China to Review Official Appointments, Removals: CCTV

Rebecca, what sort of personnel changes are we talking about here? And I guess the implications at such a tenuous time for the Chinese economy. The U.S. is one we’re watching very closely. Yeah. So this is quite sort of unexpected. Just a one day meeting for the National People’s Congress Standing Committee. So this is the body that when the full NPC isn’t in session, is responsible for formally appointing and removing figures. So it’s important sort of in two counts. The first is whether we see the ascension of Pangong Shan. He’s expected to take on that top

job at the PBOC. And the second, of course, is Chin Gung, China’s foreign minister, who’s been out of the public eye since June 25th, being very, very closely watched. And there’s a couple of options today with that meeting. So either we hear that nothing changes, in which case we know mention of Tiangong, in which case he’s likely to still be that minister and for another month to months or indefinitely. But it really depends on what actually is going on behind the scenes here. Or alternatively, we hear that he is being removed, in which case that

would indicate there is some issue potentially with his help or some other issue that has come up. So these are two scenarios really being very, very closely watched. Rebecca, what’s the

implications for the economy and policymaking given all of this? Yeah. I mean, I think the disappearance of Chen Gang generally has underscored this fear around China’s policy making, being something of a black box and impossible to determine, really. We’ve had chatter from diplomats in Beijing and elsewhere around the whereabouts of Tim for several weeks now, really kind of somehow captured the imagination and in the

information vacuum that the government has allowed to flourish, all sorts of speculation has been allowed to emerge. And it isn’t really critical moment for Xi Jinping because he is trying to stabilize his economy. That growth we are seeing sort of start to splatter as well as try and stabilize economic ties. Sorry, excuse me, as well as stabilizing those diplomatic ties with countries like the US and its allies, which increasingly view China as a strategic competitor. So the one hand trying to sort of roll out a reset this global relationship, but the other having his top

diplomat missing in action, the person that he is relying on in some ways to helm the implementation of these type of efforts, particularly with the sort of day to day business of diplomacy, things like meeting, greeting, having that communication with other visiting foreign ministers and business delegations. Yeah. Rebecca It’s fascinating, isn’t it? You’ve really seen that impact these high level meetings that were to be held with representatives from the UK. The EU have now been put on hold. How are we seeing, I guess, a leadership manoeuvre who’s potentially stepping in 14 gong as his whereabouts

are still unclear at this point between? Yeah, it has been really interesting to see how figures have sort of stepped in. Mojo shoes is a possible option. So this is Tim Gunn’s deputy, although his one time superior as a spokesperson at the Foreign Ministry. Now he has sort of leaned in. He’s a pretty well credentialed figure here, taken overseas to do pretty prominent overseas ambassadorial roles, for example. So we’ve seen him step in. He stepped in at a BRICS foreign minister meeting, for example. So he’s sort of junior to Tim Gunn, potentially could step into

that role. We’ve also seen one guy who’s a sort of senior equivalent, senior figure to Tim Gunn, also stepping into some of the appointments and the meetings that Tiangong has not been attending to.