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Khushboo Razdan

Former Chinese premier Zhu Rongji, who helped engineer one of the greatest economic reforms in human history, died of an illness on Wednesday in Beijing. He was 97.
Zhu, who served as China’s premier from 1998 to 2003, is remembered for shaking up the centrally planned economy, overhauling the state-owned enterprise (SOE) sector and tackling corruption.
He was the mastermind behind negotiations for China’s World Trade Organization (WTO) entry in 2001, which opened China up to the international market and ushered in major changes in the Chinese economy.
Working under former Communist Party leader Jiang Zemin, Zhu led the modernisation of China’s taxation and financial systems, which were fundamental to economic reform.
Zhu also played a key role in ensuring the smooth handover of Hong Kong in 1997, and led Beijing’s handling of the Asian financial crisis in 1997 and 1998.
In a statement on Wednesday, Hong Kong Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu thanked Zhu for his support to the city, while expressing his deepest condolences on his passing.


He said Zhu “had supported Hong Kong in staying united and striving to leverage its strengths amid such challenges as the Asian financial crisis, resolutely upholding the prosperity and stability of Hong Kong as an international financial centre”.
“I am sincerely grateful for his care and support for Hong Kong’s economic and social development over the years,” Lee said.
“He had visited Hong Kong on multiple occasions in his different positions, reaching out to Hong Kong people from all walks of life.”
Economist Lawrence Lau Juen-yee, former vice-chancellor and president of the Chinese University of Hong Kong, said Zhu had realised the devaluation of the Chinese currency “would not only not improve the situation for China but would make things worse for everyone else”.
“He therefore decided to hold the renminbi exchange rate steady and engage in other expansionary measures such as a full refund of value-added taxes upon exporting of Chinese goods. It worked.”
“He was also committed to help Hong Kong through the crisis and had contingency plans in place. Fortunately, the collapse of Long-Term Capital Management and the drying up of credits for hedge funds targeting Hong Kong made the contingency plans unnecessary,” he said.
Zhu’s last public appearance was in October 2018 in Beijing, when he met members of the Advisory Board of the School of Economics and Management at Tsinghua University.
The meeting was attended by former US Treasury secretary Henry Paulson, Apple CEO Tim Cook and Ginni Rometty, CEO of IBM at the time.
The official obituary released by state news agency Xinhua on Wednesday described Zhu as “an outstanding member of the Communist Party, a long-tested and loyal Communist fighter, an outstanding proletarian revolutionary and statesman, and an exceptional leader of the party and the state”.

It credits him with helping the country navigate through the immense impact of the Asian financial crisis and “resolutely safeguard the prosperity and stability of Hong Kong as an international financial centre”.
It also noted that he had shifted to proactive fiscal and monetary policies to maintain stable and rapid economic growth.
The official obituary highlighted Zhu’s role in advancing economic system reform, pointing to his overhaul of state-owned enterprises, where he prioritised clearer property rights and the separation of government functions from business operations.
The statement also shed light on his instrumental work in leading the “arduous negotiations” that secured China’s entry into the WTO, a move that reshaped the country’s integration into the global economy.
Paul Triolo, partner at DGA-Albright Stonebridge Group, recalled meeting Zhu while working at the US embassy in Beijing from 1995 to 1997.
“Zhu was a unique Chinese government figure at the time – articulate, urbane, able to discuss complex economic issues with ease with Western officials and businessmen,” Triolo said.
He said Zhu’s interactions with figures such as economists Joseph Stiglitz and Alan Greenspan marked a rare period when a senior Chinese leader was able to have a “real give and take” with Western leaders on topics of global importance.
Denis Simon, former vice-chancellor of Duke Kunshan University, said Zhu “used Western pressures to achieve deeper reforms that would have been hard to accomplish without a major external push”. Simon, who teaches at Tsinghua University’s Schwarzman College, met Zhu in New York in 1990.
He said these achievements had paved the way for China’s economic surge, though at a serious social cost, including tens of millions of displaced state-sector workers across old industrial hubs.
“China today may need Zhu’s candour, technical competence and willingness to confront vested interests, but it cannot simply reproduce his late-1990s strategy,” he said.
“The current challenge requires not only reducing excess capacity, but also strengthening household demand, rebuilding the social safety net and changing the incentives that currently encourage local governments and firms continually to overinvest.”

