Opinion | Occupy-related complaints of police misdeeds must be properly investigated
Albert Cheng says the Hong Kong force has unwittingly become a political tool of the government. Its good name must not be smeared
The Occupy protests are now in their fourth week with no sign of abating. As expected, the two-hour televised dialogue between the student leaders and government officials on Tuesday did little to move both sides from their respective entrenched positions. The occupiers are unlikely to go home soon.
The way the democracy movement has unfolded is beyond the expectations of the protest organisers as well as the authorities. The government had planned for a scenario in which up to tens of thousands of peaceful demonstrators could be removed from Central in a day or two. That has turned out to be wishful thinking.
Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying has adopted an uncompromising approach since the unpopular decision of the National People's Congress to impose stringent restrictions on the nominating procedures for the chief executive election in 2017. The fact that hundreds of thousands of citizens have taken to the streets shows that the problem at hand is primarily a political one, rather than a matter of law and order, as Leung would like to portray it.
Instead of seeking a political compromise, officials have spent most of their time highlighting the clashes between the police and the protesters. Various front groups have been mobilised to challenge, sometimes violently, the activists for the inconvenience and economic losses caused by Occupy.
Leung's latest move was to discredit through selected news media the local democracy movement as being manipulated by foreign interests. He has indeed been rather successful in distracting public attention from his own scandal about having pocketed some HK$50 million from a foreign firm under dubious circumstances.
Undoubtedly, most of us in Hong Kong take pride in our police force and are grateful for the men and women in uniform for their service. However, the hard-earned reputation of the police is now at risk as the force has been used as a political tool to shield Leung from the onslaught of public opinion.
The decision to fire tear gas had nothing to do with the police on duty, who were there to execute orders. Given their professional training, it would not have been much of a problem for the police to have cleared the occupied sites if they were given a clear order.