My Take | Police recruitment drive is a bellwether
- The opposition claims the budget contains a Trojan horse: extra money for the force to hire more officers. But the question is: will people want to join?
A game of chicken is on. Buried in the latest government budget is a funding request for 2,543 new jobs in the police force, the largest increase in manpower that will cost almost 25 per cent more in operating expenses.
Most of the new posts will be on the operational side, meaning anti-riot and investigative capabilities in case of more protest violence once the current health crisis is over. Opposition leaders are already crying foul and have vowed to fight the appropriation.
Civic Party head Alvin Yeung Ngok-kiu and Democratic Party chairman Wu Chi-wai – the two dominant mainstream pan-democratic parties in the legislature – have expressed opposition. Unfortunately, the government has sneakily tied the new police funding to the entire budget, which offers billions in handouts and loan guarantees, respectively, to permanent residents and small to medium-sized businesses.
Will the pan-dems risk being accused of standing in the way of massive sweeteners, including HK$10,000 for permanent residents aged over 18, being handed out to 7 million-plus people in Hong Kong on a matter of principle? Of course, they can still take a symbolic stand by voting no; the outcome will still be the same because they don’t have the numbers in the current legislature to veto the appropriation.
Eight months of violent protests and police countermeasures and suppression have battered the force’s image. Some in the so-called yellow-ribbon, anti-government camp practically consider the police an occupation force composed of rapists, murderers and torturers. But despite all such unfounded allegations, police have not managed to kill a single protester or rioter.