PAUL Au Wing-cheung and Wong Chuen-ming, currently serving life sentences in the Philippines, have been waiting for their appeals to be heard for an unusually long time. Four years after they were arrested at Manila airport and convicted of possessing 34 kilograms of the amphetamine 'ice', they still await that second chance to prove their innocence.
The courthouse holding their case records was destroyed by fire in 1992. But while this may well make both the prosecution's case, and their own, more difficult to set out, it is not an adequate excuse for denying them a hearing.
For both men, the Governor's visit to Manila offers a new chance. He has raised their case with President Fidel Ramos and asked permission for one of his staff to visit them. He would have been remiss to do any less. The Philippine Government is not slow to raise the problems of its own citizens in trouble abroad and should not expect visiting foreign dignitaries to pass over similar cases in polite silence. Equal access to Philippines' justice should be available to all, whether they are Filipinos or foreigners.
However, Mr Patten was right to avoid the impression that he was in anyway doubting the ability of Philippines' courts to come to the right decision once the case is heard. Mr Ramos' government has shown poor judgment recently in automatically assuming its own citizens found guilty abroad are innocent. The result has been to make the Philippines look foolish, not to help Filipinos working overseas. Mr Patten's intercession is rightly aimed at getting the legal process moving again, not at trying to influence the courts. Otherwise it would create pointless antagonism and could be counter-productive.
It is good for Hong Kong's reputation and credibility that the Governor and his administration are keenly aware of this danger. It may be of greater importance to Au and Wong that the Philippines, too, understands he is not prejudging their case.
