Top-level communist Wen Jiabao named China's premier, replacing Zhu Rongji

Associated Press | March 15, 2003

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BEIJING, Mar 15, 2003 (AP WorldStream via COMTEX) -- The third-ranking member of China's Communist Party was appointed Sunday to be its next premier, assuming control of a fast-changing economy that has carried the country to new heights and created staggering problems during two decades of reform.

Wen Jiabao, 60, becomes the country's top economic official, replacing the retiring Zhu Rongji as expected. The appointment caps a generational leadership transition that inserted new top-level party officials into the highest seats of China's government.

The largely ceremonial legislature, the National People's Congress, approved Wen's elevation overwhelmingly as the final top-level personnel appointment. Voting was 2,906 for Wen, three against and 16 abstentions.

Wen, grinning, rose and shook hands with Zhu as legislators in the massive main auditorium Great Hall of the People applauded. The odds-on favorite for more than a year, he made no public statement after his appointment but took handshakes from delegates after the session adjourned.

"Developing the economy will be the biggest challenge. I think Wen Jiabao is most well-suited for the job. He has the training and the ability to do it," said Wang Yongchun, a delegate who is a provincial official from northeastern China's Jilin province.

Wen, a technocrat with an easy smile and a talent for escaping brouhahas that have taken down the people around him, replaces Zhu, who is retiring after five years of running the day-to-day tasks of the government. Zhu, however, received two write-in votes to be the nation's chief prosecutor.

On Saturday, party leader Hu Jintao was elevated to president and other top communist officials took top government posts in the transition, which was years in the making. The congress is believed to endorse all decisions mandated by the party, the true font of power in China.

Wen's appointment fits that notion. He was named to the Communist Party's inner-circle Politburo Standing Committee since November.

His chief - and daunting - tasks are to implement changes required by China's World Trade Organization membership, and, more generally, keep the country's economy moving.

That's a chief worry among China's new leaders, who are taking the reins of an increasingly restive society of 1.3 billion people struggling to cope with unemployment and rural poverty - and a feeling by poorer Chinese that two decades of economic reform begun by the late Deng Xiaoping has left them behind.

"There is still much more work to be done in the countryside," said Pan Yunhe, a legislative delegate and a computer science professor from the southeastern province of Zhejiang.

"We have a lot of confidence in Wen Jiabao," Pan said Sunday, shortly before Wen's confirmation. "He's been concerned about rural issues for a long time, and we think that he will take care of them."

Hu, 60, was the only candidate for president. He was anointed long ago by Deng and now controls both party and government, the two most prominent posts in China.

News of Hu's appointment dominated coverage Sunday by Chinese state media.

The party's People's Daily and other major newspapers ran identical red headlines - signaling rare, momentous news by departing from their usual black - announcing his elevation.

Legislative delegates on Saturday also reappointed outgoing President Jiang Zemin chairman of the government commission that leads China's 2.5-million-member military. He already chairs an identical party commission, and there was no indication when he might give up those posts.

Jiang had been party chief since 1989 and president since 1993.

Wen, born in the eastern city of Tianjin, studied geology and joined the Communist Party in 1965. As he rose through the ranks, his career path remained smooth despite an eight-year tenure in the party's Central Office during which two of the three men he worked for fell from grace.

Zhu, a crusty reformer known for his straight talk, his sense of humor and his irritability, leaves behind a reputation as a tough taskmaster who helped China's economy recover from the 1997-98 Asian financial crisis.

Few seemed concerned that the more mild-mannered Wen wouldn't be up to the job.

"I'm not worried about this at all. Every leader has his own work style," said Chen Huidong, a delegate and the official responsible for luring overseas investment to the eastern Chinese province of Zhejiang.

"The job of leaders is to follow the blueprint and the demands of the party and the government, and these are the main motivating forces," he said. "They are not purely driven by personalities or temperament."

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