Unrest persists in Hong Kong

By Giovanni Roverso

Editor’s Note: This analysis attempts to sum up the key points of the conflict in Hong Kong as of the date of publication. This is a follow-up to Protests Run Amok in Mong Kok from the 2014 November Issue.

Protests in Hong Kong started out peaceful on Sep. 28, 2014 under the Occupy Central movement banner, clogging key areas of Hong Kong Island, notably Admiralty district, amidst government buildings, businesses and elegant storefronts. The situation escalated as the police began using pepper spray and tear gas the following day. Demonstrators expanded north into Mong Kok, Kowloon district in October. As seen in Nathan Mauger’s shorts, demonstrators defended themselves against riot police with walls of umbrellas. The Umbrella Revolution, as it has hence become known, is effectively the longest series of protests the ex-British colony has seen since London handed authority of the city over to Beijing in 1997, when it became the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region HKSAR of the People’s Republic of China PRC.

China established the “One country, two systems” principle in the early 1980s to ensure a smoother reunification with Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan, which demanded special rights. In 1984, Great Britain and the PRC signed the Sino-British Joint Declaration, which assured Hong Kong a “high degree of autonomy,” and promised basic policies to be stipulated in Hong Kong’s new Constitution, called the Basic Law of the HKSAR. This was adopted in 1990 and is to “remain unchanged for 50 years.”

Pro-democracy advocates are concerned primarily about due implementation of two key parts of the Basic Law as follows: “The ultimate aim is the selection of the Chief Executive by universal suffrage upon nomination by a broadly representative nominating committee in accordance with democratic procedures,” and “The ultimate aim is the election of all the members of the Legislative Council by universal suffrage.” Universal suffrage means “the right of all the adults in a country to vote in elections,” according to Macmillan Dictionary.

While the next Legislative Committee elections are set for 2016, rules to conduct them by popular vote won’t be worked on before untangling the Chief Executive nomination process first. The next Chief Executive is due in 2017.

The current committee, which used to elect the Chief Executive directly by majority vote, will instead select two or three 2017 candidates before the Hong Kong people will be allowed to vote.
Pro-democracy advocates have been demanding that the candidates undergo civil nomination instead, as the committee appears to be disproportionately against democratic candidates.

On Aug. 31 the Standing Congress of the National People’s Congress NPSC stated, “The Session is of the view that since the Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region shall be accountable to both the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and the Central People’s Government in accordance with the provisions of the Hong Kong Basic Law, the principle that the Chief Executive has to be a person who loves the country and loves Hong Kong must be upheld.” The Congress made it clear that such is a basic requirement of the “one country, two systems” policy.

Many fear that even slightly democratic candidates could be excluded on the pretext of not “loving the country” enough.

According to the Associated Press, during talks held on Oct. 21 between Hong Kong student leaders and government officials, Chief Executive Leung Chun-Ying refused the possibility of civil Chief Executive nominations, citing Hong Kong Basic Law.

Leung did make concessions however: “How we should elect the 1,200 so that the nominating committee will be broadly representative, there’s room for discussion there.” He stated that such changes could be covered in a second round of consultations over the next several months.

“There’s room to make the nominating committee more democratic, and this is one of the things we very much want to talk to not just the students but the community at large about,” he said.
While some might be happy with renegotiating the make-up of the nominating committee, many would consider that a defeat.

On Nov. 15, student leaders were to fly to Beijing to speak with the Chinese Premier, but they were denied the right to travel at the airport by Chinese authorities.

Protesters who were in the tens of thousands at the beginning of October, have been slowly dwindling. A majority of the protest groups still believe that their strength is in their non-violence, but with little to no concessions being made over the last two months, some people are losing patience and have been more confrontational.

Following a series of restraining orders issued by Hong Kong’s High Court against protesters in both Admiralty and Mong Kok, sections of Admiralty district around city government headquarters were peacefully cleared by police. Not so peaceful was the clearing of Mong Kok which occurred on Nov. 25 and 26. Here more than 150 people were arrested over the course of the operation. Among the arrested were some of the key protest leaders who were banned from returning to the cleared protest sites.

Police forces have also been losing their patience and have been accused of using excessive force in dealing with the demonstrators. Even some reporters were roughly handled prompting an official complaint from the Hong Kong Journalists’ Association.

Unrest has refused to die down with intense clashes continuing throughout the following weekend. Protesters kept returning to Mong Kok with more and more advanced tactics in attempts to re-establish a strong foothold, but police forces have simply matched their efforts with increased force.

On Monday protesters retaliated and attempted to occupy government buildings with little success.

Leung told reporters that some people have mistaken the Hong Kong police’s tolerance for weakness, and called for students to refrain from returning to the occupation sites Monday night.

Many are calling for a reality-check from all sides of the conflict, protesters need to focus on keeping the protests within legal limits, while the government needs to act more directly to negotiate with the pro-democracy camp to in order to put an end to the clashes and to prevent the city’s protest-suppressing expenditures from spiraling out of control.

Perhaps someone should ask the Chief Executive how far the government would be willing to go about reforming the nominating committee before things get so far out of hand that the Chinese government decides to intervene directly.

The stalemate could to continue into next year, yet there is still hope.

A Nov. 10 report by Southern China Morning Post found Tung Chee-hwa, former Hong Kong Chief Executive, launching a new think tank called “Our Hong Kong Foundation” designed to “create conditions for an early and peaceful end of the Occupy movement.” According to the report, “the foundation will start conducting studies on issues related to the city’s long-term development early next year and submit its recommendations to the Hong Kong government.”

This is a follow up to Civil protest runs amok in Hong Kong