Xi jinping was already in sarawak way back in 1992.when Chinese were still Riding bicycles.
The time China’s Xi Jinping visited Kuching, Sibu
By Edgar Ong on April 19, 2025, Saturday at 12:01 AM
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Xi has met and held talks with PM Anwar during the working visit to Malaysia, with many new bilateral agreements being signed. — Bernama photo
CHINESE President Xi Jinping had just paid a highly-successful state visit to Malaysia, and was hosted by the Malaysian government in Kuala Lumpur from Tuesday (April 15) till Thursday (April 17).
Not many are aware that on April 23-25, 1992, at age 39, Xi – as the head of a trade delegation – was in both Kuching and Sibu on a business visit as the guest of some Sarawakian businessmen.
At the time, Xi was the Municipal Committee Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) of Fuzhou City.
Xi’s meteoric rise within the ranks of the CCP had started in June 1985, when he had arrived in Xiamen as its vice-mayor.
Xi was instrumental in the setting-up of Xiamen Airlines, the Xiamen Economic Information Centre, and the Xiamen Special Administrative Region Road Project, and had drafted the city’s first strategic plan for 1985-2000.
On a more personal basis, he had married Peng Liyuan in Xiamen. Peng was a famous opera singer, a folk singer and also an actress who had received her training at the China Conservatory of Music.
Xi had impressed the CCP Fujian Provincial Committee who, in May 1990, decided to assign him to Fuzhou City as the Municipal Committee Secretary.
In April 1992, Xi had led a delegation to seek overseas investments for projects in their province, and had arrived in Kuching and Sibu.
In Kuching, upon arrival, Xi was picked up from the international airport by Wong Siu Poh, a driver assigned by Tan Sri Datuk Amar Sim Kheng Hong who was the then-deputy chief minister, to drive him from the airport to the hotel and then for lunch at the Lok Thian Restaurant.
As Wong had passed away in the 1990s, it could not be fully ascertained as to the schedule or the names of the people that Xi had met at that time.
According to Wong’s son, James, his father had also made a brief stop at his home at Sekama Road in Kuching, just next to Tan Sri Sim’s private residence.
Upon arrival at Kuching, Xi and members of the economic and trade delegation, led by KTS Group managing director Dato Sri Lau Hui Kang, who personally flew to Kuala Lumpur to welcome Xi, paid a courtesy call on Datuk Patinggi Tan Sri Dr George Chan, who was then a Minister in the Chief Minister’s Office of Sarawak.
Photo taken during the 1992 visit shows Hui Kiang (right) and Xi having a conversation during their meeting in Sibu, with KTS Group’s then-chairman Lau Swee Nguong looking on. — See Hua Daily News file photo
In the evening, they continued their flight to Sibu. Upon arrival at the airport, they were warmly welcomed by KTS Group then-senior executives, Temenggong Dato Vincent Lau, and Dato Henry Lau.
Other dignitaries included Hock Hua Bank director John Ting, Lau Hieng Ing, and Wong Chih Yong. The delegates also visited the World Foochow Association president Tiong Hiew King and the Chinese Chamber of Commerce president Teng Chin Hua.
After Kuching, Xi’s next stop was Sibu where he held meetings with prospective Foochow businessmen for potential projects that he had planned for Fuzhou City in China.
According to someone who had personal knowledge of these discussions, Xi was successful in this aspect. To this day some major businesses based in Sibu still hold equities in certain properties and business enterprises in Fuzhou – this has included a hotel project, which was then deemed ‘abandoned’ but was rescued financially by Sarawakian businessmen, and is now apparently flourishing.
Photo, taken in 1992, shows the then-citizen Xi (fifth left) in Sibu, with senior business magnates seeking investments for projects in Fuzhou, China.
Isn’t it amazing that as recently as only three decades ago, the officials from the People’s Republic of China were literally traveling around the then-Third World countries like Malaysia with their open-hands-out approach seeking for our overseas investments – versus the reality of today with the ‘Belt and Road Initiative’ that China had since launched in 2013.
For the uninformed, the ‘Belt & Road Initiative’ is a global infrastructure development strategy, adopted by the Chinese government in 2013 to invest in more than 150 countries and international organisations. It will link six urban development land corridors by road, rail, energy and digital infrastructure.
This project is ongoing.
I am sure that those lucky enough to have met the 39-year-old Xi then in 1992 would never in their wildest dreams had imagined that within a period of 20 years (Xi became the President of China in 2012) that the leader of a humble trade delegation from a small Chinese province seeking our investments would one day rise to become among the most powerful men on earth.
This latest visit to Malaysia was his third; he was here previously on Oct 3-5, 2013, and again in 2016.
This photo, given by former councillor Mohamad Taufik, shows his daughter Nisa Addina with Xi during the hosting of Chinese leader’s 2016 visit at Sri Perdana in Kuala Lumpur.
During his 2013 visit, he was entertained at ‘Sri Perdana’ by then-prime minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak. For that evening’s entertainment, one of the featured local artistes was young Sarawakian, Nisa Addina Taufik, daughter of local entrepreneur and former Kuching South councillor Mohamad Taufik Abdul Gani.
Nisa Addina had impressed Xi and his wife with a charming rendition of Teresa Teng’s classic ‘The Moon Represents My Heart’.
Meanwhile, Xi’s visit in 2016 was timed with the launch of the Xiamen University Malaysia (XMUM) in Sepang, Selangor – the very first Chinese university branch campus to be opened in the nation.
At that time, our Deputy Premier Datuk Amar Dr Sim Kui Hian met Xi for the first time. In his Facebook post on April 16, 2025, Dr Sim had shared: “When I met President Xi in 2016, I told him that I am from Sarawak, second generation of Malaysia-China Bilateral friendship (my late father TSDA Sim Kheng Hong, had represented Sarawak in the first Malaysia-China diplomatic relationship visit in 1974), he told me that he had been to Sibu!
“Was very embarrassed that I did not even know President Xi had visited Sibu in 1994 while he was the Communist Party Secretary for the Province of Fujian. Not surprised as I was still in Melbourne, Australia.”
Photo from Dr Sim’s Facebook post shows him shaking hands with Xi during the latter’s 2016 visit to Kuala Lumpur
During the April 15-17 visit, Xi had his hands full and with very tight schedules, he was fully occupied in the nation’s capital.
The Chinese leader had met with and held talks with both the Yang Di-Pertuan Agong Sultan Ibrahim and our Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim.
Many new bilateral agreements were signed.
Today, China is Malaysia’s largest trading partner, and it has been since 2009.
These strong bilateral trade today exceeds RM400 billion per annum, and is still growing.
In the education sector, we have more than 50,000 students from China studying here and 15,000 of our own Malaysians are over in the People’s Republic of China’s institutions of higher learning.
Our overall relationship, aside from trade, is also blossoming.
Within China, Xi is considered one of the most successful members of the ‘Princelings’ – a quasi-clique of politicians who are descendants of early Chinese Communist revolutionaries.
Political observers have called him the most powerful Chinese leader since Mao Zedong, especially since the ending of the presidential two-term limits in 2018, which effectively means that he can rule China for as long as he wants to.
From outside of China, Singapore’s former prime minister Lee Kuan Yew had this personal opinion of Xi: “Xi is a thoughtful man who has gone through many trials and tribulations.
“I would put him in the Nelson Mandela class of persons. A person with enormous stability who does not allow his personal misfortunes or sufferings to affect his judgement.
“In other words, he is impressive.”
I can only add that it takes one to recognise another of the same stature.
