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Former Chinese Premier Li Keqiang died of a heart attack on the morning of October 27. (Source: Reuters) |
Former Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, who retired earlier this year, died early on October 27 after suffering a sudden heart attack at the age of 68. In an official obituary, state media praised Li as “an outstanding leader of the Party and the state” and said his passing was a “great loss” to China.
“Prime Minister of the People”
Hours after the sad news broke, millions of people took to Chinese social media platforms to pay tribute to the “people’s premier,” a government leader known for his soft-spoken demeanor.
Tao Jingzhou, an international arbitration expert and a classmate of Li Keqiang at Peking University, said he was shocked by the news. “Keqiang has left us forever. He was never idle, always humble and tolerant for the sake of others and the country. His passing is really too sudden,” Tao Jingzhou wrote on social media X.
Jiang Mingan, a law professor at Peking University and a former classmate of Li Keqiang, called the pain of the former Chinese premier's passing "indescribable."
Many people who had met and talked to former Premier Li Keqiang shared photos of him on the social media platform Weibo, including photos of his visit to Sichuan shortly after the region was devastated by a historic earthquake in 2013, or his visit to a hospital in Wuhan in late January 2020. He was the first senior Chinese leader to visit the epicenter of Covid-19 when the pandemic broke out.
“It warms my heart to recall the moment when Li Keqiang asked medical staff in Wuhan to call home every day,” one social media user wrote.
Fluent in English, former Premier Li Keqiang regularly represented China at international events such as the annual China-EU Summit. In particular, he built strong relationships with European leaders, notably former German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
Several European embassies in China have expressed their condolences. On social media X, German Ambassador to China Patricia Flor described former Premier Li Keqiang as “a valuable partner who positively shaped bilateral relations.”
Li Keqiang’s last meeting with his German counterpart was in November when he hosted Chancellor Olaf Scholz in Beijing. “He will always be remembered,” Flor wrote.
In Tokyo, Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno, the top government spokesman, said the former Chinese premier “played an important role” in bilateral relations. Li Keqiang made an official visit to Japan in 2018 and participated in a trilateral leaders’ meeting. “We offer our sincere condolences and prayers for former Premier Li Keqiang,” Matsuno said.
In Washington, according to State Department spokesman Matthew Miller, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken sent condolences to the Chinese government and people.
Tirelessly promoting reform
As the first Chinese premier with a bachelor's degree in law and a doctorate in economics, both from the prestigious Peking University, Li Keqiang is remembered for his leadership of the world's second-largest economy.
During his decade as China's premier, Li Keqiang has steered the world's second-largest economy through a series of storms, from a difficult period due to rising government debt to trade tensions with arch-rival the United States and the Covid-19 pandemic.
He served two five-year terms – the maximum allowed by China’s constitution for the premiership. The official obituary praised the former premier for “wholeheartedly supporting the Belt and Road Initiative and the poverty alleviation campaign – championed by President Xi Jinping.” Li was also credited for his efforts to balance economic growth and social stability.
In his first year as China's premier, Mr. Li pushed an economic policy that foreign media called "Likonomics" - no stimulus, financial deleveraging and structural reform.
This policy is seen as a remedy for an unbalanced economy with growing government debt and excessive infrastructure investment. The idea behind these measures is to trade short-term economic difficulties for long-term benefits.
Approachable and pragmatic, former Premier Li Keqiang tirelessly pushed for market-oriented reforms, simplifying government procedures and creating a better business environment for private and foreign companies.
“Former Premier Li Keqiang was committed to market-oriented reforms. He was a charismatic truth-teller and a very popular premier,” said Zhu Tian, professor of economics at the China International Business School in Europe.
In 2013, when Li Keqiang took office as Premier, Beijing adopted historic reforms that gave the market a decisive role in allocating resources. This was followed by a detailed and thorough reform roadmap, on which the economy continued to grow steadily for a decade – albeit at a slower average rate (between 5-6%) – and approached the threshold of high-income countries in the world.
Speaking at the National People's Congress in March last year, he declared that “China's open-door policy will not change, nor will the flow of the Yangtze and Yellow rivers be reversed.”
“Li Keqiang always impressed me as being very committed to China’s development, intellectually curious, with a deep understanding of the economy and how China could learn from international good practices in economic management,” recalls Bert Hofman, director of the East Asian Institute at the National University of Singapore.
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