Hong Kong entertainers, and some perspective(s) on how bad things have become in Hong Kong

 

I like to think that Anita Mui passed on the torch...

 

Today is Leslie Cheung's birthday.  If he had lived, he'd have been 65 today.  I sometimes wonder what he'd have made of Hong Kong's present situation.  I wonder that too, actually more, about another Hong Kong luminary who passed away in 2003: Anita Mui Yim-fong; this not least because she was far more openly political -- and would regularly sing the anthem most commonly associated with Tiananmen Square Massacre commemorations, Blood-Stained Glory, at her concerts.

 

While Leslie and Anita are no longer with us, Anita Mui's chief protege, Denise Ho, is.  And this evening, she staged a concert -- online because the Hong Kong Arts Centre cancelled her booking days before her concert series there was scheduled to take place.  It represented the latest act of defiance and resistance from a professional entertainer who has become more well known as a pro-democracy activist in recent years, and who has been resolute in stating that she does not intend to leave Hong Kong; this despite there being obvious attractions for someone who likes to express herself freely to do so.      

 

On the subject of such folks: yesterday, Ng Ka-leung, one of the co-directors of the dystopian but (all too) prescient Ten Years, became the latest prominent Hong Konger to announce that he had left his home city.  I think it's particularly telling, even worrying, that Ng has decided to joined the likes of his fellow Ten Years co-director, Jevons Au, who left in July of last year, in exile -- because while Au has become the better known filmmaker in recent years (with post-Ten Years film successes Trivisa and Distinction), Ng's Local Egg was the segment of Ten Years with the most optimistic outlook and message!     

Not that I blame him, of course.  It's hard to deny that the current situation in Hong Kong is not great and its (immediate) future looks plenty bleak.  And while there's been a pause in the onslaught of bad news (that left many of us reeling earlier this week) this weekend, it just only really means that we've had time to take a breath and get some perspective with regards to how bad things here really have become, including by reading pieces like Kent Ewing's over at the Hong Kong Free Press, a few choice excerpts of which I reckong are worth sharing:

Hongkongers—from opposition politicians to teachers to civic activists and students—all made the mistake of choosing to believe in the 1984 Sino-British Joint Declaration. That agreement paved the way for the city’s 1997 handover from British to Chinese sovereignty under a “one country, two systems” arrangement that for at least 50 years was supposed to guarantee Hong Kong “a high degree of autonomy” as well as personal freedoms for its citizens that are simply nonexistent on the mainland.

These freedoms—of speech, press and assembly—were then enshrined in the Basic Law, Hong Kong’s mini-constitution, which also promised a gradual progress toward democracy that, like those guarantees of personal freedom, now seems dead in the water...

[O]vert demonstrations of freedom of expression and tolerance for dissent were part of what made post-handover Hong Kong such a special city in China. They were not unpatriotic. To the contrary, for many Hongkongers, they represented the highest form of patriotism—the kind that strives to build a better city and better country and, yes, squawks and agitates when that does not happen...

The crackdown on Hong Kong freedoms... —now putatively justified by a sweeping national security law that seems to mean anything authorities want it to mean—has been a gross overreaction to a peril that never really existed. It betrays the deep-seated, abiding insecurity of Chinese officialdom, which sees destabilising foreign forces hiding in every nook and cranny of Hong Kong.

Rather than foreign forces, the authorities themselves may well be most responsible for the coming into being of considerable opposition to the Hong Kong government and also Beijing's.  As law professor Michael Davis pointed out in his "Testimony before the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission Hearing on “US China Relations in 2021: Emerging Risks":  "Growing public awareness that Hong Kong’s capacity to guard its autonomy would depend on the promised democratic reform, led to equally large protests for democracy in 2004. This demand would become a constant theme in Hong Kong politics, in the 2012 protests against the government’s proposed patriotic education, in the 2014 “umbrella movement” protesting government foot-dragging over the promised democratic reform, and in the 2019 protests against the government’s proposed extradition bill."

