Former Chinese president Jiang Zemin dies at 96

China’s former leader Jiang Zemin, who was elevated to the head of the Communist party as a loyalist during the Tiananmen protests and then presided over years of economic expansion, has died aged 96.

The cause of death was leukaemia and multiple organ failure, state media said. His life ended in a hospital in Shanghai, the city that was his power base, and has been the scene of recent protests against the government and its Covid controls.

Jiang’s death could hardly have come at a worse time for China’s current leader, Xi Jinping. There is a tradition in China of using public mourning gatherings for past leaders to express discontent with the current regime.

The 1989 Tiananmen protests that triggered Jiang’s own elevation to the top of China’s Communist party, and later head of government, had their roots in mourning for reformist premier Hu Yaobang.

Jiang did not inspire the same public affection in China as Hu did three decades ago, but nonetheless, many in China may look back fondly on the time when he ran the country. It was an era that saw harsh repression – including of the Falun Gong religious group – but in some ways was the diametric opposite of Xi’s China.

Jiang shepherded China out of the international isolation that followed the massacre around Tiananmen Square. The economy grew rapidly, he oversaw entry into the World Trade Organization which spurred growth, and the government loosened controls on citizens’ private lives.

Xi in contrast has isolated China with Covid regulations and aggressive foreign policy. The economy is slowing in part because of these restrictions and authorities have extended their reach into citizens’ homes, personal lives and leisure time.

“The Jiang era wasn’t exactly that great when it was unfolding, but in contrast to where China is today you will have a lot of people are who are genuinely nostalgic,” said Steve Tsang, director of the SoasS China Institute.

“It is not hard for people to reimagine it in a more beautiful and sanitised way, saying how great it was – which is really criticising what is happening today. That is why Xi will be very cautious.”

Emotional tributes poured in immediately after the news was announced. “The end of an era, and it was a good time! An era of unity and struggle for development!” read one message on Weibo, China’s biggest social media platform.

His death was top of the site, with one news article read by 700 million users, and garnering hundreds of thousands of comments. “A leader who carries on the past and ushers in the future, leading us to a new era,” said another commentator.

Tsang predicted tight controls on any public mourning, in an attempt to control dissent particularly in Shanghai, a key site for protests in recent days and Jiang’s power base.

He was so closely identified with the financial hub that his faction inside the party was known as the Shanghai gang. Some originally counted Xi as a member, before he created his own power bloc.

Long before his death, Jiang had already become a channel for discontent with China under Xi, mostly expressed through an unlikely internet meme – “toad worship” – that was eventually stamped out by censors.

The meme grew out of Jiang’s apparent resemblance, with his trademark large-frame glasses and high-waist trousers, to a cartoon amphibian.

He was also admired for his colourful personality, and penchant for flamboyant public appearances, in contrast to Xi’s meticulously stage-managed persona.

Jiang famously sang an Elvis song with the president of the Philipines, cracked out a comb to tidy his hair while meeting the King of Spain, and stepped away from a meeting in Hong Kong to harangue journalists with an impromptu lecture on media ethics in three languages. “Too simple, sometimes naive,” he told them.

A ruthless believer in one-party rule and party loyalty, he was part of the leadership responsible for the bloody crackdown on Tiananmen protesters and later had no compunction about coming down hard on any group he saw as a threat to Communist control.

But he helped shape a system of collective leadership, and norms around term and age limits for the country’s rulers, that aimed to prevent a return to the chaos of the Maoist era.

Xi has dismantled that system, engineered a historic third term in control of the party, and accumulated more power than any leader since Mao.

Jiang’s death, coming as the leadership tries to suppress the most widespread protests in decades, is a reminder that despite Xi’s networks of surveillance and intimidation, his control is not absolute.

“For all the demonstrations of strength and control Xi has made, this shows how very brittle the system is, that the death of a very, very old man could cause so much concern,” Tsang said.