Opinion | Hong Kong patriot blues: why it’s no longer enough to be deep blue

With no filibustering opponents left to distract them in the new electoral system, there are no excuses for loyalists to drag their feet

Beijing expects them to stop the slogans and start finding solutions. Yet, those who raised hell over the colour of an Olympic jersey clearly didn’t get the memo

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A view of Lion Rock from Wong Tai Sin. A top Beijing official, quoting lyrics from “Below the Lion Rock”, has tasked patriots with leading Hong Kong towards “setting aside differences and confrontations”. In other words, Beijing wants no more adversarial politics. Photo: Sun Yeung

Published: 6:45am, 9 Aug 2021Updated: 6:45am, 9 Aug 2021

If the pan-democrats feel they have been pushed out of Hong Kong’s political arena, they are not alone. “Grandpa” Beijing isn’t making life easy for the pro-establishment camp, either.

The new and improved electoral system Beijing has tailored for Hong Kong has not only kept out the pan-democrats; in expunging the loyalists’ enemies, Beijing has also sent the pro-establishment camp into an existential crisis of its own.

Without opponents, there is no one to spar with, and opportunities to score political points become scarce. Without any more political theatrics and bad behaviour in council meetings at the legislative and district levels, there is nothing to condemn.

More crucially, there is no longer a nemesis to fight and react to. Back in 2019, when the pan-democrats won a landslide victory across the 18 districts, it was also the greatest setback suffered by the largest pro-Beijing party, the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong, since its founding.

The DAB reacted by setting up a monitoring body to keep an eye on the work of the newly elected district councillors. Many of the defeated candidates, former councillors and high-flyers who would have been on the political fast track, were relegated to that task until the next round of elections.

But now, with 256 – or 57 per cent – of 452 elected district councillors having resigned as of August 1, leaving at least four of the 18 district councils unable to function properly, there isn’t much for the DAB body to monitor.