Xi Jinping’s second term begins with show of unequivocal loyalty from lawmakers

With close ally Wang Qishan returning to centre stage as vice-president, they will make a powerful duo – with no limits on their time in office

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Xi Jinping (right) shakes hands with Wang Qishan after Wang was elected vice-president in Beijing on Saturday. Photo: AP

Published: 10:51pm, 17 Mar 2018Updated: 10:31am, 18 Mar 2018

Xi Jinping started his second term as China’s president on Saturday with a show of unchallenged authority, receiving full support from the legislature while his trusted ally was brought back to political centre stage.

With no other candidate in the running, the unanimous vote by the largely ceremonial National People’s Congress was more of a political statement – proclaiming unequivocal loyalty and deference to the country’s most powerful leader in decades.

In another confirmation of Xi’s political clout, former anti-corruption tsar Wang Qishan was returned to Xi’s side as the vice-president, making him the first Communist Party member without a rank to take the job since 1998.

Xi also became the first Chinese state leader to take a constitutional oath, as both the country’s president and head of its military – a symbolic move to show the significance of the constitution after it was revised a week ago to scrap the presidential term limit, add Xi’s political theory and emphasise the party’s leadership of China.

Xi Jinping takes a constitutional oath on Saturday – the first Chinese state leader to do so. Photo: AFP

Wang retired from the supreme, seven-member Politburo Standing Committee in October, observing an unwritten rule on the retirement age.

His comeback was approved with 2,969 out of 2,970 votes in favour, and one against.

But Wang is likely to take the vice-president job a bit further than his predecessors, who played a largely ceremonial role. He is expected to take a major role in foreign policy, in particular handling rocky relations with the United States.