China ended a three-decade tradition when it announced on March 4 that Premier Li Qiang would not hold a press conference at the conclusion of the annual meeting of the National People’s Congress in Beijing. Moreover, the NPC, as the central government’s rubber-stamp legislative body is known, stated there will be no post-meeting pressers through 2027. The widely televised event, during which premiers would take questions from both domestic and foreign media, has been a highlight of the Chinese political calendar since 1993.
The surprise move comes at a time of disturbing news about both China militancy in its peripheral seas and hints that the Chinese regime is tearing itself apart.
China’s leaders are now reacting to a rapidly deteriorating situation. The economy, the motor of the country’s half-century rise, is failing. Gross domestic product did not increase 5.2 percent last year, as the National Bureau of Statistics officially reported. Growth—if indeed there was any—was about 1.5 percent, as the Rhodium Group estimated.