Hong Kong should batten down the hatches for another round of political battles
The city would rather not do the heavy political lifting for now, yet the message from top Beijing official is clear: sooner or later, we have to toe the line
Beijing is getting tough on Hong Kong ahead of the 20th anniversary of the city’s return to Chinese sovereignty. Last week, Zhang Dejiang (張德江), head of the National People’s Congress and China’s No 3 official, offered a carrot. Then, at the weekend, he took out a stick.
Earlier, Zhang told a delegation of senior Hong Kong business representatives in Beijing that the “key mission” of the incoming administration of Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor was to focus on improving people’s livelihoods. The city was polarised, and the well-being of the people was the only way to ease tensions, he said.
So far, so good. That was what Lam said she wanted to do during her election race – to focus on housing, education and people’s livelihoods. Zhang, who oversees Hong Kong and Macau affairs, has referred to that as “the mainstream view and the key mission facing Hong Kong”. It was taken as a cue that we could and should avoid the heavy political lifting for a while, that is, universal suffrage and legislating against treason, sedition, subversion and secession under Article 23 of the Basic Law. After the political disasters of the past five years – for both the pan-democrats and the government – it would not be a bad thing to lay off the incendiary political stuff.