A Death in the Lucky Holiday Hotel (13 page)

F
OR TWO WEEKS every March, more than 3,000 delegates and hundreds of media organizations converge on Beijing for the National People’s Congress (NPC), and the capital enters a period of heightened security. Police round up petitioners who have come to Beijing with grievances, and Tiananmen Square is heavily patrolled to prevent any disruptions that might attract negative media coverage.

Under the Chinese constitution, the NPC is the top legislative body in China. Whereas Western legislators debate their laws in ornate ancient or contemporary parliamentary buildings, Chinese NPC delegates meet in the Great Hall of the People on the western edge of Tiananmen Square, a gigantic concrete auditorium built in the functional style architecture of the former Soviet Union and devoid of any aesthetic appeal. Delegates review the annual government report, pass legislation, and formalize appointments of government officials.

Several years ago, a Chinese website posted a series of pictures depicting the behaviors of legislators in different countries: in Turkey, a suited legislator is seen climbing onto the podium with a dozen others pulling his legs from behind; in Mexico, one legislator punches another in the face; in Japan, a female legislator rides on the shoulders of her supporters as others throw pens and paper at her; and in India, a female lawmaker slaps her colleague with a shoe. The site showed two pictures of China’s NPC—in one, delegates are sound asleep in different poses, as one might see on a long-distance flight. In another picture, with a panoramic view, hundreds of delegates raise their hands in total conformity.

The two images of Chinese lawmakers mirror reality. Since the Communist takeover in 1949, the NPC has been considered a “rubber-stamp” parliament, passing virtually every measure, resolution, and
law drafted and presented by government agencies and party organizations. Over the past decade, as the party has attempted to build and promote the “rule of law,” the NPC has seen an increase in its legislative functions. Discussion is becoming more lively, and sometimes vigorous. The government media, which occasionally broadcasts NPC proceedings, may focus its cameras on some token “no” or abstention votes. But until China’s one-party system is changed, conformity is the norm and everything that happens in the NPC is choreographed. One retired official who had served on the NPC for fifty-seven years recently told the media that she was proud to have never cast a single dissenting vote. “We were chosen by the party and we should support the party,” she said.

There was a whiff of excitement and a hint of drama on March 3, 2012, at the opening ceremony of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, a token political advisory body that holds its session simultaneously with the NPC. As the delegates came on stage, Bo was last in line, straightening to attention as the national anthem began playing. He was dressed in a black suit, white shirt, and blue tie with white dots. He sat in the second row, on the left side of the podium as viewed from the audience. Cameras started to flash, their white lights throwing a halo especially around Bo. He appeared poised, with a slight smile. After sitting, he did not bother to greet his neighbor, Xu Caihou, vice chairman of the Central Military Commission. Instead, Bo waved to people he recognized in the audience.

It was his first national appearance since the Wang scandal had broken a month before. The media and the public were looking for clues as to whether he was in trouble, whether he was about to fall, and if he fell, how far.

When the chairman of the People’s Political Consultative Conference launched his opening speech, Bo fidgeted, looking bored and distracted. Occasionally he would gaze around,, shooting a glance or two at the media booths in the lower balcony, or tapping his fingers on his right thigh. Twenty minutes into the speech, Bo seemed to realize that he had some work to do. He took out his reading glasses from his coat pocket and began reviewing the written speech being read out
in front of him and marking on it with a pencil. Moments before the ceremony adjourned, Bo stuffed stacks of documents into his bulky briefcase and left—some say “bolted from”—the stage while the other Politburo members stood and stretched, and lingered to chat with their colleagues. Reporters were outwitted and cross that they had let Bo slip away. A media manhunt ensued, during which several Hong Kong journalists discovered that, to avoid attention, members of the Chongqing delegation were not staying at any of the NPC-designated hotels.

