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Hello and welcome to The Spectator Podcast. I'm Laura Prendergast and on this week's episode, we'll be discussing the cult of President Xi.

We'll also be looking at the Palmarian Church in Spain. And finally finally we'll be discussing why good girls fall for bad boys. First, China is having its 19th party Congress, and for the first time since the death of Chairman Mao four decades ago, a personality cult is emerging in China, says Cindy Yu. Cindy joins me now. So Cindy, in your piece, you talk about being in Beijing and seeing

pictures of President Xi's face all over. Is that not what always happens before a party

Congress? No, absolutely. It is absolutely what always happens before party congress. So I say in my

piece that the sort of adulation for an individual leader is nothing new in China. But what is actually very, very

special about this Congress is the way that anyone else knew has been treated in a run-up to the

Congress. So every Congress can be seen as a cabinet reshuffle, essentially. Whereas right now,

we should be seeing rising stars nurtured, vetted, aligned for running the government

in five years' time when Xi's terms end, we're not seeing any of that. So whereas the propaganda

will always and is always there, but what's actually happening is that it's corresponding

with actual action where his enemies are being rooted out. And how has he managed to do that? So the

biggest tool that Xi Jinping has been using for rooting out his enemies is the anti-corruption campaign,

which is something of a trademark of his since his rise to power five years ago. What he does is that

he actually conduct inspections, governmental inspections, every year. So from the very bottom up from

each of the provinces, finding out about embezzlings, about gift giving. And there is a huge

culture of that in China. So my mother actually is an antique dealer and her business had been

fueled by gift giving. High-ranking officials giving ancient Chinese antiques

to other officials or business leaders in order to get things done. But obviously that's not

the recipe for functioning government. And so she's promise has been to root out that and he has

done that. But in the process, he has also got rid of his enemies who have, whether truthfully or not,

been embezzling, been accepting gifts.

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