The Death of Huang Ju: Filling the Chinese Leadership Vacuum

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China Brief
Volume 7, Issue 12 (June 13, 2007) | Download PDF Version

The Death of Huang Ju: Filling the Chinese Leadership Vacuum

By Willy Lam


On the surface, the recent death of Politburo Standing Committee
member and First Vice Premier Huang Ju presents President Hu Jintao
with an opportunity to further consolidate his power by marginalizing
the influence of the rival Shanghai Faction within the Chinese
leadership. A former mayor and Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Secretary
of Shanghai, Huang was rumored to have been involved in business
irregularities since the late 1990s and was suspected of corruption.
Yet, the Shanghai Faction led by former president Jiang Zemin and Vice
President Zeng Qinghong remains influential, as illustrated by the
obstacles that Hu and his faction have encountered while trying to
widen the anti-graft dragnet in Shanghai in the wake of the September
2006 detention of Chen Liangyu, Huang's successor as the party
secretary of the city.

Eight months after the arrest of Chen for his involvement in the
misuse of a multi-billion yuan social security fund, the pace of the
investigation has dwindled. This is despite expectations that the
demise of Huang, who had been terminally ill with cancer for the past
year, might afford Hu and his allies, Premier Wen Jiabao and Secretary
of the Central Commission for Disciplinary Inspection (CCDI) Wu
Guanzheng, new openings to ensnare more "tigers" from among venal
Shanghai Faction affiliates. Political sources in Shanghai say that
Huang's close relatives are on "intimate terms" with both Chen and his
associates, who were allowed to utilize the social security fund for
various dubious investments. Moreover, what Shanghai insiders call the
Huang Ju Clique is believed to have provided backing and "political
shelter" to disgraced Shanghai mogul Zhou Zhengyi. A rags-to-riches
tycoon, Zhou was first arrested by the CCDI in 2005 for alleged
speculation in the stock and real estate markets. Owing to
interference by both Jiang and Huang, Zhou was given only a short jail
sentence and released in mid-2006. He was re-arrested not long after
Chen's detention (China Daily, December 8, 2006). It is understood
that since mid-2006, the CCDI has stationed more than 100 agents and
investigators in Shanghai. No major breakthroughs, however, have been
reported in connection with the corruption rings associated with Chen,
Zhou and several Shanghai Faction members.

In contrast, Hu and the CCDI's Wu have scored impressive victories
regarding graft cases outside of Shanghai. One recent example is the
surprisingly harsh death sentence that the former director of the
State Food and Drug Administration, Zheng Xiaoyu, received last month
(New York Times, May 29). Given that Zheng was detained three months
after Shanghai's Chen, the CCDI and other related agencies managed to
complete investigations into dozens of Zheng's relatives and
affiliates within just six months. Similarly, satisfactory progress
has been reported in the clean-government campaign in another directly
administered city, Tianjin, where dozens of CCDI agents have been
working assiduously since late last year. Early this month, the fast-
growing industrial and financial hub was rocked by the supposed
suicide of the Chairman of the municipal Chinese People's Political
Consultative Conference (CPPCC), Song Pingshun. A former police chief
who had been apprehended for questioning by the CCDI in early summer,
Song is believed to be the overseer of a corruption ring that included
Tianjin's chief prosecutor, Li Baojin. Li, a protégé of Song's, was
arrested last year (Ming Pao, June 6; Associated Press, June 8).

Diplomatic sources in Beijing said that after the demise of his 69-
year-old protégé, former president Jiang asserted his influence in
support of Huang's family. This has, in effect, prevented the CCDI or
other anti-graft bodies from pursuing a host of Shanghai-based
suspects. Jiang's re-assertion of a party elder's prerogatives has met
opposition in Shanghai, where Huang and his family members are far
from popular. It is well known that Huang had allowed his wife to be
involved in business long after the CCDI and the Ministry of
Supervision had announced regulations forbidding relatives of senior
cadres from engaging in commercial activities. Moreover, Huang's
daughter, who settled in California in the mid-1990s after marrying
into a prominent Taiwanese American family, is said to have helped
quite a few of Huang's associates invest in or immigrate to the United
States.

The official obituary issued by Xinhua carried pro forma eulogies of
Huang's contributions to the development of Shanghai. It also noted,
however, that the conservative leader played a key role in the
unpopular campaign against "bourgeois-liberalization"-a code word for
Western ideological concepts-in the mid-1980s (Xinhua, June 5).
Moreover, after he became party leader of Shanghai in 1994, Huang
became preoccupied with securing his personal interests within the
municipal party and government apparatus. Huang also sought to
undercut and diminish the authority of his deputy, Shanghai mayor Xu
Kuangdi, a capable and well-regarded technocrat who was a protégé of
former premier Zhu Rongji's. The Western-trained Xu refused to humor
Huang and retired in 2001.

