The ending of Hong Kong, as we know it, is taking place now. More suppression of the Hong Kong people is coming - it is now the new normal. Political differences aside, regardless of being blue, green or yellow, people in this city, to a certain degree, respect and live with the differences - the old Hong Kong way. It takes more than 150 years, including the earlier years after the 1997 Handover, to build and shape the very foundations of this city. But not anymore. Hong Kong has a new color, and it is “communist red”. The authoritarian regime has turned absolutely impatient, wanting to change the very essence of Hong Kong in no time and with no pretense.

Communist China, famous for silencing its own people and crushing those who try to resist, has played hard ball with Hong Kong since the second half of this year, through the enactment of the National Security Law (NSL). The old Hong Kong, as we know it, is in the process of dismantling, which affects millions of Hong Kong people by depriving them of the freedom to live.

Freedom, among other aspects of Hong Kong, is really running out of time. The right to peaceful assembly and protest is now effectively banned in the name of fighting the coronavirus pandemic. The massive resistance of 2019 was people’s kneejerk reaction to Beijing’s interference in Hong Kong and the Extradition Amendment Bill, and the ultimate protest against the non-delivery of genuine universal suffrage.

US President J. F. Kennedy once said: “Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.” Maybe it is true. Maybe that resembles what has happened in Hong Kong: people wanted true democracy and freedom, and communist China never intended to deliver it, so people resisted.

Besides, though citing the motto “killing 200,000 people in exchange for 20 years of stability” from communist China’s paramount leader Deng Xiaoping might sound inhumane, I have no doubt that Beijing could send a chill down all Hongkongers’ spine, and do whatever she thinks necessary, including a crackdown like the suppression of 1989 Tiananmen protests.

Hongkongers might not fully understand the true nature of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) until quite recently. The Basic Law, Hong Kong’s mini constitution, had protected us well for nearly 23 years until the CCP wanted to conquer and master the city. It was almost a wake-up call for Hongkongers over the last 12 months that the non-democratically elected CCP could do a lot of harm locally and regionally beyond everyone’s imagination. It might catch some people by surprise now that it is “the party”, the CCP, that represents China, but not its own people.

To Hongkongers, when they witness massive arrests of pro-democracy activists, politicians and business leaders all over a short period of time, it is ominous: the totalitarian regime is trying to find an excuse under the sun to freeze your assets; a political purge is now taking place.

It is SOS time: the final days of Hong Kong is now, and the government is making any excuse to crush the opposition with the convenience provided by the NSL. In the meantime, the massive arrests of “political enemies” in Hong Kong just show us that communist China cannot tolerate those who cannot be subdued. There has been no healing process for the social unrests of last year. Under the NSL, one can easily be locked up before a court date is set, and in the cases over the last five months, defendants were denied bails.

Suddenly, a new generation of “political prisoners” in Hong Kong has evolved into a longlist of people across different age groups, which is getting even longer by the day. The fate of Hong Kong activists resembles that of those in mainland China: Liu Xiaobo, a renowned dissident and writer awarded the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize, was jailed multiple times and finally “died” in a hospital in Beijing; Li Wangyang, a labor rights activist, “committed suicide” in a hospital room in China. It makes a lot of Hong Kong people suddenly fear that the arrests, trials and sentencing could be unjust, and the prison terms could be on a par with those handed down by the mainland courts, if not harsher.

The poker-faced Chief Executive of Hong Kong, Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet Ngor, has recently professed on TV that she is a working machine “re-energized” to execute duties from Beijing. She has also said she doesn’t care about how Hongkongers think of her anymore. The CCP will definitely alter the existing political system of Hong Kong, especially now that all democratically elected pan-democratic legislators have been kicked out, and it is almost impossible for them to get back in. The year 2020 might have been the worst year for Hong Kong since the Handover in 1997.

The sense of helplessness is surreal for Hongkongers. CCP’s hostility towards Hongkongers will just get worse until most of the opposition is suppressed. The “rewriting” of Hong Kong history is happening now, and the education sector, medical and the judicial system are under duress.

With the recent arrests of media tycoon Jimmy Lai, and former legislator Ted Hui going into exile, Hongkongers need to be acutely aware of their personal safety and the security of their financial assets. Though Beijing’s unprecedented crackdown on human rights defenders might look more and more similar across Hong Kong, Tibet and Xinjiang, the high-profile suppression in Hong Kong will come at a “greater price” for China. The “crucifixion” of Hong Kong people’s freedoms will get more ruthless, as the CCP is taking further control of Hong Kong by any humanly possible means.

The international community has now witnessed first-hand that Hong Kong is on the receiving end of a dictatorship. For the younger generation of Hongkongers, they have confronted the political aggression by the CCP over a months-long battle in 2019. Now, Hongkongers are on an “escape route” trying to settle down in a new place before options run out. It might not be that obvious for the outside world to see the seriousness and consequence of this “sneak invasion”. For those young Hong Kong activists and disqualified legislators who are already in exile, calling for help and hoping the conscience of the world will stand with the people of Hong Kong have become second nature to them

(Edward Chin (錢志健) runs a family office. Chin was formerly Country Head of a UK publicly listed hedge fund, the largest of its kind measured by asset under management. Outside the hedge funds space, Chin is Convenor of 2047 Hong Kong Monitor and a Senior Advisor of Reporters Without Borders (RSF, HK & Macau). Chin studied speech communication at the University of Minnesota, and received his MBA from the University of Toronto. Twitter: edwardckchin Youtube: Ed Chin Channel Facebook.com/edckchin Email: [email protected])

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