By Li Ping

As the Wuhan Virus continues its rampage in Hong Kong, there are more clusters of infection in group hangouts and within buildings. People’s lives lack security and they are even living in fear. The virus, like excessive arrest, is beyond one’s control. However, Carrie Lam is neither ashamed of how slow she is to react to all these waves of outbreaks, nor is she thinking about how the people are suffering. Instead, she has her head deep in the game of CCP bootlicking, bragging about her own political achievements and self-congratulations. During the last wave of the outbreak, Hong Kong banned nighttime indoor dining for 36 days. The reaction to this wave of the epidemic was even slower than the last. How much longer do the people have to suffer?

In July of this year, the Carrie Lam government disregarded the advice from experts and allowed seafarers to be exempt from quarantine when entering the city, and from there came the third wave of outbreak. On July 13, the confirmed cases were more than 50 for the first time. After two days, the government took advice from experts and implemented the indoor nighttime dining ban. However, the government extended the dine-in ban to the entire day on July 29, requiring workers to eat on the streets despite sun and rain. Within two days of implementation, it was reverted back to only a ban on nighttime indoor dining, which was not lifted until August 28, a period of 36 days.

Since the outbreak of the fourth wave of the epidemic, the experts have been repeatedly calling for the resumption of the strict epidemic preventive measures in July. However, the Carrie Lam government is only too eager to push Return2hk and restore customs clearance between China and Hong Kong, and cannot wait to prove that Hong Kong has resumed normal life and economic activities. Since November 22, the daily new cases have exceeded 60, but the government has ignored the number of restaurants emerging earlier that required strict compulsory quarantine. It was not until yesterday, 17 days later, that the nighttime dine-in ban was implemented again. With the government being so slow to react, coupled with the epidemic fatigue of the people, the fourth wave of the outbreak will be hard to control. It looks like the nighttime indoor dining ban will continue through Christmas and into the New Year.

Hong Kong’s economy has been hit hard, to an extent where people are almost deprived of their livelihood. However, while the Lam Cheng government has been claiming that it has no financial resources to continue to support workers, and can no longer introduce another job protection scheme, it was not only allocated HK$550 million (US$71 million), with the approval by the Legislative Council, for the preliminary study of Lantau Tomorrow, but also additional funding of HK$62.6 billion (US$8 billion) the day before yesterday, which included HK$3 billion (US$387 million) for the police force. No money for job guarantees, but money to flush down the toilet. Lantau Tomorrow and the police force could ask for money anytime they want. Since the disqualifications of the pro-democracy legislators and turning the Legislative Council into a rubber stamp, the government can go on a spending spree and take the anti-epidemic fund wherever it wants to. That is exactly what Carrie Lam described in her wish to allow the government officials “to live and work in peace”.

In public and during interviews, Carrie Lam has even become more persistent in defending the CCP’s forceful implementation of the Hong Kong National Security Law while painting the false image of Hong Kong returning to a non-violent, stable society. This is the most common trick of self-commendation and self-bootlicking in the CCP’s playbook. The CCP has always stressed that its three major styles of operating are combining theory with practice, closeness with the masses, and criticism and self-introspection. In reality, however, the hidden rules of officialdom are simply fusing theory with practical benefits, closeness with leadership, and praise and self-commendation. Carrie Lam has learned and internalized these very well, and therefore has been thanking the party and the country all the time, as well as mentioning always that she was the one who suggested for the central government to implement the Hong Kong national security law and to disqualify the pro-democracy legislators.

And yet, comparing the current Wuhan Virus-stricken Hong Kong to last year’s anti-extradition bill movement, is it really more of an international financial center now? Have the citizens really lived and worked in peace? Carrie Lam has used the dirty authority of the national security law to suppress parliamentary protest, street protest, international protest, and put up a false façade of peace and stability in Hong Kong. It is in effect a futile attempt to solve the problem.

Moreover, the Carrie Lam government used the epidemic as an excuse to cancel the September LegCo election, the gathering ban as an excuse to oppose protests and demonstrations, and the violation of the gathering ban to carry out the arbitrary and excessive arrest and charges of protesters. These are all attempts to conceal the reality that the national security law has deprived Hong Kong of democracy, freedom, and human rights. How is the international community going to trust her government? On the one hand, those pro-CCP politicians have given their full support to the Carrie Lam administration’s refusal to close the borders, and going after the medical professional who went on strike to demand for the border closer, and on the other hand, they have demanded the Carrie Lam administration to implement the dine-in ban ignoring the law and evidence, people’s livelihood, and the guarantee of life.

The Carrie Lam administration and the pro-CCP politicians have been indecisive and opportunistic in the epidemic fight and suppression of the protest, adding a layer of politics to the experts’ advice and suggestions on epidemic preventive measures. Their credibility is depleting quickly, and more people are frustrated with the autocratic regime, leading to distrust and non-cooperation. The politicization of the epidemic has made Hong Kong’s future epidemic fight miserable. What is even more disappointing is that with the fourth wave of the Wuhan Virus, we trust that as long as the citizens work together to fight it, it will eventually be over; yet no matter how Hongkongers resist and fight, democracy and freedom are still nowhere to be seen.

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