China celebrates Deng anniversary
From CNN Beijing Bureau Chief Jaime Florcruz
BEIJING, China -- China has hailed its late former leader Deng Xiaoping on the 100th anniversary of his birth.
President Hu Jintao praised Deng as a man who made the people's interests a priority. Deng is known as the leader who crushed the pro-democracy movement at Tiananmen Square.
Hu also paid tribute to Deng as the driving force behind China's economic reforms.
Deng died seven years ago but his legacy looms larger than the bronze statue that Chinese leaders unveiled to mark the anniversary of his birth.
Deng, who was born in 1904, was one of the first generation of Chinese Communist Party leaders.
He held prominent positions in the 1950s and 1960s but was stripped of his roles during China's Cultural Revolution.
Deng was reinstated as Vice-Premier of the State Council in 1973, but he had always disapproved of the kind of personality cult that surrounded Chairman Mao Zedong.
His power grew after the death of Chairman Mao in 1976, and he became China's paramount leader in 1978.
Though Deng resigned from his last official post in 1989 he remained China's most influential political figure until his death in February 1997.
Museum-goers in Beijing have been lining up to view a special exhibition highlighting his career as a communist leader and world statesman.
Many people who visit to see the Beijing exhibition have glowing words for the late paramount leader.
"In China's 5,000 years of civilization, he can definitely be counted as one of the greatest," 88-year-old Professor Ke says.
"He brought China back on track after the Cultural Revolution and worked for world peace and prosperity for everyone."
Prosperity was not just for those in the big cities but also for those in the towns and villages.
"I think Deng Xiaoping's most important contribution is lifting out of poverty hundreds of millions of people and improving their lives, and in such a short period of time," Sun Youli, an associate professor at the American University, told CNN.
It took enterprising Chinese like restauranteur Zhu Rong only ten years of hard work and risk-taking to dramatically better their lives.
Zhu says a hands-on management style is a key part of her business success. Others like her are just beginning to live Deng Xiaoping's famous quotation that "to get rich is glorious."
"To me, his most significant influence is that an ordinary girl like myself could now become the Boss." Zhu says.
It was no small achievement for the Sichuan native who came to Beijing in the early 1990s, looking for a break.
"I chose not to work for the government because I wanted freedom. I wanted to break out on my own."
Zhu now owns a chain of eight restaurants with total revenues of more than ten million US dollars a year. She employs over 600 workers, mostly children of farmers from her hometown, Sichuan province.
These changes in their lives show how Deng transformed communist China into something like a capitalist country---and now one of the fastest growing economies in the world.