At the same time, it is worth noting and emphasizing that: "Hong Kong protesters have not sought a local government constantly at odds with Beijing, but they have clearly hoped for a government that would find its voice to guard autonomy and protect the city’s core values. Long ignoring popular demands to fulfill Basic Law commitments, the Beijing and Hong Kong governments only have themselves to blame for the growing opposition. The 2020 National Security Law (NSL), imposed directly by Beijing, represents a refusal to take responsibility for this failure and profoundly undermines the “one country, two systems” model."

 

For, lest it not be clear, the NSL: "represents a comprehensive threat to Hong Kong’s autonomy, rule of law and basic freedoms. One would be hard-pressed to devise a more comprehensive plan to shut down an open society and inhibit the free-wheeling debate that has long characterized Hong Kong", and made Hong Kong Hong Kong as well as attractive for many people.

It never rains but it pours in Hong Kong these days

 

June 4th, 2013 -- candles still were lit at Victoria Park

despite there being a veritable deluge that evening

 

It never rains but it pours.  That must be how members of the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China must feel this week.  And even while they must have known that their defiance would their result in their incurring the ire of the authorities, the onslaught that has followed must surely be hard to bear.

The day after the arrests of four leading members of the Alliance for failing to supply information requested by the national security police (because, among other things, the requested information may not actually exist), its already shuttered June 4th Museum was raided by the cops.  Yesterday also saw 12 democrats (former legislative councillors Albert Ho, Andrew Wan, Cheung Man-kwong, "Long Hair" Leung Kwok-Hung, Cyd Ho, Chu Hoi-dick and Yeung Sum, and activists Figo Chan, Steven Kwok, Chiu Yan-loi, Mak Hoi-wah and Leung Kwok-wah) plead guilty in court to charges of having taken part in or inciting others to participate in last year’s banned Tiananmen Massacre vigil.  

In his mitigation speech (published in full here), Albert Ho was steadfast in his beliefs and honored Hong Kongers: "Why did the Hong Kong Alliance still continue to commemorate June 4 and demand the vindication of the 1989 Democracy Movement persistently after the suppression of the Movement in 1989? In short, it is due to the moral commitment and conscientious duty willing to be taken up by the Hong Kong People."

 

In his mitigation speech (available in full here), Yeung Sum stated the following: "Although the June Fourth Candlelight Vigil was more or less a form of ritual, it indistinctly created beliefs that were commonly shared by the Hong Kong people, such as the vindication of the June Fourth Incident, and the pursuit of democracy and freedom. These beliefs have been held on continuously for the past 32 years. Therefore, the values of valuing human rights, respecting life and pursuing democracy, freedom and justice have been established among Hong Kong citizens. These values and beliefs have formed the sense of identity of the Hong Kong people."

 

Today, the four people arrested on Wednesday were joined in court by another member of the Hong Kong Alliance and also the group's chairman, Lee Cheuk-yan, and co-vice-chairman (with Chow Hang-tung), Albert Ho (yes, the one who was among the ones in court in a separate trial yesterday).  Lee Cheuk-yan, Albert Ho and Chow Hang-tung were charged with the national security law offence of inciting subversion.  Chow also was charged along with four others of "failure to comply with notice to provide information" -- though, interestingly, the "collusion with foreign forces" accusations have now been fallen to the wayside.   

 

Also today, the national security police announced the freezing of HK$2.2 million worth of  the Hong Kong Alliance's assets.  In addition, the authorities are seeking to strike the Hong Kong Alliance off the Company's Register -- and while the Hong Kong Alliance officially will have until 5pm on September 24th to register their dissent and rebuttal, it's obviously facing an uphill battle to do so; not least since its leadership is behind bars, with Chow Hang-tung's latest bail denial occuring just this afternoon!       

What is one to makeof all this?  For now, all I'll do is to repeat this Tweet by Brian Hioe: i.e.,
"The arrests just keep coming in Hong Kong the past few days. Quite grim. The worst part is that this is the new normal, it looks like". :(

What a difference a day makes in Hong Kong, 2021

Hong Kong's Tony Leung Chiu-wai

 

"What a difference a day makes."  Thus goes the line in a Dinah Washington song that prominently features in a 1994 Hong Kong movie that stars Tony Leung Chiu-wai.  This time yesterday, I was floating on air after watching Shang Chi and the Legend of the 10 Rings, the latest Marvel superhero movie that had Hong Kong's Tony Leung Chiu-wai stealing the show.  Whereas tonight had me spending time decompressing with friends and musing, among other things, about whether we would leave Hong Kong as emigrants or refugees.

