'We Want Freedom': Beijing Witnesses Rare Protest Against President Xi Jinping Days Before Party Congress

The Communist Party's leadership has been criticized for putting up banners at a busy square in the capital Beijing.

China's President Xi Jinping delivers a speech at the session of the Chinese Communist Party's five-yearly Congress at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing (Source: File photo/AFP)

New Delhi: Amid China is preparing for the Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC) to be held once in five years, It is believed that in this conference, Chinese President Xi Jinping can be elected for the third consecutive term. However, before the meeting, Xi Jinping is facing fierce opposition. The Communist Party's leadership has been criticized for putting up banners at a busy square in the capital Beijing, as reported by the British daily 'The Guardian'. 

Images of Twitter banned in China showed smoke rising from a street on fire and a banner calling for an end to the strict "zero COVID" policy and the overthrow of the Communist Party leader and President Xi Jinping. According to a tweet by a Beijing-based journalist, the banners carried slogans to promote the need for 'revolutionary change'.

Rare demonstration in Beijing. 2 banners hung over a busy overpass.

One reads: "Go on strike. Remove dictator and national traitor Xi Jinping."

The other says "say no to covid test, yes to food. No to lockdown, yes to freedom...Don’t be a slave, be a citizen." pic.twitter.com/t1Y1GeGP5m

— Selina Wang (@selinawangtv) October 13, 2022

“We want food, not PCR tests. We want freedom, not lockdowns. We want respect, not lies. We want reform, not a cultural revolution. We want a vote, not a leader. We want to be citizens, not slaves,” reads one banner hanging over Sitong Bridge, an overpass on Beijing’s Third Ring Road in the Haidian district.

 

In another banner, Xi was also called a 'traitor of the dictatorship'. According to the report, the officials later removed the banners after the videos and pictures circulated on social media. According to a media report, the banners read, "Let us strike out of schools and work and remove dictatorial traitor Xi Jinping. We don't want COVID test, we want food; we don't want lockdown, we want freedom."

 

 

Liang Wannian, who heads China’s expert panel on COVID-19, said, “it’s not scientifically possible to clearly delineate” while acknowledging public expectations of the rollback of the policy ahead of the Congress, which was widely expected to confer a third term to President Xi, who is an ardent advocate of the zero-COVID policy, as reported by news agency PTI.

 

"We have been working to beat the pandemic but at this stage, from a scientific point of view, it is difficult to say definitively in which month we will have reached this standard,” he was quoted as saying by the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post on Thursday.