Hong Hong: Power of the People
Philip Bowring IHT
Wednesday, July 9, 2003
(This I think is the best article I read in those heady nine days)
HONG KONG The Hong Kong people have stood up, to borrow Mao Zedong’s words. They have surprised themselves, China, and even the world. Often portrayed as paying more attention to personal advancement and making money than to who governs them, they may have written a new chapter in Asian democratic development. Mounting a demonstration whose size exceeded all expectations, they forced the government to retreat and to defer a national security bill that would have undermined their autonomy, in the process humiliating their Beijing-appointed leader and opening the way to constitutional change.
Though the territory has known mass protests and riots before, this was the first time that Hong Kong’s people set out a political agenda of their own, daring Beijing to acknowledge that there were “Two Systems in One Country,” and their own government to acknowledge that it represented their interests, not Beijing’s.
It was the size of the demonstration, not the passion, that was decisive. Indeed, the results already seem almost out of proportion to the relaxed atmosphere in which it took place. The half million participants, many neatly dressed in black, some carrying babies and pushing prams, stood for hours in the midsummer heat. As numbers swelled far beyond what organizers and police had expected, crowds were corralled into narrow streets, unable to move. But scarcely a soul got angry, no one was arrested. Humor, not anger, was the dominant sentiment. People who just weeks ago wore masks and avoided close contact because of the SARS epidemic were now packed happily cheek by jowl for hours on end. It seemed a celebration of the end of SARS as well as a political statement.
Still, the government might not have caved in to one demonstration, however large. But in the aftermath it sensed that the organizers could repeat the protest over and over again.
Following the march, media normally supportive of the government reported events in ways which showed a change of heart. They went with the flow of opinion that the security legislation was dangerous and the government incompetent.
So eventually did the one astute politician, James Tien, head of the pro-business Liberal Party. By resigning from the cabinet, apparently with the approval of some in Beijing, he forced the government to defer the legislation and has opened the way to further changes in the way Hong Kong is run.
The result was not merely the postponement of the much disliked security laws. The events of the week could also lead to the early retirement of Chief Executive Tung Chee-hwa, whose political bungling has exasperated Beijing. They will probably lead to several ministerial changes, as well as amendments to a system introduced only last year which made ministers accountable directly to the chief executive, bypassing the legislature. Most importantly, they have put the Hong Kong government and Beijing on notice that mass demonstrations could become a regular feature of Hong Kong life unless the democratic franchise is broadened to reflect interests other than those of big business and pro-Beijing politicians.
The events also highlighted China’s dilemmas in dealing with Hong Kong. There is no longer one view of Hong Kong in Beijing. Indeed, Tung’s vacillating responses to the protest suggest he was receiving no clear signals. Beijing apparently did not want to get involved, yet had to be seen as backing its appointee. Eventually it was compelled to heed Hong Kong’s complaints. News of the protests was firmly suppressed in the mainland media, revealing Beijing’s fear that they could set a precedent – that there were mass demonstrations, and they succeeded. But the news is filtering in anyway. .Unlike South Korea and Taiwan, where democratic movements had roots in militant unions and the middle class, Hong Kong’s political reform movement is a very middle class affair. There is scant threat of real turmoil. But these 10 days have seen a peaceful revolution that no one anticipated.
Copyright © 2003 The International Herald Tribune
Emboldened Hong Kong Protesters Call For Free Elections
By KEITH BRADSHER The New York Times HONG KONG, July 9
The article has good summary of protest and I like the headline.
(Prajal was explaining to me how James Tien is no “Hero” and this article sums it up.)
Tens of thousands of demonstrators gathered this evening under a waxing moon to stand before this city’s legislature building and call for free elections and the resignation of Hong Kong’s leader. Tonight’s crowd was sizable, filling a downtown avenue and two urban parks. But it did not come anywhere close to matching the estimated 500,000 people who marched here on July 1, mainly to protest a stringent internal security bill that the government was trying to push through the Legislative Council.
