China’s Political Discourse December 2022: A Slap in the Face on Covid Policy
By China Media Project
This monthly report is prepared for Sinocism by the excellent China Media Project.
China’s Political Discourse: December 2022
A Slap in the Face on Covid Policy
In China, the term “slap in the face,” or dalian (打脸), refers to a demonstrable error that results in extreme embarrassment and leaves a shameful mark of redness on one’s face. The term aptly describes the humiliating situation in which the Chinese leadership found itself in December 2022, as its sudden and ill-conceived about-face on Covid drove a wave of infections across the country that overwhelmed hospitals and pharmacies, resulted in untold deaths — and demanded ever more acrobatic feats of rationalization in official propaganda.
The Chinese Communist Party’s rationalization of its dramatic 180-degree turn on Covid was evident in the so-called “Notice on the Further Optimization of Measures for the Prevention and Control of Covid-19,” published by the State Council on December 7. The word “optimization,” or youhua (优化), suggested the fine-tooling of existing measures, and “further” that such careful and professional modifications had already been happening. In fact, the updated policy — referred to also as the “New 10 Regulations” (新十条) — was nothing short of the wholesale rolling back of Xi Jinping’s “zero Covid” approach to battling the pandemic at home.
Among the stipulations in the State Council notice was that PCR testing would no longer be mandated for whole populations within jurisdictional areas, and cases and their close contacts would no longer be forced into local quarantine camps. Instead, mild and asymptomatic cases would be encouraged to isolate at home. Additionally, restrictions would no longer apply to online and offline purchases of over-the-counter fever and cough medications.
While many welcomed these changes in principle, there were legitimate concerns that the country was inadequately prepared and that the healthcare system would be overwhelmed. As PCR testing was dropped, it became impossible to get an accurate picture of the number of infected people. And as hospitals in major cities like Beijing were inundated with feverish patients, and emergency wards were left overcrowded and understaffed, it became painfully clear that the roll-back of “zero Covid” was hardly the “optimization” or “adjustment” the government claimed.
A notice issued by the National Health Commission on December 26 brought further clarity on the rolling back of Covid restrictions. According to the notice, Covid-19 was no longer to be called “novel coronavirus pneumonia” (新型冠状病毒肺炎). Instead, it would be called “novel coronavirus infection” (新型冠状病毒感染), and be downgraded to a Class B infectious disease according to the country's law on the prevention and treatment of infectious diseases. This meant that Covid would no longer be subject to the same level of response as Class A infectious diseases like cholera and the bubonic plague.
In our focus topic for December 2022, we take a closer look at the official narrative on the dramatic policy shift underway on Covid, and how this was challenged by real experiences and online discourse.
Focus Topics
Taking Stock of Covid Policies, While Ibuprofen Is Out of Stock
As the Chinese leadership made a 180-degree turn in its Covid policy, commentaries in the People’s Daily attributed to "Zhong Yin" (仲音) — a homophone for “important voice” (重要声音), and thus pointing to the prevailing leadership view — lost the sense of resoluteness that had characterized them the previous month (See the Sinocism-CMP report on discourse in November 2022).
A total of 16 “Zhong Yin” commentaries were published in the People’s Daily in December 2022. Of these, four had headlines including the phrase “taking times and circumstances into account” (因时因势), a bald-faced attempt to rationalize the dramatic policy shift underway as responsive and “scientific” — this being a word long employed in CCP discourse to assert the rationality and necessity of political decisions made by the leadership. A December 16 “Zhong Yin” headline emphasized, for example, the need for Covid control policies that are “scientific and precise” (科学精准).
Five “Zhong Yin” commentaries included the word “optimization” in the headline, portraying changes to Xi Jinping’s “zero Covid” policy as having simply been retooled for greater effectiveness. And there was an emphasis too in the “Zhong Yin” commentaries, mirrored throughout official state media propaganda in December, on the people-centered nature of policy-making and the need to take into account the livelihoods of all Chinese — this despite the fact that uncompromising lockdown policies had already, for many months, upended Chinese lives and had a dramatic impact on economic well-being.