On the afternoon of March 5, delegates from Chongqing gathered in small groups to review the government’s annual work report. Bo led the discussions in his group and took the opportunity to propagate his views on a popular topic: achieving common prosperity. Thirty years after China’s economic reforms, Bo said, income disparities between peasants and urban residents and between the wealthy and the poor had widened dramatically and needed government attention. Problems relating to the distribution of wealth had impeded consumption, stunted social development, and created anger among citizens. He urged the leadership to adopt different policies for different income levels to create a fair system. “Common prosperity, in my understanding, is a core value of socialism,” he said. “While encouraging competition, we should also pay attention to social fairness and care about the lives of middle- and low-income families.” Using his experience in Chongqing as an example, he said creating incentives for development should not be the government’s sole target. “Shared prosperity can go hand in hand with China’s rapid speed of development.”

In his speech, widely reported by the government media, Bo defended his record in Chongqing, where he said the GDP in 2011 and the annual income for peasants and urban residents had doubled since 2007, when he had officially assumed the top leadership position there. The city had achieved an annual growth rate of 15.7 percent, and foreign investment increased 9.6 percent every year, to 10.6 billion yuan in 2011.

For a while, it seemed Bo had everything under control. However, on the morning of March 8, delegates from Chongqing who gathered after breakfast for the second plenary meeting noticed their party boss
was missing. Delegates contacted Bo’s security staff but could not reach anyone. Mayor Huang Qifan suspected something had gone awry. Could it be that the Central Party Committee had taken Bo away for questioning the night before? Had Bo escaped abroad? According to a Chongqing delegate, the mayor looked visibly disoriented and immediately contacted several senior leaders, inquiring in a roundabout way whether Bo had been called to an urgent meeting. No, he had not, Huang Qifan was told. President Hu Jintao’s office had ordered the Central Guard Bureau to check for Bo’s name on all overseas and domestic flights. Nothing turned up.

By late morning, the Beijing Capital International Airport had alerted the senior leadership that Bo Xilai and his bodyguards had flown to Chongqing on the private jet of Xu Ming, CEO of the Dalian-based Shide Group. Bo claimed he needed to take care of some “important matters.” His conspicuous absence at the NPC plenary session was said to have infuriated Premier Wen Jiabao, who was presiding that morning, and sparked a renewed wave of speculation among reporters. One newspaper in Hong Kong said on its website that Bo had an emergency meeting with his close friends in Chongqing because he had received news that he would be under investigation.

In the afternoon, Bo jetted back to Beijing and appeared at a group meeting. On TV, he looked tired. His friend Zhou Yongkang, a Politburo Standing Committee member, surprised the media by showing up at the Chongqing meeting. In a brief speech, Zhou recognized Chongqing’s economic achievement and heaped praise on Bo’s anticrime initiatives. Many Bo supporters were relieved. “Zhou’s unwavering support showed that Bo could be spared the fallout from the Wang incident,” declared a commentator on the BBC’s Chinese Service.

The next day, the Chongqing delegation had an open house. Bo and Mayor Huang Qifan held a press briefing in a conference room with 150 preregistered journalists. Those without tickets waited anxiously outside. It was Bo’s first press conference since the Wang Lijun incident in February. A NPC delegate told me Bo had been asked explicitly to strictly follow the talking points and not to go into details about the former police chief or corruption allegations
against his family. At the beginning, Bo did as he was told. When a reporter asked what would happen to Wang Lijun, Bo waved a piece of paper and read off from it several lines, urging journalists to report it verbatim:

       
Wang Lijun is now being investigated by the Central Party Committee and the investigation has made progress. He has asked for a leave of absence and will not attend the NPC session. His issues are being handled carefully and we will publicize the results once the investigation concludes.

Reporters, especially those from Hong Kong, pursued the topic relentlessly. One asked if Mayor Huang Qifan had gone to the US Consulate with truckloads of armed police and attempted to abduct Wang Lijun.

Huang called the allegations pure fabrication, insisting that he had traveled to Chengdu by himself. But he acknowledged he had held an hourlong conversation with Wang Lijun inside the US Consulate. “I learned about his situation during our conversation and persuaded him to leave the consulate,” Huang explained. “He was willing to come with us. The reports about his voluntary leave after staying in the US Consulate for thirty-three hours are true. Nobody forced him, and I was incapable of forcing him.”