 

The events that brought about that change of mood as well as conversation involved the arrests this morning of four leading members of the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China, including Chow Hang-tung, who, just yesterday, told her fellow Hong Kongers: "do not live grovelling. We should try our best to follow our conscience in our own life and space. Of course different people bear different concerns and calculations but I believe each of us still has some personal space to defend, and some work waiting at our hands."   

 

The Alliance are suspected with "colluding with foreign forces".  But the police have not furnished any evidence for their allegations and went ahead and arrested four of their key members anyways.  Chow Hang-tung's arrest also has meant that she was not able to appear in court this afternoon in her capacity as a barrister to represent Gwyneth Ho, 47 activists and former lawmakers charged under Hong Kong’s national security law,  who ended up cancelling her application for bail after the court decided against allowing the media to report details of her hearing.     

 

In Ho's view, "Bail is important, but it's meaningless if it's a closed-door, unfair process."  And about the best thing that came out of her having sought bail today was that Chow managed to write a document to help Ho present her case.  It can be seen here and is worth a read -- if nothing else than to emphasize that the likes of Chow and Ho believe that the law is on their side and are seeking to apply the law in Hong Kong; something that many other people believe is useless and have even stopped trying to do so -- and how badly does this reflect on Hong Kong that this is so (as does the territory's increasingly high emigration numbers). 

 

Returning to the subject of Shang Chi and the Legend of the 10 Rings: oh, for a righteous (ethnic Chinese) hero like that who can save us/the world.  And in lieu of that being the case, there are people wondering for how much longer Tony Leung Chiu-wai and his ilk will want to remain in Hong Kong; this especially now when Hollywood appears ready to welcome him/them much more than circa 1997 and the future of Hong Kong cinema is appearing constricted, if not outright bleak, thanks to the new censorship laws that soon will be in place in the territory!

The Hong Kong I care for and Hong Kongers whose courage I'm awed by

 

Just a small section of the hundreds of thousands of people 

holding lit candles at Victoria Park on June 4, 2014

 

Keith Richburg wrote in the Washington Post yesterday about there now being two Hong Kongs.  "One Hong Kong is populated by bankers and financial services professionals, real estate developers and property owners, and businesspersons whose primary pursuit is trade with mainland China. In this universe, times are good and getting better."  

 

I have banker, financial services professional and property owning friends but by and large, that is not my Hong Kong.  Instead, I am far more familiar with the other Hong Kong that Richburg delineats: that which "is populated by people in the public space — politicians, journalists, teachers, labor leaders, artists, filmmakers, those active in civil society groups as well as many students and young people. To them, Hong Kong has become unrecognizable, a place where dissent is crushed and debate stifled. They see no future here and no hope."

 

"Many from this universe are voting with their feet", Richburg notes.  "Nearly 90,000 people have left Hong Kong in the past year, the biggest net outflow in more than half a century since records were kept, leading to a steep 1.2 percent drop in the population."  A few days ago, I saw boxes piled in the reception area of my building.  When I asked the security guard on duty if people were moving in, he shook his head and told me that the boxes belonged to a family moving out -- and, without prompting, added that they were migrating to the United Kingdom, then asked me if I was planning to leave Hong Kong soon too.    

 

Conversations about leaving have become really common in recent months.  Hong Kong has long been a city of comings and goings.  But the goings really have accelerated over the past year or so -- and the sense people are getting is that the vast majority of new arrivals to Hong Kong these days and for the foreseeable future will be from Mainland China.  And I think it says much that a friend's answer to my question of what would prompt her to decide to leave the only part of the world she has ever lived in is "When all my neighbors are Mainlanders", something she can foresee being the case within the next two or three years.  Ditto re Richburg reporting that "As one longtime expatriate businessman here wryly told me, “China wants to keep Hong Kong. They just want to get rid of the Hongkongers.”"     

