Huang Ju (28 September 1938 – 2 June 2007) was a Chinese politician and a high-ranking leader in the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). He was a member of the Politburo Standing Committee of the CCP, China's top decision making body, between 2002 until his death in 2007, and also served as the first-ranked vice premier of China beginning in 2003. He died in office before he could complete his terms on the Standing Committee and as vice premier.
An electrical engineer by trade, Huang was a close confidante of party leader Jiang Zemin, to whom he owed his rise to power. He served as mayor of Shanghai between 1991 and 1994, then Communist Party secretary of the metropolis between 1994 and 2002. Huang's career in Shanghai and his family's alleged involvement in several corruption cases in the city generated controversy. After 2002, Huang emerged as one of the least popular and most partisan members of China's top leadership, and was named by observers as a "core member" of the Shanghai clique.
Early life and career
Huang was born in Shanghai and he was the second of five children in the family. Huang spent a long time in Zhejiang when he was young. From 1944 to 1950, he studied at Zhejiang Jiashan Yishan Primary School () and Qidong Primary School (). He attended Jiashan No.2 Middle School () and Jiaxing No.1 Middle School () for high school from 1950 to 1956. He attended Tsinghua University between 1956 and 1963 where he graduated in Electrical Engineering. In 1966, he joined the Chinese Communist Party.
Huang was employed as a technician in the foundry section of the Shanghai Artificial-board Machinery Factory () from 1963 to 1967. From 1967 to 1977, Huang worked as Technician in the power section of the Shanghai Zhonghua Metallurgical Factory (), where he also served as deputy lead of the production party group. He became deputy director of the Revolutionary Committee (during the Cultural Revolution, the highest day-to-day authority), Deputy Plant Manager, while working as an engineer, from 1977 to 1980. He was Assistant Manager of the Shanghai Petrochemical General Machinery Company () from 1980 to 1982. From 1982 to 1983 he was Deputy Commissioner of the Shanghai First Mechanical and Electrical Industry Bureau ().
Shanghai politics
From 1983 to 1984, Huang Ju served as a standing member of the Shanghai Municipal Party Committee and secretary of the industry affairs committee; he was the Shanghai Party Committee's secretary General from 1984 to 1985 and deputy party chief in charge of propaganda from 1985 to 1986.
In 1987, Huang was named as a candidate for the mayor of Shanghai, but received too few votes supporting his candidacy by the municipal People's Congress. Zhu Rongji was subsequently elected mayor instead. When Zhu ascended to Beijing to become governor of China's central bank, Huang became mayor of Shanghai in 1991 and then the city's party chief in 1994, serving until October 2002. In September 1994 he entered the Politburo of the Chinese Communist Party at the 4th Plenum of the 14th Central Committee.
Huang's rise in Shanghai politics was largely credited to the patronage of Jiang Zemin, who served as the Party Committee secretary in Shanghai until the latter's sudden appointment to become general secretary of the Communist Party following the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre. Huang was seen as one of Jiang's most trusted confidantes in Shanghai, and Jiang's elevation to become the party's top leader paved the way Huang to climb higher on the party's career ladder. Huang was said to be so thankful of Jiang's patronage that while on a working visit to New York during his term of Shanghai mayor, Huang and his entourage, immediately after leaving the airport, proceeded first thing to wine-and-dine Jiang's son Jiang Mianheng.