He said it himself: If he doesn't want to do something or it is too difficult for him, he just delegates it, gesturing with his hand like a monarch would do. So the core of your statement is very likely true.
All say the company was actually much better run when Ma was managing company day to day, than when after Tsai took over operations, and himself just hired tons of "pro managers" to hand over errands.
At around this time (2012-2013), Tsai decided to show how much of a serious tech exec he was..., and he came with idea to do what big boy do, and rewrite all of Alibaba's core code into one True Enterprise Grade Java MegaFramework of Doom.
And it was at that time when their website quality started to fall off a cliff, and they started loosing talented people who were off-put by Tsai's management...
I'd say Aliexpress was much better at the time of it launch, than it is now. Alibaba, and 1688 had an even more dramatic loss of quality, and vendor oversight.
P.S. People talk about party affiliation of Ma from him joining the part to be allowed to teach in eighties, while forgetting that Tsai does not even hide his affiliation with the United Front (an organisation for CPC's version of "useful idiots,)" and is a much more outspoken political player, and party appologist.