“Be a good servant of the people.” This is the promise Xi Zhongxun, the father of Chinese President Xi Jinping, once made.
Xi Zhongxun always had the people in his heart, which also deeply influences Xi Jinping.
The father once told his son, “No matter what your job title is, serve the people diligently, consider the interests of the people with all your heart, maintain close ties with the people, and always stay approachable to the people.”
A photo showing Xi Jinping (L) and his father Xi Zhongxun in Sanya, south China’s Hainan Province. /CMG
Serve the people
As a leader coming from the people, Xi Zhongxun said he was the son of farmers and considered himself a member of the working people.
“Wherever he goes, it seems that every village has someone he knows,” an American scholar, who once traveled with Xi Zhongxun from Suide to Yan’an, recalled.
In 1943, when Xi Zhongxun worked in Suide, northwest China’s Shaanxi Province, he requested cadres at all levels to go deep into the countryside and do practical things for the masses.
When China began its reform and opening-up in 1978, Xi Zhongxun served as the Party chief of the southern province of Guangdong.
To get started in Guangdong, Xi Zhongxun worked round the clock. During one summer, he visited 23 counties in the scorching heat to familiarize himself with the local situation.
Xi Zhongxun often told his children to rely on themselves, and encouraged them to go to places with the hardest conditions and places where the building of the country is most needed.
Inheriting his father’s down-to-earth approach, Xi Jinping, while in Zhengding, Hebei Province, visited all villages administered by the county. Then in Ningde, Fujian Province, he visited nine counties within the first three months as secretary of the Ningde Prefectural Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC), and traveled to most townships later on. After he was transferred to Zhejiang Province, he visited all 90 counties in just over a year.
“As a servant of the people, I have my roots deep in the northern Shaanxi plateau because it cultivated my unchanging mission: to do practical things for the people!” Xi Jinping wrote in a memoir.
Chinese President Xi Jinping chats with local villagers in an orchard in Nangou Village of Yan’an, northwest China’s Shaanxi Province, October 26, 2022. /Xinhua
A better life for the people
“Serving the people is the greatest filial piety.” This was Xi Zhongxun’s expectation for his son.
In 2012, Xi Jinping made a solemn promise that “the people’s desire for a better life is our goal,” showing his determination to lead the CPC to serve the people.
To that end, Xi Jinping urged nationwide efforts to end poverty. He noted that poverty alleviation must be made a primary goal, and more resources must be channeled to poverty reduction, education, health and infrastructure development.
What’s more, he proposed the rural revitalization strategy as a key move for the development of a modernized economy at the 19th CPC National Congress in 2017.
In 2021, the country announced a “complete victory” in its fight against poverty. The final 98.99 million impoverished rural residents living under the current poverty line have all been lifted out of poverty. All 832 impoverished counties and 128,000 villages have also been removed from the poverty list.
Combined with poverty-reduction results since the late 1970s, China is responsible for over 70 percent of the global reduction in poverty over the period.
Xi Jinping puts his promises into practice, keeps his father’s advice in mind, and always practices the purpose of serving the people wholeheartedly with concrete actions.
The two generations, no matter when and where, always see the people as their common concern and strength.
