As part of the downsizing of the PLA, the staff and circulation of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Daily is also being reduced and restricted. The South China Morning Post reported (August 8, 2018) that the number of military personnel employed by the People’s Liberation Army Daily will be reduced from 300 to less than 60, and that the PLA Daily will become an online publication. The print publication would be distributed only to senior officers and officials, and soldiers stationed in remote areas that do not have internet coverage. Many senior military officials and officers would lose their jobs, while the newspaper itself would be downgraded as a division-level service unit instead of a military command. The hub of the new operation will be the PLA Media Centre, which is headed by PLA Senior Colonel Ding Haiming. The media centre opened earlier this year to manage the military’s news websites – including an English-language version known as China Military Online – as well as its multimedia, social media and other platforms that appeal to a younger audience. The 50 or so officers who remain at the newspaper would mostly conduct political management and frontline interviews, with newly recruited civilian staff handling editing and production work.

(Comment: The military reforms have resulted in 300,000 jobs axed, seven military regions reduced to five theatre commands, and the PLA’s four headquarters replaced with 15 small departments. Senior officials working for non-combat units such as medical, communications, academies and army entertainment troupes, have been the main targets for the cuts. Interestingly, the late PLA General Xu Caihou, a former Vice Chairman of the CMC who died in 2015 while under investigation for corruption was editor-in-chief of the PLA Daily in the early 1990s.)