‘More Opposition in Mao’s Time.’ Why China’s Xi Jinping May Have to Rule for Life

In the end, dissent was negligible, just as Xi Jinping likes it. Sunday’s vote to remove term limits from the Chinese presidency, thus allowing the incumbent Xi to rule beyond his erstwhile 2023 retirement date — and possibly for life — was passed by 2,958 votes in favor, with just two against and three abstentions.

The final tally at China’s National People’s Congress annual parliament at Beijing’s Great Hall of the People was hardly surprising.