The overarching message, then, was that the glorious wisdom of Xi’s “zero Covid” approach had simply been continued and extended. If China’s policies were glorious and correct before, they were now even more glorious and more correct. A read through the December “Zhong Yin” headlines makes the general sweep of the CCP’s narrative on Covid clear:
December 2, 2022, “Gathering Consensus, Forming Synergy” (凝聚共识 形成合力)
December 3, 2022, “Effectively Meeting the Basic Living Needs of the Masses During the Handling of the Epidemic” (切实满足疫情处置期间群众基本生活需求)
December 4, 2022, “Doing a Good Job of Vaccinating Key Populations” (做好重点人群疫苗接种工作)
December 9, 2022, “Optimize Epidemic Prevention and Control Measures According to the Time and Situation” (因时因势优化疫情防控措施)
December 11, 2022, “Joint Efforts to Implement Optimized Measures for Epidemic Prevention and Control” (形成合力，落实好疫情防控优化措施)
December 12, 2022, “Promoting the Optimization of Measures for Greater Effectiveness” (推动各项优化措施落地见效)
December 13, 2022, “Applying Heart, Soul and Strength in Working for the Masses” (用心用情用力为群众办实事)
December 14, 2022, “Responding in a Timely Way to the Real Issues Facing the Masses” (及时回应解决群众实际问题)
December 16, 2022, “Making Decisions in Response to the Situation, for Scientific and Precise Prevention and Control” (因时因势决策，科学精准防控)
December 17, 2022, “Continuously Building a Solid Prevention and Control Barrier to Protect the Health and Safety of the People” (不断筑牢保障人民健康安全的防控屏障)
December 18, 2022, “Strongly Protecting the Livelihoods of the People in the Midst of Prevention and Control” (在疫情防控中有力保障改善民生)
December 19, 2022, “Maximizing the Protection of People’s Lives and Physical Health” (最大程度保护人民生命安全和身体健康)
December 20, 2022, “Minimizing the Impact of the Epidemic on Economic and Social Development” (最大限度减少疫情对经济社会发展的影响)
December 28, 2022, “Optimizing and Adjusting Prevention and Control Policies According to the Time and Situation” (因时因势优化调整防控政策)
December 30, 2022, “Life First, Always Protecting the Health and Safety of the People” (生命至上，始终护佑人民群众健康安全)
December 31, 2022, “Time and Situation, Steadily Optimizing and Adjusting Prevention and Control Policies” (因时因势，不断优化调整疫情防控政策)
As the forceful measures that had been applied for three years in the battle against Covid-19 were “optimized,” dropping suddenly into the past, the time had come to clean up the battlefield. On December 7, the day of the release of the new State Council measures, the official Xinhua News Agency ran a commentary called “Winning Strategic Initiative in the Midst of Persistence: A Review of China's Battle for Epidemic Prevention and Control” (在坚持中赢得战略主动——近三年来我国打好疫情防控攻坚战述评). The commentary was a consummate act of dissembling, essentially plastering over the extreme “persistence” that had marked Xi’s “zero Covid” policy even through the horrors of the spring, as the policy drew resistance in Shanghai and other major cities. Now, it suggested, a new phase of persistence had arrived, made possible by changes to the nature of the virus and China’s state of preparedness.
The Xinhua commentary included this key passage:
Over the past three years, the virus had weakened, and we have strengthened. . . . We waited for a decline in the pathogenicity of Covid. We adhered to [a policy of] prevention and control while undergoing research, closely tracking variants of the virus, and we now have vaccines and drugs, improved rescue and treatment capacity, stronger epidemic prevention skills, and improved health awareness and literacy, all of which has laid the foundation and created conditions for further optimization and improvement of prevention and control measures.
But this portrait of a confident and well-conceived turn came into immediate conflict with realities on the ground, as patients with fevers started to inundate hospitals in major cities like Beijing, and emergency wards became overcrowded and understaffed. For months on end, the country had focused on coercive testing and quarantine protocols, applied right down to the neighborhood level. Had that not been the real focus? Had other preparations really been made at all — such as the vaccination of the elderly, and the stockpiling of essential medications?
In the first half of December, media reports in China were inundated with messages of moderation that hinted at incapacities and insufficiencies where Covid control was concerned. This included a wave of “if not necessary” (非必要) reports. Citizens should not dial 120 emergency hotlines or visit the hospital if not necessary. They should not return home to the countryside, leave the city, go out, scan their health codes, or attempt to do PCR testing, unless absolutely necessary.
According to reports from Chinese media in early to mid-December, daily emergency calls to 120 in Beijing had rocketed past 30,000, compared to an average of 5,000 per day prior to the policy change. This far exceeded the emergency hotline’s capacity. In Zhengzhou, the capital city of Henan province, the emergency hotline received an average of 4,600 calls a day from the public in early December, 2.3 times normal levels. As emergency calls rose across the country, a number of areas, including Sichuan’s capital of Chengdu, urged the public not to dial 120 unless urgently necessary.
