Shanghai set to endorse Gong Zheng as its new mayor
- Former governor of Shandong province has held several senior party roles and has 20 years’ experience with the General Administration of Customs
- He will take over in the east China financial centre from Ying Yong, who was recently made party boss of Hubei province
“With the approval of the Communist Party’s Central Committee, comrade Gong Zheng has been named both a member of the Shanghai Communist Party Committee and the Standing Committee as well as a deputy secretary,” the Shanghai city government said on WeChat on Thursday.
The public endorsement means Gong – who was previously governor of the east China province of Shandong – should be announced as mayor of Shanghai by the local people’s congress soon.
He will replace Ying Yong, who was appointed party boss of Hubei last month following a leadership reshuffle in the central China province sparked by a public outcry over the poor handling of the coronavirus outbreak, which is now a global health crisis that has killed more than 8,800 people around the world.
A native of Jiangsu province, Gong, 60, has a PhD in economics and spent more than 20 years working for China’s customs agency, rising to deputy chief of the General Administration of Customs in 2003.