By Hong Soon-do, Beijing correspondent, AsiaToday - We are beginning to see the outline of China's future leadership team for 2022, when China's President and General Secretary of the Communist Party of China Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang are expected to step down. The team, which is composed of young bloods that have been recently promoted to secretary or vice minister level, would be taking care of China's future unless something major comes up.

Hu Chunhua, the current party secretary of Guangdong, is considered a promising candidate for China's next general secretary. He rose to a vice minister level post before hitting 40./ Source from search engine Baidu

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The next generation leadership team is composed of 12 members, according to Beijing's leading newspaper The Beijing News on Thursday. The three most prominent ones are Hu Chunhua (52), party secretary of Guangdong Province, Sun Zhengcai (52), Chongqing party secretary, and Zhou Qiang (55), head of China's Supreme People's Court. They are currently holding posts that could serve as stepping stones to China's no. 1, no. 2, and no.3 positions - General Secretary, Premier, and Chairman of National People's Committee - during the leadership change in the future unless something major happens.

Chongqing Communist Party Secretary Sun Zhengcai. At the moment, he is the closest to the next premier position./ Source from search engine Baidu

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The three other noteworthy young bloods are Lu Hao (48), governor of Heilongjiang Province, Nur Bekri (54), deputy head of the National Development and Reform Commission, and Xie Ru (46), deputy governor of Jiangxi Province. Three of them stood out among others from early years for their brilliant talent and had been promoted to vice-minister level posts at their mid-30s.

Other six members are Pan Yue (55), vice-minister of the Ministry of Environmental Protection in China and deputy secretary for the Communist Party; Deng Xiaogang (48), deputy party secretary of the Tibetan Autonomous Region; Yang Yue (47), standing member of the Fujian Provincial Party Committee and party secretary of Fuzhou; Sun Jinlong (53), deputy secretary of Hunan Province; Tan Zuojun (47), deputy governor of Liaoning Province; and Zhu Yanfeng (54), chairman of Dongfeng Motor and deputy party secretary of Jilin Province. All of them rose to high positions very quickly when they were at their late 30s. They are expected to be admitted to the Central Politburo of the Communist Party of China, which has 25 seats in total.

China's new leadership change is expected nearly 6 to 7 years from now. Maybe there isn't much meaning to talk about China's next generation leadership. However, considering China's political system of picking future leaders far in advance, there is no doubt that these twelve members are the future leaders of the Chinese government.