Medications to reduce fever and inflammation were in such short supply and in such demand that couriers delivering the medicine to customers were forced to disguise packages out of fear that they might be hijacked.
On December 13th, Vice Premier Sun Chunlan (孙春兰) said while directing epidemic prevention and control work in Beijing, that “new infections in Beijing are in a period of rapid growth, but the vast majority are asymptomatic infections and light cases, and there are currently 50 cases of critically ill patients in hospital, mostly with underlying diseases.” The immediate priority, she added, was to support the city in securing general access to medications. This statement of priorities was a disappointment for hospitals that were dealing with wave after wave of emergency patients.
The situation was the same across the country, and on December 14, the Joint Prevention and Control Mechanism of the State Council held a press conference during which it addressed the most urgent issues. Mi Feng (米锋), a spokesperson from the National Health Commission, said the goal of Covid prevention and control was now to safeguard general health and prevent serious illness, and the most urgent task was to ensure the public's access to medical care and essential medications.
But this clear moderation of the government’s approach to Covid contrasted with an intensification of the triumphant tone in the official Party-state media on the history of the country’s fight against the virus. On December 15, the People’s Daily ran an official commentary attributed to “Ren Zhongping” (任仲平), a penname reserved for “important People’s Daily commentaries” (人民日报重要评论) that are written by a writing team at the newspaper to reflect views in the CCP’s top leadership. (For more on official pennames, see CMP’s “Pen Names for Power Struggles”). The commentary, “Through Three Years of the Pandemic, We Have Walked Together in Our Hearts” (三年抗疫，我们这样同心走过), drew widespread scorn online with its overwrought lead, which oozed propaganda-speak:
In the factory workshops, machines roar; on the streets and down alleys, people come and go; on the highways and rails, vehicles zoom past; in the supermarkets and shopping malls, abundance is offered at stable prices; the vast fields teem with vibrance . . . . As the year comes to a close, the sacred land surges with vitality, displaying myriad ambient scenes.
Though the commentary spoke of a “scientific war against the epidemic” (科学战疫), it exposed the chief logic that had guided the CCP’s approach to Covid, in which “speaking politics” (讲政治) took precedence over “speaking science” (讲科学).
How should China take account of the past three years and its war against Covid? The “Ren Zhongping” commentary urged the need to emphasize “large accounts” over a detailed accounting (关键要算大账，算总账). What did that mean? Essentially, it meant the public should see past the difficulties they had faced and past the painful costs of “zero Covid,” in order to recognize long-term benefits and larger goods.
“In the struggle against the epidemic, we must reckon the economic accounts, but even more we must take an account of lives,” the commentary said, suggesting that economic pain caused by forced lockdowns had been necessary to save lives. “In the struggle against the epidemic, we must reckon the accounts before our eyes, but even more must reckon the long-term accounts,” it said, suggesting that the long-term benefits of CCP policies outweigh short-term problems. “In the struggle against the epidemic, we must reckon the partial accounts, but even more must reckon the total accounts,” it said finally, suggesting that whatever pains the Chinese people suffered, and whatever apparent faults might enter the ledgers, the overall picture was positive.
The “Ren Zhongping” commentary concluded with a predictable claim to the glories of the CCP’s accomplishments under the leadership of Xi Jinping — in other words, a political settling of accounts.
What has been remarkable for the world to witness is that under the strong leadership of the CCP Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping as the core, China has in the past three years found a dialectical way to accurately and efficiently coordinate epidemic prevention and control with economic and social development.
This CCP narrative resounded in the official media, deepening for many the sense of detachment from reality. Far down below the lofty heights of official magniloquence, the country was undergoing the largest Covid surge the world had seen at any point in the pandemic. In many places, crucial medications were sold out. News coverage outside China showed patients in some areas receiving medical treatment (including IV drips) on the street or in their cars. International health experts estimated that deaths from Covid in China could reach two million within a few short months.
“This thing came like a freight train,” one foreign lawyer in Beijing observed to The Guardian, describing how the virus had sickened 90 percent of the workers at his office.
