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SCMP Reporter

CHINA'S former vice-premier and economic hardliner Yao Yilin died on Sunday after a long illness.

   Yao, 77, a former State Council member, was described in an obituary published by Xinhua (the New China News Agency) as 'an outstanding proletarian revolutionary and eminent economic planner'.

  'Yao's death is a great loss to the party and the country,' it said. National television news lead its bulletins with the death announcement.

  'We should learn from his revolutionary spirit and moral character to stay on course and build, with [President] Jiang Zemin at the core of the leadership, socialism with Chinese characteristics,' the bulletin said.

  The cause of death was not specified.

  Yao, a conservative economic planner, had been associated with the periods of China's economic retrenchment since market-orientated economic reforms were first embarked on in 1979.

  He forged close ties with Prime Minister Li Peng and became a trusted adviser on economic issues.

  Diplomats in Beijing said Yao's death was not a surprise because he had disappeared from public view for months in 1991, and had not been seen in public at all since he retired from his last official post - the high-powered Politburo - the following year.

  They said Yao's death might tip the balance slightly in favour of the Communist Party's moderate wing.

  'From the point of view of those in the leadership who favour the reform programme, it is not bad news,' said one Western diplomat. 'When Deng Xiaoping goes, the fewer of these types who are still around the better.'   A Beijing student said: 'His death will not have much impact on the succession. It is only interesting because it means there is now one less living leader who bears allegiance to Chen Yun.'   Mr Chen is widely regarded as the godfather of central planning in China.

  Paul Lin Ta-kuang, whose wife Eileen Chen Siu-tsung is Yao's cousin, said yesterday that the policy of reforms and opening-up was a historical trend which would by no means be reversed by any officials.

  'The influence of Yao was dwindling quickly after he fell sick and I don't think his death will affect the economic reforms now under way,' Mr Lin said.



Hardliner Yao dies after long illness