Appointment system breeds collusion
Prepare for worse ahead with the new junior ministerial positions. Far from being a constitutional advance, this is an extension of the colonial system of appointment of people willing to back the government in return for influence, prestige or commercial advantage. Instead of entrepreneurial businessmen, grass-roots organisers or independent professionals, here is a crop of individuals who appear to have been picked as facilitators rather than for their administrative skills, drive or originality.
To call them politicians is wrong. Only a few have been actively involved in politics. Successful politicians in open societies must appeal to electorates. In closed systems like China, competition within the ruling party is fierce. But the Hong Kong politics as envisaged by Chief Executive Donald Tsang Yam-kuen is neither. It is a throwback to the days when Hong Kong was supposedly apolitical and the colonial government co-opted enough of the elite to present an appearance of local representation.