Opinion | Beijing's 'take it or leave it' attitude on Hong Kong autonomy a far cry from 2003
Under Xi Jinping, the central government no longer cares what Hong Kong or the world thinks about 'one country, two systems'
To understand the significance of Beijing’s white paper on the “one country, two systems” principle, an episode in 2003 may help.
The then Hong Kong stock exchange was licking its wounds from the penny stock crisis, when a proposal to delist stocks trading below 50 HK cents led to a panic sale and public apology by a minister.
The government was eager to replace the bourse’s chief executive, Kwong Ki-chi, for mismanaging the incident.
Top government officials set their eyes on Gao Xiqing, a mainland-born, US-educated lawyer who had just left his job as a deputy director of the China Securities Regulatory Commission.
They saw Gao as an ideal candidate to push for further mainland business for the exchange given his Beijing connections and his brief stint as an investment banker in Hong Kong.
Hong Kong is no longer the priceless China vase that one should not touch without gloves
That happened at a time when the then premier, Zhu Rongji, had hired several Hong Kong regulators to work for their mainland counterparts.