(Oriental Daily with video) October 30, 2016.

Today RTHK City Forum discussed the subject of the Chief Executive election. During the break, a man wearing a Defend Hong Kong Movement cap criticized Legislative Councilor Lau Siu-lai for her oath of office and then took off his shoe to throw at her. Afterwards, Lau said that she was not injured but the action was an assault. She asked the police be summoned. When the police came, Lau said that she was hit in the arm and chest, and requested a medical examination at the hospital.

Defend Hong Kong Movement founder Fu Chun-chung said that the man was not a member of their organization. He said that since Lau Siu-lai advocated the throwing of bricks, she deserved what she got this time. The program host said that people have thrown water bottles at guests before and that this is not the right way to express an opinion. The host asked the RTHK workers to expel the man. However, others present said that the police should be called.

Videos:

TVB http://news.tvb.com/local/5815cbf06db28ca443334640/ Shoe throwing incident.

Cable TV https://www.facebook.com/bbtauseeworld/videos/555434897987225/ Shoe throwing incident.

Oriental Daily https://www.facebook.com/bbtauseeworld/videos/555417027989012/ Man escorted away afterwards

Internet comments:

- (Wikipedia) Bush shoeing incident

During a December 14, 2008, press conference at the prime minister's palace in Baghdad, Iraq, Iraqi journalist Muntadhar al-Zaidi threw both of his shoes at then-United States President George W. Bush.

"This is a farewell kiss from the Iraqi people, you dog," yelled al-Zaidi in Arabic as he threw his first shoe towards Bush. "This is for the widows and orphans and all those killed in Iraq," he shouted as he threw his second shoe.

Bush ducked twice to avoid being hit by the shoes. Prime Minister Maliki also attempted to catch one of the shoes to protect Bush. Al-Zaidi was pulled to the floor by another journalist, before being grabbed by Prime Minister Maliki's guards, kicked, and rushed out of the room.

Bush said some Iraqi reporters had apologized to him. "Thanks for apologizing on behalf of the Iraqi people. It doesn't bother me." Bush said, "If you want the facts, it's a size 10 shoe that he threw."

When asked about the incident by another reporter, Bush said, "It's a way for people to draw attention. I don't know what the guy's cause was. I didn't feel the least bit threatened by it."

On March 12, 2009, al-Zaidi was sentenced to three years in prison for assaulting a foreign head of state during an official visit.

Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OM3Z_Kskl_U

- (RTHK) Lau Siu-lai said that she called the police because she did not want to see people getting injured in open forums for bringing up subjects that citizens regularly discussed.  She said that this would seriously hurt freedom of expression.

Lau also said that physical violence is nothing compared to the deprivation of human rights and perversion of justice at the Legislative Council. She said that we should reflect deeply about just who is making people become so irrational.

- What would Lau Siu-lai say if someone threw a shoe at Chief Executive CY Leung? She would say that CY Leung should go home and seriously reflect on his unpopularity because people throw objects at him everywhere that he goes.

- Previously, Lai Siu-wai emphasized that while she is not advocating using violent resistance, many different methods of resistance are necessary in Hong Kong today. She said that in the cases of the Restore Sheung Shui actions and the Lunar New Year's Day incident in Mongkok, citizens should understand the meaning behind the brick-throwing and pushing-and-shoving.

- Previously, the Victoria Park grandpas only used some foul curses occasionally. After Occupy Central, they have progressed to throwing shoes. From whom did they learn to be so irrational and violent?

- The standard Yellow Ribbon argument is that if you cannot talk reason to get what you want, you use violence against the system.

- Why is the Legislative Council in such a mess? We don't have to reflect much deeply because it must surely due to stupid acts such as Lau Siu-lai saying her oath of office with 6 seconds between words.

- When this sort of thing happens, we must do something to express our disapproval of violence in our society. How so? We need to donate more money more frequently to Lau Siu-wai.

- If throwing bricks is right, then how can throwing shoes be wrong?

- "Teacher" Lau Siu-lai's basic civic lesson:
Throwing a brick = public justice
Throwing a shoe = violence

- At least, this guy did it in front of the television cameras without wearing a mask. He is a genuine folk hero.

- He will present in mitigation the usual letters from his elementary school principal and classmates.

- And there is always the Raymond Wong defense:

-- There is no concrete evidence that the defendant intentionally launched an assault.
-- The situation was chaotic, so there is reasonable doubt as to whether this was an accident or not.
-- There is no evidence that the defendant did not slip while adjusting his shoe and thus the shoe flew out of his hand in the direction of Lau Siu-lai.
-- The defendant suffers from a mild case of mental retardation and therefore cannot be legally held responsible for his actions.
-- While the defendant adamantly refuses to plead guilty, he is sorry that this happened.
-- The defendant did not benefit personally; he did everything for the sake of public justice.
-- There is reasonable cause to think that the defendant acted in a moment of rashness.
-- A jail term serves no purpose for a senior citizen who is unlikely to be a recidivist.
-- A jail term will not serve as a deterrent to other possible offenders; rather it will undermine faith in the justice system because of the lenient non-jail sentences handed in previous cases against Yellow Ribbons.

- This man is not suffering from the usual Yellow Ribbon "mild mental retardation." He is suffering from Alzheimer's Disease. The prison guards are not going to appreciate sending him to prison, because of all the additional care that will be required.

- Chief Executive candidate Woo Kwok-hing said that he would have joined Occupy Central if it happened 50 years ago. Thus Woo would heartily approve of this bold act of civil disobedience.

- Forgotten is exactly what Lau Siu-lai said to trigger the man to take off his shoe and throw it at her.

- ( Facebook) This is fantastic publicity for Lau Siu-lai just when it seemed that Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching were hogging all the Page A1 headlines. She began by saying that CY Leung started the Hong Kong independence movement. Then she went on to say that all the candidates for Chief Executive are puppets for somebody or the other, and she would only vote for someone who promises to start a "constitutional crisis."

- Lau Siu-lai entered the Legislative Council in order to help the weak and vulnerable elements of society, such as unlicensed itinerant hawkers, homeless people, etc. Right now, she is going after a senior citizen because she can.

- The Tall Wall is Legislative Councilor Lau Siu-lai with a monthly salary of $95,180. The Egg is the male senior citizen. Whose side are you on?

- The meaning behind this bold act of civil disobedience is that this citizen was upset at Lau Siu-lai, Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching for insulting the Basic Law, the Legislative Council and its oath of office, the people of Hong Kong and all persons of Chinese descent. However, these three appear not to have suffer any adverse consequences. When the legal system fails to deliver justice, the citizens have to take matters into their own hands.

Seriously, the guy threw a blue New Balance shoe. This shoe was Made In Amerika; it is not a cheap, inferior copycat Li Ning made-in-China shoe.

- And there is the obvious comment: When you want the police, they are Police Uncles; when you don't want the police, they are Police Canines.

- Of all the things that he could have thrown (such as water bottles, bricks, rotten eggs, tomatoes, bananas, dog feces, pig intestines, paper airplanes, keys, marbles, etc), why did he choose a shoe? It must be for cultural and religious reasons:

(CNN)

The act of throwing a shoe at someone or showing them your sole is "incredibly offensive" in the Middle East, he said. "The bottom line is a shoe is dirt," CNN producer Mohammed Tawfeeq said. "Throwing a shoe on someone means throwing dirt on that person."

Professor Faegheh Shirazi, with Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Texas, agreed, saying it is offensive "regardless of the religious practices." "Throwing a shoe or hitting someone with a shoe or showing the bottom of your shoe when sitting with legs up on a chair and facing another person all are culturally unacceptable and are considered to be a grave insult and belittling to a person," Shirazi said.

Another offensive aspect is the significance of the shoe being a sign of wealth. "Most often, lower-status people and poor men could not wear shoes," Shirazi said. "The feet came in contact with pollution and the dirt on the road. The dirt on the feet indicated the lack of social status, the level of economic class and the level of education and lack of sophistication and intellect."

Tawfeeq, who occasionally visits the United States, was surprised to learn shoe throwing was not considered an offense in North America.

A search of literature reveals references suggesting the power of the shoe is ancient. For example, in the King James Version of the Old Testament, Psalm 60:8 says: "Moab is my washpot; over Edom will I cast out my shoe: Philistia, triumph thou because of me."

"Perhaps it has to do with the hierarchy of the body position, that is, the relationship between the head and the feet, the head being at the top and not touching the ground and the dirt," Shirazi said. "The head carries a more prestigious status in comparison to the feet, which in older times mostly remained bare."

- I doubt that this perpetrator is from the Middle East. More likely, he is a local Hongkonger who knows the homonym: "臭鞋掟臭蟹" (throw a stinking shoe at a stinking (c-word)).

- Look at the man and his beard. Read What Islam says about the Beard.

- In common law legal systems, a precedent, or authority, is a principle or rule established in a previous legal case that is either binding on or persuasive for a court or other tribunal when deciding subsequent cases with similar issues or facts. So what is the likely sentence for the man who threw the shoe at Lau Siu-lai? 12 months of probation? 80 hours of community service? 30 months in jail?

- If Raymond Wong got 2 weeks for throwing (and missing with) a glass cup at the Chief Executive, this guy should get 36 months in prison based upon that precedent.

- (Oriental Daily) November 1, 2016. Lau Siu-lai said that if she and Yau Wai-ching/Leung Chung-hang are not sworn in, then there would be a 16-16 split in the geographical constituency of the Legislative Council. Therefore she said that she needs to be sworn in immediately in order to maintain the majority.

Meanwhile counter-demonstrators want her sent to prison for making a false oath as well as being the instigator of the Fishball Riot.

- (Hong Kong Free Press) April 26, 2017.

A pro-Beijing protester has been handed a suspended jail sentence for throwing a shoe at pro-democracy lawmaker Lau Siu-lai during a televised forum last October.

61-year-old Wong Tai-hong pleaded guilty to a count of common assault at the Eastern Magistrates Court on Wednesday. He was handed a suspended sentence of two weeks in prison.

Apple Daily reported that he had criminal background of violence, and is currently unemployed.

Wong told the court he was unhappy that Lau only complained about the country and the government without reflecting on herself, but realised what he did was wrong.

- (Apple Daily) Wong Tai-hong, age 61, unemployed, living off social welfare, three sons and three daughters, unable to pay any fines and thus requested a suspended sentence, prior record related to violence (unspecified).

- (The Guardian) May 7, 2009.

In the article below about the trial of Muntazer al-Zaidi, who was convicted of assaulting a foreign head of state after he threw a shoe at George W Bush, we conflated two court hearings held three weeks apart. Zaidi did not tell the court on 12 March: "I saw only Bush and it was like something black in my eyes." Nor did he say at that hearing: "I had the feeling that the blood of innocent people was dropping on my feet during the time that he was smiling and saying bye-bye to Iraq with a dinner." He made these statements at an earlier hearing, on 18 February. The quotes first appeared in an Agence France-Presse story.

Dressed in an old beige suit, with dark rings under his eyes, and a five o'clock shadow, Muntazer al-Zaidi looked more hard-pressed journalist than Arab folk hero as he entered Baghdad's central criminal court yesterday morning to face charges of assaulting a foreign head of state, namely one George W Bush.

The last time the man universally known as "the shoe thrower" appeared in court, three weeks ago, he sported a scarf in the colours of the Iraqi flag and put on a bravura performance, telling of his outrage and uncontrollable emotions when Bush spoke at a news conference on his farewell trip to Iraq. Yesterday, he was mostly subdued. It wasn't until the judge handed down the sentence - three years in a prison - that he burst into life, though his shoes stayed firmly on his feet. "Long live Iraq!" he shouted before being led away by a heavy security detail.

