The pair will then head to Zhuhai in the coming days, as Zhou will also be introduced to Beijing’s key team overseeing the casino hub, according to the source.

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Much like Xia at the start of his tenure, Zhou has no prior work experience in Hong Kong or Macau. The source said it would be a new normal as the governing system for both cities would “no longer be a silo where only so-called Hong Kong experts can operate”.

“It is just another system for the party to rotate and test out its cadres,” he added.

“Xia Baolong and Luo Huining have shown that officials with no Hong Kong experience can quickly pick up the job and perform well, despite the additional complications under ‘one country, two systems’.

“That is because their vast regional administrative experience gave them a good sense of the nation’s big picture when they weigh policy options,” the source said, referring to Luo, former director of Beijing’s liaison office in Hong Kong, who was brought in at the same time as Xia.

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Professor Lau Siu-kai, a consultant with the Chinese Association of Hong Kong and Macau Studies, a semi-official Beijing think tank, said Zhou’s higher standing in the party would better position him to advance Hong Kong-related policies among its organs and government agencies.

Direct knowledge of Hong Kong was not as important when picking senior HKMAO officials, since adhering to Beijing’s clearly laid out policy directions was the priority, he said.

“Zhou’s absence of Hong Kong-related work experience will also limit the influence of Hong Kong interest groups over him,” he said. “Having a cosy relationship [with the locals] could restrict an official’s ability to fully implement Beijing’s policies.”

Born in Xiangyang city in central Hubei province, Zhou joined Xiangfan city’s Machinery Industry Bureau to become a technocrat in 1984, after graduating from the Hubei Institute of Technology with a degree in mechanical engineering.

He was rotated out of the industrial bureau in 2004 and took up various county and municipal leadership roles in Xian Tao, Shi Yan and Yi Chang cities in his home province until December 2020, when he was transferred to Henan province.

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He became Henan’s deputy governor in 2021 and was promoted to deputy provincial party chief and secretary of the provincial political and legal affairs commission, overseeing party building and security affairs, a post he held until the latest move to the Hong Kong and Macau affairs apparatus.

Confirming the induction of Zhou, a second source on Saturday said his appointment also indicated the final stages of the upgrade of Beijing’s top office overseeing Hong Kong and Macau affairs to a higher-level outfit reporting directly to the ruling Communist Party’s central leadership, after 3½ months of intensive reorganising.

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A front-page report in Friday’s Guizhou Daily – the mouthpiece of the Communist Party’s Guizhou provincial party committee – also hinted at the completion of the HKMAO’s upgrade.

In its report on the Pan-Pearl River Delta Regional Cooperation Chief Executives’ Joint Meeting in Guiyang, the official title of HKMAO deputy director Yang Wanming was formally stated as “deputy director of the Hong Kong and Macau Works Office of the Central Committee and the Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office of the State Council”, a first by official mainland media.

The source noted: “From now on, all HKMAO leaders will carry these two titles simultaneously.”

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The upgrade is part of a major party and state organ overhaul announced at the annual meetings of China’s national legislature and top political advisory body.

Other overhauls in the “Party and State Institutional Reform Plan” include the formation of top party bodies to oversee China’s finance sector, science and technology, as well as social works.

Setting out the enhanced scope of the new body, Beijing said it would “commit to the duties of investigating, researching, coordinating and supervising the implementation of the one country, two systems principle, the comprehensive jurisdiction of the central government, and governance of Hong Kong and Macau in accordance with the law”.

It would also “safeguard national security, guarantee people’s livelihoods and well-being, as well as support Hong Kong and Macau to integrate into the national development plan”.

The upgraded HKMAO will continue to work from its current office on Yuetan South Street in Beijing for the time being, despite the expanded headcount making the place “a bit congested”, according to the first source.

Additional reporting by Kahon Chan