Hu Xijin: China 'bans' ex-editor of nationalist tabloid Global Times from social media, but why?

Global Times, the Chinese-state-owned tabloid, is one of the most nationalist supporters of President Xi Jinping's regime, but one of its editors has now been 'banned' from social media, according to reports.

There is no official reason given on why Hu Xijin, the former editor-in-chief of Global Times and an online influencer who defends China, suddenly disappeared from social media since last posting on Saturday (Jul 27). But Hu's silence appears to be in the wake of the backlash he faced for an article he had written on the economic reforms of China.

A report by Bloomberg news agency citing a person familiar with the matter said that he has been "banned from posting on social media" after writing controversial comments about the Chinese economy. His account on Weibo has been suspended, as per the source who was not named in the report. 

Hu has some 25 million followers on Weibo, the X-like microblogging platform on the Chinese internet. He is also active on WeChat and X, which is banned in China, where he has half a million followers.

After retiring from Global Times in 2021, He wrote a newspaper column, Hu Says, and appeared on television channels and online to offer a strident defence of Chinese policies.

What did Hu write that angered Chinese state media?

In an article on Chinese economic reforms, Hu suggested that the private sector in the country may become equal to the public sector. The article has since been deleted.

In the piece posted on his WeChat account on July 22, Hu also wrote about the recent plenum of China’s Communist Party (CCP).

The resolution document of that event, Hu wrote, left out a phrase that had been used to stress the role of the state sector in the country’s economy, according to a report in the South China Morning Post.

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The phrase in question is related to the Chinese public ownership playing a dominant role in its economy. Hu said it was a “historic change” that showed China hoped to “achieve true equality between the private and the state-owned economy”.

Backlash for Hu's article

The article garnered backlash from nationalist writers, bloggers and even state media. They accused him of “blatantly violating the political discipline of the party”, noting that the “dominant role” of public ownership was enshrined in the constitutions of both the ruling party and the country, the SCMP report said.

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The Chinese Communist Party's official paper, the People’s Daily, wrote a commentary that China’s basic stand on the state and private sectors “hasn’t changed and won’t change in the future”, the report said.

Hu's sudden silence on social media appears to have followed this.

(With inputs from agencies)