Singapore’s prime minister spoke uncomfortable truths that both Beijing and Hong Kong’s protesters need to hear

Lee Hsien Loong, like his late father, sees the tensions behind ‘one country, two systems’ Beijing has not addressed. Hong Kong protesters should also take to heart his warning against the all-or-nothing approach

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Singapore's Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong has been treated as a hero on Chinese social media since he said the Hong Kong protesters were trying to “humiliate and bring down” the Hong Kong government. Photo: AFP

Published: 9:00am, 28 Oct 2019Updated: 6:01pm, 18 Dec 2019

Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong has recently offered extensive comments on Hong Kong’s situation. At a time when repeating slogans sadly passes for public discourse and tweets are rampant, such thoughtful comments – which essentially require that they be more than 280 characters – without all the hyperbolic dressing are refreshing.

Lee said a lot more than what was most widely reported – that the protesters’ demands are not meant to be a programme to solve Hong Kong’s problems but are “intended to humiliate and bring down the government”. Mainland media immediately picked up on this and Lee became quite the hero there because of it. It’s most unfortunate, because he said much more, too.

He didn’t simply dismiss people’s grievances as livelihood issues or merely blame the unaffordable property market; he sees deep-seated political issues related to “one country, two systems” that his father, Singapore’s founding father Lee Kuan Yew, had warned about long ago.

The late senior Lee sounded prescient words for Hong Kong almost two decades ago. During his visit to the city in 2000, to receive an honorary degree from Chinese University, he spoke about the challenge for Hong Kong and Beijing to trust and accommodate one another.

Lee believed that if Hongkongers wanted more democracy and autonomy, they needed to convince Beijing that this would work within the boundaries set in the city’s mini-constitution. “Otherwise, the chief executive and the people of Hong Kong will find themselves locked in a frustrating process of attrition with the centre,” he said.

That “frustrating process of attrition with the centre” has picked up tremendous speed this past decade and spiralled out of control in the past few months. During Lee Hsien Loong’s interview with CNN’s Fareed Zakaria this month, he continued his father’s line of thought, saying that Hong Kong is “part of China and this is a big psychological change which is not easy for the population to get used to”.

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