Throughout the brief proceedings Zaidi seemed all too aware that he could face up to 15 years in jail. Standing in the wooden pen, sweating, before a panel of three judges he glanced nervously into the packed observers' gallery, apparently seeking out family and friends.

Kicking off proceedings, the presiding judge Abdulemir Hassan al-Rubaie asked Zaidi whether he was innocent or guilty. "I am innocent," came the reply from the 30-year-old reporter. "What I did was a natural response to the occupation." This electrified the court. Relatives began to protest his innocence and urge the judge to show clemency. Twice, Rubaie called for calm, before threatening any miscreants with expulsion.

Hands trembling, and speaking rather breathlessly, Zaidi began to restate his defence. He had not "intended to kill Bush or humiliate him" with his shoes, he said. When he saw "the occupiers' president" smiling, "I saw only Bush and it was like something black in my eyes". He added: "I had the feeling that the blood of innocent people was dropping on my feet during the time that he was smiling and saying bye-bye to Iraq with a dinner [with the Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki]."

Zaidi's trial had begun on 19 February but was adjourned until yesterday as the judges considered a defence argument that the charge was not applicable because Bush was not in Baghdad on an official visit, having arrived unannounced without an invitation. Rubaie read a response from Maliki's office that said the visit had been official. Thus Zaidi would be tried under article 223 of the Iraqi penal code - dating from the Saddam era - which outlaws assaults on foreign leaders.

The chief defence lawyer, Dhia al-Saadi, demanded the charge be dismissed, saying that the case was one of insult not assault. His client's action "was an expression of freedom and does not constitute a crime". "It was an act of throwing a shoe and not a rocket," he said. "It was meant as an insult to the occupation."

Saadi cited the immediate reaction of the target of Zaidi's flying shoes, President Bush, as evidence of the lightness of the offence. After ducking behind a lectern, Bush had joked that he believed Zaidi wore a size 10, and added: "That's what people do in a free society, draw attention to themselves." He had not felt "in the least bit threatened", Bush had said. It was all to no avail.

After a 15-minute adjudication period, the court was cleared of all spectators, and Zaidi was handed a three-year prison sentence. His relatives erupted in anger, shouting that the decision was unjust and unfair. Some collapsed and had to be helped from the court. Others were forcibly removed by security forces as they shouted "down with Bush" and "long live Iraq".

"This judiciary is not just," Zaidi's brother Dargham said. Another brother, Uday, said the verdict was politically motivated. The journalist's sister, Ruqaiya, burst into tears, shouting: "Down with Maliki, the agent of the Americans." Zaidi's lawyers said he would appeal against the sentence.

If the Iraqi authorities were hoping to draw a line under the affair they are probably in for a shock. While some Iraqi officials regarded Zaidi's actions as an insult to the Iraqi state and he was criticised by fellow Iraqi journalists, who said he had allowed his emotions to overcome his professionalism, many ordinary Iraqis said he had already served his punishment and should be released. A poll released yesterday, commissioned by ABC News and the BBC, suggested 62% of Iraqis regard the shoe-thrower as a hero.

(SCMP) October 25, 2016.

The Legislative Council president reversed an earlier decision on Tuesday and deferred the swearing-in of two localists who insulted China in their initial oaths, prompting the pair to threaten to force their way into the chamber on Wednesday.

Andrew Leung Kwan-yuen said for now he had to take the painful but necessary step to ban the Youngspiration duo from retaking their vows, even as the Chief Executive Leung Chun-yings lawyers toughened their legal action by asking the court to declare their seats vacant. The move made late on Monday was an amendment to their original writ seeking a judicial review to challenge the right of the pair to take their oaths a second time.

Andrew Leung said administration of the oaths for Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching would be deferred until the Court of First Instance had ruled on the judicial review. The hearing is set for November 3

The Legco president would not say whether he would continue to wait if the court ruling was appealed. But he admitted he viewed with grave concern the threat of a boycott at all costs by the pro-government camp. The most probable outcome is that Legco will come to a complete halt if he let the duo retake their oaths, he said.

His decision came hours after the chief executive warned of far-reaching repercussions on how Beijing viewed Hong Kong and its relations with the mainland if the matter was not rectified. Leung said he also had to consider his duty outlined in Article 72(2) of the Basic Law on the Legco president having the power to decide the councils agenda. Having considered the Basic Law, the rules of procedure and the impact on Legco operations and on the individual lawmakers, I came to the conclusion that I have justifiable grounds to defer the administration of oaths until the court has a ruling on the judicial review, he said.

The Legco presidents lawyer argued in court last week that banning the Youngspiration pair from retaking the oath would seriously deprive them of constitutional rights. Leung denied succumbing to political pressure and denied contacting Beijings liaison office in Hong Kong, saying he only made different decisions at different times.

On Tuesday, the Youngspiration pair slammed the president for what they called a ridiculous reversal of his earlier decision. They vowed to enter the chamber today through legal means. I will be here at the chamber at 11am sharp tomorrow, Baggio Leung said. I will ask the president to let me take the oath right there on the spot. He has no power to stop me. Asked whether they would take legal action against the president, the localist said: I have had considerable reservations about the governments legal action against us [and the legislature]. I dont want to commit the same mistake.

(Hong Kong Free Press) October 25, 2016.

Two democratically-elected localist politicians who are set to be barred from attending a Legislative Council meeting on Wednesday have accused the Councils president of bowing to pressure. Both have vowed to do all in their power to enter the chamber to complete their oaths as lawmakers.

President Andrew Leung Kwan-yuen made a u-turn on Tuesday saying that a repeat swearing-in session for Youngspiration politicians Sixtus Baggio Leung Chun-hang and Yau Wai-ching will be deferred on Wednesday, until a legal challenge over the matter raised by the government has concluded. He said the pair will not be able to enter the chamber, as he has decided that their swearing-in will not be on the agenda.

But Baggio Leung said their first oaths which some deemed an insult to Chinese people were also challenged legally by in court when Andrew Leung decided last week that they could, in fact, take their oaths again.

Legally, I cannot see any new developments or new reasons that caused Andrew Leung to make a completely opposite decision, Baggio Leung said. This is no reason that the Chief Executives judicial review could change his decision, and a common citizen cant.

Baggio Leung said it was a political decision after the pro-Beijing vowed to walk out of council meetings to stop them from taking their oaths again. Andrew Leung said his u-turn was made after considering the continuous running of the LegCo.

As the LegCo president, he colluded with a certain camp to strip the constitutional rights of democratically-elected lawmakers, to give up the honour of the legislature, he said. I can say that he is not worthy of remaining as president.

Leung said he had submitted a written question for the government and an amendment to a debate for the meeting on Wednesday, therefore they will still walk into the chamber and cite the rules of procedure of LegCo to demand an opportunity to retake their oaths. Article 18(2) of the rules state that oath-taking is always the first item on the agenda of council meetings, and it does not require prior approval from the president.

Andrew Leung has no right to block us from entering the chamber, he said.

Baggio Leung compared their situation to the child in the story The Emperors New Clothes: Although to some people we may not have done something good, in the end you will understand our reasons I have no regrets.

Leung also warned that it is an offence to block lawmakers from attending LegCo meetings, and that LegCo security guards should not act illegally.

Citing Mr Justice Thomas Au Hing-cheung, Yau said Au rejected the governments bid for an interim injunction to bar them from retaking their oaths because if the government later lost the case the lawmakers constitutional rights would be stripped.

The presidents decision is a de-facto execution of the rejected injunction, she said. If our oath-taking is delayed because someone lodged a legal challenge against the presidents decision, does that mean a lawmakers oath-taking would have to be delayed if I find someone to lodge a judicial review?

Its our responsibility to finish our oaths and enter the chamber, so we will use all methods that we can think of, she said.

(SCMP) October 27, 2016.

Hong Kongs Legislative Council was thrown into tumult yet again on Wednesday with a meeting adjourned for the second time in three weeks, as two localist lawmakers barred from attending stormed into the chamber with the help of other pan-democrats.

As the finger-pointing between pan-democrats and pro-establishment legislators continued, Legco appeared on course for further paralysis for at least another week or two after the Youngspiration pair vowed to repeat their tactics at another meeting next Wednesday.

The latest descent into chaos came a day after Legco president Andrew Leung Kwan-yuen made a dramatic U-turn to defer the second oaths of Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching who used insulting language towards China in their initial swearing-in pending a court ruling on a judicial review filed by the government. The administration earlier mounted an unprecedented legal challenge against the presidents initial decision to give the pair a second chance.

The Legco president also banned the duo from entering the chamber on Wednesday, to no avail.

As a feisty rally of more than 8,000 participants got under way outside against the duos antics, a dramatic showdown ensued inside as eight pan-democrats formed a human chain to escort the pair into the chamber.

Convene the meeting now. Administer the oath following the law, the pro-democracy lawmakers chanted.

Civic Passions Cheng Chung-tai left his seat amid the protest and refused to leave the chamber despite an order by Andrew Leung to do so.

Unable to control the situation, the Legco president announced an adjournment, shortly after a temporary suspension failed to force the pair, who sat stony-faced, to vacate their seats.

I already announced the decision [on Tuesday] to delay the oath-taking process of the two lawmakers, and they have refused to leave even upon my order, said Leung, who said he regretted the development. I have no choice but to adjourn the meeting as order could not be restored.

It was the second adjournment in just two weeks of the new Legco session since legislators were returned in elections last month. Last Wednesday, the pro-establishment camp staged a walkout to block the two localists from retaking their oaths, spurring Andrew Leung to abort the meeting due to a lack of quorum.

Both sides continued to blame each other on Wednesday for causing further delays to legislative affairs.

We must not let the [Legco] president and the pro-establishment camp evade all legal bases in their deeds, said Demosisto lawmaker Nathan Law Kwun-chung.

Civic Party lawmaker Alvin Yeung Ngok-kiu said the chaos stemmed from the pro-establishment camps threat of a walkout. But New Peoples Party lawmaker Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee laid the blame on the pan-democrats.

People might have different takes on the rules of procedure, but they should respect the final ruling of the president, she said.

Ip also said she believed the meeting next Wednesday, which will be held a day before the Court of First Instance convenes its first hearing on the governments application for a judicial review, would face the same fate.

Outside the legislature thousands of angry protesters, many belonging to groups in Hong Kong representing different Chinese cities and provinces, demanded the resignation of Sixtus Leung and Yau, who in their oaths referred to China as Chee-na, a variation of the derogatory term Shina used by Japan during the second world war.

Protest organiser Stanley Ng Chau-pei estimated more than 10,000 people came out.

It showed many do not support Leung and Yau, Ng, of the Federation of Trade Unions, said. There is no place in Legco for those who insult Chinese people.

(SCMP) October 26, 2016.

Thousands of protesters, politicians and community and business leaders occupied the public square outside the Legislative Council complex yesterday to condemn two Youngspiration lawmakers for anti-Chinese slurs during their members oaths.

Chinese flags and banners branding the pair traitors and scum fringed the pavements leading to the entrance of the Admiralty building. Coachloads of protesters mostly old people descended, while others flooded in from the nearby MTR station, waving placards with slogans demanding Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching be thrown out of the Legco.

