Wen Jiabao

September 15, 1942

Wen Jiabao (born 1942) is a retired Chinese politician and geologist who served as premier of China from 2003 to 2013 and as the third-ranking member of the Chinese Communist Party's Politburo Standing Committee from 2002 to 2012. He rose through the party after working as a geologist in Gansu and served as director of the CCP General Office from 1986 to 1993.

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Biography

Wen Jiabao was born in Tianjin in 1942 and attended Nankai High School. He studied geological surveying at the Beijing Institute of Geology from 1960 and did graduate work there until 1968; he joined the Chinese Communist Party as a student in 1965. He then spent a decade with the geology bureau of Gansu province, leading a survey team and rising to head the bureau, and later became a vice minister of geology and mineral resources.

Promoted by party leader Hu Yaobang in 1985, he directed the party's General Office from 1986 to 1993, serving under three general secretaries. In 1989 he accompanied Zhao Ziyang on his visit to the student protesters in Tiananmen Square but, unlike Zhao, survived the purge that followed. He became a close ally of Zhu Rongji, joined the Politburo in 1997 and, as vice premier from 1998, oversaw agriculture, finance and the environment.

Wen entered the Politburo Standing Committee in 2002 and was premier from March 2003 to March 2013, working alongside Hu Jintao. His governments abolished the agricultural tax, shifted spending towards the interior and rural poor, responded to the SARS epidemic and, after the 2008 financial crisis, launched a large stimulus programme. His rapid visit to the area hit by the 2008 Sichuan earthquake made him popular as the 'people's premier'.

He was regarded as the leading reformist voice in the leadership and spoke repeatedly of the need for political reform, remarks that were often censored at home. Reports that his relatives had amassed great wealth clouded his reputation. He retired in 2013 and was succeeded by Li Keqiang.