The “Lianghui,” or the “Two Conferences,” is a common Mandarin Chinese abbreviation for the national or local People’s Congress and the national or local committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference. It’s a rubber stamp process to show that representatives of the people in the country or in a local region review and approve the work of the central or local government and make decisions on the personnel in the committees of the People’s Congress and the People’s Political Consultative Conference.
The national level of the “Lianghui” was scheduled to be held in Beijing in early March. There had been reports that Beijing would postpone them due to the coronavirus outbreak. On February 24, Beijing officially announced the suspension decision without a specific date for when the meetings would be rescheduled.
Ming Pao, a Hong Kong based media with ties to Beijing, reported on February 20 that Xi Jinping did not want to postpone the meetings. Most of the Politburo Standing Committee members preferred to do so. There were three reasons against holding the conferences:
- Gathering over 10,000 people in Beijing presents a big risk of coronavirus infection.
- Li Keqiang strongly requested that the meeting be postponed because he needed to rewrite the government work report to re-adjust for the impact of the epidemic .
- Officials are tied to fighting the coronavirus and do not have time to prepare for the two conferences.
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1. Excerpt in Chinese:
新华社北京2月24日电（记者杨维汉、陈菲）十三届全国人大常委会第十六次会议24日下午表决通过了关于推迟召开十三届全国人大三次会议的决定。
新华社北京2月24日电日前，中国人民政治协商会议第十三届全国委员会召开第三十三次主席会议，研究了关于推迟召开全国政协十三届三次会议的相关事项，为贯彻落实中共中央关于统筹推进新冠肺炎疫情防控和经济社会发展工作的总体部署、组织全国各级政协组织和广大政协委员积极投身打赢疫情防控阻击战，建议原计划于3月3日召开的全国政协十三届三次会议予以适当推迟，具体时间另行确定。
Source: Xinhua, February 24, 2020
http://www.xinhuanet.com//mrdx/2020-02/25/c_138815990.htm
2. Excerpt in Chinese:
受疫情严峻影响，今年的两会已确定延期，但下周内召开的人大常委和政协常委两个会议，据悉只会确认大会延期，不会公布确切的召开时间，因为内地的疫情虽已趋缓，但专家仍难判定爆发高峰期是否已过，变数仍多。因此，最乐观的估计，两会召开也要4月上中旬。如此一来，国家主席习近平访日的行程也势必受影响。
有消息称，习近平本不想延期，两会毕竟是内地年度「政治生活大事」，因疫情要推迟属破天荒，载入史册是不光彩的纪录。但一来疫情确实凶猛，上万人聚集北京风险极高；二来李克强坚决要求推迟，因应疫情形势变化，政府工作报告要重写，很多指标要重新订定；三来各级官员因抗疫焦头烂额，实在无力顾及两会筹备，因此，政治局常委也多数赞成两会延期。
Source: Ming Pao, February 20, 2020
http://mingshengbao.com/tor/article.php?aid=697219