China makes historic move to allow President Xi Jinping to rule indefinitely

China’s lawmakers on Sunday passed a historic constitutional amendment abolishing a presidential two-term limit that will enable Xi Jinping to rule indefinitely.
The amendment upends a system enacted by former Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping in 1982 to prevent a return to the bloody excesses of a lifelong dictatorship typified by Mao Zedong’s chaotic 1966-1976 Cultural Revolution.
“This marks the biggest regression in China’s legal system since the reform and opening-up era of the 1980s,” said Zhang Lifan, an independent, Beijing-based political commentator.
“I’m afraid that this will all be written into our history in the future,” Zhang said.
Voting among the National People’s Congress’ nearly 3,000 hand-picked delegates began in the mid-afternoon, with Xi leading members of the Communist Party’s seven-member all-powerful Politburo Standing Committee in casting their votes. He placed his orange ballot paper in a red box bearing the official seal of state placed front and centre on the stage inside the cavernous hall.