My TakeFrom sacrificial lamb to figure of ridicule

Democrat Howard Lam Tsz-kin is probably the most ridiculed person in Hong Kong at the moment. Not only does he face five months in jail for falsely claiming that he was kidnapped, drugged and tortured by mainland agents, no one, not even his Democratic Party comrades, have shown him much sympathy.

There is little doubt that he deserves the punishment handed down in court, against which he will appeal while on bail.

People have speculated widely on why he did it; most miss the mark. Given his political and theological backgrounds, it’s not so hard to understand why he did it at the time in August 2017.

Given this consideration, he is not wholly undeserving of sympathy, however misguided and deluded he might have been. The judge rightly observed that Lam showed no remorse and refused to acknowledge his misdeed. Lam’s claims struck a sensitive chord, even fear, with many Hongkongers who worried about the possibility of mainland authorities breaching the “one country, two systems” principle by detaining locals at will.

That was precisely why he did it. Some people thought he suffered from a personality disorder. Others thought he just wanted attention. Many believed he wanted to blacken the name of the central government and sow distrust.