A seemingly misleading quote by a senior Chinese Communist Party official who claimed the “zero-Covid” policy would remain in place in Beijing “for the next five years”, has created confusion and panic in China, leading Chinese censors to scour the internet to delete the remarks.
Beijing Daily, the official Communist Party newspaper for the Chinese capital, earlier reported that the city’s party chief, Cai Qi, on Monday said that “for the next five years, Beijing will resolutely implement Covid-19 pandemic control measures and uphold the ‘zero-Covid’ policy to prevent imported cases from coming in and domestic cases from rebounding.”
According to CNN, the reported reference by Cai, who is a close ally of Chinese President Xi Jinping, to “the next five years” sparked a huge backlash on Chinese social media. In response, Beijing Daily removed the line, describing it as an “editing error” while leaving his other remarks about pandemic controls intact.
Chinese State media quoted Cai as saying that, the pandemic controls that would stay in place include routine PCR tests, strict entry rules, regular health checks in residential neighbourhoods and public venues, as well as rigorous monitoring and testing for people entering and leaving Beijing.
Since early May, Xi has enforced the zero-Covid policy especially at a meeting of the country’s top decision-making body – Communist Party’s Politburo Standing Committee. Xi has ordered officials and all sectors of society to stick to the “decisions and plans” of the Communist leadership.
The strict zero-Covid policy has ensured that cities across China including Beijing and Shanghai are under full or partial lockdown. This has hurt the economy and the job market in China leading to an unemployment rate of 18.4 per cent among 16–24-year-olds.
China has such a strict policy against Covid that it continues to shut down entire communities and cities over just a few Covid cases.