The organisers a group of 25 pro-Beijing parties and community and business groups calling itself the Anti-China-Insulting, Anti-Hong Kong Independence Alliance said more than 10,000 people joined it. Police estimated the crowd peaked at 8,720.

During their Legco pledges on October 12, Leung and Yau swore allegiance to the Hong Kong nation and pronounced China as Chee-na, similar to the derogatory Shina used by the Japanese during wartime. Despite outcry, the pair refused to apologise.

Emotions remained high throughout yesterdays rally as community leaders and politicians took turns to condemn the pair onstage. Among them was Hong Kong business magnate Allan Zeman, chairman of Lan Kwai Fong Holdings, who urged the crowds to say no to these two young people.

National Peoples Congress delegate Maria Tam Wai-chu also addressed the protesters and said: They were voted in by their voters, but did the voters expect them to say such derogatory things about the Chinese?

Also there were 20 representatives of the former guerrilla squads East River Column and Kowloon Independent Brigade, that fought Japanese troops during the second world war.

Kevin Ng, in his 40s, a company driver whose grandfather was a squad member, said: I think the two [localists] have gone too far. My grandfather fought for Hong Kong against the Japanese. I cant allow anyone to use dirty words to insult Chinese and Hongkongers.

Emerging from a sea of elderly protesters was former anti-Occupy student activist Ashley Tse Hiu-hung, 25, who said: I came because I want to tell Leung and Yau that they cant represent us young people.

Alliance spokesman Stanley Ng Chau-pei said: The huge turnout is solid proof of public discontent with Leung and Yau. They should be thrown out of Legco. There is no place in Legco for those who insult Chinese people.

In the evening, 50 supporters of the Youngspiration lawmakers staged a sit-in outside Legco to denounce what they called a trampling on separation of powers.

A number of pan-democrats, including Nathan Law Kwun-chung, of Demosisto, and Eddie Chu Hoi-dick also turned up.

Among those in the audience was Hung Siu-fai, 21, a physics student from the University of Science and Technology. She expressed reservations about the pairs behaviour during the oaths, but said: What I cant tolerate is the procedural violence of the pro-establishment camp.

Internet comments:

- Hong Kong Basic Law Article 72

The President of the Legislative Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region shall exercise the following powers and functions:

( 1 ) To preside over meetings;
( 2 ) To decide on the agenda, giving priority to government bills for inclusion in the agenda;
( 3 ) To decide on the time of meetings;
( 4 ) To call special sessions during the recess;
( 5 ) To call emergency sessions on the request of the Chief Executive; and
( 6 ) To exercise other powers and functions as prescribed in the rules of procedure of the Legislative Council.

- CAP 2501 Rules of Procedure of the Legislative Council of the Hong Kong Special Administration Region

Part C: Arrangement of Business
Rule 18: Order of Business at a Meeting

(1) The business of each meeting other than a meeting under Rule 8 (Attendance of the Chief Executive) or Rule 13 (The Chief Executive's Policy Address), or the first meeting of a term or a meeting to elect the President shall be transacted in the following order:

(a) Administration of oath or affirmation.
(b) Obituary and other ceremonial speeches.
(c) Reading by the President of messages and announcements by the President.
(d) Presentation of petitions.
(e) Laying on the Table of papers and of reports of committees.
(f) Asking and answering of questions put to the Government.
(g) Statements by designated public officers.
(h) Personal explanations.
(i) Government bills.
(j) Government motions other than those specified in paragraph (ja). (L.N. 245 of 2009)
(ja) Government motions on subsidiary legislation and other instruments made under an Ordinance. (L.N. 245 of 2009)
(jb) Members' motions on subsidiary legislation and other instruments made under an Ordinance. (L.N. 245 of 2009)
(k) Members' bills.
(l) Members' motions other than those specified in paragraph (jb). (L.N. 245 of 2009)
(m) Requests for leave under Rule 89 (Procedure for Obtaining Leave for Member to Attend as Witness in Civil Proceedings) and Rule 90 (Procedure for Obtaining Leave to Give Evidence of Council Proceedings).
(n) Proceedings under Rule 16(4) (Motions for the Adjournment of the Council).

(2) The items of business mentioned in paragraphs (a), (b), (c), (d), (e), (g) and (h) of subrule (1) shall not require notice; but with the exception of items (a) and (c) they shall not be entered upon save with the previous leave of the President.

- (SCMP) Beijing just wont allow Hong Kong localist duo to take up their seats. By Michael Chugani. October 25, 2016.

Were very sorry. Please give us another chance. There, that wasnt too difficult, was it? Call it a pound of flesh, but that was what loyalist legislators had demanded for letting two independence advocates retake their oaths to become lawmakers.

An apology? Go to hell. That was essentially the retort from Yau Wai-ching and Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang. The Youngspiration pair didnt just refuse to express remorse for using an expletive and a derogatory name for China during their first oath-taking. They gave loyalists the middle finger by attending a localism seminar in Taiwan.

True grit or youthful pig-headedness? Whatever, but the salient point is the two have signalled theyre unafraid of a political brawl. Their knuckle duster is the 19 per cent vote share independence and localist candidates won in last months Legislative Council elections.

But is vote share no matter how large any match for the might of Beijing? Is vote share a mitigating factor in a court fight? Brashness blinded the pair to such things when they swaggered into Legco for their oath-taking.

Sorry seems to be the hardest word. So sang Elton John. But it no longer matters. The apology window has closed. Loyalists now want two political corpses, not a pound of flesh.

They may well get their corpses. Legco president Andrew Leung Kwan-yuen has agreed to loyalist demands to delay the oath-taking. Opposition legislators have denounced the stalling tactics of the loyalists. Thats a bit rich, given the opposition not only invented but frequently uses such tactics.

Is Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying picking a fight in asking the court to disqualify the two as legislators? You bet. Furious opposition lawmakers say it abuses the separation of powers. But if Leung was wrong to involve the courts and loyalists were wrong to block the oath-retaking, then is the opposition saying the Youngspiration pair should pay no price?

What must infuriate Beijing is the oppositions doubletalk. They say the pairs behaviour was unacceptable yet insist they be allowed to retake their oaths instead of waiting a week or so for the court to consider the matter. This only fuels Beijings distrust of the opposition.

Baggio Leung and Yau were elected fair and square. They speak for many in our society. It would be a travesty of democracy to deny them their seats. But their theatrics reopened a wartime wound the Japanese inflicted on the dignity of the Chinese people. I just cant see Beijing letting them into Legco.

- Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching said that they will use "all methods that we can think of" to crash the Legco meeting and get sworn in. So let's keep a score these particular rules of procedure:

- CAP 2501 Rules of Procedure of the Legislative Council of the Hong Kong Special Administration Region

Rule 39: Interruptions:

A Member shall not interrupt another Member, except-

(a) by rising to a point of order, when the Member speaking shall resume his seat and the Member interrupting shall direct attention to the point which he wishes to bring to notice and submit it to the President or Chairman for decision; or

(b) to seek elucidation of some matter raised by that Member in the course of his speech, if the Member speaking is willing to give way and resume his seat and the Member wishing to interrupt is called by the President or Chairman.

Rule 41: Content of speeches

(1) A Member shall restrict his observations to the subject under discussion and shall not introduce matter irrelevant to that subject.

(2) Reference shall not be made to a case pending in a court of law in such a way as, in the opinion of the President or Chairman, might prejudice that case.

(3) Except as otherwise provided in Rule 66 (Bills Returned for Reconsideration), it shall be out of order to attempt to reconsider a specific question on which the Council has taken a decision during the session, except in debate on a motion to rescind that decision moved with the permission of the President.

(4) It shall be out of order to use offensive and insulting language about Members of the Council.

(5) A Member shall not impute improper motives to another Member.

(6) The name of the Chief Executive shall not be used to influence the Council.

(7) Except where his conduct is the subject of a motion to which Part JA (Procedures for Particular Motions) applies, the conduct of the Chief Executive, a Member of the Executive Council or a Member of the Legislative Council otherwise than in the performance of his official duties shall not be raised. (L.N. 311 of 1998)

(8) The conduct of Judges or other persons performing judicial functions shall not be raised.

Rule 42: Behaviour of Members during Meeting

During a meeting of the Council-

(a) all Members shall enter or leave the Council properly attired and with decorum;

(b) no Member shall cross the floor of the Council unnecessarily;

(c) Members shall not read newspapers, books, letters or other documents, except such matter therein as may be directly connected with the business of the Council; and

(d) while a Member is speaking all other Members shall be silent and shall not make unseemly interruptions.

Rule 45: Order in Council and Committee

(1) The President, the Chairman of a committee of the whole Council or the chairman of any standing or select committee, after having called the attention of the Council or the committee to the conduct of a Member who persists in irrelevance or tedious repetition of his own or other Members' arguments in the debate, may direct him to discontinue his speech.

(2) The President, the Chairman of a committee of the whole Council or the chairman of any committee shall order a Member whose conduct is grossly disorderly to withdraw immediately from the Council or the committee for the remainder of that meeting; and the Clerk or clerk of any committee shall act on orders received by him from the Chair to ensure compliance with this order.

- (Bastille Post) There were three legislators who still have not taken their oaths. Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching had previous been fouled out by the Legco Secretary-general. Newly elected Legco chairman then added Lau Siu-lai because he disallowed her slow-paced reading. Andrew Leung won't let Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching take their oaths on Wednesday pending the outcome of the judicial review filed by the government. By omission, Andrew Leung is allowing Lau Siu-lai to take her oath.

- Why shouldn't Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching be given a second chance? If they get this second chance, it means that a precedent will have been set. In the future, all Legislators will get a free first chance to stage whatever they want: chant "Hong Kong Is Not China", say "Fuck the Chinese locusts," "Screw the stinking Americans," tell Polish jokes, eat a banana, do somersaults, copulate with his poodle dog, etc, knowing full well that all they have to do is to get the second try right.

- Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching pilloried Legco chairman Andrew Leung for being down on his knees to kowtow to the Hong Kong/Chinese Communist governments. Great! Meanwhile Leung and Yau are down on their knees to beg Andrew Leung to give them a chance to take the oath to pledge allegiance to the Hong Kong/Chinese Communists governments (guaranteed to have no tricky pronunciations this time).

- (Oriental Daily) Yau Wai-ching said that she never anticipated that things would turn out this way, although she has no regrets. This is the reason why people don't trust the Hong Kong independence. In this case, any number of people could have told you about the consequences of horsing around with the oath of office -- that many many people would be offended, that you may not be allowed to take office, etc. But you go ahead anyway and now you have this train wreck which you say that you have no regrets. In the meantime, you still haven't been able to answer the simple question "Why?" In the case of Hong Kong independence, any number of people are telling you about the possible consequences. But you won't consider them (or you are incapable of thinking about such matters) and you just want to roll ahead. When the whole thing blows up in your face, all you say is: "I didn't anticipate that it would end up like this, but I have no regrets" while you survey the devastated landscape.

- HKSAR Chief Executive CY Leung made the point that if a US Congressman or a UK member of parliament got up and referred to the "People's Re-fucking of China", he would have caused a major diplomatic incident and possibly forced by his party to resign.

- This time around, Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching is getting paid back with the same medicine.

Leung Chung-hang said that it was his Ap Lei Chau accent that mispronounced China into Shina. He never reckoned that Ap Lei Chau community groups and residents would band up to take out full-page newspaper ads to denounced this slur against them.

Yau Wai-ching pronounced "republic" as "re-fucking" and dared people to respond. At the RTHK City Forum, a citizen got up and addressed Leung Chung-hang with the homonym of "Dick Still Itiching" causing considerable embarrassment.

