Hong Kong Indigenous leader Ray Wong publishes ‘final message to Hongkongers’
Group’s convenor says it is ‘better to die with honour than survive in disgrace’
“Better to die with honour than survive in disgrace.” So says the core member of localist group Hong Kong Indigenous, which participated in the Mong Kok riot, in a “final message to Hongkongers” published on Thursday.
In pre-recorded audio published on the group’s Facebook page, convenor Ray Wong Toi-yeung lamented that his home was no longer recognisable and how those frustrations eventually led him and his allies to launch what has been described as the biggest riot in Hong Kong since 1967.
“I was born and grew up in Hong Kong – a place which I love and cherish. But as I gradually grow up, I witnessed how Hong Kong – which is supposed to belong to Hongkongers – is gradually becoming unrecognisable,” Wong said. “I can no longer distinguish whether I am on the mainland or in Hong Kong.”
READ MORE: Courtroom packed as 37 face rioting charges and are banned from entering parts of Mong Kok
After night fell on the first day of Chinese New Year, Wong was seen standing on an abandoned taxi which had its back windscreen shattered, asking protesters to rally more friends to Mong Kok.
The 22-year-old has been arrested several times before for participating in different protests. His most recent arrest was in September last year for allegedly assaulting a police officer on a footbridge near Sheung Shui MTR station in a demonstration against parallel traders.
“We know when the government ignores the people’s demands, the people must use their own way to defend their homeland.”
Wong said he had felt frustrated that his efforts in social movements against national education and the Northeastern New Territories development scheme ended in vain, until two years ago when 87 canisters of tear gas were fired at protesters in the pro-democracy Umbrella Movement.