 

In addition to getting Hong Kongers to leave Hong Kong, it seems that the authorities also intent on making space for new arrivals by way of imprisoning an untold number of Hong Kongers.  Speaking of which: today marks the one year anniversary of People Power's Tam Tak-chi having been put behind bars.  And he's got a way to go before he has a chance to be free since his sedition trial will not resume until October 18th and is not expected to reach a verdict until November, and he is one of the 47 democrats charged under the national security law for taking part in and/or organizing the July 2020 primaries for the still postponed Legislative Council elections.   

 

I hate to say but it's looking very likely that Hong Kong's political prisoner numbers will soon be added to by those members of the Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China who are currently still not in prison.  This is because the organizers of the (previously) annual June 4th candlelight vigil in Victoria Park came out yesterday and stated that it will not cooperate with a request from the national security police to hand over financial and operational information.  

"Your white terror ends here. We will not transmit the fear to others", Alliance committee member Chow Hung-tung announced to the authorities.  Their bravery awes me, especially because they surely know that their defiance might well result in their being heavily penalized.  

Over on Twitter, a Hong Konger who goes by the handle Jasnah Kholin - 8964- ACAB wrote that "i've ranted a lot about the sheer ineptitude & stunning cowardice of so many terrible people in [Hong Kong], yet i feel like i don't do enough to highlight the bravery of those here w/principles like @zouxingtong [i.e., Chow Hung-tung]. it's people like her & the rest of @hka8964 [i.e., the Alliance] that are HK at its best."  To which I'd like to add that the League of Social Democrats' Raphael Wong -- who already is serving time in a Hong Kong prison as of last week for his role in an extradition bill protest which took place in October 2019 -- is one more of those Hong Kongers whose courage and principled stance is extremely impressive.

 

Something that also is quite awe-inspiring is Wong's optimism.  To be sure, he (too) accepts that "for now, the legislative struggle is “finished“" and "for now, Hongkongers need to “retreat from the political front”[, albeit] without becoming completely apolitical".  But he continues to hold on to the belief that "Future activists and political talents will emerge when the time comes again."  

 

Right now, that time is not looking like it'll be coming all that soon.  Instead, it is looking like further repression will be the order of the day for some time, with the attacks against the democracy-loving section of Hong Kong civil society coming pretty much daily now.  (Today's most high profile setback: the announcement by the 612 Humanitarian Relief Fund that it's immediately halting the collection of donations as the Alliance for True Democracy, the group whose bank account it uses, said it would no longer execute its payment requests in the wake of the national security police announcing that they were investigating the two organizations and ordering them to hand over information, including details of donors and recipients.)   

 

Incidentally, Raphael Wong's words put into my mind the story of the 47 ronin of Tokugawa Japan that I first learnt about by way of Kenji Mizoguchi's 1941 masterwork , and whose graves at Sengakuji I visited and prayed at some years back.  And yes, I can't help but wonder whether it's a film that many (more) Hong Kongers will consider viewing some time -- though probably not on a big screen in the future since it might well be one of those cinematic works that the Hong Kong film censors will decide is a threat to national security!   

The convictions continue, and persecution but also (attempts at) resistance within Hong Kong prisons

Way too many Hong Kongers have been inside 

vans like this in recent years :(

 

Three more people were convicted today of rioting in the vicinity of the Hong Kong Polytechnic University in November 2019.  And no, it's scant consolation that two others standing trial at the same time were cleared of rioting; this particularly since of that duo, one ended up being convicted of possessing instruments fit for unlawful purposes -- specifically, cable ties -- along with one of the trio convicted of rioting.  

 

These convictions came one day after five Chinese University of Hong Kong students were found guilty of rioting at their educational instutition (and -- to add insult to injury -- also of breaching the face mask ban), also in November 2019.  Something that's worth pointing out: it actually wasn't established by the prosecution that the quintet -- who, incidentally, are aged between just 20 to 23 years -- had actually committed any violent acts against the police.  Instead, their having been seen to have "stayed with protesters who threw petrol bombs at police officers on November 11, 2019, with the only explanation being that they had wanted to encourage the protesters to commit acts of breaching the peace" was alone to get them convicted of rioting and, presumably, being handed prison sentences that will be on the lengthy side.  (Their sentencing is expected to take place only next month -- and, yes, they are to be behind bars through then.)

