No need for promises of more political reform, says top Beijing official
There is no need for Beijing to promise that the election model for the chief executive could be amended beyond 2017 as this is already guaranteed by the Basic Law, mainland official on legal affairs Zhang Rongshun has said.
There is no need for Beijing to promise that the election model for the chief executive could be amended beyond 2017 as this is already guaranteed by the Basic Law, a mainland official on legal affairs has said.
Zhang Rongshun, vice-chairman of the Legislative Affairs Commission of the National People's Congress Standing Committee (NPCSC), also said he was optimistic about the prospects of reform given its wide support in Hong Kong.
"There is no law that cannot be amended and thus there is no need [for Beijing] to promise the [election model] can be changed after the package is passed," Zhang said in Beijing yesterday, adding the Basic Law had already provided the legal ground for future amendment.
Last August, the Standing Committee rolled out a stricter-than-expected decision which ruled that only two or three candidates who secured half the votes of the nominating committee could run for the top job.
Pan-democratic lawmakers have vowed to vote down any "undemocratic" reform proposal based on this decision as they fear that Beijing would declare the city's constitutional development "mission accomplished" afterwards.
On Saturday, the president of the Legislative Council, Jasper Tsang Yok-sing, called on Beijing to clarify whether the reform proposal would remain in place for good once it had been passed.
Zhang, however, yesterday skirted the key question of whether future reform must still adhere to the Standing Committee's restrictive framework.
Civic Party lawmaker Alan Leong Kah-kit said Zhang's remarks would not convince Hongkongers to "pocket" the imperfect reform package first.
Tam was speaking during a closed-door meeting in Beijing yesterday with a group of mainland scholars, including Tsinghua University's law dean, Wang Zhenmin, Peking University legal expert Rao Geping and a few Hong Kong representatives.
A source at the meeting said the mainland scholars had unanimously agreed that the concept of "one country" was frequently ignored in Hong Kong.
"The scholars said Hongkongers always accused the mainland of interfering in their affairs, be it politics, economic development or culture," said the source, who refused to be named.
"Some said there's something wrong with journalism training in Hong Kong, while others doubted if the city's civil servants really understand the principle of 'one country, two systems' … the scholars believed the central government would exhaust all the powers which it didn't use before to reverse the situation in future."
Tam could not be reached for comment yesterday.
In an open forum on the Basic Law earlier yesterday, Tam, a local delegate to the National People's Congress, also argued that the 79 days of Occupy Central sit-ins, in which young protesters demanded that Beijing shelve the restrictive decision on political reform, stemmed from a lack of proper education on the country's modern history.
"We could not blame the British for not teaching [students] the modern history of China. What [I find] a pity is we did not try our best to fill in the gaps of national education after the handover."
She said a stronger education on Chinese history would equip those born in the 1980s and 1990s with a better understanding of the country's previous sufferings and its bright future.
Chen Zuoer, head of the Chinese Association of Hong Kong and Macau Studies, a semi-official think tank, said it was not only the local government's responsibility but also Beijing's to "enlighten" Hongkongers' understanding of the city's mini-constitution in light of the Occupy protests.
The promotion, he said, should be beefed up in order to cover every sector, including government, the judiciary, education, media and business.