Just because a famous soccer player has to apologise for stating facts, in order to not lose more sponsorships, does not mean that the fundamental truth or facts of the matter have changed.
Mao Zedong was a dictator.
What we can also deduce is that Kylian Mbappé cares more about sponsorship money than he does about facts and truth. Unfortunately joining a seemingly ever-growing club.
"Dictator" is also an accurate description of Xi Jinping. The Chinese government like to use more words to describe him, but that's just because they don't like the associations that go with the word dictator.
I'll be going to China in late January, I'm sure I'll meet some of the dictators minions at the airport.