Why Hong Kong must do all it can to protect ‘one country, two systems’

I am writing in response to the article, “Government is rewriting history of Hong Kong, one inconvenient phrase at a time” (May 1), which said the official protocol office has changed its website to erase any mention of a “handover of sovereignty”.

We in Hong Kong have used the phrase “handover of Hong Kong” for decades. The handover ceremony of July 1, 1997 was a memorable event in modern Hong Kong history, which signified that Britain no longer ruled us as a colony and returned the sovereignty of the city to China. 

The changes in the website of the Protocol Division, and the proposed removal of the words “taking back” from school textbooks to describe the resumption of sovereignty by China in 1997, ignored Hong Kong’s history.

I think everyone in Hong Kong has to protect Hong Kong’s history and its unique political structure. As an educator or student, we need to know and preserve the history of Hong Kong by studying and teaching it as part of the school curriculum. As a lawmaker, we need to protect “one country, two systems”. So does everyone else in Hong Kong.