Continuing their collective celebratory dance over his leadership, China’s state-run media is telling its citizens to be very proud of Xi Jinping’s G-20 teleconference speech on Thursday.
With a smiling photo of Xi floating through some clouds, Xinhua proclaimed the Chinese Communist Party leader’s “important speech entitled, ‘Hand in hand to fight the epidemic and overcome the difficulties.'” The title’s lack of originality aside, Xi’s speech encapsulated the narrative China wants to broadcast to the world.
It’s a narrative with three parts.
First, that China is leading world efforts to confront the coronavirus, displacing U.S. leadership of a positive international order. Second, that China should be thanked and rewarded for its efforts. And third, that Xi is the instrumental element that ties mutually beneficial Chinese and global efforts together.
Of course, while it finds some rather odd levels of sympathy in the Western media, China’s claim of positive leadership on this crisis isn’t credible. After all, the Chinese Communist Party covered up the early outbreak in Hubei province, then threw doctor whistleblowers in prison, then refused to cooperate with the World Health Organization, then allowed infected persons to travel and spread the virus globally, and is now saying that the U.S. Army created the virus. Oh, and until recently, Xi hid from Hubei province. Instead, he simply walked around Beijing waving at people.
This reality somewhat undermines Xi’s claim on Thursday that his government is “not afraid of danger and always put people’s lives and health in the first place.”
Nor does China’s response to the crisis, which includes hoarding medical supplies at home then selling defective supplies abroad, suggests that G-20 leaders would be wise to accept his push “to take common measures to reduce tariffs, remove barriers, and facilitate trade …” Here we see Xi’s growing effort to use the coronavirus’s catastrophic impact on the global economy to strengthen China’s market position.
But this speech does tell us one thing. When it comes to a crisis made far worse by Xi’s malfeasant leadership, introspection won’t be high on the Chinese Communist Party’s to-do-list.
