City Beat | Politburo heavyweight moves into key Hong Kong role
Xi puts Politburo woman into United Front job signalling an upgrade in its influence on city
Speculation on just how tough Beijing's attitude to Hong Kong will become following the Occupy protests should not ignore the recent change at the helm of the Communist Party's United Front Work Department, whose roles include the promotion of good relations with China's non-communist camps, including those in this city.
Replacing the disgraced Ling Jihua as head of the department is Sun Chunlan, former party chief of Tianjin and one of only two women in the powerful Politburo. Ling, once an adviser to then-president Hu Jintao, was sacked after becoming yet another high-level target of a graft investigation.
One aspect of Sun's appointment that deserves more attention is that she is the highest ranking official within the party to head this department for more than three decades - when general Wu Lanfu, dubbed the "King of Mongolia", took up the job in the 1970s. His role was to repair relations between the Communist leadership and minority ethnic groups after the turmoil of the Cultural Revolution.
The appointment of another Politburo member to the post after more than three decades comes after the job was held by a succession of vice-chairmen of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, usually a retired senior official deemed suitable for a role in forging relations rather than policies.
It's worth noticing that shortly before Sun's appointment, Party Secretary Xi Jinping chaired a Politburo meeting in mid-December in which a decision was made to improve the ruling party's relations with the people by enhancing both standards of living and public consultation on major policies.
The signal the appointment sends is clear. Xi is making the work of the United Front one of his priorities - not only as a way of consolidating his own power but also as a means of maintaining effective rule of the party. To put it in a more direct way, the United Front would appear to be no longer a talk shop, organising seminars and inviting political and social heavyweights to dine, but will become more proactive.