Our friend the accountant is, typical of a certain sort of Hong Kong person, generally apolitical. Whatever else you might say about him, he certainly isn’t a rabble-rouser. But that was his sympathetic comment about Occupy Central: “When you’re pushed around, what else can you do?” To him, Occupy Central is a logical response to bullying: Either you back down and comply with the bully’s wishes, or you stand up to the bully- there isn’t much middle ground. In a nutshell, that is the dilemma Hong Kong faces at the moment—what to do with a big bully.
Category Archives: Politics
A Resolute No to Fake Democracy
Chinese translation published in InMedia
Alan Yeh / flickr
We must say it loudly and clearly: The Chinese Communist Party’s vision of fake democracy for Hong Kong is far worse than no ‘reform’ at all.
Current social weather likened to events leading to 1967 riots
18 August 2014 | EJ Insight
Political commentators Johnny Lau and Ching Cheong compare the current social atmosphere in Hong Kong to the one just before the 1967 leftist riots.
The Alliance for Peace and Democracy is using organizations to accomplish the political task of the authorities. The society is being torn apart, and authorities are aggravating the situation by playing on the people’s sentiments, Apple Daily reported on Monday, citing Lau.
Hong Kongers Demand Self-Determination—Will Beijing Listen?
Chris Horton | 3 Jul 2014 | The Atlantic
HONG KONG — Last Monday marked the 16th anniversary of the return of Hong Kong to Chinese rule after more than 150 years of being a British colony. Official and unofficial events here attempted to present a cheery picture of Hong Kong’s relations with the mainland.
“They’re terrified that Hong Kong will become too democratic an example for cities on the mainland. It’s a parental mentality.”
“Democracy is not a panacea, but it’s something to start with. With democracy you have transparency, you have people’s wishes and real public opinion in play. People’s self-determination, in the end, is what democracy is all about.”
Special Report: The battle for Hong Kong’s soul
Greg Torode, James Pomfret & Benjamin Kang Lim | 30 June 2014 | Reuters
“The real cabinet is the shadow cabinet,” said one source close to Leung [HK’s puppet leader]. “The chief executive’s office can’t do without the Liaison Office’s help on certain matters.”
Before the 1997 handover, the Chinese Communist Party focused on courting businessmen, academics and activists to secure influence and loyalty. It has now become more assertive, attempting to isolate party enemies, silence critics, and deliver votes.
A legacy of the earliest days of Leninist communist revolutionary theory, the United Front Work Department’s mission is to influence and ultimately control a range of non-party groups, luring some into cooperation and isolating and denouncing others. “The tactics and techniques of the United Front have been refined and perfected over the decades and we are seeing a very modern articulation of it in Hong Kong.”
The Invasion of Hong Kong Begins!
24 Feb 2014 | China Uncensored
The Hong Kong Town Planning Board has unanimously approved the construction of a PLA (People Liberation Army) port in Victoria Harbor in Hong Kong’s Central District. And with the massive Occupy Central protest coming up later this year, well, we know how well the PLA and protesters get along. What does this mean for Hong Kong’s hope for democracy? Find out on this episode of China Uncensored.
Occupy Central with Love and Peace
7 Aug 2013 | International Political Forum
Occupy Central with Love and Peace, or Occupy Central in short, does not refer to the Hong Kong version of the anti-capitalistOccupy Wall Street movement in 2011. Nor is it a romantic title of a melodrama. Instead, it is a proposed civil disobedience movement which would take place in Central (the CBD), Hong Kong in July 2014.
Holding Out in Hong Kong
Ian Buruma | 6 December 1997 | ChinaFile
Chinese values do not adequately explain the peculiar alliance between mainland Communists and the local tycoons, who still want Hong Kong to be run as a profitable colony, albeit under a different master. Opportunism is part of it, to be sure. Most Hong Kong tycoons have been cultivating guanxi with the Communist patrons for years. …Tycoons and Marxist commissars are bound by more than opportunism, however. They share a deep conviction that everything can be reduced to economics, and that liberal politics is a hindrance, at best. As the distinguished lawyer Gladys Li put it to me: “China’s view of Hong Kong is business, business, business.”
The formula for the future status of Hong Kong, “One Country, Two Systems,” has a history of deceit. The phrase was first used in public by Deng Xiaoping in 1984. But the concept is very close to the one applied to the Autonomous Region of Tibet in 1951. Tibet was to be kept separate from China, to allow “feudal” Tibet to catch up with communism. Hong Kong must remain separate from China for fifty years to allow Communist China to catch up with…capitalism? In both cases, the “existing political system” would (will) not be altered. We know what happened in Tibet. We don’t yet know what will happen in Hong Kong. But one issue involving deliberate deceit has yet to be openly discussed: the role of the Chinese Communist Party. What will the New China News Agency be doing in Hong Kong after June 30? Surely not just reporting the news. Will senior people in the Hong Kong government declare their membership in the Communist Party? Which system would they be serving? Who will be accountable to whom?
Occupy Central with Love and Peace 