Pan-democrats just cannot see beyond universal suffrage
I would be more enthusiastic about universal suffrage if the pan-democrats would give some proposals on 'What next?' after it becomes law in Hong Kong.
I have waited in vain for them to tell the public how the present problems will be solved when each person has a vote. The leaders mislead the public by calling for universal suffrage but never say how the people's grievances will be addressed.
If universal suffrage makes life better for the worker, why are so many people, including university graduates and non-graduates, prepared to leave their countries (for example, Indonesia, the Philippines and Thailand) which have universal suffrage, to work in this 'undemocratic' society in Hong Kong? In each case, the answer is that only the rich in their countries benefit from one person, one vote. They have learned to buy votes from the poorest of the poor. Some overseas workers rightly complain of discrimination here. Nevertheless, I have found that most of them consider Hong Kong to be more democratic than their own country with its universal suffrage.
No democracy should be introduced until its promoters have found a way to balance the power of rich and poor. Otherwise, the elite will find a way to influence the vote, usually by corruption, but also by ensuring candidates who address the subject of the poverty that will follow universal suffrage, 'disappear'. The carnage in the Philippines has already begun a year before the next elections.
I doubt if our legislators read anything about the world and what has happened in other Asian countries and most of the countries of South and Central America and Africa, after they were cajoled into handing over their resources to former colonial countries. Remember, the present western democracies are of the same kind which stole land and resources in their colonial days. They have not changed. As Noam Chomsky says, 'They resort to 'unilateral use of military power' to ensure 'uninhibited access to key markets, energy supplies, and strategic resources'.
Do the 'democratic' leaders of Hong Kong ever read recent history?
Elsie Tu, Kwun Tong
