By Li Ping

Freedom of speech and freedom of press are important content of Hong Kong’s core values, but they are on the verge of collapsing under the suppression of the CCP and Hong Kong Communists. One the one hand, the people can do little about the Sinicization of newspapers, news editing, and senior news editors. They have voiced their support for the purged Headliner and other programs but to no avail, shown their support towards Apple Daily that was searched by hundreds of police but have not resolved the crisis of existence of free media; on the other hand, the Hong Kong Commies have replicated the CCP’s speech crime in every corner of the people’s lives, including economic crimes, public nuisance crimes, literary incitement crimes, etc. Give the dog a bad name and hang it. Today, the investigations against Nabela Qoser in RTHK have been reopened, the only reason for it must be to penalize her for demanding the Chief Executive to “speak like a human being”, and in a way, to introduce the crime of malicious verbal assault against leaders.

The people of Hong Kong cherish the freedom of speech and the freedom of press, and have been very concerned about the Sinicization of media control, the beating up of journalists, newspapers and radio stations being purged, etc., so we have not witnessed a situation like German theologian Martin Niemöller’s confession:

When the Nazis came for the communists, I remained silent; I was not a communist.

When they locked up the social democrats, I remained silent; I was not a social democrat.

When they came for the trade unionists, I did not speak out; I was not a trade unionist.

When they came for the Jews, I remained silent; I wasn’t a Jew.

When they came for me, there was no one left to speak out.

However, the space for Hong Kong’s freedom of speech and freedom of press is continuously shrinking, because Hongkongers are facing an authoritarian regime that has hated freedom the most, and suppressed it the most brutally, in history. Before the implementation of the Hong Kong national security law, the crimes of inciting others and inciting public nuisance have been used as charges for prosecuting Chan Kin-man and Tommy Cheung; after the implementation of the Hong Kong national security law, the crime of publishing incitement was resurrected through the prosecution of Tam Tak-chi (Fast Beat); the crime of incitement within the Hong Kong national security law was used against people like Tony Chung, founder and convenor of the localist student group Studentlocalism. These charges, which were never deployed before, or at least successfully used, are now birds in cages that are set free. The Hong Kong Commies are mimicking the CCP crimes of provoking troubles and inciting subversion of the regime as a means to suppress the freedom of speech.

CCP’s latest masterpiece in the area of suppressing freedom of speech is to send former chairman of Huayuan Property Co., Ren Zhiqiang, to prison for 18 years for four crimes of corruption, bribery, misappropriation of public funds, and abuse of power by employees of state-owned companies. The “true crime” of Ren Zhiqiang was that he criticized the CCP for concealing the Wuhan virus situation, and lambasted Xi Jinping by name as “the butt naked clown who insists on being the emperor”. During the Cultural Revolution, this kind of “crime” was the crime of maliciously attacking great leaders, or simply the offense of malicious attack, which could lead to direct sentencing; In this new Xi Jinping era, this is known as the political mistake of asking the weight of the cauldron of the central government. There is no direct charge in criminal law, so it has to be tried and charged as an economic crime.

It is not surprising that because Nabela Qoser was outspoken and has publicly demanded that Carrie Lam speaks like a human being, that transformed her into a thorn in the eyes of Carrie Lam’s government. On Sep. 8, after Tam Tak-chi was charged with the crime of publishing incitement, Carrie Lam was being asked how she viewed these prosecutions of people who criticize the government and officials. She claimed that “criticizing the Chief Executive would definitely not fall into these legal restrictions on freedom of speech”, and argued that the criticisms towards the SAR government and the Chief Executive on newspapers, digital media, and the Internet are innumerous, so how can one say that this, in particular, was a violation of the related legal provisions?

A government and its leader that has never reflected despite receiving a whole slew of criticisms, has never had any accountable officials step down, its shamelessness simply goes without saying. Although there is a myriad of criticisms, the thorns in the eye is none but individual media and individual reporters, among the former is RTHK, and among the latter is Nabela Qoser. RTHK coupled with Nabela Qoser adds up to an unpardonable sin. Therefore, while Carrie Lam’s claim that criticizing the government and the Chief Executive is innocent still echoes, Nabela Qoser has been ordered to respond with a deadline as to whether to accept the extension of the civil service probation period for 120 days, and to reopen the investigation on her performance.

Nope, this was not criminal prosecution of criminal investigation at all, but it is only because even though Carrie Lam has admitted to being above the three powers of administration, legislature, and judiciary, she has not yet dared to claim to be the almighty core of the party, government, and military, to be at the same level as the one embodiment of authority, core, and leader that is called Xi Jinping. Directly imposing the crime of asking the weight of the cauldron and the crime of malicious attack on Nabela Qoser, other criminal charges will be added on for prosecution. However, suppressing Nabela Qoser violated the doctrines of freedom of speech and freedom of the press revered by Hongkongers, and triggered the crisis of introducing the “crime of malicious attack” to Hong kong. Hongkongers are not going to remain silent. Will the Carrie Lam government insist on marching towards the path of no return?

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