Leung and Yau thought that the storm would blow over if they could take the oath again in a serious vein. But the Justice Department used the pan-democrats' favorite tool of judicial review to stop Leung and Yau.

Leung and Yau thought that they could still take the oath because the judge did not issue an injunction, but the pro-establishment legislators threatened with the pan-democrats' favorite tool of adjournment due to lack of quorum.

Tactics are means which can be employed for any end.

- (HKG Pao) Leung Chung-hang declared that he will march into the Meeting at 11am tomorrow. He said that Legco chairman Andrew Leung does not have the power to stop him. He said that he will follow the rules of procedure to demand to take his oath. He said that he will defend the dignity of the Legislative Council. He also said that it is a crime to prevent a Legislator from entering the meeting chamber, and he warned the security guards not to impede him tomorrow.

- Leung Chung-hang is talking about all the privileges that he imagines are accorded to legislators. Unfortunately, his current status is only Legislator-elect pending the oath of office. He is not entitled to those privileges.

- Bwaaaaaahhhhhh! This is so funny. First of all, any number of Legislators have been ejected from the meeting chamber before as a result of Rule 45(2):

The President, the Chairman of a committee of the whole Council or the chairman of any committee shall order a Member whose conduct is grossly disorderly to withdraw immediately from the Council or the committee for the remainder of that meeting; and the Clerk or clerk of any committee shall act on orders received by him from the Chair to ensure compliance with this order.

This year, the Legislative Council has hired more female security guards to help carry out Yau Wai-ching, Lau Siu-lai and other female radical legislators.

Now if the security guards stopped him tomorrow, what is he going to do? Is he going to call the Hong Kong "Black" Police to report a crime? Is he going to ask the police to drag the security guards to a dark corner for a beating?

- Is Leung Chung-hang worried about what will happen?  No way. Citizens posted photos of him with a 20-something-year-old woman, ogling her tits.

- (Hong Kong Free Press) October 26, 2016.

Pro-democracy lawmakers have called upon Legislative Council President Andrew Leung to step down after he halted a chaotic session on Wednesday over the ongoing oath controversy.

Leung announced on Tuesday that he would defer the retaking of oaths by Youngspiration lawmakers Yau Wai-ching and Baggio Leung Chun-hang until the governments judicial review is concluded. The controversy surrounds Yau and Leung who referred China to Chee-na considered by some to be insulting in the legislatures swearing-in session two weeks ago.

Yau said: Baggio Leung and I should be legally allowed into the meeting room. But today we had to rely on the help of the pan-democrats and opposition camp in order to get into the meeting room.

This shows that the president did not read the rules of procedure well, and used a reason completely lacking in legal basis to deny presiding over the oaths of Baggio Leung and I, she added.

The president is shameless, [he] is the culprit of destroying the legislatures honour, Yau said. He only cared about the pro-Beijing camps interests.

Baggio Leung thanked the opposition lawmakers for escorting them into the chamber this morning. Our action today proved that tyranny will only unite us.

Some pro-democracy lawmakers surrounded Yau and Leung to prevent the legislatures security guards from removing them.

The pro-democracy camp is now calling upon Andrew Leung to resign.

Helena Wong Pik-wan of the Democratic Party said: We need to protect the dignity of the Legislative Council. We want a president who is not the president of a particular camp, but a fair and neutral president.

We are here right now, not actually for the pro-democracy camp, but for all Hong Kong people, said Nathan Law of Demosistō. We want to protect the system that we have made through these years, that we enjoy and treasure.

Calling the president a pawn of the pro-establishment camp, Law said: Leung should be held responsible and should step down after he has abused his powers. This, I believe, is the most basic and united stance of everyone who support democracy and self-determination.

James To Kun-sun of the Democratic Party said: [Andrew Leung] should step down because he hasnt even the basic ability to manage the meeting.

He said that Leung had said that there were no problems when lawmakers raised challenges over the procedures, rather than hear the challenges.

Andrew Leung said he will not change his ruling barring the duo from attending the meeting. But I think for the meeting to go on in an orderly fashion, I need the cooperation of all 69 members, he said. I will not make the job of our colleagues [LegCo staff members] difficult.

Leung said he decided not to switch the meeting to another room because the chaos would still continue.

The pro-Beijing camp said that they were extremely regretful that the meeting was adjourned.

We will support the decision handed down by the president of the LegCo, said Holden Chow of the pro-Beijing DAB party.

Youngspiration has called for a rally to protect the separation of powers and to return our lawmaking dignity at 6pm on Wednesday in the protest area of the Legislative Council.

The party said that it hoped that Hong Kong people will protect the separation of powers and stop the Hong Kong communist government from destroying the citys system.

- (Ta Kung Pao) October 26, 2016.

Legco president Andrew Leung declared yesterday that Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching would not be sworn in today. Seven Democratic Party legislators including James To issued a declaration to oppose.

In their letter: "We absolutely do not agree with the addition of the insulting 'Shina' added by Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching into their oaths. Their actions insult the intelligence of ordinary citizens and cause negative reactions." Then they said: "Legislators should be sworn in as quickly as possible when their term begins, as supervised by the Legco president. Andrew Leung's actions sets a dangerous precedent by using his position as president to carry out executive orders. He has seriously damaged the dignity and constitutional position of the Legislative Council."

Here, the Democratic Party is contradicting itself.

First of all, the Democratic Party dares not offend the public by supporting the "Shina" speech of Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching. Such being the case, then are their original "Shina" oaths proper and legal oaths of office?

If these were not legal oaths, then why should the Legco president have any reason or duty to supervise their new oaths? Conversely, if the Democratic Party believe that those were proper and legal oaths, then why didn't do the same? They didn't because they know that those oaths were improper and illegal, and they offend the intelligence of the people of Hong Kong. If this is the case, then why would they still insist that Andrew Leung must supervise those two to take their oaths again?

As for the dignity and constitutional position of the Legislative Council, who is being contemptuous and destructive here? There is only one answer, namely Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching along with all the opposition people (such as the Democratic Party) who are aiding and abetting them. The Legislative Council should have its dignity and constitutional position in accordance with the Basic Law. But when words like "Shina" and "Fucking" can be bandied around the meeting chamber, its dignity and constitutional position are obviously damaged and shaken to an unacceptable extent.

The pro-establishment walked out to stop the oaths and Andrew Leung refused to supervise the oaths. They did so in order to defend the dignity and constitutional position of the Legislative Council. But what has the Democratic Party done so far?

- (Oriental Daily) October 26, 2016.

Last evening (October 25), the pan-democrats hinted that they would take action at Andrew Leung's postponement of the oath ceremony for Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching. Today, the pan-democrats split into two forces. Leading the way, the Democratic Party, Civic Party (Kenneth Kwok and Tanya Chan) led Lau Siu-lai into the meeting chamber. Next seven persons including Civic Party's Alvin Yeung and Jeremy Tam, Demosisto's Nathan Law, Chu Hoi Dick "escorted" Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching into meeting chamber.

According to their original script, Andrew Leung would send the security guards to prevent Leung and Yau from entering and there will be minor skirmishes outside the entrance. But Lau Siu-wai would be able to be sworn in. Thereafter, they will raise procedural questions as well as a motion for adjournment until the meeting ends.

But their script was broken when League of Social Democrats' Leung Kwok-hung charged at the president's dais and Civic Passion's Cheng Chung-tai was expelled for disorderly conduct. In addition, the pro-establishment camp arranged for the security guards to make only a half-hearted effort so that Leung and Yau were able to enter the meeting chamber. As a result of al the chaos, the meeting was adjourned. Who was responsible for the adjournment? The pan-democrats. The pro-establishment legislators merely sat, watched and posted onto Facebook.

- (Kinliu) October 26, 2016.

Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching were escorted into the meeting chamber with a formation of Civic Party's Alvin Yeung and Jeremy Tam in front, Shiu Ka-chun and Chan Chi-chuen (People Power) on the side, and Nathan Law (Demosisto) and Chu Hoi Dick behind. Notably absent was the Democratic Party.

Previously Democratic Party legislators James To and Lam Cheuk-ting had defended Leung-Yau's anti-China rhetoric, but they didn't join the formation. When the meeting began, they raised placards that read: "Andrew Leung does not represent me." Even their more radical member Hui Chi-fung entered on his own.

At the press conference, Helena Wong explained that the Democratic Party disagreed with what Leung-Yau said and therefore did not enter with them. She said that the Democratic Party objected to Youngspiration's insulting of the Chinese people and using obscene language. But she said that anyone who was legally elected should be sworn in. Lam Cheuk-ting also told the press that the Democratic Party only wants the Legco president to follow the rules of procedure and they do not approve of what Leung-Yau said.

- (Elizabeth Quat video) (Oriental Daily live broadcast)

(Wen Wei Po) Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching were able to enter the meeting chamber not because of the number of pan-democratic legislators shepherding them in. Look at the video: more than fifty photojournalists and Legislative Councilor aides crashed into the meeting chamber. The photojournalists wanted to capture the whole trip, and the Legislative Councilor aides wanted to take videos of their bosses to post on Facebook. They even jumped on top of the tables to take better photos.

- (SCMP) October 26, 2016.

Two weeks into the oath-taking saga, those in the pro-democracy camp appeared ambivalent about matching their words of fury with adequate action.

Supporters will be wondering why the camp had not organised a single rally or march to protest the ruling of Legislative Council president Andrew Leung Kwan-yuen even as they lashed out at him for blatantly depriving two localist lawmakers of their constitutional rights.

Pan-democrats inaction stood in stark contrast to the crowd of nearly 10,000 mobilised by Beijing-friendly groups outside the legislature on Wednesday, demanding that the Youngspiration pair Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching quit Legco. About the only other group in the same area pointing fingers at Andrew Leung was the League of Social Democrats.

But on Wednesday there was a show of unity, albeit briefly, among pan-democrats and localists.

Eight pan-democrats escorted Yau and Baggio Leung, whom Andrew Leung had banned from joining the meeting, into the chamber. The pair openly expressed gratitude for their help.

That show of strength in numbers, however, did not extend to the entire pro-democracy camp.

At a press conference held by the democratic caucus soon after, Democratic Party lawmaker Helena Wong Pik-wan made a candid statement that raised eyebrows.

I want to point out that none of the seven Democrat lawmakers took part in escorting the duo, she said. We do not agree with the remarks made by them [in their oaths].

Leung and Yau used the term Chee-na, a variation of the derogatory term Shina used by Japan during the second world war.

Their remarks angered not just the pro-establishment camp. Many supporters of the Democratic Party, which has never advocated separatism or nationalism, were also offended, Wongs colleague Lam Cheuk-ting said.

Andrew Leung was definitely wrong in destroying the system, but we think the Youngspiration pair were also responsible for causing the situation today. It would not have happened if they did not take their oaths that way, said Lam.

The Civic Partys Dennis Kwok echoed that sentiment. He said the duos irresponsible act had forced all Hongkongers to pay for the mess they had created.

The rift between the traditional pan-democrats and localists, and their lack of mutual trust, were the key reasons why the camp had failed to mobilise public support in the past weeks, several members of the camp said.

At previous election forums, Yau had blamed Wong and her allies for achieving nothing over the past years, while Wong accused Yau of being a spy from the pro-establishment camp.

Independent lawmakers such as social welfare sector representative Shiu Ka-chun and Eddie Chu Hoi-dick, as well as Demosistos Nathan Law Kwun-chung, had been trying hard to bring pan-democrats and localists together in the preceding two days.

