Beijing, October 18:

Sharply dressed in a pinstriped suit and purple tie, the chairman of China’s second-biggest bank talked animatedly at a news conference about its ambitions to expand abroad.

But Guo Shuqing turned abrupt when a journalist asked a question hanging over this week’s Communist Party congress: Is he due to become China’s next central bank chief? “Rumor. Unfounded,” the China Construction Bank chairman said with a chuckle, and called on the next reporter.

As they haggle over posts in the ruling party this week, Chinese leaders also are assembling a corps of officials to guide the economy for the next five years, judging them on both job skills and loyalty to the secretive communist system.

Although premier Wen Jiabao, whose chief task is managing the economy, is expected to keep his post, a slew of leading economic portfolios are up for grabs.

At least two vice-premierships, which have in the past overseen financial and industrial reforms, are open, and the central bank governor is likely due for a transfer.

The new team comes on board as China becomes ever more intertwined with the global economy. The boisterous economy, about to overtake Germany as the world’s third-largest, is buoying global growth as the US and Japanese economies turn sluggish. But its massive trade surpluses are generating friction with the US and EU. At home, inflation is at its highest in a decade.

The changes are unlikely to result in major policy shifts. No matter who is selected, party leaders make the big economic decisions and count on the senior officials to carry out policies, sharply limiting the scope for officeholders to influence overall strategy.

“I don’t see any major deviations in terms of policy, broadly speaking, because there are so many forces at work,” said William Hess, chief China analyst for the consulting firm Global Insight. “That’s all decided by politicians above them, and hopefully they are competent implementers of that policy.” At the People’s Bank of China, top candidates to succeed governor Zhou Xiaochuan are believed to be Guo, a banker and former official with years of experience in monetary and industrial policies, and Shang Fulin, the chairman of China’s securities regulator who previously ran a state-run bank and worked in the central bank.

Less clear is who will take vice-premierships, though a leading contender is Beijing mayor Wang Qishan, who began his professional career as a rural policy expert before running the Construction Bank and working in two southern provinces.

Another unknown is who will fill the gap left by the expected retirement of State Councillor Wu Yi, the party’s trusted troubleshooter. Wu shepherded China’s entry to the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and leaders have turned to her to handle crises ranging from the SARS pneumonia epidemic and recent tainted food and products problems to disputes with US.

Some appointments will likely be apparent when the leadership closes out its congress and unveils a new Politburo, the party’s decision-making body. Other changes may not be known until the national legislature meets next March to approve top government posts already arranged in private by communist leaders.

Guo, the Construction Bank boss, reflects the party’s effort to nurture politically reliable officials who also have technical skills and exposure to the global economy.

He has moved between government, party and business posts over the past decade, serving as a deputy provincial governor, a deputy central bank governor and director of China’s foreign exchange regulator. Fluent in English, he was a research fellow at Britain’s Oxford University.

Since 2005, he has been chairman of Beijing-based Construction Bank, whose foreign ties include an 8.5 per cent stake held by Bank of American Corp.

Still, the party’s emphasis on political loyalty is limiting Beijing’s efforts to attract the most skilled executives and entrepreneurs, many of whom work abroad, said Robert Broadfoot, managing director of the Hong Kong consulting firm Political and Economic Risk Consultancy Ltd.

He pointed to the example of Henry Paulson, a star investment banker at Goldman Sachs who is now the US treasury secretary.

“There is an attempt to move to more professional skills but the hand of the party is still evident,” Broadfoot said. “A lot of those skills just aren’t in China. They have to bring them home.”