Source:
https://scmp.com/comment/letters/article/3096321/hong-kong-national-security-law-stick-place-will-city-get-carrot
Comment/ Letters

Hong Kong national security law: the stick is in place, will city get the carrot?

  • Common sense suggests the carrot of universal suffrage should be introduced to heal the divisions
A banner saying: “I want universal suffrage”, hangs by the side of a block of flats in Tseung Kwan O in May 2016, during a visit to Hong Kong by a top mainland official. Photo: Nora Tam

On July 28, the Hong Kong Public Opinion Research Institute (PORI) released a survey which found that satisfaction with the Hong Kong government was at 19 per cent while Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor’s approval rating was 18 per cent. The chief executive is widely unpopular, yet she continues to hold the job.

This unpopularity is not entirely self-inflicted,however. Beijing has helpfully stabbed Lam a few times in the back, if rumours are true, by refusing to let her resign, refusing to allow any compromise with the initially peaceful protesters and, finally, by imposing the unpopular National Security Law and apparently forcing her to defend it even before the details were released. This, coupled with police action and a general lack of public relations savvy, has led to her poor approval rating.

Clearly, large swathes of the Hong Kong population distrust her. It is difficult for her to govern credibly when most people did not have a role in choosing her as their leader.

At the very least, our mainland counterparts can point to the incredible economic uplift by the Communist Party as a basis of legitimacy and a source of faith. China’s gross domestic product (GDP) is more than 38 times what it was in 1990. What do Hongkongers have to place their faith in Lam? Because Beijing appointed her? Has Beijing created incredible economic growth in Hong Kong? Hong Kong’s GDP is only 4.6 times what it was in 1990, compared to 5.8 times for South Korea and 10.3 times for Singapore.

Lam needs to own up to the fact that her policies, whether authored by Beijing or not, are not popular in Hong Kong. The only way out for her is to actually enact some popular policies for once.

Hong Kong freedoms will not be eroded by Beijing’s national security law, Carrie Lam says

02:22

Hong Kong freedoms will not be eroded by Beijing’s national security law, Carrie Lam says

The big and threatening stick of the National Security Law is in place. Common sense suggests the carrot of universal suffrage should be introduced to heal the divisions across Hong Kong, and to introduce a policy that most people can agree on.

Sadly, this kind of forward thinking is nowhere to be found. With the disqualification of several Legislative Council candidates from election, which is now delayed (thanks to Lam’s lack of credibility, nobody believes this is apolitical), the stick keeps getting bigger.

Branton Li, London