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Hong Kong politics: Business as usual
By Gary LaMoshi

HONG KONG - You never bring four flowers to a hostess here, because four represents death in Cantonese numerology. So it would have been more appropriate for hopes for democracy in Hong Kong if the ruling from the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC) had come down on 4-4-04 rather than two days later. Beijing's ruling - "sugar-coated poison" in the words of Democratic Party patriarch Martin Lee - in effect killed political reform in Hong Kong.

The big motherland offered the "sugar coating" of possible direct election of Hong Kong's chief executive in 2007, wrapped around the poison of the NPC asserting its right to interpret at will the Basic Law, the constitution that the British hammered out with Beijing as a fig leaf before they skipped town. Beijing alone remains interested in the document, while Britain, ironically, is occupying Iraq allegedly in the name of bringing it the democracy it never bothered to give Hong Kong in 150 years of rule. The Basic Law document promises Hong Kong a high degree of autonomy for 50 years, based on the Deng Xiaoping's "one country, two systems" principle.

Make that "one country, our system" now. By taking the right to interpret the Basic Law into its own hands, Beijing has made any local debate about Hong Kong's government purely academic. The concept of "Hong Kong people ruling Hong Kong" that China touted when it replaced the colonial regime always was really "Hong Kong people approved by Beijing ruling Hong Kong" until 2007; the NPC ruling extends that term indefinitely.

Tactical nuclear assault
This NPC ruling marks the second occasion it has spoken as Hong Kong's ultimate overseer, a role previously filled by Great Britain's Privy Council. The first time came in 1999 over immigration rights for mainlanders with one Hong Kong parent, a case that predated the handover and was much more about saving face for Beijing than preserving the character of Hong Kong. The Court of Final Appeal ruled against the government, despite a vicious propaganda campaign of big lies by Chief Executive Tung Chee-hwa's regime that might have intimidated judges unfamiliar with the Western concept of an independent judiciary.

After a loud and healthy debate over the merits of undermining the local courts and the Basic Law's autonomy provisions, Tung's regime did appeal to the NPC, bringing the expected ruling in favor of the government. But the ruling, the equivalent of escalating from conventional to nuclear weapons, came at the price of undermining Tung's support in Hong Kong, ending the charade that he was anything but a puppet of Beijing. Today, he enjoys support from about one in six Hong Kong residents.

Tuesday's NPC decision saves Tung and his successors future NPC agonies. From now on, Beijing says it will intervene in Hong Kong to provide "clarification" whenever it chooses (or whenever its poodle in Government House privately asks it to), without waiting for a public summons. Hong Kong people ruling Hong Kong - in a manner Beijing sees fit.

It's fair to ask: What did you expect from communist China? Of course Beijing would be nervous and reach for greater control after 500,000 Hong Kong people poured into the streets last July 1 to protest proposed anti-sedition laws (see Article 23 protesters take aim at Hong Kong elite, July 1, 2003) and Taiwan staged its second democratic presidential election - replete with drama and heading for a resolution in line with the spirited traditional island politics. The re-election of Chen Shui-bian with his thinly veiled pro-independence platform that Beijing vehemently denounces may have dampened hopes that Taiwan will return to accept the big motherland's embrace under "one country, two systems", so Beijing lost its major motivation for restraint in Hong Kong.

Hu's on first
Yet we Hong Kong people came to expect better from Beijing under former president Jiang Zemin, who presided over the handover just months after Deng Xiaoping's death. Guessing what goes on inside the Chinese Politburo is simply that, but it's worth noting that the ham-handed push for unnecessary anti-sedition legislation and this latest assault on Hong Kong's autonomy took place under the new regime of President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao. That may merely be coincidence. It may be that Hu and his team take the promises of previous generations of leaders less seriously. It may be that they believe that Tung and the pack of Beijing poodles barking approval speak for the people of Hong Kong.

Prominent among those rolling over for a scratch from Beijing are leaders of Hong Kong's business community. Contrary to local mythology and the Heritage Foundation's annual ranking of Hong Kong as the "world's freest economy" or the runner-up to Singapore (see Singapore Inc peels a veil in the dark, March 26), the government has played a vital role in creating Hong Kong wealth, dating back to the opium trade. The property market is at the root of most modern Hong Kong fortunes, and since colonial times, that industry has been dependent on the government, which owns all land (and, contrary to another myth, creates more via reclamation of the harbor), sells it to developers and then - here's the key - the buyer negotiates with the government to determine what can be built. It can be a 76-story office/hotel/residential/retail complex instead of a six-story block of flats, depending on your clout.

The other half of the Hong Kong myth is that people just want to do business without any interference from government or the distraction of politics. While it's true that Hong Kong has never had democracy, politics has played a crucial role - for some people. Tycoons, such as Tung and Cheung Kong, Hutchison Whampoa's Li Ka-shing, father of dot-bomber Richard Li (see Hong Kong phone giant gets static, February 14, 2003) and putative Air Canada rescuer Victor Li - sat on the colonial governor's Executive Council. The great and good simply opposed letting the vast majority of Hong Kong people have a voice equal to theirs that might object to tycoons making a killing at their expense.

With Hong Kong's unexpected and embarrassing extended economic slump, mainland China has increasingly become the focus for acquiring and increasing wealth, whether through development projects in its booming cities or bringing in fresh money from the mainland to reflate the local property and retail markets. In both cases, business with China requires cooperation from political authorities.

Brown-nosing O'Rear
No surprise, then, that Hong Kong business leaders sing praises of this, and all, announcements from the big motherland. David O'Rear, chief economist at the Hong Kong Chamber of Commerce, deserves special recognition for selling out freedom. O'Rear declared, "We have more democracy than most Asian countries," from behind the foreign passport he shares with many of those Hong Kong tycoons now waving Beijing's flag the way they previously flaunted their honors from Buckingham Palace.

In the short run, Hong Kong's business leaders are simply doing what they've always done, cozying up to the political leaders to make sure they get theirs. Erosion of freedoms and of reliable rule of law in Hong Kong degrades the city as a center for international commerce, but that may not matter much with increasing reliance on Beijing as the source of wealth.

Failing to address legitimate demands for political rights, now more in demand because of experience with bad government and a struggling economy, does pose real danger for the Tungs and Lis and Hus and Wens - and, we can only hope, the O'Rears. Allowing Hong Kong people to elect a chief executive and legislature under the explicit and implicit veto of Beijing - and wise leaders in Beijing can be heroes if they let that happen in 2007 - constitutes an effective safety valve against more radical calls for change.

In Hong Kong, the danger from radicals isn't a movement for independence but an attack on the system of privilege that keeps tycoons rich and the rest of us running around that wheel in our teeny-weeny cages. Throw us a bone now, or risk having yours picked clean later. Insurance is cheap, but it's not Beijing that has its O'Rear on the line.

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Apr 8, 2004

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