Daily Times

Earlier this week, this scribe’s book The Road to Leadership: Xi Jinping-From Educated Farm Boy to Paramount Leader of China was launched. The book is a tribute to President Xi Jinping in a researched chronicle of the struggles of a young farm boy who rode the currents of adversity and humble existence to become a formidable statesman at the world stage.

On November 15, 2012, Xi Jinping was nominated as the next President at the 18th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party. This was my first encounter with this august personality and when I read more about him, I was so fascinated by his struggles, that I decided to research deeper and write a book on him.

There was a need for this book on President Xi Jinping because the world wants to understand the paramount leader of China, who has become an international statesman, committed to take China to the new heights as a developed country and eradicate poverty from China.

The Road to Leadership provides glimpses of Xi Jinping’s formative years, events that helped shape his character, personality and rise in the cadre of the CPC. How Xi Jinping, in his early years learnt the dignity of labour, lived in a cave dwelling with villagers, slept on a kang, a traditional Chinese bed made of bricks lined with straw and covered with a coarse blanket. In the Shaanxi countryside, he had to do all sorts of harsh labour, such as carrying manure, hauling a coal cart, farming and building water tanks.

From the very beginning the young Xi Jinping had endeared himself to his peers and elders. Tilling the soil taught him the honest virtues of labour and whetted his skills for hard work. By gaining their trust, he was elected village Party chief. He led the farmers to reinforce the river bank in a bid to prevent erosion, organized a small cooperative of blacksmiths in the village, and built a methane tank, the first in landlocked Shaanxi. He was once awarded a motorized tricycle after being named a ‘model educated youth.’ However, he exchanged the tricycle for a walking tractor, flour milling machine and farm tools to benefit the villagers.

The world looks at Xi Jinping as a powerful leader, but Xi Jinping is also as a family man as well as a leader who does not demur from reaching out to the masses without protocol

It is remarkable that Xi Jinping, who was initially self-taught, went on to receive a Doctorate in Law. Xi is so far the only Chinese President with a PhD. Thus, the exponential development of President Xi Jinping’s career was neither pure luck nor a fluke but careful planning, hard work and sacrifices by the paramount leader to reach the pinnacle of power.

In 1982, Xi took an important decision, which was to hold him in good stead for his political career. He realized that going to the provinces was the ‘only path to central power.’ Staying at Party headquarters in Beijing would narrow his network and invite resentment from lesser-born peers. Xi asked to be sent back to the countryside and was assigned to a horse-cart county in Hebei Province.”

Xi Jinping’s business acumen was employed for the economic well-being of society from a very early stage. When working in Zhengding, Hebei province, in the 1980s, he saw potential business opportunities when he learned that the crew of The Dream of Red Mansions, a popular novel-turned-TV drama, was looking for a filming location. He proposed building in Zhengding a large residential compound featured within the novel. The compound, which was used by the TV crew, later became a sightseeing attraction. Tourist income from the compound exceeded 10 million Yuan the year it was completed, paying back more than the investment. The compound has been used as the set for more than 170 movies and TV dramas, with up to 1.3 million tourists every year.

The Belt and Road Initiative of President Xi Jinping his Chinese Dream, BRICS and the Asian Infrastructure Invest Banks are for the betterment of society.

The special capability of Xi Jinping as an author is evident from the fact that he wrote 232 columns for the Zhejiang Daily, using the pen name Zhexin, while serving as a mid-level government worker. Xi’s book The Governance of China records the thinking and practice of Chinese central leadership and responds to the concerns of the international community, providing an insight to China’s rise and the future direction it will take and how it will influence the world.

President Xi Jinping’s contributions to Scientific Advances, saving the environment and, most importantly, his crackdown on corruption have been presented in detail in the book.

The world looks at Xi Jinping as a powerful leader, but Xi Jinping is also as a family man as well as a leader who does not demur from reaching out to the masses without protocol. His visit to the residents of Shaanxi, where he spent seven years at the formative stage as a farm boy, bearing gifts for all and sundry, his attention to veterans and the urge to raise modern China out of the scourge of poverty have all been described in the book.

The role of the first lady Peng Liyuan, who is a renowned and well-liked soprano and opera singer has been highlighted. The Lighter side of Xi Jinping has been presented through editorial caricatures and cartoons.

The writer is a journalist specialising in foreign policy and national security affairs