It took Law, the youngest of Hong Kongs lawmakers and a former Occupy student leader, to call on the camp to use the opportunity of crisis to stay united.

But Shiu remained pessimistic that it would help unite the camp in the long run.

Such collaboration might only happen on an ad hoc basis, he said.

- (Oriental Daily) October 26, 2016.

The Alliance to Oppose China-Hating and Hong Kong independence called for a rally outside the Legislative Council this morning. The Legco demonstration zone was filled with people. At around noon, the organizers estimated between 14,000 and 16,000 demonstrators. The Hong Kong Police said that there were 8,720 persons at the peak.

The police shut down the pedestrian overpass between Admiralty Centre and the Legislative Council due to congestion. Instead they asked people to use the CITIC Tower overpass. Legislative Councilor Cheng Chung-tai (Civic Passion) argued with the police at the overpass.

- Interesting that none of the English-language media are reporting on this demonstration. They would rather report on five 'pro-democracy' demonstrators setting a petition letter on fire outside the China Liaison Office on a Sunday than a massive show of force.

- How was this demonstration being reported? At 10am, Commercial Radio said that there were as many as 1,000 people outside the Legislative Council. At 7pm, Commercial Radio said that 10,000 was there before.

- (YouTube) Aerial video of the demonstration.

- Commercial Radio

After the rally, the national flags and placards can be found lying all over the place, some of them being stuffed into garbage cans. There were also a lot of rubbish on the ground. Citizens took photos.

- CAP 2401 National Flag and National Emblem Ordinance

Section 7 Protection of national flag and national emblem

A person who desecrates the national flag or national emblem by publicly and willfully burning, mutilating, scrawling on, defiling or trampling on it commits an offence and is liable on conviction to a fine at level 5 and to imprisonment for 3 years.

- Eh, wait a minute, the photo of the national flags in the garbage can was taken in 2014 but being attributed by Commercial Radio to have happened here and now. At this latest event, the volunteers were photographed gathering all debris into plastic bags for disposal. But none of those photos were published in Yellow Ribbon media outlet Commercial Radio.

- If this was a "pro-democracy" event, Commercial Radio would have reported the organizers' claim of 16,000. Since this is a "pro-establishment" event, Commercial Radio reported the "police estimate" of 8,420 (which is 300 less than the actual police estimate).

- Commercial Radio apologizes. They said that they cited from the Facebook group "Strong Nation Crazy Talk" and used the accompanying photo. They now realize that the photo came from a 2014 incident. Therefore they have now removed their original report. They apologize profusely for affecting the reputation of the Anti Insult-China Anti-Hong Kong Independence Grand Alliance or otherwise inconvenienced any other persons. They promised that such incidents will not recur in the future. 2016.11.10.

- Did the media say anything about what the 10,000 people are demanding? No. Instead, they reported that more than 20 people voiced support for Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching. Some of them raised yellow umbrellas and placards. Legislative Councilors Chu Hoi Dick, Lau Siu-lai and Nathan Law were there to provide support and they criticized Legco president Andrew Leung for stopping the two from taking their oaths of office.


P.S. Not a word that the people on the left were objecting to whatever Chu Hoi Dick was saying.

- And here is the Youngspiration counter-demonstration: fewer than 50 unless you count journalists too.

- What happened? Youngspiration has been saying at every step that their two legislators were elected by more than 50,000 voters. Like, you know, 50,000+ support them saying "People's Re-fucking of Shina" etc. Tonight, when the going got tough, only 50 showed up? What happened to the other 49,950+? Are they persons of Chinese descent upset by being called "Shina-jin"?

- Look, it's Wednesday night and the Hong Kong Jockey Club is holding Happy Wednesday races at the Sha Tin Race Course. A bonus is that this is October and they are running an Oktoberfest!

- Chapman Chen's Facebook

At a time when disaster awaits Hong Kong and there are matters of grave importance to be decided, Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-chin are the last hope of Hong Kong parliamentary politics. Last night, there was a huge unprecedented turnout, including many with different political views such as Leung "Long Hair" Kwok-hung, Chu Hoi Dick, Nathan Law, Glacier Kwong, etc. So how can I miss this? Unfortunately some people continue to hold personal grudges and refuse to care about the future of the people of Hong Kong. While Youngspiration fight the Communist bandits every day, these guys exploit the situation to their own advantage, or manufacture vicious rumors, or use the vilest of curses. They should know that God is watching from above!

- Thirty people counts as a "huge unprecedented" turnout. The bar is set pretty low, huh?

- Even Leung "Long Hair" Kwok-hung admitted that the turnout was small. But he put a spin on it: "But in view of the fact that the assembly was called quite late, this was a fantastic turnout."

- As the Cantonese saying goes, when you get knocked down flat on your ass, you get up grabbing a handful of sand from the ground and say that you got something worthwhile out of this.

- Sze Tat Chau's Facebook

For more than one month, Leung-Yau of Youngspiration have led a counter-unification campaign that has successfully unified all their possible enemies. When Edward Leung (Hong Kong Indigenous) was disqualified by the Returning Officer, he selected these two Youngspiration candidates as his Plan B stand-in. Those who voted for them were basically voting for Edward Leung. At this time, there is a big political crisis for the two. Why hasn't Edward Leung said a word? Brother Edward, you own some degree of responsibility here. You should at least say something to the voters, instead of pulling the disappearing act.

- (Ta Kung Pao) November 5, 2016. With respect to Yau Wai-ching's pronunciation of "People's Re-fucking of Shina", Ray Wong (Hong Kong Indigenous) said: "We did not know beforehand, including Hong Kong Indigenous and the legislative assistants at Leung Chung-hang's office. We only found out after the oath was over." Even so, Wong does not think that there is any problems. When someone said that they wanted to severe all connections to Yau, Wong said: "Fuck you! How can you do that?"

As for what happened during Leung Chung-hang's oath, Ray Wong admitted that it was based upon the recommendation of Hong Kong Indigenous. An oath is the occasion to express a political stance but not the act of resistance itself. The political expression shows accountability to those who voted to elect him. As for the "Hong Kong is not China" banner, Wong explained that it is based upon the "Catalonia is not Spain" slogan and this type of slogan is being used by independent movements everywhere. Although the word "independence" does not appear, it expresses their position. As for the hand gesture, Wong said that it is an act of repentance to God because the oath is against the wishes of the oath-taker. Wong said: "We localists will only pledge loyalty to the people of Hong Kong." However Wong did not explain why Leung Chung-hang later said that he pronounced China as "Shina" because of his Ap Lei Chau accent.

- (Wen Wei Po) October 30, 2016. Last month Hong Kong Indigenous spokespersons Ray Wong and Edward Leung traveled to Brussels to attend the Seventh International Conference of Tibet Support Groups and to give a talk in London about The Future of Hong Kong 2047.

- Why are you fighting for Tibet independence and not rescuing Youngspiration? You were the ones who betted on them, so you have a responsibility.

- Fuck your mother, will you please get someone to come back to Hong Kong to clean up the stinking mess? Or is your entire party of several dozen people traveling overseas with not a single person left in Hong Kong?

- No matter what happens to Youngspiration, it is clear that Hong Kong Indigenous endorsed Youngspiration and is therefore obliged to help out. At this time, the entire Localist movement is being devastated by Youngspiration. In the future, all Localists will be suppressed. Shouldn't you apologize to those who voted for you, those who support you and the entire Localist movement?

- The reason why the English-language media won't report on this assembly is that they know that these pro-establishment demonstrators are being paid. Stooges do not represent public opinion. The standard rate is $300 per person, so that 15,000 would cost $4,500,000. But the Chinese Communists can easily afford this and a lot more.

- While there is no direct evidence of payment, everybody knows that this is true. After all, it is unimaginable that anyone would come to demonstrate otherwise.

- I fully agree. I am of Chinese descent and I am not upset at being called a "Shina dog." Why should anyone else be? They need to get a life.

- Ah Sau's Facebook


Several thousand people participated in the anti-China-insult demonstration. As usual, Apple Daily interviewed a few old people who didn't know why they are marching and reported the talk about $150 per marcher. But I noted that actress Susan Shaw Yin Yin was present as well as some of my local-born, normally apolitical friends. Wong Yeung-tat pointed out on a Passion Times program that some of these people were genuinely opposed to Hong Kong independence. However, I think that some people sincerely came out to demonstrate but not necessarily opposing Hong Kong independence.

Many people in Hong Kong actually don't care about Hong Kong independence one way or the other. Most of them only want to be winners. If Hong Kong independence leads to an economic boom, I think 99% of them will be in favor. But at this time, Hong Kong independence is merely a slogan. Nobody has even proposed armed revolution. By this time, the people of Hong Kong are numb to more slogan-shouting.

Previously more than 10,000 people attended the Hong Kong National Party's rally for Hong Kong independence. The pro-establishment camp didn't seem able to assemble 10,000 people to counter-demonstrate. But at this anti-China-insult demonstration, many people did not come for the money and lunch boxes; they came because they genuinely felt that they have been insulted as persons of Chinese descent. The trigger was the phrase "re-fucking of Shina." In other words, they resent the two Youngspiration legislators.

After the two Youngspiration members got elected, they had two grand accomplishments: the talk about having space to "fuck" and the talk about the "People's re-fucking of Shina." Both items became Page A1 news for a few days. As newly elected legislators, these results were quite impressive. Although the two items seemed unrelated, they are both related to social taboos. For a young girl to use an obscene term "fucking" to describe sexual intercourse seems unmannerly. Meanwhile "Shina" is a term of insult for the entire generation of Chinese people who had lived through the Japanese invasion of China.

There is nothing right or wrong about social taboos. Many taboos have no rational basis, but they exist in our daily lives. For example, it is a social taboo to talk about "Death" on Lunar New Year's Day and there is no scientific basis for it either. Nevertheless most people avoid doing so because they don't want to offend others. Social taboos are also the basis for social group formation. When both taboos were violated, it was predictable that people would feel resentment. When both taboos were broken by the same organization and this organization advocates Hong Kong independence, it goes without say that Hong Kong independence took a big hit.

I don't know whether this was a historical accident or whether the wisdom of someone behind the scene. I don't expect to find any conclusive evidence one way or the other. But the reality is that Leung and Yau broke taboos and managed to sully the name of Hong Kong independence in the short space of one month. The brand "Localism" was buried along with it too.

- You would think that the public should have a say on this issue, but none of the polling organizations has done anything to gauge public opinion. Or else they have done something but decide to suppress the information for political reasons.

- Wong Yeung-tat's Facebook

What did the people of Hong Kong do to deserve such a fate? ...
10,000 people gathered to support the government to attack the Legislative Council. You would think that many of these are paid Commie stooges, right? Many of these people don't necessarily support the government but they genuinely oppose Hong Kong independence!
Over the past several years, we poured our blood and sweat to nurture localist consciousness. In the last two elections, Localism became a golden herald that everybody wanted to use to reap the rewards. This reached a peak in the September Legco elections.
But what did Youngspiration do? In the short period of a single month, the people would rather support the dictator to destroy the dignity of the Legislative Council in order to stop Hong Kong independence and suppress Localism ...
What did the people of Hong Kong do to deserve this?

- That last sentence about Cheng Chung-tai is surely the most interesting part. What was he arguing with the police about?

Here is a video of Cheng Chung-tai walking about.