But the train had been coming for many months already, during which China had failed to make basic and essential preparations. Media around the world asked how China’s leadership could have failed to have an exit plan from “zero Covid.” Why hadn’t the government prepared for the surge anyone could have predicted would come by ensuring the vaccination of the elderly and readying hospitals and pharmacies? “The policy of controlling covid was relaxed very suddenly," a young doctor at a hospital in Shanghai told Reuters. "The hospitals should've been notified in advance to make adequate preparations."
Crematoriums and funeral homes in Beijing and other areas reported a dramatic surge in demand, an indication that the virus was tearing through communities with devastating effects. The government responded by fudging the real number of Covid deaths, reporting single-digit figures that convinced no one. As Mei Xinyu, a Chinese economist, remarked on the numbers on social media: “These are an example of ‘believing in one’s own lies.’”
The Annual Roundup from Society
On December 29, Xinhua News Agency released its list of “10 Major Domestic News Stories in 2022” (2022年国内十大新闻), which aside from a predictable focus on the Beijing Winter Olympics, the 20th National Congress of the CCP, and the 25th anniversary of the return of Hong Kong, included the “resolute crushing” of Taiwan independence forces (referring to military exercises to respond to Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan), and “the head of state conducting foreign relations to lead with Chinese characteristics.”
The obvious skew in the Xinhua list toward the positive official framing of a year teeming with other news choices, prompted many Chinese to share the post, adding their own comments and assessments. One internet user, for example, offered an alternative list of major news stories:
The Xuzhou chained woman incident, the China Eastern Airlines crash, the Shanghai lockdown, the Tangshan attacks, the Henan township and village banking crisis, the Guizhou quarantine transport crash, the A4 [protests] incident, the Changsha building collapse, the Urumqi fire, and pre-bookings for cremation [as Covid victims overwhelm facilities].
Another internet user composed a limerick (打油诗) entitled “Amazing” that began:
Bumper grain harvests year after year,
While Covid is driven outside.
Our leader clears the way for another term,
While auto exports reach new highs.
The year began with the arrival of Omicron,
The nation on alarm to strike it down,
The year ends with precision policies,
The state rolling out the New Ten rules.
Contributions on social media became more and more creative, with one user designing a simple image summing up the year. Called the “2022 Year-End Report,” it was an illustration in which nearly all of “2022” (January-November) was drawn out with PCR test swabs, but the tail of the last “2” (December) rendered with the image of a positive rapid test.
One of the most bitterly tongue-in-cheek offerings was a 2022 Top Ten List posted through WeChat. Item 10 on the list was a summary of the past three years under Covid:
Professional matters were handled with bullshit.
Bullshit matters were handled with professionalism.
Good things were done atrociously.
Atrocious things were done seamlessly.
As the year came to a close, the contrast could not have been more pronounced between the official framing of 2022 as a glorious journey through hardship, and the bitter laughter and appraisal offered by grassroots voices online. For many, the government’s slap in the face resounded. The red mark still lingered. But the official policy was to deny failure and focus on the horizon.
The year’s final edition of the People’s Daily on December 31 included a front-page announcement of Xi Jinping’s 2023 New Year’s Address, to be televised that evening at 7 PM. As he spoke in his address of great prospects and glorious accomplishments, Xi Jinping overlooked the tragedy and hardship of 2022. He said nothing of soaring Covid numbers but gave a nod to the three successful space flights of the country’s Shenzhou program. He said nothing of the tragic crash of China Eastern Airlines Flight 5735, but hailed the first official delivery of the Comac C919, China’s narrow-body airliner. Under the leadership of the CCP, China was marching confidently forward:
In 2022, we triumphantly held the 20th National Congress of the CCP, which drew a grand blueprint for comprehensively building a modern socialist country and comprehensively promoting the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation through Chinese-style modernization, sounding the trumpet of the times for a new march.
In the Party-state media, any allusion to unhappiness was merely a stage on which to sing more loudly about victory. As one official assessment of Xi’s address oozed: “Over the space of a year, we all gritted out teeth and moved forward. Was it difficult? It was difficult! But still we accomplished a series of great things that impressed the world.”
December Surprises
To Not Achieve Zero Would Be a Shame!
On December 1, the WeChat public account “Jinzhou Release” (锦州发布), operated by the local government of Jinzhou, a prefectural-level city in Liaoning province, posted an article called “A Few Considerations on the Current Epidemic and Control Measures” (关于当前疫情防控措施的几点考虑). The article read:
The relevant control measures we implement at present are all concrete arrangements based on the 'ninth edition' of the 'twenty articles.’ If we now abandon these measures that have seen outstanding results, we can predict that the virus, which has not been zeroed out, will spread from one to ten, and from ten to a hundred. It would be a great pity to not achieve zero when it can be achieved!
