Troubles mount in China ahead of Xi’s bid to stay in power

When Xi Jinping strode into the Bird’s Nest Olympic stadium in the winter, waving and bundled in a black jacket and mask, hundreds of Chinese spectators and performers cheered in what was meant to be the start of a victorious year for their nation’s president.

The Communist Party leader had personally seen to the smooth execution of the Beijing Winter Games, a show of China’s power at a critical moment on the world stage. He had banked on steady, if slower, economic growth. And his firm zero-COVID policy had largely contained a pandemic that had battered the U.S. and Europe.

But things — even amid Xi’s tightly choreographed control of the state — have not gone as planned, presenting a glitch six months before the Communist Party is expected to endorse him for an unprecedented third term as its leader.

A persistent new wave of COVID-19 outbreaks has upended Xi’s zero-tolerance approach, resulting in embarrassing memes and confrontational videos coming out of Shanghai, where 25 million residents have been confined to their homes for over a month. Such harsh lockdowns have derailed manufacturing and consumer spending, deepening worries about a sobering economic slowdown and shaking the confidence of foreign businesses that have long courted opportunities in China.

Meanwhile, Beijing’s support of Moscow in the Ukraine war threatens its already-troubled relations with the West even as it tests Xi’s political partnership with Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, who relies on China for importing Russian oil. Balancing China’s international ambitions — countering what its president sees as Western…