(Wen Wei Po) Cheng Chung-tai walked from the MTR Admiralty Station across the pedestrian overpass to the Legislative Council, using his mobile phone to conduct a live Facebook broadcast. He spoke to a female demonstrators: "You are using an iPhone. If you are a patriot, you should not use foreign merchandise. If you are a patriot, you should use Xiaomi!" The woman countered: "You're crazy! What kind of person are you? Are you an idiot?" Cheung Chung-tai accused her of cursing him, and added that it is a matter of extreme urgency to take back the right to approve one-way visas.

Next Cheng Chung-tai walked up to Government Headquarters. He said that a government workers used an obscenity against him. The government worker repeated denied this. The video did not record any alleged obscenity. But Cheng insisted that this was the case. He demanded the person to show his government worker's ID. Cheng said: "You used an obscenity. If you have the guts to say it, you should have the guts to admit it."

The government gave his name and government department name. But Cheng persisted: "You wait for the letter of complaint!" After Cheng left Government Headquarters, he developed sudden amnesia and added: "Actually I don't know what he said, but it was something like Pok Gai."

Here is another video of Cheng Chung-tai filming at the pedestrian overpass.

The overpass is more than ten feet wide. Some citizens were filming the crowd below, but they do not interfere with pedestrians. Cheung Chung-tai found a police officer to lodge a complaint.

Cheng: There is no reason that they should be allowed to film here. This is the only passageway leading to the Legislative Council.

Woman: You go away. It is none of your business that we feel like filming here.

Cheng (to the police officer): What is the reason for letting them film here? This is the only passageway leading to the Legislative Council.

Police: Sorry, I did not arrange this. You should ask them over there (Legislative Council) ... this passageway can be used by everybody.

Cheng: 4020 (police badge number), I am Legislator Cheung. How can you let them in?

Police: They did not go in. This passageway is meant to be used by pedestrians.

Cheng: This is the only passageway to the Legislative Council.

Police: You enter first. We'll re-arrange things.

Cheng: Are you saying that this is a problem with the Legislative Council?

Police: Very well, this is a public place where people can walk.

Cheng: You don't usually do this with assemblies. Your attitude is really bad.

Police: No, I feel that it is very good.

Cheng: Can you call your supervisor to come over?

Police: Fine. If you are in a hurry to get to work, you can ...

Cheng: I have to attend a meeting at 11. These people are stopping me from entering/exiting. I am telling you this patiently, but you gave me this kind of response. Why don't you go down to the assembly too?

- Once upon a time, there was "My dad is Li Gang" in China. Today we have "I am Legislator Cheng" in Hong Kong.

- When a person points at his own nose and announce, "I am Legislator X," everybody else (from the police to senior citizens) must obey.

- Cheng Chung-tai picked on the police officer because he knows that the Hong Kong Police work under rule of law. He picked on the senior citizens because he knows that he can outfight them. He stays away from everybody else.

- We all know that Cheng Chung-tai is valiant. Here is a video of Cheng Chung-tai hurdling the barrier in the Legco meeting chamber to resume his seat and refusing to budge after being ejected by the Legco president for disorderly conduct. Dozens of security guards could not make him move!

- (Hong Kong Free Press) October 28, 2016.

An electoral success, she is Hong Kongs youngest ever female lawmaker. But to some people Youngspirations Yau Wai-ching is the most hated person in the city.

Yau was one of the fresh faces returned to the Legislative Council in the last election. But it is unclear whether Yau will be able to keep her seat, as the Chief Executive and the Secretary for Justice have lodged a legal challenge asking the court to declare her office vacant.

During her first taking of the oath, she pronounced Peoples Republic of China as Peoples Refucking of Chee-na, which some deemed as an insult to Chinese people worldwide.

She has yet to complete her oath, but told HKFP that said she had no regrets over her actions. She insisted that she read the whole of the original oath, and that she made a proper effort to complete it.

This government has no standards at all. If they want to crush you, you can read the oath normally and they can still say: Oh you mispronounced this word, I will have to disqualify you, she said. And so if there are no standards to speak of, then why dont I choose to be true to myself, to really make a promise to Hongkongers.

Yau said she was not satisfied with the current situation: I entered [LegCo] to do work I did not join to only complete the oath, I have been feeling that my progress in work is too slow, I should not be stuck at this step.

Despite the controversy, she is officially a lawmaker and is paid HK$93,040 a month, but she said she hoped to do more with her position.

I must admit our street stands have not been as frequent as in the past. I very much hope I can appear at street stands after the incidents from these two months are settled.

Because I have told people that I cannot be a lawmaker who only shows up [at local districts] once in four years, I must not break my promise This is my responsibility.

Yau said her party plans to conduct more work in local districts, with its 100-odd members and other volunteers, by using her LegCo seat to bring their ideas into reality.

Yau, 25, is considered the only female localist in 70-member legislature.

But Yau said that she did not want to be bound by the labels.

My age is not a problem, attitude is the problem, she said. In politics, your conviction or ideals are important, and they should not be bound by age. Being young or localist is not the main point.

She dismissed the idea that she and party colleague Sixtus Baggio Leung were childish or naive during the swearing-in ceremony.

We were actually very serious, Baggio Leung and I were very serious, she said. I never thought it was a childish act. If you paid attention to the entire process of our oath-taking, we first pledged loyalty to Hongkongers, I dont think this is childish.

Often branded a goddess or a bb [baby] by supporters, Yau has also attracted countless sexist comments following the recent incidents. However, Yau said she did not care.

When people want to attack you, it does not matter whether you are male or female, she said. This is why I will not draw attention to my being a female as a reason for being attacked.

Yau emphasises that Youngspiration was founded to serve Hong Kong people, and she has stuck with the main tenets of her platform the self-determination of Hong Kong people and changes to immigration policy.

With or without opposition from within the chamber, Yau is adamant that she will take every opportunity to raise motions on these topics.

She said she has considered that she may face further challenges from the government over the next four years.

If there are several more cases like that, I think people will see who is one stirring up trouble, I entered [LegCo] to do work, to propose issues important to Hong Kong people, no matter livelihood issues or the future of Hong Kong, they have to face it sooner or later, she said. In this contrast, people can see obviously who is playing the destructive role.

The day before the latest oath-taking drama exploded at LegCo on Wednesday, Yau made a seemingly nonsensical post on Instagram, drawing thousands of likes and hundreds of perplexed comments.

After Tuesday is Wednesday, it said.

Yau said the cryptic post was meant to raise awareness of the controversial LegCo meeting, which she and Leung were barred from. This is not the first time a public statement from her team has misfired, drawing attention away from the original focus.

A successful public relations [exercise] should let the public know what you really want to say, but at the same time you need to raise peoples interests to know about the issues, she said. It needs a very skillful technique, but so far the issues I raised have not received the intended result.

Yau said there was very little public response when she raised the issue of limited space on minibuses this year, but in early October, just one phrase from her generated an avalanche of media attention.

She said bok-yeh, a Cantonese slang term for to bang.

Even if we want to bok-yeh, we cant find a room, this is a very practical issue, she said at a forum, when speaking on young peoples living space.

When asked again, a more media-savvy Yau tried to avoid the two words, simply framing the issue as space issue, with a smile.

Many people know what I was actually talking about, but focused their attention on those two words, she said. These two cases seem to be complete opposites I am still learning how to bring up an issue.

- This interview article includes this photo from Yau Wai-ching office. Written on the board is "People's Refucking of Chee-na."

So out goes any pretense about any Ap Lei Chau accent. Well, if this is what you want to say all along, why not just admit it? Instead, you rile up all the Ap Lei Chau residents as well as your alma mater Wah Yan College (because the former principal said that their students at this elite school should be able to pronounce China properly and, furthermore, their students were not taught to tell jokes or lies about matters of grave importance).

- (Video) Someone has edited Yau Wai-ching's statement about the shameless Andrew Leung who is destroying the dignity of the Legislative Council into what they considered to be the correct statement of facts.

Me and Leung Chung-hang are thick-skinned and shameless. Last week we reversed our course. We were the instigators who are destroying the dignity of the Legislative body.

- (Headline Daily) By Chris Wat Wing-yin. October 27, 2016.

What is the commonality of the following statements?

"Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching should surely be deplored for insulting China and its people, but the ten years of the Cultural Revolution was more than insulting China and its people. It destroyed Chinese culture, human relationships, historical artifacts, ..."

"It is true that Japan invaded China. The official statistic is the Japanese army slaughtered 35 million Chinese. But 36 million people perished during the Great Leap Forward, more than the number that the Japanese army killed ..."

"Even though Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching said the wrong things, is it necessary to criticize them day after day? CY Leung does the wrong things every day of the year and is the cause of chaos in Hong Kong, so why don't you criticize him instead?"

"It is wrong to throw bricks at people, but what is the root of the problem? Who used the violence of the system first?"

"If playing mahjong on the plaza of the university campus is a disgrace, then it is more disgraceful that the diplomas of all university students in Hong Kong are signed by their Chancellor CY Leung."

Have you detected the rule? This is the classical Yellow Ribbon tactic. It is known as misdirection. The subject is A, but you switch the subject to B. If you debate on B, you have been tricked.

Yesterday 10,000 people demonstrated outside the Legislative Council against Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching. But the opposition said that the most important issue of the day is that Legco president Andrew Leung must resign.

- (Ming Pao) What next? Youngspiration quotes two supporters at the Electoral Affairs Commission that there is a top secret document to ask them to prepare for by-elections for three vacant Legislative Council posts.

This is a misdirection play.

- (SCMP) October 26, 2016. Can Hong Kong afford to let separatists into Legco? By Alex Lo. October 26, 2016.

It should be clear by now that Younspirations Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching have no interest in normal legislative business. The Legislative Council is just a useful platform for them to advocate independence for Hong Kong. Any other issues such as housing, social welfare and education dont concern them. They and their kind simply think if Hong Kong could isolate itself from the rest of China, everything would turn out fine.

As such, there is no difference between forcing their way into the Legco chamber, as they did yesterday, and flying to Taiwan to advocate independence at a university forum. They are all means to the same end.

That is also why they are happy to quote Legcos rules and procedures, and the Basic Law, when it suits them, and flout them when its useful and convenient to do so. Its often observed that their attendance at a Taiwanese university was just to thumb their noses at the Hong Kong and central governments after they used insulting and swear words in their Legco oath-taking debacle.

That is true to an extent. But their bungled oaths rather reveal their true thinking: they dont consider themselves Chinese, and dont think Hong Kong is part of China.

They chose to insult China and the Chinese people. It was not a mistake, nor was it done out of ignorance. Every opportunity is too good to waste to undermine the government, to give Beijing the finger, to promote separatism and to keep up the momentum for their movement. Unlike seasoned politicians, these two young people mean what they say, so we should take their words at face value.

I respect their honesty and sincerity, which are far better than the unprincipled and cynical attitude of the pan-democrats, who are aiding and abetting the two while claiming they dont support separatism or independence for Hong Kong.

But the real question is: can Hong Kong afford to let separatists into Legco? Both Leung and Yau are fresh university graduates. But I suggest they go back to primary school to reread the story of the Trojan horse. The idea is not to reveal yourself until you have gone inside the city. The two jumped out too soon and revealed their true colours. They have exposed themselves. Now lets make sure they dont cause further harm.

(Apple Daily) October 22, 2016. Also at YouTube.