The Hu administration's apparent failure to succeed in the popular
anti-corruption campaign has deprived the Fourth Generation leadership
of the wherewithal to convince the masses of their ability to deliver
a series of pledges laid down soon after their elevation at the 16th
CCP Congress in late 2002. Other major promises made by Hu and Wen
such as narrowing the divide between the rich and poor as well as
bridging the gap between coastal and hinterland China will take much
longer to materialize. Last week, the CCDI issued yet another series
of regulations that stated that currently serving or recently retired
cadres are banned from establishing businesses with associates; are
forbidden to free shares of listed companies or other gifts; and are
prohibited from seeking employment or other advantages for their
relatives (People's Daily, June 9). The lackluster performance of the
CCDI's "tiger-killing" expedition in Shanghai, however, has tarnished
Hu's ambitious campaign to nurture clean governance.

Meanwhile, with little over four months until the 17th CCP Congress,
the energy and attention of the leadership is now focused solely on
the distribution of coveted slots on the CCP Central Committee, the
Politburo and its Standing Committee that will occur during the
Congress. The 81-year-old Jiang's continued influence is notably
evident in this regard. A source in Beijing familiar with the
deliberations within the Shanghai Faction has noted that the former
president had held "fairly detailed discussions" with Hu on personnel
changes at the Congress. "As usual, Jiang counseled stability," the
source said. "Jiang urged Hu not to bring too many new faces into the
nine-member Standing Committee." For this and other reasons, the
majority of the nine Standing Committee members are poised to be given
new five-year terms. Apart from Hu, Wen and parliamentary chief Wu
Bangguo, these nine members include Zeng, 68, and Li Changchun, 63,
who holds the ideology and propaganda portfolio that includes media
censorship.

Considering that the age of 68 was set as the retirement age for
Politburo members at both the 15th and the 16th Party Congresses,
Zeng's extended tenure can only be seen as yet another instance in
which rules and regulations are being bent to suit the political
expediency of the day. Hu and Wen, however, have had difficulty
convincing Jiang and other Shanghai Faction stalwarts that Wu
Guanzheng, 69, should also be allowed to retain power. Hu had argued
that following Zeng's example, the leadership collective should also
make an exception for Wu so that the latter would have a few
additional years to complete his relatively successful anti-corruption
drive. Regarding Li Changchun, the youngest Standing Committee member,
the issue is not one of age but of the overall perception that his
extremely orthodox approach to ideology and propaganda has stifled the
spirit of innovation that Hu and Wen have been trying to foster during
the past two years. Li, however, has successfully curried favor with
ex-president Jiang, who is lobbying forcefully for him to remain in
the Standing Committee.

Perhaps most significant is that President Hu has had difficulty
inducting a Fifth Generation representative from within his own
faction into the Standing Committee. Since Hu, 65, is expected to
retire from the party leadership at the 18th CCP Congress in 2012, the
law of succession would dictate that a protégé of Hu's should be
installed into the highest policymaking organ as soon as possible. The
problem with Hu's younger-generation associates and underlings,
however, is that almost none of them has acquired the experience or
developed a national stature that is commensurate with Standing
Committee membership. For example, the two front-runners to succeed Hu
as party chief, the party secretaries of Liaoning and Jiangsu, Li
Keqiang and Li Yuanchao, respectively, have failed to distinguish
themselves during the past four to five years.

Sources in Beijing stated last week that a compromise might be
accomplished between Hu and the Shanghai Faction: that a Hu protégé
with enough experience and stature be elevated to the PSC. The name
mentioned in this context was the veteran director of the CCP United
Front Department, Liu Yandong, 62, who had worked closely with Hu
within the Communist Youth League leadership in the 1980s. Not only is
Liu popular and trusted by Hu, but also, after the expected retirement
of Vice Premier Wu Yi next spring, she will be the nation's highest-
ranking woman. Under this scenario, Liu would assume the position of
State Vice President, while incumbent Zeng will take over the
chairmanship of the CPPCC. Unlike Hu's younger protégés, Liu is
acceptable to most CCP factions. Moreover, there is a consensus among
senior political circles that a woman in the Standing Committee will
better enable China to fit into the global norm of having additional
senior female officials.

The problem for President Hu is that Liu is hardly a rising star of
the Fifth Generation. There is also a possibility that, should Hu fail
to elevate any of his Fifth Generation protégés to the top this time
around, the Shanghai Faction as well as other CCP cliques may settle
on somebody else at the 18th Congress in 2012 -perhaps a so-called
princeling, or the son of a party elder-for the position of the next
CCP General Secretary. These intriguing developments reveal that
despite the impression given by the official media that Hu is China's
undisputed leader, there are serious limitations to his powers. He has
been forced to resort to time-honored horse-trading practices with
other power blocs in order to move the party forward.

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