Mysterious delay as Xi Jinping’s coronavirus textbook goes missing

President Xi’s much-vaunted book is titled ‘A Great Power’s Battle Against Epidemic’. Yet nobody seems able to get a copy of it.

Chinese President Xi Jinping's book "A Great Power's Battle Against Epidemic" doesn't appear to be available. Pictures: Supplied/AP

The Beijing bookseller almost burst out laughing at my question. “Have you got a copy of Xi Jinping’s new book on the coronavirus?”

There was sniggering behind his N-95 mask.

Once composed he told me that, no, the shop didn’t have a copy of General Secretary Xi’s latest book, “A Great Power’s Battle Against Epidemic” (People’s Publishing House).

But I had read in the China Daily last week that the book — a COVID-19 themed follow up to the Paramount Leader’s 2017 bestseller “The Governance of China, Volume Two” (Foreign Languages Press) — was about to be released?

“Some people thought it wasn’t a good idea to publish it. Not at this time,” he said, that snigger returning.

Only eight days earlier, the new book on President Xi’s management of the COVID-19 crisis was heralded by China’s state media — which is “guided” by the Party’s Propaganda department — as a major international publishing event.

The Party mouthpiece Xinhua announced that the book, a compilation of carefully chosen reports and key speeches, would document the Chinese President’s “commitment to the people, his sense of mission, his far-reaching strategic vision and outstanding leadership as the leader of a major power”.

“A Great Power’s Battle Against Epidemic” — which Xinhua noted had been composed under the guidance of the Party’s propaganda department, the same group that oversees Xinhua — would also outline the Party’s leadership and the clear advantages of “China’s socialism with Chinese characteristics”.

It was to be the Party’s textbook to the world on how to fight the coronavirus that was first found in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in late December.

Along with the Chinese original, editions published in English (with the less jingoistic title “A Battle Against Epidemic”), French, Spanish, Russian and Arabic would propagate its wisdom through the world’s 7.7 billion people.

Patients resting at a temporary hospital set up for COVID-19 coronavirus patients in a sports stadium in Wuhan, in China's central Hubei province. Many patients have been discharged after treatment at the temporary hospital, leaving some beds empty. Picture: STR/AFP

At least, that was the original plan.

As has often been the case during the epidemic, many Chinese people had other ideas.

After an eruption of caustic online comment, and immeasurable private chatter, “A Great Power’s Battle Against Epidemic” is suddenly “not in stock”.

The book has vanished — without any official explanation — from the online catalogues of the People’s Publishing House.

The Propaganda department seems to be reconsidering the jarring timing and triumphant tone of the book, as COVID-19 spreads around the world, killing thousands.

“There are many opinions,” answered the Beijing bookseller, waiving the thermometer gun he had taken my temperature with for emphasis, when asked what had happened.

One opinion, widely shared before it was deleted by state censors, was that the publication was a monumental propaganda fail: one that revealed a profound gulf between the central elite of the Chinese Communist Party and the 1.4 billion people it rules over.

Passengers travel on a subway train in Shanghai on March 5 as China on March 5 reported 31 more deaths coronavirus, taking the country's overall toll past 3000. Picture: Hector Retamal/AFP

The timing of the book was almost as strange as this week’s state news story about a letter written by “Grandpa Xi” — on February 15, at the height of the “People’s War” against the coronavirus — to a group of fourth grade students in Utah.

Published on the front pages of China’s state controlled media, the story was another effort overseen by the Party’s peak propaganda department.

“I think it’s a great honour. The Chinese president is incredibly busy, running a country and dealing with the new coronavirus,” said Darrin Johnson, the principal of Cascade Elementary School in Utah, in the story.

“Cool! I can’t invite President Xi to eat doughnuts if he visits Utah,” said Sarah, a 9-year-old student.

Various embarrassed answers have been given by the publisher for the delay of “A Great Power’s Battle Against Epidemic”: that printers have been shut down because of the coronavirus, that trucks and trains carting copies to the eager reading public can’t travel because of quarantine measures.

The truth seems to be that the Party’s elite were informed that, because of the efforts of its Propaganda department, many of the people they govern were laughing at them.

While the Party may be tin-eared, it is clearly not entirely deaf.