A female student complained that the students frequently made noise late into the night at the Hostel B dormitory, Lingnan University. On October 19 after 2am, she could not fall asleep due to the commotion outside. She went out into the corridor and saw more than 10 male students out there playing games. She asked: "Can you please lower your voices?" A male student yelled aloud: "Please lower your voice! It is late! Don't make noise! Someone wants to sleep!" She asked: "Do you find this funny?" The male student: "Tell the warden then!" Some of the male students went back into their rooms and turned the music volume up.

Commentator: "Shina dog" standards are truly double standards. When you showed up, you said aloud: "Fuck your mothers!" What kind of future do you have?

Original poster: What Hong Kong culture? If you are trash, you should not turn Hong Kong into trash with you. What exchange student? I am a long-time student. Let me tell you, I have been attending Lingnan for three years, and there is no worse Hall than this one. Are you talking to me about cultural toleration? When I first came to Lingnan, I did not know any Cantonese. Today, I can speak Cantonese and write traditional characters because I respect Hong Kong culture.

Do not think that the exchange students don't know. You can deceive other people but you can't deceive me. When  you cannot even deceive yourself, you cannot deceive others. You do not represent Hong Kong culture. Instead you are a Hong Kong young wastrel with no culture. If you can't sleep at night, you should go back to your room to study and think about how to overthrow the Chinese Communist Party first. Then maybe Hong Kong may have a future.

Commentator: Old student, if you say that the other halls are so good, why don't you live there instead of Hall B?

Original poster: Do you think that I want to be here? I was on an exchange program last semester. When I came back, I had no choice. SSC arranged this. Right now you know that nobody wants to live here.

Commentator: Why no move away? I'll help you to file an application.

Commentator: Why do you consider applying to move to a different hall. You don't want to live here anyway. It will be better for everybody.

Commentator: Stupid cunt! This place is just not fright for wastrel sisters who only know how to study.

Another commentator wrote: Ahah, good luck with these mofos, I was on 2nd floor and during weeks sleeping before 3am was almost impossible ... we almost fought twice cuz some said that I wasn't respectful to the local culture.

Internet comments:

- CAP 400 Noise Control Ordinance

Section 4. Noise at night or on a general holiday

(1) Any person who between the hours of 11 p.m. and 7 a.m., or at any time on a general holiday in any domestic premises or public place makes or causes to be made any noise which is a source of annoyance to any person commits an offence.

(2) Any person being the owner, tenant, occupier or person in charge of any domestic premises who between the hours of 11 p.m. and 7 a.m., or at any time on a general holiday knowingly permits or suffers noise which is a source of annoyance to any person to emanate from those domestic premises commits an offence.

(3) Any person who commits an offence under this section shall be liable to a fine of $10000. (Amended 2 of 1994 s. 9)

- Yau Wai-ching is a graduate of Lingnan University majoring in Chinese literature. So it is no surprise for her to say "Shin-ma" for "China."

- More precisely, Yau Wai-ching graduated from Fucking Lingnan University.

- Lingnan University is ranked eighth among the eight universities in Hong Kong. So what do you expect? Anyone who has any other option would not be attending university in remote Tuen Mun (=Nowheresville).

- Lingnan University students are a pile of garbage. How can you make a pile of garbage stand up on its feet? How does a pile of garbage be upwardly mobile?

- This female mainland student clearly has her own problems. If her grades were decent, she would not have to come down to Hong Kong to study at Lingnan University. She should have known that her fellow students there are all bums. If anything, she should be grateful that she hasn't been raped or killed.

- The female mainland student writes in English whereas the local Hong Kong students respond with Hong Kong-style Chinese. Why? Because the local Hong Kong students are too embarrassed by their poor English skills.

- (Oriental Daily) October 19, 2016. The University Grants Committee issued its report on Lingnan University. Specifically, the Quality Assurance Bureau had previously stipulated in 2010 that Lingnan University students must participate in English-language testing before graduations. However, this has yet to be fully implemented. The data showed that employers and alumni continue to give poor grades on the English skills of Lingnan University students.

- If these young wastrels have studied well, they might learn that "Shina" refers to China, including Hong Kong and Macau. Taiwan came under Japanese rule many years ago, so it is actually known as Taiwan. But Hong Kong and Macau are part of "Shina" and their residents are "Shina dogs."

- Those students are not as bad as the discussion forum commentator who wrote: "Everybody knows that when a female student moves into a mixed-gender dormitory hall, she is to serve the pleasure of the guys. Most likely, this Shina dog refuses to obey the rules."

- If we are going to have a Hong Kong nation, we need to have a Hong Kong culture. This needs to be defined from scratch so that every Hongkonger will know what is local culture and what is alien culture. Today we begin with Rule #1:

If you make a helluva noise in the middle of the night to cause others to lose sleep, then this is Hong Kong local culture.

We look forward to more rules coming to you in the near future ...

- How do you compare the cultural levels of Hong Kong and mainland China? There are many poorly educated rural people in China, so the overall cultural level must be lower. But those mainland people who come to Hong Kong to study are much better qualified because they are the cream of the crop. What is more, they are more diligent because they value the opportunity. So if you compare the mainland students against the local Hong Kong students at any of the eight universities, the former will be more competitive.

- And that is why the local students hate mainland students! If the class grades are given on a curve, the mainlanders will take the top.

- What is wrong with calling mainlanders "Shina dogs"? It is the exercise of our God-given freedom of expression. If those male students at Hostel B should get punished, it will be the end of Article 27 of the Basic Law.

- The Hong Kong Basic Law? Didn't you guys set it on fire any number of times before already? Why are U hiding behind it now?

- During the British colonial era, the Hong Kong University dormitories were under curfew after midnight. Anyone who started a commotion was banned permanently from residing there. How is that for freedom of expression?

- This was not a violation of freedom of expression, because the miscreants can continue to exercise their freedom of expression elsewhere.

- Irony: Here is the Lingnan University Student Union Campus TV telling that happiness exists in their dormitories: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hTJwbTrQlo (includes English sub-titles).

(Wikipedia) Travel with Rivals is a Hong Kong television travel programme on Viu TV. The programme brings together two people from different backgrounds, with conflicting core values, for a five-day trip to other parts of the world.

Episode 1-3 (Warsaw, Poland): Legislators Jasper Tsang (DAB) and Leung Kwok-hung (LSD)
Episode 4-5 (Hanoi, Vietnam): Yip Chung-sing and Amanda Tann
Episode 6-7 (Florence, Italy): Shiga Lin and Gloria Yip
Episode 6-7 (Seoul, South Korea): Ann Chiang (DAB) and Roy Tsui
Episode 8-9 (Dublin, Ireland): Zac Kao and Denise Ho
TBA (Bali, Indonesia): Renee Dai and Siu Yam-yam
TBA (Japan): Agnes Chow and Junius Ho

(The Standard) April 6, 2016.

The management of Hong Kong's new free television station, which goes on air today, hopes to revive the local TV industry through creative reality shows rather than dramas.

Viu TV is the SAR's first free-to-air TV broadcaster in 37 years, and will take over part of the digital spectrum of Asia Television, which shut down on Friday. ATV's analog channels were taken over by RTHK.

Speaking to RTHK, Viu TV's general manager Lo Ting-fai said the new station will focus on producing reality shows instead of dramas. "The most important thing is to attract people who have not watched TV for a long time to switch on their TVs again," he said. "Or to make people who would normally watch TV for an hour to watch it a bit longer."

It would be great for the industry, even if viewers choose to enjoy a TVB drama first before switching over to Viu TV to watch Legislative Council president Jasper Tsang Yok-sing, Lo added, referring to the station's travelogue series Travel With Rivals, with Tsang and lawmaker "Long Hair" Leung Kwok-hung starring in the first episode.

"If we can attract more people to watch TV, it will boost advertising revenue, and we can use the money to enhance our productions," Lo said, stressing the need to produce high-quality shows.

(Headline Daily) October 19, 2016.

Former Chinese student activist Wang Dan and former Hong Kong University Student Union president Billy Fung Jing-en went to Japan to record for Viu TV's programme <Travel with Rivals>. During their stay, they held a press conference hosted by the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan to call for the international community to support Hong Kong independence.

Among those present was the World Uyghur Congress representative in Japan, who asked Fung whether the Hong Kong independence movement and the Xinjiang independence movement. Fung reponded: "Just as we in Hong Kong, the Uyghurs are being oppressed and persecuted by the Chinese Communists. Our fates are alike. Based upon the principle that local matters should be determined by local people, we support the choice of the Uyghurs. We can cooperate on this."

Last night, Viu TV issued a statement to condemn these two individuals for organizing a press conference on their own and making improper statements. Viu TV is extremely disappointed and angry. Viu TV pointed out the talk of Hong Kong independence denigrates the people and is delusional because this can never happen. Viu TV has decided not to air any of the already filmed videos about Wang Dan and Billy Fung Jing-en. They also reserve the right to seek legal redress against anyone who has or will use Viu TV to promote Hong Kong independence.

(YouTube) The Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan. Wang Dan and Billy Fung Jing-en: Tensions between China and Hong Kong and update report in the semi-autonomous territory.

Internet comments:

- How do Wang Dan and Billy Fung Jing-en clash in basic core values?

- They have more in common than in conflict -- both of them hate the Chinese Communists. Now they have even more in common, because they both hate Viu TV.

- Easy. Viu TV was assuming that Wang Dan is a Chinese chauvinist whereas Billy Fung Jing-en is a Shina-hating racist Singaporean.

- So it means that Wang Dan would refuse to pay tribute at the Yasukuni Shrine whereas Billy Fung would leap at the chance if invited by Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

- You are believing the fiction that Fung put on Wikipedia about being Singaporean. He is actually a new immigrant from Fujian province, China. If he was Singaporean, he would have to do military service.

- They share the core values about (1) revolutions require martyrs to make sacrifices and (2) those martyrs are always somebody else.

- Viu TV was counting on them to clash. Instead they held a joint press conference to promote various independence movements in China.

- Viu TV's problem is not with Wang and Fung. It is with the executive producer who came up with the idea of using this pair. His/her judgment is extremely questionable.

- Why did Viu TV choose to locate this episode in Japan? A better choice would be for them to go to Dharamsala to meet the Dalai Lama.

- Viu TV probably cannot get away this easy. Wang Dan and Billy Fung Jing-en will probably file suits for unlawful termination and deprivation of their freedoms of expression, demand $1 in compensation and maximize promotion for Hong Kong/Xinjiang/Tibet independence.

- How the hell does the Hong Kong independence movement work with the Xinjiang independence movement? They have completely different styles. Do you expect Hongkongers to become suicide bombers, bomb-throwers, knife-slashers, car-rammers and self-immolators? Hey, that can be really dangerous to your health and well-being.

- If Billy Fung Jing-en signs a joint cooperation pact with you, can you trust him to keep his end of the bargain? Consider the fact that he considers the confidentiality agreement with the Hong Kong University Council as utterly worthless.

- Maybe Billy Fung's idea of cooperation is for ETIM/Al Qaeda/ISIS to send suicide bombers to Hong Kong to do the dirty work, because local suicide bombers are hard to recruit.

- When you've been blown to pieces,  you can't use Facebook anymore.

- The World Uyghur Congress toolkit only has terrorist attacks and self-immolations. They can provide training and materials to the Hongkongers. I really don't mind seeing Joshua Wong turning himself into a human torch.

- (Apple Daily) During the Q&A part, a reporter said that Beijing cannot possibly let Hong Kong independence happen because Taiwan, Tibet and Xinjiang will follow suit to split up the country. Fung replied that China will not permit Hong Kong to have democracy in the short run, and that means no independence as well. But the basic issue is that if Hong Kong has enough international support, then Hong Kong will be strong and powerful enough to become independent without needing China's permission. Fung said that it is a human right for a Hongkonger to determine his own future.

