Powerful Ally of Xi Jinping Makes Political Comeback in China

BEIJING — Wang Qishan, the formidable Chinese politician who oversaw President Xi Jinping’s withering campaign against corruption, has been appointed to the national legislature, official news outlets said Monday. The announcement added to signs that Wang, who retired from top Communist Party posts last year, could return to public office as a powerful ally of Xi.

Wang, 69, previously ran the Communist Party’s anti-corruption agency, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, turning it into a fearsome enforcer of loyalty to Xi. He stepped down from that and other leadership positions at a party congress in October, apparently sticking to an unspoken retirement ceiling for high-ranking Chinese politicians.

But there has been speculation ever since then that Xi could see to it that Wang remained a powerful player in China’s political leadership. The reports on Monday of Wang’s appointment to the party-controlled legislature, the National People’s Congress, are the clearest sign yet that he will remain in public life.

Official news outlets reported that Wang had been chosen as a deputy to the congress for Hunan, a province in southern China. But the official reports gave no other clues about his future.

The National People’s Congress usually meets in full session only once a year, and Wang’s appointment as one of the 3,000 or so deputies does not make it a certainty that he will return to high office. It is very unusual, though, for a leader who steps down from the party’s top ranks to join the legislature.

Before the announcement, four people, citing conversations with senior Chinese officials and speaking on condition of anonymity, told The New York Times that Wang had a strong chance of being appointed vice president when the National People’s Congress meets for its annual session, probably in March. At that time, it is all but certain to give Xi a second, five-year term as president and to appoint a new government leadership lineup to support him. The people were a Chinese government official, a Chinese-American business executive who often meets senior politicians in Beijing, a foreign executive who has met Wang and a former U.S. government official who has met him several times, including last year. They all requested anonymity to avoid damaging their ties with Chinese leaders.

The South China Morning Post, an English-language newspaper in Hong Kong, reported in December that Wang could be appointed vice president.

In China, the vice presidency is a relatively weak position, and the current holder of the job, Li Yuanchao, has left barely any imprint. But in previous decades, the job was held by powerful politicians who influenced policy and supported the top leader: Yang Shangkun, for instance, a People’s Liberation Army general who was close to Deng Xiaoping. Some analysts said Wang could use the job to serve as an adviser and enforcer for Xi. “What seems to be assured — or as close to it as it gets in China — is that he still is very well respected,” and that one way or another he would retain influence on key issues, said Randal Phillips, a former U.S. intelligence officer who now works for the Mintz Group, a company that assesses business risks. He spoke in a telephone interview before the latest announcement about Wang.

Phillips said he had not heard anything definitive about Wang being appointed vice president.

“It actually would be a very safe thing for Xi to put him in,” Phillips added, “because he’s got instant credibility, and he’s not a threat of any kind.”

According to party insiders, Xi had floated the idea of keeping Wang in the party leadership by changing an informal rule that says leaders must retire if they are 68 or older when a party congress convenes. In the end, though, Wang stepped down and he has stayed out of the public eye since then.

Wang’s extended political life may magnify speculation that Xi is looking to stay in power after his dual second terms as Communist Party chief and president end in 2022 and 2023. When Xi won his second term as party leader last year, he broke with recent precedent by not promoting a likely successor into the party’s topmost body, the Politburo Standing Committee. But most analysts believe it is too early to tell what will happen five years from now.

Xi and Wang first met about five decades ago during Mao Zedong’s Cultural Revolution, when they were sent from Beijing to labor in the same impoverished, hilly region of northwestern China. Wang worked on a rural commune about 50 miles from Xi, who has recalled visiting Wang for a night and lending him a book on economics.

Before taking up his job as anti-corruption chief in 2012, Wang forged a career as an economic administrator and troubleshooter. He served as vice premier, helping steer China’s response to the global financial crisis in 2008, and he often met Western business leaders and politicians. In his new political life, Wang could reprise that role.

“It looks more likely now that he has a strong chance of becoming vice president,” said Deng Yuwen, a current affairs commentator in Beijing who previously worked as an editor for a Communist Party newspaper.

“Generally speaking, the state vice president is a very empty, symbolic, ceremonial thing,” Deng said. “But Xi could make arrangements for Wang to take on more important, substantive tasks.”