My Take | Pan-dems have opened up a can of worms

  • A Hong Kong court has backed the opposition by ruling the government’s ban on wearing face masks at protests is unconstitutional but in the long term, the backlash from Beijing could erode our judicial independence

Alex Loin Toronto
A masked anti-government protesters at Hong Kong’s Tamar Park. Photo: Winson Wong

Not too long ago, a retired top judge warned that Hong Kong’s judicial independence faced “a storm of unprecedented ferocity”. We are now in the eye of the storm.

The pan-democrats opened a can of worms by taking the authorities to court for using emergency powers to ban the wearing of face masks amid escalating violence by anti-government rioters over the past six months. They won. To make a long story short, the court ruled that the ban breached provisions in the Basic Law, the city’s mini-constitution.
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