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BEIJING (AP) - Seeking to maintain its hold on a fast-changing China, the ruling Communist Party celebrated its 80th birthday Sunday by reaching out to the country's growing army of private entrepreneurs.
Addressing thousands gathered in Beijing's cavernous Great Hall of the People, party leader Jiang Zemin acknowledged the economic importance of private businesspeople, the self-employed and employees for foreign-funded firms. Jiang suggested the party might admit more people from the thriving private sector.
"They also are builders of socialism with Chinese characteristics," Jiang said in his nationally televised speech.
"Party members who are workers, farmers, intellectuals, soldiers and cadres are the basic components of the party's ranks," said Jiang.
But the party, which already has 64.5 million members, also should accept "outstanding people from other parts of society who meet conditions for party membership," he said.
Eighty years after its founding congress in July 1921, the world's largest Communist Party is struggling to remain relevant to a country radically changed by two decades of capitalist-style market reforms.
The growth of private businesses, the decline of state-run firms, the growing mesh of economic, cultural and personal contacts between China and the West and inroads by the Internet, faxes and telephones have given many Chinese unprecedented freedoms and diluted the party's once-dominant hold over their lives.
The party used its birthday to seek to justify its continued monopoly rule. State-run newspapers with banner headlines in red stressed the party's role in raising living standards and turning China into a world power since the communist takeover of 1949.
"Without the Communist Party, there would be no new China. Under the Communist Party, China took on an entirely new look," said Jiang, who is expected to hand over leadership of the party to a younger successor next year.
The 74-year-old wore a dark suit, shirt and red tie for his nearly two-hour speech, not the proletarian tunics typically worn by earlier leaders like Mao Tse-tung and Deng Xiaoping. But Jiang spoke before a backdrop of red flags and a giant bronze-coloured hammer and sickle. At the end of the meeting, the crowd stood as a band played the Internationale, a communist anthem.
Jiang gave no sign that the party plans to relax its grip on power. He called on party members to "resolutely resist the influence of the Western multiparty system."
But Jiang did call for measures to tackle the rampant official corruption that has left many Chinese disenchanted with party rule.
"All corrupt actions and corrupt elements must be rooted out. They cannot be tolerated. We must not be soft-handed. There must be no shelter for corrupt elements within the party," Jiang said to strong applause.
Jiang also repeated vows to recover Taiwan, the island Beijing views as part of its territory. The party wants to use peaceful means to unify Taiwan with the Chinese mainland "but we cannot promise to renounce the use of military force," Jiang said.
The party celebrates its anniversary on July 1, although its founding meeting opened on July 23, 1921, in Shanghai.
===== Kevin Dean Buffalo, NY ICQ: 8616001 http://www.yaysoft.com
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