The government toned down that bill on Saturday and then postponed a vote on it early Monday, and has not set a new schedule for its consideration. Richard Tsoi, a spokesman for the Human Civil Rights Front, which organized both rallies, said that tonight’s peaceful gathering drew the 50,000 people that the group had expected even before the government withdrew the bill on Monday. The police estimated that at least 30,000 people were present halfway through the two-hour rally and that more may have left earlier or arrived later.
In tonight’s rally, speakers called not only for the security legislation to be redone entirely but for Hong Kong’s chief executive and all lawmakers to be elected by universal suffrage, making the territory a democratic model for the rest of China. Demonstrators also chanted many times for the resignation of Hong Kong’s chief executive, Tung Chee-hwa, although Mr. Tsoi said that this was not the purpose of the rally. Record unemployment of 8.3 percent, falling home prices and Hong Kong’s slow initial response to SARS (news – web sites) have sapped Mr. Tung’s popularity.
Compared to those in the July 1 rally, tonight’s demonstrators seemed to include a higher proportion of students and other young people. But there were also signs that last week’s demonstration may have broadened the range of people willing to attend rallies here. Ho Chin, a 69-year-old retired electrician, said that he had never attended a political demonstration until last week, but came again tonight because, he said, “I want to have a vote.”
Beijing has shown no interest in letting people here play a greater role in choosing their leaders, and top Hong Kong officials have been openly hostile at times. The political leader of this city’s powerful business community declared today that he thought the political system should continue to reserve a large role for business people because democratically elected candidates too often lacked technical expertise in legislative issues affecting companies. As demonstrators wearing white shirts and waving green light wands converged in Hong Kong’s central business district in the fading light just after sunset, it also seemed as though Tung Chee-hwa, Hong Kong’s chief executive, might retain his job despite the calls in the streets for his resignation.
Ma Lik, the secretary general of the pro-Beijing Democratic Alliance for the Betterment of Hong Kong, said that Mr. Tung should reassign some ministers but should not resign. Sir Gordon Wu, an influential construction tycoon here, agreed with Mr. Ma. Mr. Tung should stay but his cabinet should change, he said in a telephone interview, explaining that, “in every football team, there always are changes in the lineup.” At a brief news conference less than two hours before this evening’s demonstration, Mr. Tung said that the government would “take actions to allay public dissatisfaction and improve the effectiveness of the government.” But he provided no details and took no questions.
Academic experts said that the final decision about Mr. Tung’s future rested with Beijing, six years after Britain handed over Hong Kong to China. James Tien, the chairman of the pro-business and pro-government Liberal Party and the man who compelled the government to postpone the security legislation by resigning from the cabinet on Sunday evening, said today that Hong Kong was not ready for more democracy.
The minority of lawmakers who are already elected by the general public here are not friendly enough to the business community and lack expertise in business issues, Mr. Tien said at a news conference for foreign correspondents. He also complained that democratically elected politicians here are too reluctant to accept financial contributions and other help from business leaders that might produce closer ties to the corporate sector. Voicing a common view among this city’s entrepreneurs, Mr. Tien suggested that the Legislative Council here needed members like Eric Li, a political independent who is elected by the territory’s 22,000 accountants. “
He doesn’t have time to meet the public all the time and get himself elected,” said Mr. Tien, a wealthy property developer who collects expensive sports cars. Mr. Li said in a subsequent telephone interview that he viewed himself as a full-time politician now, and believed that all Legislative Council seats should be filled through universal suffrage someday. But he said that business people should continue to be allocated special seats in the 2004 and 2008 elections for the Legislative Council, contending that the political parties were not well enough developed yet to attract technically qualified people as candidates. An 800-member Election Committee, chosen by 3 percent of Hong Kong’s population, mainly pro-Beijing business people and professionals, selects the chief executive here, under a system devised before Britain handed over Hong Kong to China in 1997.
