Beijing appoints veterans to its state-level Hong Kong office to improve messaging on national security law, other city policies
- Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office establishes two new departments for propaganda and security matters, picks Zeng Jian and Wang Zhenmin to head them
- Zeng’s main role is to ‘win the narrative’ on Hong Kong, while tackling misconceptions about national policy and the way the city is run
The State Council’s Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office (HKMAO) on Thursday updated its organisation chart on its official website, confirming the establishment of the two departments.
Two sources familiar with the matter said Wang Zhenmin and Zeng Jian, both of whom served the central government’s liaison office in Hong Kong earlier in their careers, had been put in charge of the security affairs and propaganda departments respectively.
Wang, 55, who was legal affairs director of Beijing’s liaison office in Hong Kong from 2015 to 2018, has already been working at the HKMAO for some time coordinating legal matters, especially those relating to the national security law, according to one Beijing-based source.
“Wang played a very important role in the drafting and implementation of the national security law in the past nearly two years. I think his new role is not surprising as the central government needs someone to coordinate and push for legal affairs, which is one of the most tricky and delicate areas in Hong Kong going forward,” the source said.
Beijing imposed the national security law on Hong Kong on June 30 last year, banning acts of secession, subversion, terrorism and collusion with foreign forces.
Prior to joining the HKMAO, Wang was the head of the Institute of State Governance and director of the Centre for Hong Kong and Macau Studies at Tsinghua University.
A second mainland Chinese government source based in Hong Kong said Zeng, 52, served as the policy research head at the HKMAO and the liaison office in the 2010s. A dozen officials from the HKMAO department in charge of media liaison had been transferred to his new department, he said.