General Secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee Xi Jinping, also Chinese president and chairman of the Central Military Commission, extends Chinese New Year greetings to the villagers in a village of the Wa ethnic group in Qingshui Township of Tengchong, southwest China's Yunnan Province, Jan. 19, 2020. Xi visited Simola Wa Village, Tengchong City, during an inspection tour to Yunnan ahead of the Chinese New Year. (Xinhua/Yan Yan)

President Xi Jinping's inspection tour to Southwest China's Yunnan Province on his way back from Myanmar attracted a wave of likes on Chinese social media on Sunday and Monday as he exchanged greetings with a group of tourists during his trip that symbolized the relaxed mood of Chinese New Year across the country.

Chinese experts noted that Xi's Yunnan tour has great significance which highlighted not only the national focus on the domestic poverty alleviation campaign but also the important message to neighboring countries that China's economic efforts in the border areas could also benefit the joint development in the region. 

Xi, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, visited the old town of Heshun, a gateway on the ancient Southern Silk Road that linked China's Sichuan and Yunnan with Myanmar and India, to learn about exchanges, historical and cultural inheritance, and ecological and environmental protection along the trade route.

"Xi Dada, where is Peng Mama?" rang out from the crowd of tourists Sunday when Xi was in Heshun, which is also a popular tourist destination in Yunnan.

"[She] didn't come," Xi replied with a smile on a bridge after exchanging greetings with the tourist. "Just busy preparing for the New Year at home like everyone else," he told the crowd, setting the tone for the most important festival in Chinese tradition after he walked down the bridge, Xinhua reported.

Xi Dada and Peng Mama are popular nicknames Chinese netizens have given Xi and his wife Peng Liyuan, which mean Uncle Xi and Aunt Peng.

Video of the short interaction attracted likes across various Chinese social media platforms. The topic "A tourist asked Xi Dada where Peng Mama is" has been viewed 120 million times on China's Twitter-liked Sina Weibo as of press time, while the topic "Peng Mama is not with me as she is busy at home" received 130 million. The video has been "liked" nearly 400,000 times on China Central Television's (CCTV) Weibo.

On Monday, Xi arrived in Kunming, capital city of Yunnan, and inspected the ecological protection work at Dianchi Lake, a large freshwater fault lake located on the Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau close to Kunming, CCTV reported.

General Secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee Xi Jinping, also Chinese president and chairman of the Central Military Commission, talks with villagers in a village of the Wa ethnic group in Qingshui Township of Tengchong, southwest China's Yunnan Province, Jan. 19, 2020. Xi visited Simola Wa Village, Tengchong City, during an inspection tour to Yunnan ahead of the Chinese New Year. (Xinhua/Xie Huanchi)

Significance to the region 

Xi went to a village of the Wa ethnic group in Tengchong, a city bordering Myanmar, to learn about poverty alleviation efforts and extend his Chinese New Year's greetings to the villagers, Xinhua reported on Sunday.

During his tour, Xi said after China completes the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects, it is necessary to comprehensively promote rural vitalization and further address problems, including the imbalance between urban and rural development, Xinhua reported Monday.

Xu Liping, director of the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in Beijing, told the Global Times on Monday that due to the significant geographic location of Yunnan, the province has been designed to be an economic high ground to allow Southeast Asian and South Asian countries to share in China's economic growth and to realize joint development in the region.

Li Chenyang, vice president of Yunnan University and director of the university's Center for Myanmar Studies, said Yunnan is facing a historic opportunity, because during Xi's visit to Myanmar, a series of cooperation documents were signed and many of them involved Yunnan.

"The province needs to speed up the implementation of these agreements and find its own advantages during the process of building the China-Myanmar Economic Corridor, to make itself a platform for other Chinese provinces to cooperate with Myanmar, and realize high-quality development for themselves," Li noted.

Yunnan reduced its poverty-stricken population from 8.04 million in 2012 to 1.79 million in 2018, according to a survey conducted by a team of the National Bureau of Statistics in the province, Xinhua said.

During his visit to the Wa village, Xi beat a wooden drum three times according to local custom to wish favorable weather for bumper harvests, peace for the country and the people, and peace for the world. 

Wa is a cross-border ethic group between China and Myanmar; so culturally, the border areas of both countries also have a strong connection, and this is also a unique advantage of Yunnan, Chinese experts said.

General Secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee Xi Jinping, also Chinese president and chairman of the Central Military Commission, visits a village of the Wa ethnic group in Qingshui Township of Tengchong, southwest China's Yunnan Province, Jan. 19, 2020. Xi visited Simola Wa Village, Tengchong City, during an inspection tour to Yunnan ahead of the Chinese New Year. (Xinhua/Ju Peng)

Potential uncertainty

In the past few years, due to war refugees from occasional military conflicts between different ethnic groups in Myanmar close to China's border, the economic development of the border region has been impacted.

The situation has since stabilized but the reconciliation process of different ethnic groups of Myanmar remains incomplete, so it will likely bring potential risks and uncertainties to the poverty alleviation campaign in the Chinese border areas as well as regional development, Xu said.

CCTV reported on Monday that Xi also inspected a People's Liberation Army (PLA) border defense battalion in Yunnan on Sunday.

China is now constructively intervening in the Myanmar ethnic groups' reconciliation process, and making efforts to mediate in the conflicts and minimize the negative impact with the appointment of Sun Guoxiang as a special envoy for Asian affairs to closely communicate with different forces in Myanmar, Xu noted.

On November 6, 2019, China donated $400,000 for the Myanmar government's peace process in Nay Pyi Taw. Sun, the special Envoy for Asian Affairs of the Chinese Foreign Ministry, presented the cash donation to U Kyaw Tint Swe, vice-chairman of Myanmar's National Reconciliation and Peace Center, Xinhua reported.