An examination of textbooks has caused a fierce debate on “separation of powers”. Some take it as a war of words that is time-consuming, which however misleads the public into thinking that it is just a controversy over use of words and conceptions. Just by looking at judges coming under attacks from party-owned media and the leftists in Hong Kong, a person of good sense would know all this is a duplicate “Cultural Revolution” targeted at Hong Kong’s judiciary. Now that the bad apples have been ferreted out from the education realm and the media industry where the revolutionary red flag is being held high and the rectification campaign is being conducted like wildfire, the next target will be the judiciary institution.

Elizabeth Quat and Holden Chow Ho Ding, LegCo members from the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong, cited an anonymous letter that says Albert Wong Sung Hau, Judge of the High Court, warned blue-ribbon magistrates to speak carefully. The duo alleged that though they do not know whether the accusation is true, the letter content worries the society. They also called for Geoffrey Ma Tao Li, Chief Justice of the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal, to give an account for it. Later on, the judiciary institution issued a statement declaring the saying in the letter is not true. Rocking the boat with anonymous letters is already a common practice in the education realm. Kevin Yeung Yun Hung, Secretary for Education, has openly stated early on that more than 200 teachers are embroiled in complaints about professional misconduct related to the anti-extradition bill amendment incident, which lasted for more than a year. He also said the authority would seriously handle complaints about the unprofessional teachers, and would consider revoking registrations of teachers involved in serious cases. What he did not mention is most of the cases originate from anonymous letters.

Magistrate Ho Chun Yiu, also accused by Elizabeth Quat and Holden Chow of making biased adjudications in anti-extradition cases, has been transferred to the High Court as a criminal listing judge - in other words an admin role staying away from criminal trials - responsible for scheduling dates for hearings of criminal cases at the Court of First Instance. By and large, recently all the judges accused of “letting go of rioters” have been attacked by name, in which Carrie Lam, Geoffrey Ma and Secretary for Justice Teresa Cheng Yeuk Wah acquiesce. While the situation is getting insane, it is clear now the objective of bringing up collaboration of the three powers is not to stir up a debate on western democratic values or definition of “one country, two systems”, but to call for the judiciary to tie in with “severe crackdown and abuse of prosecution”. The defendants charged with breaching the National Security Law are not yet tried. As to Tam Tak Chi being indicted for using seditious words pursuant to an ancient rusty law, it is also pivotal as one more evil law will be back to life, if he is convicted.

The regime has always fantasized about making Hong Kong a replica of Singapore, holding the view that it is good for Hong Kong, too liberal now, to become Singapore, which has the stringent Internal Security Law, and judges being accommodating in their rulings in line with instructions given by the People’s Action Party, as well as the civil law and commercial law complying with the common law principles, which is appealing to investments from around the globe. Isn’t it perfect? However, they have forgotten Singapore is a sovereign state ruled by the Li dynasty, to which the judiciary readily submits for giving consideration more or less to national interests. Hong Kong is a totally different story. The reason why foreign investments stay with the country under the autocracy is not national security, stability or social order, but the country actually being one of the allies of the U.S., responsible for keeping guard over the waterways across the Strait of Malacca. If the U.S. had never treated Singapore as a country on its own side, no foreign capitals would have stayed on, regardless of the scale of despotic power and the Internal Security Law. To put the horse before the cart, those who are daydreaming about turning Hong Kong into Singapore are simply dim-witted and ignorant.

Going down the line like this, Hong Kong is in fact on the way to “Lam Chau”(mutually-assured destruction). The Chinese Communist Party tries to subdue Hong Kongers into submission, which results in a whole lot of disasters coming one after another. The international community is unable to shun a fact: “One country, two systems” in Hong Kong has ended. In the past, when political maneuvring was still behind the curtain, governments of western countries could still look the other way. But now with a request for collaboration of the three powers taking centre stage, are the headquarters of foreign investments that are getting prepared for drawing off the ones to blame? If Hong Kong became Singapore, why would foreign investments lodge with a knockoff of Singapore instead of moving to a genuine Singapore?

(Lau Sai Leung, commentator)

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