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Who is Cai Qi, said to be No.5 in Xi Jinping's power circle?
Cai Qi's role as China’s No. 5 also makes him the highest ranked official on a body in charge of convening the Politburo.
Chinese president Xi Jinping held talks with his US counterpart Joe Biden last November. However, there was a man seated next to the Chinese leader who gained a lot of attention.
Cai Qi, a member of the Politburo Standing Committee, is Jinping's chief of staff. He is the first person to hold both the positions since the Mao era. He is only politburo member to publicly travel with his boss during the latter's stint as president.
Qi has also attended overseas summits with Russia’s Vladimir Putin and South Africa’s Cyril Ramaphosa last year.
Here are five things to know about Qi, said to enjoy exceptional trust and empowerment from Communist China's supreme leader.
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Who is Cai Qi?
1. Raised in mainland China's Fujian province, Cai Qi worked in government and party positions early in his career. It was in Fujian in the 1980s when he first met Jinping. They later moved to wealthy Zhejiang at the turn of the century. People who worked with Qi remember him as intelligent and approachable.
2. His higher profile puts Qi on a similar standing to China’s No. 2, Premier Li Qiang, as Xi continues to break norms after stacking the party’s top body with loyalists.
3. Qi was remembered as a prolific social media user with 10 million followers who brought attention to issues such as youth suicide. But after Jinping became the leader, Qi's online accounts went silent and his public persona hardened, as he was called to Beijing to serve on China’s top national security commission.
4. Qi was catapulted to the top-decision making Politburo, a rare leap for an official who had never even served in the much larger Central Committee, normally a prerequisite. In 2017, he became Beijing’s party chief, in charge of securing the home of the nation’s top rulers.
5. Qi earned a reputation as a hardliner. After a deadly fire threw a spotlight on the capital’s poorer population, he vowed to “see blood” in a campaign against illegal migrant dwellings that left thousands homeless, and drew widespread public criticism, Bloomberg reported.
6. During the Covid-19 pandemic, Beijing avoided going into lockdown, unlike neighboring Shanghai. That feat was more impressive given the city held the 2022 Winter Olympics, building a so-called Covid bubble for foreign athletes to shield the local population from possible infections. Later that year, the capital convened thousands of people for a leadership congress, as Cai imposed strict testing requirements and limits on movement.
7. Qi was one of the first officials to publicly refer to Xi Jinping in equal terms to Mao, saying that he was “piloting at the helm” — a phrase previously reserved for Mao.
8. In 2022, Jinping smashed party norms to extend his own rule and promote trusted lieutenants, a move that saw Cai elevated to the elite Standing Committee. Months later, he was appointed as the president's top aide, gaining more access to the president.
9. Qi's role as China’s No. 5 also makes him the highest ranked official on a body in charge of convening the Politburo.
10. Steve Tsang, director of the SOAS China Institute, said,“Cai’s power comes from enjoying the confidence and patronage of Xi,” he added. “The security of a hatchet man rests ultimately on retaining the trust of the supreme leader.”
