book ‘ the governance of China and the vision that emerges out of Xi’s theory of the Chinese Dream makes the Xi Factor very vital for the SCO’s future as he has the same vision for making SCO more vibrant, more effective and more constructive in years to come.
On April 2, 2017, the Constitution of the People’s Republic of China incorporated“Xi Jinping’s Thought”.
Therefore the President’s Thought will be officially associated with the Party’s “guiding ideology”, without forgetting that the current Xi is the first, after Mao Zedong, to mark the history, texts, and official policy line of the Communist Party of China with his own explicit ideological and political vision.
For the great achievements that he made during his last 2 tenures,, he is also termed a Paramount Leader by global media.
This means that Xi will remain at the helm of affairs of China for an unlimited period of time and therefore he will keep playing his role and exercising his vision for China’s development and global peace and harmony. It is up to the CPC moot to elect Xi for the next term or otherwise but in any case, The Xi FACTOR in China’s amazing development and CPC’s phenomenal success will continue to glitter and shine forever.
-The Author is President and Editor-in-Chief of Pakistani newspaper The Dailymail International
