Far East Economy Review: No Faith in The Article

Half a million people take to the streets to denounce new security laws. But their protest is unlikely to move the unpopular government

IT WAS THE BIGGEST CHALLENGE to official authority in China since the 1989 Tiananmen protests. On July 1, half a million people took to the streets in the former British colony in protest at tough new national security laws that many fear will undermine freedom in this vibrant city. The peaceful demonstration, six years to the day since Hong Kong returned to Chinese rule, signalled a growing political crisis for Chief Executive Tung Chee-hwa as public frustration boils over at the performance of his unpopular administration and the lack of political reform.

Hot and tired but exultant after marching for more than four hours in the sweltering heat, 23-year-old Baptist University social work student Charis Yau hoped that Tung and his government now understood the deep public hostility to the new laws. "We want to show the power of the people," she said. Fellow student Chung Wan-sang echoed the sentiment of many other marchers in calling for political change. "The process is not fair," the 22-year-old said. "Citizens should be the masters of society. The government doesn't hear our voices, so we go out onto the streets."

While the new security laws were clearly the catalyst for the huge protest, which stunned organizers and the government alike, it was clear that popular discontent with Tung and his team over the recent Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome crisis was a major factor in the turnout. Hong Kong has been declared free of the deadly virus for now but the local economy remains in the doldrums, unemployment has risen above 8% and a grinding decline in the property market continues to erode the wealth of homeowners. Slogans on posters, banners and T-shirts, some uncharacteristically crude for Hong Kong, ridiculed Tung and his top officials and called on them to resign. Security chief Regina Ip, who has aggressively defended the new laws, was a particular target.

However, undeterred by local and overseas condemnation, the government intends on July 9 to enact the new laws that critics claim will give the authorities the power to silence political opponents and control the press under the pretext of protecting national security. In a statement released after hundreds of thousands of people, most dressed in black, had swirled for almost six hours around his office in Hong Kong's Central business district, Tung said he was "concerned" about the scale of the protest but refused to back down. "Enactment of the national security bill is a constitutional duty of Hong Kong," Tung said. "The rights and freedoms enjoyed by the people of Hong Kong will not be affected."

For some Hong Kong demonstrators, the march brought back sharp memories of the bloody Tiananmen Square crackdown on June 4, 1989, which prompted more than 1 million people to take to the streets in the then-British colony in sympathy with the victims in Beijing. Many July 1 protesters were well aware that the new laws proposed for Hong Kong had a direct link with those events. After the Tiananmen upheaval and associated protests in Hong Kong, China insisted that Hong Kong's post-handover constitution should include a provision that obliged the incoming local administration to introduce new national security laws. It is this provision, Article 23, which is behind the current wave of dissent.

By coincidence, the Chinese leader who played a small but dramatic role in the Tiananmen protests, Premier Wen Jiabao, was visiting Hong Kong for this year's handover anniversary celebrations as the demonstrators began gathering in the streets. Wen, then an aide to former Communist Party leader Zhao Zhiyang, was with Zhao when he visited student demonstrators in Tiananmen Square ahead of the crackdown.

Zhao was later purged for his sympathy with the protesters and has been under virtual house arrest ever since. However, Wen refused to answer questions on the Hong Kong demonstration and left hours before it began. In his only comment on the new national security laws, he did seek to reassure the public. "Article 23 will not affect Hong Kong people, including reporters, from enjoying their various rights and freedoms under the law," he said.

Despite these assurances from top government leaders and the Tung administration's legal experts, there is still widespread unease over the laws. Many believe they go far beyond what is necessary. The major fear is that they give the government power to ban any organization in Hong Kong that has been judged a threat to national security on the mainland. Critics say that will open the way for a crackdown on groups that challenge the Chinese Communist Party.

This means that groups like the Falun Gong spiritual movement, outlawed in China as a threat to state security, could also be banned in Hong Kong. Hong Kong churches feel they might also be in danger. And, deepening these fears, a government security official, rather than the courts, would decide whether a group could appeal against any such ban.

PRESS FEARS

Local journalists fear that the new offence of publishing state secrets could be used to muzzle Hong Kong's freewheeling press. They are also alarmed that there will be no public-interest defence allowed to justify the publication of government information or communications between the local and central authorities. And the new laws would also allow the police to search private property without a warrant if a threat to national security was suspected.

In defending the proposals, the Tung administration has pointed to similar draconian laws in Western countries. And he can also count on some backing in Hong Kong. Sympathetic unions have demonstrated in support of the measure--including parallel activities on July 1--insisting that it is Hong Kong's patriotic duty to protect the motherland's security. Tung can also count on pro-Beijing and pro-business factions in the Legislative Council to pass the laws. But opponents counter that Hong Kong lacks the checks and balances of a developed democracy and open government to protect people from the abuse of these powers. They say the new laws would be more acceptable to local people if Tung were also proposing full universal suffrage. The territory's constitution allows for this from 2007.

As local criticism mounts, foreign governments have also joined the chorus of disapproval. Britain believes that the new laws threaten the formula of "one country, two systems" that China promised would protect Hong Kong's freedoms for 50 years after the 1997 handover. On the eve of the protest, British Foreign Office Minister Bill Rammell said in a statement that the provisions allowing for the banning of groups outlawed on the mainland "blurred the dividing line" between Hong Kong's and China's legal systems. The United States Congress on June 26 overwhelmingly passed a resolution calling on Tung to drop the laws and hold immediate elections for the entire local legislature. Only 24 of the 60 members of the Legislative Council are now directly elected.

However, there is no sign of any political relaxation in China that would allow democratic change in Hong Kong. That means pressure for change is likely to mount. The danger for Tung and the Beijing leadership is that the normally restrained people of Hong Kong have shown they can peacefully exert their power on the streets if they are denied a say in running their affairs. Pro-democracy parties are now threatening more mass protests when the security laws are enacted. It is possible that these new laws aimed at ensuring national security may deliver exactly the opposite outcome.

http://www.feer.com/articles/2003/0307_10/p016region.html