Nevertheless, early in the morning the next day, the city entirely scrapped the “dynamic zero” policy. The dramatic change was again announced through “Jinzhou Release.” According to the government’s “Notice Concerning the Orderly Restoration of the Production and Living Order in the Main City” (关于有序恢复主城区生产生活秩序的通告), lockdown and testing policies would be dropped beginning at 6 AM on December 2, the account reported.
The “New 10 Regulations” were released just five days later, and the prophecy made by “Jinzhou Release” quickly became true. Cases in the city, and across the country, grew dramatically.
One day later and one person less is a major victory
On December 17, the official account of the CCP-run Zhejiang Daily newspaper on the Baijiahao platform ran a commentary that marked a surprise drop in the state media façade of unwavering adherence to Xi Jinping’s "dynamic zero" Covid policy and all-is-well triumphalism. Called “One Day Later and One Person Less is a Major Victory” (迟一天少一人就是大胜利), the commentary suggested a society on edge. “Since December began, in the face of Omicron’s rampage, everyone is weighing whether they can hold on, avoiding a positive or getting a positive later,” it read. “Every city is scheming and working to see if the peak of infections can be pushed back a day, or the number of infected kept down just a bit.”
Through the second half of December, similar calls appeared in the official media to find ways to limit the number of infections and postpone the peak. For many reading between the lines, the new insistence that “victory” could be achieved through limited and transitory successes in flattening the wave of infections was further evidence of just how overwhelmed the authorities were by the situation.
The Hot and the Cold
About the Scale:
According to the discourse scale developed by CMP in 2016, based on a historical analysis of keywords appearing in the China Communist Party’s flagship People’s Daily newspaper, we define a six-tier system of discourse intensity based on the total number of appearances of a given discourse term on a per article basis for the full year in the paper. The scale is as follows:
In 2021, CMP adjusted its classification method for CCP discourse, determining the intensity (热度) of Party terminologies according to the absolute number of articles including those terms in the People's Daily newspaper. Previously, CMP used a proportional method, which looked at the number of articles including a particular catchphrase (提法) as a ratio of total articles in the newspaper over a given period. Our monthly classification standard, based on the six-level scale created in 2016, is as follows:
In December 2022, as Covid infections were on the rise across China, the phrase “epidemic prevention and control” (疫情防控) rose to the top of the CMP scale in Tier 1. Another phrase to rise up out of Tier 2 was “with Comrade Xi Jinping as the core” (以习近平同志为核心), which wavered between Tiers 1 and 2 through 2022. Other phrases at the top included “Chinese path to modernization” (中国式现代化), in Tier 1 for a third consecutive month, “Belt and Road” (一带一路), and references to both the “20th CCP National Congress” and “since the 18th CCP National Congress” (十八大以来) — this last an oft-used phrase to signal changes, always positive, since Xi Jinping came to power.
Xi Jinping’s banner phrase, “Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for the New Era” (习近平新时代中国特色社会主义思想), finished out the year with no clear sign of shortening as anticipated in the months leading up to the 20th National Congress. As in previous months, it remained in Tier 2, alongside other key terms signaling Xi’s power and vision. These included the “Two Establishes” (两个确立), code for the centrality of Xi himself as the “core” leader, and his ideas as the bedrock of the future (see the monthly analysis below); the “Two Upholds/Safeguards/Protections” (两个维护), emphasizing the need to 1) protect the “core” status of Xi Jinping within the CCP, and 2) to protect the centralized authority of the Party; and the “Four Consciousnesses” (四个意识) and “Four Confidences” (四个自信), which readers can learn more about here.
Shortened permutations of Xi’s banner phrase for various policy areas showed only slight variations for the month. “Xi Jinping Thought on Ecological Civilization” (生态文明思想), the buzzword for China’s approach to sustainability issues, rose one level from Tier 4 to Tier 3, while “Xi Jinping Economic Thought” (习近平经济思想) rose from Tier 5 to Tier 4. “Xi Jinping Thought on Rule of Law” (习近平法治思想) held steady in Tier 4. As was often the case in 2022, the laggard of the group was “Xi Jinping Thought on Diplomacy” (习近平外交思想), which dropped to the bottom of the CMP scale at Tier 6.