Pascal Lamy, director general of the WTO from 2005 to 2013, said, “I have always kept an immense consideration and respect for Premier Zhu Rongji, who will remain in history on the podium of China’s modernisers.”
“The way he handled China’s accession to the WTO was a masterful lesson in geopolitics and geoeconomics,” he said.
Following his retirement from the premiership in March 2003, Zhu continued to support central authorities under the leadership of Hu Jintao and Xi Jinping, according to the obituary.
“He remained concerned about the great cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics and firmly supported the building of party conduct and integrity and the fight against corruption,” it said.
It added that Zhu had “deep affection for the public, stressing that government workers must act as public servants, dare to speak the truth, not be afraid of offending people, not seek special privileges, take on heavy responsibilities and tackle tough issues responsibly and deliver practical results”.
When Zhu became premier in 1998, he set up and led the National Science, Technology and Education Leading Group to promote the close integration of science, education and the economy to boost national prosperity, according to a 2013 story published by Economic Information Daily.
In the 1990s, when China’s high inflation, mounting debt and SOE losses threatened financial stability, Zhu targeted the risks by centralising fiscal policy, cutting red tape and closing or privatising failing enterprises.
Zhu was “the true founder of China’s socialist market economy”, said Wang Dan, China director at Eurasia Group.
“Subsequent reforms of similar depth have been absent from China; subsequent policies have essentially been reinforcements of the reforms he spearheaded in the 1990s,” she said.




Wednesday’s official obituary praised him for promoting the re-employment of laid-off and unemployed workers and strengthening the social security system.
Born in 1928 in Changsha, the capital of the central province of Hunan, Zhu graduated from Tsinghua University in 1951 with a degree in electrical engineering and joined the civil service, working on regional and national economic policy.
He served as vice-premier in charge of China’s economy between 1991 and 1998 before taking on the role of premier.
Additional reporting by Dannie Peng, Ji Siqi and Xiaofei Xu


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Obituaries

Zhu Rongji, China’s chief engineer of economic reform and former premier, dies aged 97

Zhu Rongji, who was premier of China from 1998 to 2003, has died aged 97. Photo: Robert Ng

Zhu Rongji helped drive China’s entry into the World Trade Organization in 2001. He is seen here the following year, at the opening of the 16th World Congress of Accountants in Hong Kong. Photo: Reuters

Chinese Premier Zhu Rongji concludes his final report to the annual session of the National People’s Congress in Beijing March 5, 2003. Photo: Reuters

Former Chinese premier Zhu Rongji, has died aged 97. Here, as Shanghai mayor in April 1988, he speaks after the first preliminary meeting of the 9th Shanghai People’s Congress. Photo: SCMP

Then Shanghai mayor Zhu Rongji addresses a press conference during a visit to Hong Kong on June 12, 1990. Photo: SCMP

Zhu Rongji (right) meets Charlene Barshefsky (left), US trade representative at the time, in Beijing in March 1999. Photo: AFP

China needs reforms, not easing, to support growth, says son of former premier Zhu Rongji

Former premier Zhu Rongji is viewed as one of China’s great reformers. Photo: AFP

Zhu Yunlai, the former president of China International Capital Corporation (CICC), is widely viewed as a representative of reformist thinkers like his father Zhu Rongji. Photo: Sina

Former Chinese premier Zhu Rongji steps back into the spotlight at elite Tsinghua University

Former premier Zhu Rongji pictured during an undated visit to Tsinghua University. Photo: SCMP Pictures

Former Chinese premier Zhu Rongji breaks long silence with letter to university

Former premier Zhu Rongji (inset) was a former dean of the management school at Tsinghua University. Photos: AFP, SCMP

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China

Politics

Zhu, who rose to become premier, spearheaded China’s entry into the World Trade Organization


Zhu, who rose to become premier, spearheaded China’s entry into the World Trade Organization.


Zhu Rongji, China’s chief engineer of economic reform and former premier, dies aged 97

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Zhu, who rose to become premier, spearheaded China’s entry into the World Trade Organization

Zhu, who rose to become premier, spearheaded China’s entry into the World Trade Organization