 

A reminder: November 11th, 2019, was the day that a police officer shot another young man at pretty much point blank over in Sai Wan Ho as well as the day that the siege of Chinese U began.  And, a few days later, on International Students Day, as it so happened, there were urgent calls for people at a protest rally I attended that evening to go over to PolyU to help people besieged on its campus.  

 

Those were dark days indeed for Hong Kong but just because the tear gas and street battles have stopped, do not even for a minute think that things are fine here now.  Among other things, consider political persecution and/or prosecution that seems to be just around the corner for seemingly everyone -- be they well known politicians and political activists, respected lawyers, famous entertainers or previously little known speech therapists.               

 

Truly, I've lost count of the number of political prisoners Hong Kong now has, regardless of whether one would include people convicted of offences such as "rioting" or just accused of it and denied bail while awaiting trial.  And I must admit to worrying quite a bit of how they are being treated while behind bars; this especially after learning of such as Tiffany Yuen having been placed in solitary confinement again -- this time with 17 other inmates at Lo Wu Correctional Institution "for allegedly trying to "build up forces and incited others to participate"" and an elite Correctional Services Department response unit known as the Black Panthers and a dog unit having been called in to deal with those women prisoners.    

I know looks can be deceiving but after seeing Tiffany Yuen hugging her beloved Buzz Lightyear plush (in a video showing what the 47 pro-democrats charged with subversion under the national security law for having taken part in a primary election in July of last year did on their last day of freedom prior to reporting to the police as per orders), it's hard to think of her as a hardened physical fighter who would need to be quelled with the help of "Black Panthers" and dogs.  Indeed, it's much easier to imagine her being prone to giving people hugs to comfort them -- which is what, as K Tse recounted in another Tweet, "Yuen was placed in solitary for 10 days last month for"; with the inhumanity of the correctional system further shown by June 4th candlelight vigil organizer Chow Hang-tung -- who now thankfully is out of jail, at least for the moment -- having been placed in solitary for 3 days for sharing stamps with a fellow inmate.   

 

I can't help but contrast Yuen and Chow's treatment in prison with German student and anti-Nazi political activist Sophie Scholl, as depicted in the 2005 dramatized telling of her story, Sophie Scholl: The Final Days.  It may not have been faithful to what actually occured but it surely says something that the prison guards and workers depicted in this feature film set in Nazi Germany appeared more humane than the ones in contemporary Hong Kong!  

 

At the same time, thank goodness that there no longer is capital punishment in Hong Kong -- the way that there was in Nazi Germany, and there continues to be in Mainland China.  And yes, that's one more reason why so many Hong Kongers were opposed to China extraditions.  Also, yes, there are indeed fears now that, with the authorities in Hong Kong looking so much to Beijing for instruction and support, in the not so distant future, the death penalty will be reinstated on this side of the Hong Kong-Mainland China border.      

Gone to the birds?

Not alone but still far from crowded!

A message to this blog's readers: I've decided to decloak over on Twitter.  Feel free to follow me there too!  I'm also keeping this blog active, for now too though.  Let's see how it all goes...!   

Is anyone safe from political persecution, prosecution or investigation anymore in Hong Kong?

Spectre of Pooh in the city

 

The University of Hong Kong (HKU) says it has lifted a campus ban previously imposed on 18 of its student council's members (even while confirming the ban for some other students).  I'm not sure how much this action can help to restore the university's tarnished reputation.  Also, I'm sure this is cold comfort to Kinson Cheung, Anthony Yung, Charles Kwok and Chris Todorovski, the four HKU students currently being held in custody after being charged with advocating terrorism -- because they led their student council to express sadness about the death of a man who had stabbed a police officer and then killed himself -- and denied bail.  

 

Still, I suppose it's a welcome dialing back of the excessive punitive action that the authorities look to be fond of these days.  In addition, it would seem to give out some hope that retreats are still possible on some fronts and that sometimes, sanity actually can prevail -- as in the case involving entertainer-activist Anthony Wong Yiu-ming last month.     

