Al Maaba Jack Ma is a member of the Communist Party: official media

SHANGHAI / TOKYO – Jack Ma Yun, founder and chairman of Chinese online business leader Alibaba Group Holding, was identified Monday as a member of the Chinese Communist Party by the party led by the People's Daily.

The newspaper published an article that day naming several entrepreneurs, including Ma, whom the government expects to honor for their contribution to the reform and opening up of China's economy.

Ma has already been introduced as a member of the Communist Party at events organized by the government. But we think that he has never acknowledged the fact in public.

"My 54-year-old CCP member has been a powerful driver of domestic demand," said the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) quoted by the People's Daily. "

Under his leadership, Alibaba ranks among the top 10 global companies in terms of market value, making China a major player in the e-commerce, internet finance and cloud computing industries, generating many entrepreneurs and startups, "said the selection body committee said in a statement, according to the paper.

Other entrepreneurs on the list of 100 winners include Pony Ma Huateng, CEO of Tencent Holdings, and Robin Li Yanhong, CEO of Baidu. The newspaper described Ma and Li as "non-partisan".

It is unclear how long Ma has been a party member and kept it secret, or where he joined the party recently.

Some suspect a motive behind the disclosure. "The Communist Party apparently wants to use its popularity to strengthen its own," said Kokichiro Mio, an analyst at the NLI research institute in Tokyo. Mio suspects that public support for the party is diminishing, and is increasingly seen as an elite organization separate from the rest of the public.

The CCP has only 90 million members in a country of nearly 1.4 billion. It is not clear whether Ma is just a core member or will be promoted to the 200-member Central Committee, which is headed by President Xi Jinping.

Ma is somehow a folk hero in the country, a man who created from scratch one of the world's largest trading empires, not to mention the Communist Party's relations, said Mio. "People can be a little disappointed now that they know that Ma is a party member after all."

My figure among business leaders such as Masayoshi Son from the SoftBank group. He personally pledged to US President Donald Trump to create 1 million jobs in the United States, a promise that he subsequently canceled after the intensification of the US trade war. and China.

Some irony in the timing of the publication of the list coincides with the 40th anniversary of the reform movement launched by former Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping in December 1978. Deng overthrew the country's attachment to communist dogma, encouraged private sector initiatives and opened China to foreign investment.

Under Xi, the party reaffirms its control over the private sector, which is championed by figures like Jack Ma, said Mio.