China’s leaders yesterday wrapped up a week-long key conclave at which they admitted more was needed to revive a sluggish economy battered by an ailing housing market, poor domestic demand and record-high youth unemployment.
Top officials have been upfront about the myriad challenges China is facing, admitting that a modest 5 percent growth goal would not be easy and that “hidden risks” are dragging the economy down, but they have supplied few details about how they plan to tackle the problems.
Officials have also moved to strengthen powers to deal with threats to their rule and tightened a veil of secrecy around policymaking, scrapping a traditional annual news conference and vowing to include national security provisions in a raft of new laws.
Photo: AFP
Delegates to the National People’s Congress, including Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), gathered at Beijing’s Great Hall of the People to rubber-stamp legislation at 3pm as the conclave came to an end.
Among the pieces of legislation approved was a revision to the Organic Law of the State Council, China’s Cabinet, which state media has said would aim to deepen the “leadership” of the Chinese Communist Party over the government.
Delegates also approved the nation’s state budget, and the national economic and social development plan for this year. Only a handful of the body’s almost 3,000 delegates voted against any of the motions.
The tightly choreographed event capped a week of high-level meetings that have been dominated by the economy, which last year posted some of its slowest growth in years.
Ministers on Saturday pledged to do more to boost employment and stabilize the nation’s troubled property market.
“Workers face some challenges and problems in employment, and more effort needs to be made to stabilize employment,” Chinese Minister of Human Resources and Social Security Wang Xiaoping (王曉萍) told a news conference.
Chinese Minister of Housing and Urban-Rural Development Ni Hong (倪虹) said that fixing the property market — which long accounted for about one-quarter of China’s economy — remained “very difficult.”
Despite official pledges of fresh support, analysts say they are yet to see the kinds of big-ticket bailouts the flagging economy needs if it is to rebound.
Taiwanese actress Barbie Hsu (徐熙媛) has died of pneumonia at the age of 48 while on a trip to Japan, where she contracted influenza during the Lunar New Year holiday, her sister confirmed today through an agent. "Our whole family came to Japan for a trip, and my dearest and most kindhearted sister Barbie Hsu died of influenza-induced pneumonia and unfortunately left us," Hsu's sister and talk show hostess Dee Hsu (徐熙娣) said. "I was grateful to be her sister in this life and that we got to care for and spend time with each other. I will always be grateful to
REMINDER: Of the 6.78 million doses of flu vaccine Taiwan purchased for this flu season, about 200,000 are still available, an official said, following Big S’ death As news broke of the death of Taiwanese actress and singer Barbie Hsu (徐熙媛), also known as Big S (大S), from severe flu complications, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and doctors yesterday urged people at high risk to get vaccinated and be alert to signs of severe illness. Hsu’s family yesterday confirmed that the actress died on a family holiday in Japan due to pneumonia during the Lunar New Year holiday. CDC Deputy Director-General Tseng Shu-hui (曾淑慧) told an impromptu news conference that hospital visits for flu-like illnesses from Jan. 19 to Jan. 25 reached 162,352 — the highest
COMBINING FORCES: The 66th Marine Brigade would support the 202nd Military Police Command in its defense of Taipei against ‘decapitation strikes,’ a source said The Marine Corps has deployed more than 100 soldiers and officers of the 66th Marine Brigade to Taipei International Airport (Songshan airport) as part of an effort to bolster defenses around the capital, a source with knowledge of the matter said yesterday. Two weeks ago, a military source said that the Ministry of National Defense ordered the Marine Corps to increase soldier deployments in the Taipei area. The 66th Marine Brigade has been tasked with protecting key areas in Taipei, with the 202nd Military Police Command also continuing to defend the capital. That came after a 2017 decision by the ministry to station
PETITIONS: A Democratic Progressive Party official quoted President William Lai as saying that civil society groups are organizing the recall drives at the grassroots level Some civil society groups yesterday announced that they have collected enough signatures to pass the first-stage threshold to initiate a recall vote against Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators in 18 constituencies nationwide, saying that they would submit the signatures to the Central Election Commission (CEC) today. They also said that they expected to pass the threshold in eight more constituencies in the coming days, meaning the number of KMT legislators facing a recall vote could reach 26. The groups set up stations to collect signatures at local marketplaces and busy commercial districts. The legislators their petition drives target include Fu
RSS