The following table shows the key terms we reviewed for the month of December 2022 and how they rated on our scale:
Monthly Hot Words
The “Two Establishes”
In December 2022, CCP-run newspapers at the provincial level published a total of 2,008 articles using the “Two Establishes” catchphrase, one of the most important buzzwords signaling the power of Xi Jinping. This marked a continued decline from the heights recorded in October in the run-up to the 20th National Congress, bringing the numbers closer to the September 2022 level of 1,566 articles.
The “Two Establishes” was an important phrase to watch through 2022, as it is meant to signal the legitimacy of Xi Jinping’s rule, and to pose a challenge to any who might resist his leadership. The top provinces using the phrase in December were Tibet, which had 107 articles and made the top three for the seventh time this year; Jiangsu, which had 102 articles, also making the top three for the second time; and Guangxi, which had 124 articles, making the top three for the fourth time.
The bottom three municipalities and provinces in December were Shanghai, which recorded 35 articles, putting it in the bottom three for the seventh time this year; Beijing, which had 42 articles, putting it in the bottom three for the fourth time; and Ningxia, which had 44 articles, putting it in the bottom three for the third time.
The Centrality Index
The death of former CCP general secretary Jiang Zemin (江泽民) on November 30, 2022, meant that during the first seven days of December, the main character on the front page of the People’s Daily (as well as on the nightly official newscast “Xinwen Lianbo”) was no longer Xi Jinping. For a full week, the CCP’s flagship newspaper was all black in commemoration of Jiang (See CMP’s “Looking the People’s Daily in the Eye”).
Shortly after his death in Shanghai, Jiang’s body was conveyed by plane to Beijing, and following the cremation of his remains and his official memorial service, his ashes were returned to Shanghai, where they were scattered at sea. This sort of handling of remains is a rather rare occurrence in China, and as the nation observed these rites, a special phrase, “respectful transfer” (敬移), emerged to describe what was happening.
Keeping with practice throughout 2022, Xi Jinping was far and away the most mentioned leader in the CCP’s Central Committee in the pages of the People’s Daily. He remained at the white-hot top of the CMP scale in Tier 1.
Wang Yi (王毅) and Ding Xuexiang (丁薛祥), who accompanied Xi on his trip to Saudi Arabia on December 7, were elevated into Tier 2, making for a rare month in 2022 in which there was not an empty tier separating Xi from the rest of the pack. He Lifeng (何立峰), who also accompanied the general secretary to the Middle East, appeared one level down in Tier 3.
Foreign Leaders
In December 2022, just as in the previous month, foreign leaders in the People’s Daily were arrayed across Tiers 4-6, with none appearing in Tiers 1-3. Russian President Vladimir Putin led the pack, being the only leader in Tier 4. Related coverage dealt with Putin’s video conferences with Xi Jinping and Li Keqiang, and with the Russian president’s condolences over the death of Jiang Zemin.
Coming second after Putin, and appearing in Tier 5, was US President Joe Biden. Two mentions of Biden came in the People’s Daily on the last day of the year. The first was in the newspaper’s list of top-ten stories in 2022, which noted the face-to-face meeting between Biden and Xi in Bali on November 14, and said that “the meeting between the China and US leaders “points the way to the development of relations between the two countries.”
Among the foreign leaders not mentioned at all in December were British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak (里希·苏纳克), Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (特鲁多), and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy (泽连斯基).
In rather stark contrast to Vladimir Putin, who experienced relatively strong though inconsistent coverage in the People’s Daily in 2022, Zelenskiy appeared in the CCP’s flagship newspaper just twice during the year. The first time came on January 5, 2022, seven weeks before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, when a page-one Xinhua News Agency report noted that Xi and Zelenskiy had mutually sent messages of congratulations to mark the 30th anniversary of diplomatic relations between the two countries. The second time came on October 7, 2022, when the paper broke its chilly nine-month silence on Zelenskiy to note that he was among the world leaders to congratulate the People’s Republic of China on its 73rd anniversary.
The official silence on Ukraine’s president has continued into 2023. There was no mention of Zelenskiy in the People’s Daily in January 2023. And the silence is likely to continue with the prospect of deepening relations between China and Russia.
"Media around the world asked how China’s leadership could have failed to have an exit plan from “zero Covid.”" The answer to the question is located in the question itself: "China's leadership." It's almost an oxymoron. Perhaps it is an oxymoron.