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      • First Week
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      • Baptism By Fire
      • Kai Tak with Mrs Thatcher.
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Walter's Blog

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Reflections on recent events, plus the occasional fact
free rant unfiltered by rational argument.
 

"If you want to read a blog to get a sense of what is going on in Hong Kong these days or a blog that would tell you what life was like living in colonial Hong Kong, this blog, WALTER'S BLOG, fits the bill."  Hong Kong Blog Review

22/5/2020 2 Comments

Beijing says enough is enough!

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"The best outcome would be Hong Kong to enact the legislation after due scrutiny, however the Pan Dem's slammed that door shut"
The Hong Kong Pan Dem camp has brought to their door the very thing they feared the most. Their cocked-eyed approach to Hong Kong's democratic development has now hit 'realpolitik'. Beijing's decision to enact national security legislation is a direct result of the Pan Dem's inability to negotiate rationally.

The scenes we've seen in LegCo over the past two weeks are an affirmation of their juvenile, callow conduct. Well, Daddy has stepped in and taken away the keys to the toy box. 


Let's get to the core of the issue. Beijing's biggest fear was always that Hong Kong might evolve into a centre for destabilising the whole nation. With 1.4 billion people to look after, China can ill-afford turmoil. Plus, any chaos may spill over into the wider world.

Thus, the interests of Hong Kong, with seven million people are de-facto subordinate. That's the hard truth.


How, you wonder, did we get to this situation. Cut a long story short, an attempt to pass Article 23 laws in 2003 failed after massive public opposition. Since then the issue has been held in abeyance.

Then allied to that in 2014, the Pan Dem's failed to grasp the opportunity for democratic reform, making 'perfect' the enemy of a practical solution. Since then, things spiralled downhill; Occupy Central, the Mongkok 2016 CNY riot and the civil unrest of 2019.


We all know that ‘one country, two systems’ was always a compromise solution that nonetheless has a certain elegance. It could work if each side recognised the other concerns. I’m afraid that's not happening. 

To safeguard its interests, the Chinese insisted that the 1997 agreement included national security laws. In simple terms, Hong Kong should not be a base to subvert the government in Beijing. The British agreed that provision, although the detail was left for after 1997.

It's 23 years since the handover with Hong Kong nowhere near agreeing on legislation. In the meantime, the likes of Anson Chan, Martin Lee and Joshua Wong went running to Washington demanding a US intervention. These actions are the very thing Beijing feared.

You can excuse Joshua Wong, after all, he's a young man with issues. This means he may not always comprehend the consequence of his actions. The same cannot be said for Anson Chan and Martin Lee. As seasoned political operators, they’ve elected to inflame sentiment. 


Following the events of 2019, with Hong Kong teetering on anarchy, and the recent shenanigans in LegCo, Beijing lost patience. I’m told behind the scenes talks to broker a settlement broke up months ago. 

Having slammed the door on negotiations, the Pan Dem's adopted a policy of filibuster and disruption.

Pro-establishment politicians are not blameless. They failed to reign in the filibuster, wobbling and prevaricating in LegCo. At the same time, Chief Executive Carrie Lam, proved incapable of breaking the impasse. 


The emergence last year of an independence movement at the core of the violent protests must have rattled the windows at Zhongnanhai. Kids with underdeveloped frontal cortexes, and thus impulsive by nature, took to the streets to confront the police.

With little ability to grasp the possible outcomes, these kids are now paying the price with jail terms, careers ruined and families in pain. Meanwhile, the failure of the Pan Dems to condemn the violence, the killing and the mayhem is a stain on their reputation. 

The timing of Beijing's move is astute. The Pan Dem's could likely win a large victory in September's LegCo elections. That would rule out Article 23. Further, the distractions of Covid-19 and a weakened US president, provide a window of opportunity. 

Added to that, Hong Kong is a city of extreme hypochondriacs: thus the virus might be seen as a more significant threat than national security laws. This may mute any response, although its anyone's guess.


This morning the social media chatter was its usual bipolar self. Some decried the decision of Beijing and others welcomed it as correcting a failing. The detractors asserted Hong Kong would experience a new wave of emigration. 

