Hu Jintao

The former president is escorted off stage during the Party Congress, with no explanation given.

He also reaffirmed China's right to use force to seize the self-ruled island of Taiwan. Hu Jintao represents a very different China to that of Xi Jinping. He attended the earlier closed-door session on the last day of the Congress, then cameras were allowed in for the final portion of the day. The Communist Party's mass meetings are normally highly scripted events, leading to speculation that the timing of Hu Jintao's departure might not have been an accident. Why in front of the cameras? There are a lot of questions and no answers so far from the Chinese government.

TOKYO -- In perhaps the most dramatic moment of the 2022 Chinese Communist Party national congress, former President Hu Jintao was escorted out of the.

China's President Xi Jinping (right) sits beside Premier Li Keqiang (left) as former president Hu Jintao (centre) is assisted to leave from the closing ceremony ...

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Key points: The former Chinese leader was sitting next to Xi Jinping when he was led out from Beijing's Great Hall of the People; The frail-looking 79-year ...

Complete humiliation for the last generation of pre-Xi leadership," tweeted analyst Alex White. A seated Mr Xi was filmed holding papers down on the desk as Mr Hu tried to grab them. - The former Chinese leader was sitting next to Xi Jinping when he was led out from Beijing's Great Hall of the People

Hu Jintao was escorted out of the closing ceremony of the party congress as Xi Jinping consolidates his position.

A steward attempted to take a sitting Hu by the arm before being shaken off. [79-year-old](/news/2012/11/9/chinas-hu-says-corruption-threatens-state) seemed reluctant to leave the front row of proceedings at Beijing’s Great Hall of the People, where he was sitting next to President Xi Jinping. [Xi set to reveal China’s new senior leadership as Congress ends](/news/2022/10/21/xi-set-to-reveal-chinas-new-senior-leadership-as-congress-ends) [Japan, Australia leaders sign new security pact to counter China](/news/2022/10/22/japan-australia-leaders-sign-new-security-pact-to-counter-china) [What’s on the agenda for China’s 20th Communist Party Congress?](/news/2022/10/16/whats-on-the-agenda-for-chinas-communist-party-congress)

Why was Hu Jintao asked to leave the stage at the end of China's Communist Party congress?

It does not include Li Keqiang or Wang Yang, both seen as economic liberals, both linked to the ideas of the former administration. It was just after the cameras had set up that officials approached Mr Hu and indicated that he should go. A longer edit of the footage taken on Saturday shows Xi Jinping turning to the former party chairman and also, to Mr Hu's left, senior figures Li Zhanshu and Wang Huning appearing concerned. The current government has encouraged an explosion in nationalist sentiment, showing little concern for what anyone else thinks about its handling of anything. Why in front of the cameras? What did he say to the man who replaced him, Xi Jinping, which prompted a nod from China's current leader?

The frail-looking Hu, 79, was sitting next to current President Xi Jinping when he was approached by a steward who repeatedly tried to lift him from his seat, ...

According to [Reuters](https://www.reuters.com/world/china/former-chinese-president-hu-jintao-escorted-out-party-congress-2022-10-22/), Hu had already appeared slightly unsteady during the opening ceremony last Sunday. It also wrote Xi’s major policy initiatives on the economy and the military into the party’s constitution, the AP said. As he was leaving, Hu exchanged a few words with Xi and patted Premier Li Keqiang, seated to the right of Xi, on the shoulder.

Footage shows former Chinese leader Hu Jintao being accompanied off stage at the Communist Party congress, where he was sitting next to President Xi Jinping ...

China's 20th Party Congress concluded on Saturday with a rare and shocking piece of live drama. Hu Jintao, the leader of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) ...

Xu Caihou, a high-ranking military official, was [detained](https://www.hrw.org/report/2016/12/06/special-measures/detention-and-torture-chinese-communist-partys-shuanggui-system?gclid=Cj0KCQjwqc6aBhC4ARIsAN06NmMYqNpnBf4ZBCD2foKElOiTP4KtQid9B2VOy4g4La_qX9mI-QoFfe0aAn_CEALw_wcB) in 2014 in the middle of cancer treatment, and died the next year. [extremely harsh](https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/10/19/china-party-congress-xi-jinping-speech/) language in his opening work report to describe the situation within the party when he took over, speaking of a “slide toward weak, hollow, and watered-down party leadership in practice,” though without mentioning Hu or others by name. (Hu’s contribution to Marxist theory, the Scientific Outlook on Development, also got a token mention in Xi’s speech.) Humiliating Hu in this fashion would also send a clear signal to the “ [retired elders](https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/10/13/china-xi-jinping-succession-ccp-party-congress-elders/),” the former high-level leaders who long remained a force within the party, that Xi’s power was unbound. But the third and most disturbing possibility is that it was planned, and we just witnessed Xi deliberately and publicly humiliate his predecessor—possibly as a precursor to wielding the tools of party discipline, followed by judicial punishment, against him. The initial list of Central Committee names—the roughly 200 people who will nominally decide the Standing Committee, the core of the leadership, in meetings Saturday and announce it Sunday—is missing Li Keqiang, the current premier and a protégé of Hu’s, and other relative economic reformers such as Wang Yang and Liu He. Hu was associated with a power network of former leaders, like himself, of the Communist Youth League; that faction appears to have been [effectively destroyed](https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/04/world/asia/china-communist-youth-league.html). That could have been a remark by Hu to his former colleagues backstage or perhaps even signs of dementia that caused a sudden panic that something might go wrong. Since stepping down as CCP leader in 2012, when Hu was lauded by party media for—in a stark contrast to Xi—relinquishing power, he has been largely off the stage. Hu was seated in a prominent position next to current CCP leader Xi Jinping, and the incident was caught on camera; he appeared to ask Xi and Premier Li Keqiang a question, to which they both nodded, while Xi prevented him from taking some papers by placing his hand on them. [visibly frail](https://twitter.com/aaronMCN/status/1583775726138195970) during the Party Congress. The second possibility is that information suddenly came up that made Xi—who would have had to personally approve any such move—afraid that Hu might abstain or even vote against him in the rounds of otherwise unanimous voting that finished off the Party Congress. That wasn’t out of any great commitment to liberalism on Hu’s part but because most party members were more occupied with making money than with enforcing the party line.