By Sharon Chen / BloombergSince taking power, Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) has effectively made himself “chairman of everything.” The 2019 novel coronavirus scare (2019-nCoV) is showing all the risks involved with that strategy. While lower-ranking Chinese Communist Party (CCP) officials are starting to admit they were slow to contain the virus, senior leaders very quickly realized the enormous political stakes. In China’s top-down system of government, much of the political intrigue takes place behind closed doors — stability and control are cherished among top leaders. Worried that they might end up being scapegoats, local officials in the firing line are publicly pointing fingers at each other. The mayor of Wuhan, the central Chinese city where the virus originated, said he had to wait for “authorization” before he could release information on the outbreak to the public.
