A RARE DEFEAT FOR XI JINPING

IN 1988, before the protests and massacre at Tiananmen Square, I had organised direct elections to the students' union at Tsinghua University.

- BY ZHOU FENGSUO

I was a student of physics at Tsinghua, which is also the alma mater of President Xi Jinping and former president Hu Jintao. As a student leader, when I organised elections, I noticed that it motivated many youngsters who participated with great excitement. A year later, when Hu Yaobang, the pro-reform general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, died, I was one of the first ones to place a wreath in his honour. And it got reported in a national newspaper.

I was excited. For the first time, I realised that our actions can have a profound impact. The protests precipitated by his death, which happened against the backdrop of economic challenges and social change in post-Mao China, were spontaneous. There was no organisation to lead the protests. I became a leader by default as no one wanted to be seen as sticking their neck out at that time.