A mystery mainland video-maker put a comic spin on the national anti-graft drive over the Lunar New Year, releasing three propaganda cartoons of an animated President Xi Jinping fighting corruption.
The cartoons were uploaded to video website Youku.com on Tuesday night by "Chaoyang Studio", and were shared by the websites of Communist Party mouthpieces People's Daily and Qiushi Journal, as well as the official microblogs of some local governments, the Southern Metropolis Newsreported. Each video is about two minutes long.
Chaoyang Studio did not post any other videos or information about the account holder.
Xi is referred to in the cartoons as "Xi Dada", a close term for an older man, and is depicted mixing with locals on a visit to a Henan county and waving the flag for the "mass line" campaign, which aims to strengthen ties between party officials and the public.
In one scene the cartoon Xi hits a tiger with a big stick - a reference to his pledge to go after high-ranking officials.
By last night, one of the videos had more than 35,000 views, while the others had more than 15,000 each.
Xi made his debut as a cartoon figure in October 2013 in the video How a Political Leader was Tempered, a five-minute work purporting to compare various ways political leaders are selected.
And a year ago Qianlong.com a news website affiliated with the Beijing municipal government, released a cartoon on Xi's "hectic" schedule in his first months in office called Where has President Xi's Time Gone?
