Hong Kong independence rears its head again on university campus, as union leader candidates grilled on views
- Trio had complained about a televised interview portraying them as indifferent to last year’s ban on a pro-independence political party
- But on Monday they noted ‘Hong Kong is an inalienable part of China’
The trio running to lead the student union at Hong Kong’s oldest university were grilled on their political stances on Monday, in another campus controversy over the city’s independence.
The three students, who called themselves Prism, braved the chill wind in an open square for two hours. They answered questions from a group of more than a hundred students, a day after complaining of a smear campaign portraying them in a televised interview as indifferent to last year’s ban on a political party and a string of disqualifications from the Legislative Council.
But, rather than clearly refuting that stance, they said they respected those decisions, while maintaining city residents should have a say on its future.
They are the only candidates for the executive committee of the University of Hong Kong’s student union, which represents more than 16,000 undergraduates. If they fail to get enough votes, HKU will become the sixth of the city’s eight public universities with a vacuum in student leadership.
Asked their opinions on Hong Kong-mainland relations, and on the city’s future after the “one country two systems” principle is set to expire in 2047, science student Cheng Chun-hei, the proposed union president, said: “The relation between Hong Kong and China is like the relation between Hong Kong and other nearby countries. There are insoluble links of geography and economy.
