The 13th National People's Congress (NPC) will hold its first annual session in Beijing on March 5, and the first session of the 13th National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) will be held on March 3 in Beijing.
The first annual session of the 13th NPC
The National People's Congress (NPC) Standing Committee presided by Zhang Dejiang, chairman of the 12th NPC Standing Committee, closed Tuesday.
The proposal to deliberate a draft revision to the Constitution and the date to hold the 13th National People's Congress (NPC) were adopted in the meeting.
The 13th National People's Congress (NPC) will hold its first annual session in Beijing on March 5 to discuss Constitution revision and elect new state leaders.
The agenda of the session includes reviewing the government work report, examining reports on the implementation of the annual plan on national economic and social development in 2017 and the draft plan on national economic and social development in 2018. It will also examine reports on the implementation of the central and local budgets in 2017 and the draft central and local budgets in 2018.
NPC deputies will deliberate a draft revision to the Constitution, a draft law on supervision, and the work reports of the NPC Standing Committee, the Supreme People's Court and the Supreme People's Procuratorate, according to the decision.
The NPC is the highest institution through which the Chinese people exercise their state power. Elected for a term of five years, it normally meets at an annual session and is convened by its Standing Committee.
The first NPC was convened in 1954, marking the establishment of the people's congress system in China.
The first session of the 13th National Committee of CPPCC
The first session of the 13th National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), a political advisory body, will be held on March 3 in Beijing, Xinhua reported.
The decision was approved at the 24th meeting of the Standing Committee of the 12th CPPCC National Committee earlier this month.
The main functions of the CPPCC are to conduct political consultation, exercise democratic supervision and participate in the discussion and the handling of state affairs.
Political consultation covers major principles and policies proposed by the central and local governments and matters of importance concerning political, economic, cultural and social affairs.
National political advisers are expected to offer proposals and insights for the government on running state affairs during this year's annual session. The 13th National Committee of the CPPCC runs almost in parallel with the annual session of the NPC.
Together, the dual meetings are dubbed colloquially as the "two sessions" in Chinese, and mark the most important two weeks in March on China's political calendar.