do feel like it's a matter of time before we all are :(
I wish I could say otherwise but the political persecution has continued in Hong Kong in recent days. Just today alone, there's the news that activist Owen Chow -- who was one of the 47 people involved with the democratic primaries held to select opposition camp candidates for the Legislative Council arrested back on February 28th, 2021, and then one of the few (just 15 to date) subsequently released on bail -- has been arrested once more this evening. His alleged crime(s): in official speak, "violating bail conditions and publishing remarks that endanger national security"; in reality, he posted on Facebook about the Legislative Council "election" this past December -- which, remember, he was originally in the running to run for a seat in!
Speaking of the Legislative Council: it convened its first session as a "patriots only" legislature today -- minus the physical presence of home affairs minister Casper Tsui and some 20 lawmakers who are either still in Penny's Bay or doing home quarantine because of their involvement in "Partygate". Another senior government official missing today: Secretary for financial services and treasury Christopher Hui, who, like Tsui, is also suspended from duty as a result of "Partygate".
As Hong Kong's latest coronavirus cluster expands further (but still is not officially considered/described as the fifth wave), thanks in no small part to certain members of Hong Kong's political "elite", the political analyses and commentary continue to come in. Today, we have a lengthy piece from politics professor Philip Cowley that is worth reading in its entirety; not least because it points to "the real scandal" in Hong Kong. For those who prefer seeing just a few choice excerpts though, here's a selection:
In Hong Kong, there is anger at the behaviour of their politicians, but it is mixed with massive dollops of schadenfreude. By European standards, Hong Kong’s fifth ‘wave’ is less of a wave and more of a millpond. It has involved fewer than 50 cases thus far. In a territory of more than seven million people, one of them just happened to attend a party containing many of its most senior political figures; of all the tapas restaurants in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine.
Depending on your point of view this is either a sign of how unlucky the politicos were or, and this seems to be the view taken by many of the people I speak to, it proves that that there is indeed a God. Because it is, bluntly, hugely enjoyable to see people who have inflicted such heavy-handed measures on the population hoist by their own petard like this, especially when not all of them have handled their incarceration with grace and dignity.
...[But] however enjoyable the Witman scandal is, there is a danger that it all distracts from the broader points about Hong Kong’s record of dealing with Covid.
The cautious approach that initially served it well is now crippling it. The death rate remains staggeringly low relative to the rest of the world; per capita, the UK’s death rate is 78 times higher. But this policy is becoming increasingly unsustainable, the measures required increasingly harsh. What once advertised itself as ‘Asia’s global city’ is becoming ever more isolated. Multiple travels bans are in place; even of those who can fly in, most have to spend three weeks in quarantine. Hong Kong’s airport is now a ghost town, save for the families leaving. The goal of reopening the border with the mainland — which Lam and others see as their priority — appears no closer to fruition either.
...The inter-generational tensions caused by Covid are evident all around the globe, with the young, mostly safe, forced to undergo restrictions to protect the more elderly. But nowhere is this issue starker than in Hong Kong, where the youngest are again being punished to protect an elderly population that has done next to nothing to protect themselves — and by a government that has also done next to nothing to make them protect themselves. This, rather than a piss-up in a tapas restaurant, is the real scandal.
And if all this wasn't enough: today also saw Carrie Lam announce that Hong Kong will create a host of new national security crimes -- and no, I am not kidding though I very much wish I was! More specifically, Carrie Lam confirmed that her government would create new "local legislation" that
meets Article 23 of Hong Kong's mini-constitution, which calls for the
city to pass its own national security laws in addition to the Chinese one imposed on Hong Kong on June 30th, 2020.
Interestingly, Lam did not outline what these new security law crimes would be. "But the specific offences Article 23 lists are treason, secession, sedition, subversion and theft of state secrets. It
also includes prohibiting any foreign political organisations from
conducting activities in Hong Kong or local political organisations
establishing ties with similar overseas bodies."
If truth be told, the threat to pass Article 23 has been there for a long time. A reminder: opposition to Article 23 is what got hundreds of thousands of Hong Kongers out protesting on the streets back in 2003. Back then, the Hong Kong government backed down. The chances that Carrie Lam's administration will listen to the people, however, are pretty much nil. And "[o]nce the Article 23 legislation is implemented it will complete the cycle of what was once a free liberal society and turning it into an authoritarian one," former legislative councillor Dennis Kwok has warned. :(
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