Hypocrisy a game two can play
How dare the French, Danish and other European consular chiefs dress down Hong Kong's security chief Ambrose Lee Siu-kwong for refusing entry to foreign activists ahead of last week's Olympics torch run?
We've said before and we'll say again: the government should not have barred the activists, even though some were known troublemakers. But having said that, we now want to say this: the European consular chiefs had some nerve ganging up against Mr Lee for exercising Hong Kong's right to turn away visitors without having to give reasons. That right is an international norm. We want to remind these consular chiefs that their countries have long records of refusing entry to Hongkongers, especially during the period leading up to the handover, when innocent travellers were routinely stereotyped as wanting to flee future communist rule. The French and the British were among the worst offenders. The west now regularly turns away travellers with Muslim names on even the slightest suspicion they may be terrorists.
Our advice to the European consular chiefs is to put away their arrogance and back off. Otherwise, Public Eye will demand that Hong Kong repays in kind. Every time a Hongkonger is turned away for whatever reason from any of the countries now complaining, we will demand that Mr Lee summons the consular chiefs for a dressing down and a public explanation. Two can play at this game.
All power to citizens' price army
Finally, real action to nail down and shame the cheats! Having a citizens' army of housewives to monitor price-gouging by our supermarkets is exactly what we need. Our political parties are gasbags but we'll grudgingly give credit to the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong for coming up with the monitoring idea.
Keeping tabs on our profiteering tycoons is something Hong Kong's timid Consumer Council should have done from day one. We all know our supermarkets take us for fools - marking up prices, then marking them down to make us think we're getting a bargain. And we all know that our weak-kneed government's reluctance to speed up anti-monopoly laws allows supermarkets to charge extortionist prices with impunity.
