January 21, 2021
A handout photo. Zhou Xianwang was criticised for allowing more than 40,000 people to attend a Lunar New Year gathering in Wuhan as the virus was spreading.
South China Morning Post
The mayor of Wuhan in central China is stepping down, nearly a year after the city became the first place in the world to be locked down to contain the spread of the new coronavirus.
There was no official statement on the departure of Zhou Xianwang as mayor and his successor will need to be endorsed by the city’s legislature before the change can be announced.
But on Wednesday Zhou was identified as a senior member of the Hubei People’s Political Consultative Conference – not as Wuhan mayor – in a report on the provincial advisory body’s website.