 

Let's hope that also will be the case for Anthony Wong's fellow entertainer-activist, Denise Ho.  As things stand though, the knives appear to be out for her -- and she effectively suffered a double attack yesterday: first, with the Hong Kong Arts Centre cancelling her venue booking for a series of concerts which she was due to headline this September 8th to 12th, citing the possibility that "Public order or public safety would be endangered during the course of the performance"; and then with the news that the police are investigating the 612 Humanitarian Fund of which she's a trustee -- and that's been helping people involved with the pro-democracy protests -- over suspected national security breaches.

 

With regards to the former: It's worth noting that Denise Ho has performed at the Hong Kong Coliseum before, with nothing untoward having happened to her, her fellow musicians, her crew and her audience as well as her applications to perform in a number of other venues have been rejected in recent years.  Also, that the Hong Kong Arts Centre has historically been seen as open to, if not outright supporting of, entertainers and cultural programs that embrace free expression and free speech.  

 

On a personal note: I've viewed works like Tiananmen Square documentary The Gates of Heavenly Peace and Nagisa Oshima's controversial In the Realm of the Senses (1976) as well as Kiwi Chow's Beyond the Dream (2019) there!  So I think it'd be safe to assume that some pressure was exerted on the Hong Kong Arts Centre to cancel Denise Ho's venue booking along the lines of what happened to get Golden Scene Cinema to cancel the screening of protest documentary Inside the Red Brick Wall back in March.  

 

With regards to the latter: the blogger over at Big Lychee, Various Sectors has wondered what will happen to the undoubted thousands of donors to the 612 Humanitarian Fund whose particulars are now being sought after by the police.  "If the NatSec cops do get hold of their details, will donors get a 6.00 am knock on the door? Will they be put under surveillance? Will the authorities inform their employers? Will employers – Vitasoy, say – feel the need to fire them?"  

 

Suffice to say that none of these actions are beyond the realm of possibility in 2021 Hong Kong.  Ditto re the freezing of donors' bank accounts.  In any case, here's a reminder, well articulated over on Twitter by Xun-ling Au, that: "The 612 fund helped defend justice & rights within the system. Bail, defence & legal services, all legal things. The fact that they are being politically targeted speaks volumes about the state of justice & rights now in HK."

 

Continuing the discussion of the state of justice and rights now in Hong Kong: In a now all too expected move, seven democrats were given sentences of a minimum of 11 months imprisonment yesterday for their roles in an unauthorized protest back in October 2019.  As it so happens, six of the defendants (former legislators "Long Hair" Leung Kwok-hung, Cyd Ho, Albert Ho and Yeung Sum along with activists Avery Ng and Figo Chan) are already serving prison time.  So it's just Raphael Wong -- who stated as part of his mitigation speech that "The march in Kowloon on October 20 was certainly an opportunity to reflect public opinion. Now, by imposing heavy penalties on us, the court is only punishing public opinion… suffocating the freedom of expression" -- who will be newly incarcerated.

 

Speaking ahead of the sentencing, Chan Po-ying, the head of the League of Social Democrats (to which Raphael Wong, "Long Hair" Leung Kwok-hung, Avery Ng and Jimmy Shum also belong) pointed out that sentencing for charges related to unauthorised assemblies have become heavier, since previously, defendants would receive a fine, if that, instead of prison terms.  And so it proved.

 

As one of the sentenced, Avery Ng, stated: "Where once there was the space to disagree agreeably and debate ideas honestly. Now there is intolerance... Every day brings a new re-interpretation of the rules… The inevitable question arises: Whose security is being protected – the liberty of citizens? Or are these laws in fact protecting and securing the power of the already-powerful?  [Also, w]hat kind of order are we seeking? Are these laws designed to uphold the rule of law, ensure freedom, a level playing field, and the chance of prosperity for all citizens? Or are they meant to usher in an era in which the government can rule unchallenged and unchecked?”" And yes, I think it's safe to surmise that those are just rhetorical questions on his part!