They may well be right, but we've encountered several such waves in the past and brushed off the impact. In any case, many of those who left before 1997 regretted their decision and sought to return quietly. With anti-China sentiment on the rise overseas, the welcome mat is missing. 


Taiwan was open to Hong Kong protesters fleeing arrest action in 2019. Then once Tsai Ing-wen secured another four year term, she closed the door to Hong Kong migrants by imposing new regulations. She can ill-afford to have a cluster of hard-core Hong Kong asylum seekers stirring up trouble.  
​

What is clear, the Pan Dems are now between a rock and a hard place. They can shout and bleat all they like, or take to the streets again. It won't matter. Their tactics backfired and gave us the result we didn't want, because the best outcome would be Hong Kong to enact the legislation after due scrutiny. 

​Many of us warned of such an outcome if the Pan Dems continued with their myopic relentless anti-Beijing mindset. And so it's come to pass. 
2 Comments
Latakia
24/5/2020 08:16:42 pm

So we see on Sunday, a few HUNDRED....not the "Thousands" reported by the SCMP coming out to "protest" by destroying shop windows, blocking traffic and otherwise interfering with the freedom of ordinary people to spend a Sunday out with the families in Causeway Bay or Wan Chai.

Great photo opps of riot police charging and our martyrs running away. No mention in international media of the vandalism and beatings on civilians....and no there's never a good reason for 7 able bodied youngsters to beat up a senior citizen until he can barely crawl away...

These "protesters" and their lawmaker enablers back by their "media" groupies only make the case for some type of National Security controls all the more palatable....

Reply
Peter Bentley
2/6/2020 08:50:39 am

An excellent analysis of the current situation ! You took the words right out of my mouth.

The UK passport matter is a real pigs ear and personally I think the UK was stupid to even mention the idea of admitting BN(O) passport holders to the UK, no matter on what timescale or on what numbers. The USA racial riots have already spread to England and - according to a recent SCMP report - have broadened out from just anti-colored people to anti-Asian/ Chinese ( who, as the average Englishman knows, ALL are covid-infected)

Actually the UK has a long and sordid track record of perfidy and hypocrisy re passports to anyone who is not a "true brit" - which means anyone who speaks in a form of English that others can understand (on the rare occasions when I have been back to UK in recent years I confess I could easily understand all the nice young people from Poland, Eastern Europe etc who now seem to fill 99% of the service industry jobs, but I could barely understand the real Brits with their thick regional dialects)

I well remember back in about 1976 at university, meeting a Chinese lady in UK for a year's post graduate research. She went to visit friends in Europe a few weeks before returning to England and thence back to HK. Throughout Europe she passed through borders without a single problem but when she tried to get back to England at Dover she was held up for several hours by British immigration even though she was holding a HK / British passport with a valid visa . The suspicion was apparently that she might plan to overstay her visa (as if she could stand bad Bristish food any longer !)

Eventually Dover immigration let her back in when she pointed to the inside cover of her HK/ British passport where there were grandly written words to this effect :

"Her Britannic Majesty of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Island hereby requests and commands that all to whom this may concern allow the bearer of this passport freedom to enter WITHOUT LET OR HINDRANCE" (etc etc)

Funny how the only immigration authorities in the whole of Europe (by then the EEU) who did not respect that "demand" were the bloody english !

Bah humbug !

PS: I agree your sentiments re Fat Pang - he single-handed destroyed the LEGCO 'through train" and in so doing poisoned the UK/ Chinese relationship (or at least muddied the waters) for the next few years. In fact, if you follow the trail back, you could argue convincingly that Patten's grevious errors as our last governor were behind the huge 2003 Art 23 protests, which in turn led to delaying Art 23 indefinitely, which in turn led to the 2019 riots when they veered from the extradition issue to a more militant demand for "democracy" , which in turn lead to the new National Security Bill followed - at long last - by Art 23 . So Fat Pang was to blame all along.

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    Walter De Havilland was one of the last of the colonial coppers. He served 35 years in the Royal Hong Kong Police and Hong Kong Police Force. He's long retired. 

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