Hong Kong’s Basic Law, the closest thing it has to a constitution, calls vaguely for the government to seek more democratic means of choosing the chief executive in 2007 and Legislative Council members in 2008. But Sing Ming, a political scientist at the City University, said that unless political reformers unexpectedly gain a lot of power in Beijing and decide to turn Hong Kong into a democratic experiment, officials here “will try to procrastinate as much as they can.” 3:44:56 AM
The Following story is correct, except we weren’t asking for “more” democracy,
because we don’t have any right now.
Hong Kong Stages Another Huge Anti-Government Rally
39 minutes ago
Add World – Reuters to My Yahoo!
By Carrie Lee
HONG KONG (Reuters) – Tens of thousands of people surrounded Hong Kong’s legislature on Wednesday to denounce the government and its planned anti-subversion bill, cranking up pressure on the territory’s embattled chief executive.
Organizers said about 50,000 people took part in the candlelit vigil, which ended peacefully after a few hours. Dragging effigies of the unpopular Beijing-backed leader and some of his ministers, some shouted: “Step down Tung Chee-hwa!”
The demonstration at the heart of Hong Kong’s business district came a week after half a million protesters took to the streets to condemn the bill in the city’s biggest demonstration since the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre.
A number of academics, politicians and rights activists made impassioned speeches denouncing Tung Chee-hwa’s administration for not listening to the people and calling for more democracy.
“You have demeaned us by not listening to our views … we want universal suffrage,” academic Chan Kin-man said as the crowded roared in approval.
Protesters were packed in pockets of open spaces and standing shoulder to shoulder in streets surrounding the territory’s legislative building. They raised fists in unison to songs of courage and patriotism.
Hundreds of police were at hand to direct traffic.
Widespread anger at Tung over the security bill and his failure to revive the ailing economy have snowballed into Hong Kong’s biggest political crisis in years.
At one point, a small group of emotional protesters, blocked the main entrance of the legislature, forcing lawmakers inside to leave by another exit at the end of a legislative meeting.
Though he reluctantly agreed on Monday to postpone the bill for more public consultation, frustration with Tung’s leadership in the last six years has reached the boiling point. Many ordinary people have lost faith in his ability to govern.
At a hastily-arranged media briefing just before the protest began, Tung promised to listen more closely to the public, but brushed off questions from reporters.
“We will respond to the aspirations of our citizens and will take actions to allay public dissatisfaction and improve the effectiveness of the government,” Tung said.
Some of those gathered outside the legislative building were members of the Falun Gong (news – web sites) spiritual group, which is outlawed in China but is still legal in Hong Kong.
The government bowed to public pressure on Saturday and withdrew a clause in the subversion bill which would have allowed it to ban groups that are blacklisted on the mainland.
Critics say the bill poses the biggest threat to basic civil rights since the former British colony returned to Chinese rule in 1997, and could lead to more interference from Beijing in Hong Kong’s affairs.
Tung no longer appears to have enough support in the legislature to push through important policies, which could add to political and economic uncertainties for the remaining four years of his term.
Demands are growing for him to resign or at least sack some unpopular ministers. Some analysts say the entire ministerial structure of the government must also be re-examined because it fails to reflect broader public concerns.
Tsang Yok-sing, leader of the largest pro-Beijing party, called on Wednesday for Security Secretary Regina Ip to be replaced. The tough-talking Ip has alienated people during the months she has promoted the bill.
Hong Kong’s constitution requires it to enact a subversion law, which Beijing wants passed as soon as possible to prevent hostile forces from using this city to subvert the mainland.
Organizers of the vigil want the law passed only after universal suffrage is established in Hong Kong and people can finally choose their own leaders.
Hong Kong’s constitution allows for universal suffrage after 2007, but the government refuses to open the issue for debate.
Some of the protestors said they are planning another pro-democracy rally on Sunday.
Yan Sham-Shackleton Online 