During the years before the handover in 1997, there were two topics which aroused the most political disputes. One was the future of the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Movements in China (Alliance). To handle this, communist China proposed that the “river water” and “well water” should not intrude each other, which means the Alliance’s activities would be accepted within the city but not in the other parts of China. The second issue was the “through train” qualification of the Legislative Council (LegCo) members, which involved the controversy whether communist China had the power to examine and approve which lawmakers elected in 1995 could retain their seats after 1997. As things unfolded, this proved to be really sticky, as Chris Patten, the Governor of Hong Kong at that time, insisted to implement political reform in 1995 without reaching a consensus with Beijing, and refused to acknowledge communist China the right to disqualify any lawmakers so elected. Lu Ping, the respective Beijing official, counteracted by “setting up another stove”, which literally means starting things from scratch. Beijing then assembled its own provisional LegCo in Shenzhen, disqualifying all lawmakers elected in 1995 and appointing a new group of its own. These are all history indeed, but it is worth noticing that the advisers behind Lu back then were two recently active guys called Lau Siu-kai and Zhang Xiao-ming.

While interviewed by Ming Pao recently, Lau has derived new idea from the Article 31 of the Constitution of the People’s Republic of China, suggesting that the systems in Hong Kong are regulated by the People’s National Congress, which boasts the power to amend it in case the city is in serious unrest or puts the security of the state in jeopardy. Furthermore, he pointed out that if the pro-democracy camp wins 35+ seats in the September election and thereby dominates the LegCo, this will be taken by Beijing as the Hong Kong people’s endorsement of the “mutual destruction” approach, turning the city into a threat to the security of the state and a bridgehead of foreign interference. He claimed that the central government would not tolerate such a scenario and it would ban related candidates from the upcoming election or disqualify those elected ones afterwards.

So, it is the same old trick of the aforementioned “through train” case. What’s new is that this time the act of disqualification is justified by the offense of “mutual destruction”, an accusation vague enough to be imposed on everything, ranging from voting against the budget to wining 35+ seats in the election. In fact, the messages from Zhang and Lau have come through loud and clear. First, Zhang has recently revealed that the national security law is going to pinpoint not just a few. It will be applicable to the negative media coverages on China, obstruction of propaganda education and even resistance to the Greater Bay Area integration. All these will be concluded as provocation of political conflicts, with the objective of subverting the rule of the communist party. To reinforce this, Lau has indicated that Beijing is ready to disqualify whoever stirs up confrontation in the legislature.

Perhaps it is hard for us to understand the grudge of Zhang and Lau. To them, the pro-democracy camp and the Alliance should have been got rid of 30 years ago. They were made disappointed as communist China chose to allow the commemoration of the June 4 Incident in Hong Kong, and the provisional LegCo had given way to a new election after just a year. They might think the opposition camp has not only failed to appreciate Beijing’s “good will” during the handover, but also pushed even further in the Protest Against Article 23 Legislation in 2003 and the Umbrella Movement in 2014. Probably only when communist China abolishes the “one country, two systems” and asserts direct rule to Hong Kong will they finally find a relief to their age-long grievances. However, bad news to Zhang and Lau, this is still far from happening, simply because Beijing can’t afford it.

In fact, if Hong Kong had not had its unique value to communist China, the latter would have already arrested the whole opposition camp. Bloomberg has just disclosed that Beijing has actually worked in behind to persuade the British CEO of Hong Kong’s Securities and Futures Commission to stay on. At a time when “foreign interference” is of much concern, why is Beijing so eager to keep a foreigner in control of the crucial machine that generates USD foreign exchange? The answer is indeed simple and clear: “You need to make sure you don’t kill the goose that lays the golden eggs”.

(Lau Sai Leung is a political commentator based in Hong Kong and a former full-time member of the HKSAR Central Policy Unit.)

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