Ren Xuefeng (; 26 October 1965 – 31 October 2019) was a Chinese politician and business executive. Ren was an early leader of the

Binhai New Area Binhai, officially known as Binhai New Area (), is a sub-provincial district and state-level new area within the jurisdiction of Tianjin Municipality in the People's Republic of China. Binhai is intended to replicate development seen in Shen ...

in Tianjin and served as the city's vice-mayor for eight years. He was transferred to

Guangdong Guangdong (, ), alternatively romanized as Canton or Kwangtung, is a coastal province in South China on the north shore of the South China Sea. The capital of the province is Guangzhou. With a population of 126.01 million (as of 2020 ...

province in 2014, where he served as

Communist Party Secretary A Party Committee Secretary () is the leader of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) organization in a province, city, village, or other administrative unit. In most cases, it is the ''de facto'' highest political office of its area of jurisdictio ...

Guangzhou Guangzhou (, ; ; or ; ), also known as Canton () and alternatively romanized as Kwongchow or Kwangchow, is the capital and largest city of Guangdong province in southern China. Located on the Pearl River about north-northwest of Hong ...

and Deputy Party Secretary of Guangdong. He was appointed Deputy Party Secretary of

Chongqing Chongqing ( or ; ; Sichuanese pronunciation: , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ), alternately romanized as Chungking (), is a municipality in Southwest China. The official abbreviation of the city, "" (), was approved by the State Cou ...

in October 2018, but died in office a year later at age 54.

Early life and career in Tianjin

Ren Xuefeng was born on 26 October 1965 in

Xingtai Xingtai (), formerly known as Xingzhou and Shunde, is a prefecture-level city in southern Hebei province, People's Republic of China. It has a total area of and administers 4 districts, 2 county-level cities and 12 counties. At the 2020 cens ...

Hebei Hebei or , (; alternately Hopeh) is a northern province of China. Hebei is China's sixth most populous province, with over 75 million people. Shijiazhuang is the capital city. The province is 96% Han Chinese, 3% Manchu, 0.8% Hui, and ...

, China. He joined the

Chinese Communist Party The Chinese Communist Party (CCP), officially the Communist Party of China (CPC), is the founding and sole ruling party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Under the leadership of Mao Zedong, the CCP emerged victorious in the Chinese Ci ...

in July 1985. He graduated from

Hebei University of Technology The Hebei University of Technology (HEBUT; ) is a provincial public university in Tianjin, China. HEBUT is sponsored by Hebei Provincial People's Government, Tianjin Municipal People's Government and the Ministry of Education of China, which s ...

in 1988 with a degree in organic

chemical engineering Chemical engineering is an engineering field which deals with the study of operation and design of chemical plants as well as methods of improving production. Chemical engineers develop economical commercial processes to convert raw materials in ...

. He later studied at

Nankai University Nankai University (NKU or Nankai; ) is a national public research university located in Tianjin, China. It is a prestigious Chinese state Class A Double First Class University approved by the central government of China, and a member of th ...

Business School on a part-time basis, earning a

Doctor of Business Administration The Doctor of Business Administration (DBA) is either a professional doctorate or a research doctorate, depending on the granting university, awarded on the basis of advanced study, examinations, project work, and research in business administr ...

degree in 1998. He subsequently conducted postdoctoral research at the university from 1999 to 2001. From 1995 to 2002, Ren was the chief executive of the Tianjin New Technology Industrial Park, the predecessor of

. From 2004 to 2008 he served as Vice-Chairman, then Chairman of Hong Kong Jinlian (Tsinlein) Group Co. Ltd., the ''de facto'' representative office of the Tianjin government in Hong Kong. He served as Vice Mayor of

Tianjin Tianjin (; ; Mandarin: ), alternately romanized as Tientsin (), is a municipality and a coastal metropolis in Northern China on the shore of the Bohai Sea. It is one of the nine national central cities in Mainland China, with a total popu ...

from 2008 to 2014.

Career in Guangdong and Chongqing

In August 2014, Ren was appointed

, the capital of

province. He replaced

Wan Qingliang Wan Qingliang (; Cantonese: Maan Hing Loeng, born February 12, 1964) is a former Chinese politician from Guangdong province. He served as the Mayor of Guangzhou, one of China's most populous cities, from 2010 to 2011, and was then promoted to Com ...

, who had been dismissed for corruption, and became the first person from outside Guangdong to serve as the top leader of its capital in 33 years. In February 2017, Ren was appointed Deputy Party Secretary of Guangdong. He left his post as party chief of Guangzhou in July 2018, after four years on the job. Ren was transferred out of Guangdong in October 2018 and appointed Deputy Party Secretary of

municipality, the No. 3 official behind Party Secretary

Chen Min'er Chen Min'er (; born 29 September 1960) is a Chinese politician and a member of the Politburo of the Chinese Communist Party who is serving as the Communist Party Secretary of Tianjin. From 2017 to 2022, he served as the Communist Party Secretary ...

and Mayor

Tang Liangzhi Tang Liangzhi (; born 12 June 1960) is a Chinese politician who is the current party branch secretary of the Anhui Provincial Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference. He was previously mayor of Chongqing from January 2 ...

. Although his new position was officially on the same level as his old one, it was generally viewed as a demotion as Chongqing is not as economically prosperous and strategically important as Guangdong. Ren was an alternate member of the

18th 18 (eighteen) is the natural number following 17 and preceding 19. In mathematics * Eighteen is a composite number, its divisors being 1, 2, 3, 6 and 9. Three of these divisors (3, 6 and 9) add up to 18, hence 18 is a semiperfect number. ...

and

19th 19 (nineteen) is the natural number following 18 and preceding 20. It is a prime number. Mathematics 19 is the eighth prime number, and forms a sexy prime with 13, a twin prime with 17, and a cousin prime with 23. It is the third full re ...

Central Committees of the Chinese Communist Party.

Death

On 24 October 2019, Ren met with Sylvain Laurent, the Asia-Pacific region CEO of the French software company

Dassault Systèmes Dassault Systèmes SE () (abbreviated 3DS) is a French software corporation which develops software for 3D product design, simulation, manufacturing and other 3D related products. Founded in 1981, it is headquartered in Vélizy-Villacoublay, F ...

, in Chongqing. After the conclusion of the Fourth Plenum of the 19th Central Committee, Ren was unexpectedly absent from an important meeting of the Chongqing Party Committee on 1 November 2019. Two days later, government media in Chongqing reported that Ren had "recently died of an illness", aged 54. According to the Hong Kong newspaper ''

Sing Tao Daily The ''Sing Tao Daily'' () (also known as ''Sing Tao Jih Pao'') is Hong Kong's oldest and second-largest Chinese language newspaper. It is owned by Sing Tao News Corporation, of which Kwok Ying-shing () is chairman. Its English language sister ...

'', Ren had been under intensive medical care after falling from a building, and had missed the Fourth Plenum. The paper reported the following day that he died on 31 October 2019, likely in Beijing.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ren, Xuefeng 2019 deaths 1965 births People's Republic of China politicians from Hebei Political office-holders in Chongqing Political office-holders in Guangdong Political office-holders in Tianjin Politicians from Xingtai Hebei University of Technology alumni Nankai University alumni Chinese Communist Party politicians from Hebei Businesspeople from Hebei