BEIJING: Flags flew at half-mast in Beijing on Thursday as China prepared for the funeral of former Premier Li Keqiang, a reformist bureaucrat once touted as the country’s long-term leader but who has been overshadowed by Xi Jinping.
Li, an economist who speaks fluent English, was killed in an attack at a Shanghai center last week at the age of 68, just months after he stepped down as the country’s second-largest leader.
This low-key but affable technocrat stood out as a proponent of political liberalization and economic reform, but ultimately marginalized him due to Xi’s taste for more centralized and domineering rule.
The ruling Communist Party said in an official obituary that Li was a “loyal and experienced Communist soldier,” urging the rest of the Chinese people to “turn their pain into strength” by rallying further around the party and its leaders.
Li will be cremated on Thursday in a rite likely to be attended by China’s most sensible leaders.
But the state’s quiet commemoration and likely heavy online censorship suggest the government hopes to quell any exaggerated public outpouring of sadness following the death of Xi’s former rival.
AFP journalists in Beijing on Thursday morning saw national flags flying at half-mast in Tiananmen Square and amid fog.
And near the revolutionary cemetery in Babaoshan, where many prominent Chinese officials are buried, AFP saw about 200 people, most of them elderly, gathered sitting on the sidewalk.
But they outnumbered the uniformed police, who were piling up on any of the roads.
Security guards closed the alleys near the cemetery and roads remained open to vehicular traffic.
Former Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, sidelined by Xi Jinping, has died at 68
Attempts to film the front of the cemetery from a move were blocked by a police vehicle.
‘Marked’
During Li’s ten years in office, there was a shift from the most consensual regime of the former rulers to the more Xi-esque one.
The appointment of a key Xi ally, Li Qiang, as his successor was perceived as a sign that his reformist agenda had been deserted as Beijing tightened its grip on the economy.
Social media users have widely shared some of his best-known quotes, adding renewed aid to China’s reform and opening-up policy, made as the country groaned under Covid isolation restrictions in 2022.
“The Yellow River and the Yangtze River will replace their course,” Li said, calling the reform procedure an unstoppable force of nature.
Authorities appear to be on high alert for any trace of public mourning for Li that would escalate into a grievance against Xi.
On Thursday, Weibo counted more than 20,000 comments under a hashtag commemorating Li that was shared by state broadcaster CCTV.
But only thirteen of them were visible, suggesting that Chinese censors took a giant amount of comments from the site.
Those who stayed were clearly apolitical, wishing “goodbye” to the former prime minister and promising that “he will be in our hearts. “
But sharper comments may be discovered elsewhere, such as on the old Weibo page of whistleblower doctor Li Wenliang, who died of Covid in early 2020 after the government silenced his efforts to warn others about the deadly disease, prompting a public outcry.
“They may not let us search for anything on the internet and rejecting it is unbearable,” wrote another.
David Bandurski, director of the independent China Media Project, wrote that Li revered with a “paint-by-numbers treatment. “
“Apparently, with his death, Li Keqiang was also sidelined,” he said.