Bo continued to address the topic of Wang by recognizing his tremendous contribution to Chongqing’s “Smashing Black” campaign. He lied to the reporters that taking away the police chief’s position from Wang was part of a bigger plan to promote Wang to a more senior position. “His escape came as a total surprise,” Bo said.

A reporter with
United Morning News
, a Singaporean newspaper that had numerous joint media projects with the city of Chongqing in the past, inquired if Wang Lijun was mentally ill. Bo evaded the question by admitting that he hadn’t seen any warning signs. He blamed himself for hiring the wrong person. “It shows that we need to take precautions regardless of how well things are going. On the other hand, we should not be discouraged by these unexpected events. When it happens, we just need to reflect on our mistakes.”

One Hong Kong reporter asked if Bo had submitted a resignation letter to the Politburo and whether his disappearance the previous day had anything to do with the Wang Lijun incident.

Bo vehemently characterized the resignation as pure fabrication, a rumor and a lie. He said his absence the previous day was due to a cough. “I didn’t realize so many people were concerned about me and speculated over my whereabouts,” he quipped. Bo’s remarks contradicted the Chongqing government spokesperson, who had said the day before that Bo’s absence had nothing to do with health issues.

When a Voice of America reporter asked whether Bo was under investigation, he responded emphatically, “No, no.”

Two hours into the press conference, Bo and Mayor Huang Qifan had fielded more than twenty questions. Unlike other senior leaders who appeared stiff and packed their comments with meaningless jargon, Bo looked relaxed and confident even when he was telling lies about his “cough” and about Wang Lijun. Reporters occasionally laughed at his jokes and his straightforward answers.

In the middle of the press conference, the phone in Bo’s pocket rang. He excused himself awkwardly and disappeared into an adjoining room, leaving the mayor alone at the podium. About fifteen minutes later, Bo rejoined Mayor Huang and switched topics. His mood changed and he launched a tirade against the media for what he called “throwing dirty water” onto him and his family:

       
Some reports say that my son, who is studying abroad, lives a lavish lifestyle and drives a red Ferrari. It’s pure nonsense. My wife and I do not own [many] personal assets. My wife used to be a lawyer [with] a very successful practice. Later, we worried that people might spread rumors, accusing us of making money through her law firm, so she closed all of her offices. That was twenty years ago. Now she stays home and takes care of house chores. I’m very touched by her sacrifice. Someone says that my son has attended prestigious Oxford and Harvard, and asks how we have the money to pay for tuition. He is supported by scholarships. I’ve clarified that many times.

Bo’s remarks, most of which have subsequently proved to be lies, took many by surprise. No one had expected him to address the media reports about his wife and son. At the end of the press conference, a Japanese reporter, who noted that many senior leaders had visited Chongqing, except President Hu Jintao, wanted to know why the president had not done so. Bo responded, “We believe President Hu would be happy if he comes to see Chongqing for himself.”

An official in Beijing later said the call Bo received during the press conference was from his wife, Gu Kailai, who urged him to dispel the rumors about their family. The official said the senior leadership, especially President Hu, was outraged that Bo had abandoned the agreed-upon script.

Wang Dan, the former leader of the 1989 student protest movement who now teaches a course of Chinese history in Taiwan, said that Bo put Hu in an awkward position by openly challenging his reluctance to visit Chongqing. In fact, at the urging of his chief of staff, a Bo supporter, Hu had intended to visit Chongqing but changed his plan after the Wang Lijun incident. “Bo’s public invitation violated the party’s unspoken rules,” said Wang. “If Hu didn’t go, the media would construe it as a sign of the party’s internal division over Bo’s Chongqing model. On the other hand, if he went, he would be forced to endorse Bo’s policies. Issuing Hu a public invitation was a clever move, but it also carried a high risk.”

Bo’s “digressions” at the NPC press conference gave ammunition to his opponents within the powerful Politburo Standing Committee, such as Premier Wen Jiabao, who had always objected to Bo’s leftist policies in Chongqing, and Jia Qinglin, chairman of the People’s Political Consultative Conference, who was worried that Bo’s rise could threaten Xi Jinping, the Party’s designated successor. After the press conference, Bo’s opponents convinced President Hu that Bo could wreck the leadership transition and that he needed to be taken down.