- Hong Kong will be strong and powerful enough that it can achieve independence without needing China's permission? This is truly delusional.

- Here is an example of a strong, powerful and fearless Hong Kong: it must be self-sufficient in food, water and energy; it must possess a couple hundred of armed nuclear warheads mounted on ballistic missiles hidden in a maze of silos that are several hundred feet underground; it must build a thirty-foot-tall concrete wall behind a minefield along the entire land border with China (the construction cost to be paid for by China, of course); it must possess several hundred Autobots led by Optimus Prime; etc.

- Well, if Hong Kong has the Autobots led by Optimus Prime as allies, then China would surely hire the Decepticons led by Megatron. The two sides won't look after the interests of tiny Hong Kong, because the Autobots and Decepticons will slug it out in Hong Kong and destroy everything in their paths. I think that a much more realistic plan is to have hundreds of Gundam vehicle suits piloted by skilled Hong Kong freedom fighters whose loyalty to the Hong Kong Nation is unquestionable.

- Here is a concrete proposal for the Hong Kong Army:

A Hong Kong Army with a standing force of 700,000 shall be established.
- 400,000 army soldiers with several hundred tanks and armored vehicles. Of these, 100,000 will be army special forces
- 200,000 navy soldiers with several hundred warships and submarines. Of these, 40,000 will be marines.
- 100,000 air force soldiers with several hundred fighters and bombers. Of these, 30,000 will be paratroopers.
In addition, there will be a strategic force equipped with several thousand ballistic missiles and rockets aimed at Beijing, Shanghai and the Three Gorges Dam, being launch-ready at all times.

Military laws applicable to every Hongkonger will include
(1) Each Hongkonger will serve 5 years of compulsory military service as soon as they reach the age of 18
(2) Each Hongkongers will be in the military reserve force. In the event of an emergency, the government will issue a mobilization order and all Hongkongers must immediately report in for service.
(3) Each Hongkonger who surrenders, deserts or consorts with the enemy shall be court-martialed. The maximum penalty is death by execution.

The police will reconstitute the Special Branch to go after all those pro-Communist/pro-China persons, who will be subject to surveillance, arrest, etc.

A foreign intelligence service will be established, mainly to send spies to infiltrate and gather information about various sectors in China. Spies will also be sent to Canada, Australia, etc to reach the families of Chinese officials.

- I guess that we have to start somewhere. Right now the number of countries supporting Hong Kong independence is zero. How do we get to 1? Which country is the best target? War-torn Eritrea? 21-square kilometer Nauru with 90% unemployment and 40% diabetic?

- On Friday, Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching were seen in Taipei. They are scheduled to speak to university students there. The Mainland Affairs Council of Taiwan has already indicated that they are paying attention to the situation of Leung/Yau.

P.S. Sorry, the Mainland Affairs Council has just retracted: they are now saying that they have no intention of meddling with Hong Kong's internal affairs.

- Unfortunately, even with an army of 600,000, Taiwan is still not recognized as a nation by any of the international bodies or large nations. The Hong Kong independence movement can still learn from Taiwan about how to establish diplomatic relations with individual countries such as Kiribati, Nauru, Palau, Tuvalu, Swaziland, Burkina Faso, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, etc. Don't learn how to lose So Tom and Prncipe like Taiwan just did.

- (Oriental Daily) Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching were scheduled to share their experiences with the Taiwan Radical Wings party at 830pm last evening. After dinner, they misunderstood and went to another function with friends. When they realized their mistake, they could not contact the Taiwan Radical Wings because they didn't have Wifi access, their telephones ran out of battery power and they had no money. When the two didn't show up by 10pm, the Taiwan Radical Wings issued a statement that certain individuals used technical means to cause the two not to be able to come, and they are very angry about this.

- (Oriental Daily) Leung Chung-hang Yau Wai-ching attended a discussion forum organized by the Taiwan National University Graduate Students Association.  The two said that their resolve for Hong Kong self-determination is unchanged.

- (Ta Kung Pao) According to our sources, Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching first attended a forum organized by the National Taiwan University Graduate Students Association on "Localist movement in the international cosmopolitan city of Hong Kong." Afterwards, Leung and Yau were supposed to attend a Taiwan Radical Wings forum.

According to our sources, Democratic Progressive Party Taipei City Executive Chu Cheng-chi did not want Leung and Yau to meet with the Taiwan Radical Wings. So he personally took them on a tour around Taipei. Chu told Ray Wong and the Taiwan Radical Wings that Leung and Yau did not want to attend their function. The Taiwan Radical Wings had invited the media to witness this marriage of Hong Kong and Taiwan independence movements, but the two stars did not show up. The Taiwan Radical Wings insisted that Leung told them that he would attend, but Chu Cheng-chi said that it was not suitable for them to do so. The next day, the Taiwan Radical Wings did not said anything more "certain individuals using technical means" and dropped the issue.

- More importantly, Yau Wai-ching spoke in putonghua. How is a Hongkonger supposed to learn to speak putonghua when the proposed curriculum of Youngspiration bans the instruction of putonghua, simplified characters and Chinese history at all levels of education?

- Like people, nations look out for their self-interests. What can Hong Kong offer them? Right now, Hong Kong positions itself as the gateway into the 1.3 billion mainland China market. After independence, what?

- Nations will not support Hong Kong out the kindness of their hearts and against their own interests if and when China retaliates. Look at Taiwan's situation. China asks each country to choose between China and Taiwan, never both. As soon as a nation recognizes Taiwan, China will break diplomatic relations PERIOD. What is a rational nation supposed to do?

- (Apple Daily) Billy Fung said that if Hong Kong wants independence, they must have international support. At this time, the United States want to pivot back to Asia and therefore Hong Kong should ally with Japan and other countries. Fung said that Japan can be useful. Hong Kong was a revolutionary base and helped to overturn the Manchurian dynasty. Thus Hong Kong can be a base to fight against the Chinese Communists.

- What? Will the United States send nuclear-armed ballistic missiles to Hong Kong and trigger another Cuban missile crisis?

- Cuba is 90 miles away from Florida. Hong Kong is contiguous with China. This would like China positioning nuclear-armed ballistic missiles in Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal aimed at the United States.

- Here is the political map of Hong Kong. To the north is mainland China. To the west is Macau/Zhuhai. To the south are the Wanshan Islands under the jurisdiction of Zhuhai city (China). To the east is Daya Wan (China). Any cargo ship carrying nuclear missiles to Hong Kong will be searched and seized by the PLA Navy first.

- (Oriental Daily) When Wang Dan got back to Taiwan, he saw the Viu TV statement. He said that Viu TV invited him to do the programme in Japan, arranging for everything including the press conference. However, Viu TV is now saying that Wang and Fung arranged for the press conference no their own. Wang said that "there is nothing more shameless than this."

Wang said that everyone knows why Viu TV issued the statement. It would be understandable if Viu TV came under pressure from Beijing and quietly shelved the programme. But to accuse Wang and Fung of organizing a press conference on their own is going too far.

This morning Wang Dan issued another statement. First of all, he said that he agreed to participate in this programme because he knew nothing about the Hong Kong independence movement and wanted to learn about it. He said that he completely disagrees with Billy Fung's viewpoints. Wang said that the greatest harm is to ban certain ideas, especially when it came from the senior management of a media outlet. This showed that the extent to which freedom of press has deteriorated in Hong Kong.

Wang said that it sounded unethical to organize a press conference while participating in a television programme. Therefore he felt that his personal reputation has been maligned. He is firmly demanding that Viu TV apologize formally to him and Billy Fung. He made a public call to the people of Hong Kong to boycott Viu TV until they apologize.

As for Billy Fung, he said that the entire itinerary was set up by the Viu TV production team. Fung said that Hong Kong has freedom of expression, and there is nothing wrong with him talking about Xinjiang independence and Hong Kong independence. Fung does not intend to pursue the case with Viu TV because he does not have the resources as a student. But he condemned Viu TV's statement and demands a retraction.

- Lancme: Denise Ho is analogous to Viu TV: Wang Dan/Billy Fung Jing-en. That is, the dog that bites the hand that feeds it.

- (HK01) In the evening of October 20th, Viu TU issued a statement to admit that their production staff had tried to arrange for Wang and Fung to attend a forum at a Japanese university. When that could not happen, they arranged for Wang and Fung to appear at the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan. Viu TV did not realize that the change in format would lead to unforeseeable things. They did not expect a variety show would be propagandizing for Hong Kong/Xinjiang independence movements. Viu TV repeated its opposition to Hong Kong independence and people using Viu TV to promote such ideas. They also said that they will not air those filmed segments of Wang and Fung.

- (Ming Pao) Billy Fung said that he received a phone call from Kam Kwong-shing, vice-president of production department at Viu TV to apologize. Fung demanded that Viu TV make an open apology. "Viu TV issued a statement before and threatened to sue us. When they found out that they made a mistake, they merely corrected their first statement but refused to apology. This is  unacceptable ... there is no reason why they talk loud when they want to accuse me, but then they want to apologize via a private phone call."

Fung said that the production department has come under pressure as a result. During the filming period, the production team gave the two the maximum freedom to say whatever they want. But the senior management clearly thinks differently from the frontline workers. The reaction from Viu TV now shows that the senior management has surrendered to the Beijing authorities. Fung said that Viu TV re-airs NOW TV news programs, so it is better than a certain free over-the-air television channel. Thus, Fung is not asking people to boycott Viu TV.

(Hong Kong Free Press) October 17, 2016.

Lawmaker Eddie Chu Hoi-dick has landed in London to investigate the controversy surrounding the nationality of newly-elected Legislative Council president Andrew Leung. Chu said he will visit Britains Home Office to urge the UK authorities to answer questions raised by the incident.

Chu, one of the lawmakers who questioned whether Leung had completed the process to renounce his British citizenship, boarded a Cathay Pacific flight from late Sunday night. He said he wished to find out more information about Leungs renunciation of citizenship before he officially chairs the first LegCo meeting on Wednesday morning. According to the Basic Law, the citys s mini-constitution, LegCo presidents must be Chinese citizens without the right of abode in any foreign countries.

Because we can see in Hong Kong that we cannot get all of the information from him, from the government, or from the LegCo secretariat, I wish to raise a lot of questions with the UK and directly ask its Home Office, he said in a pre-recorded video posted on his Facebook account on Monday.

He also said he wished to connect with the media and the political sector in the UK to find the truth behind the incident.

A staff member at Chus LegCo office told HKFP that Chu is expected to arrive back in Hong Kong at around 8am on Wednesday to attend the LegCo meeting on that day.

Leung came under fire before his election as president last week after he at first declined to provide documents confirming that he had renounced his British citizenship.

Leung showed opposition lawmakers copies of two emails from the Home Office last Wednesday in an effort to convince them, but many remained unmoved as he was unable to present an official declaration of renunciation document, which lawmaker Claudia Mo Man-ching also a former British citizen who gave up the nationality said would be the proof they need.

Leung then showed the document that afternoon. The move surprised many as the documents physical copy usually takes several days to arrive in Hong Kong from the UK. He was then elected as president by a 38-0 margin, as the opposition camp walked out of the election questioning its legality.

In a press release on Monday, Chus office said the incident still raised questions, and there were several problems related to the Home Offices handling of the matter.

We think that the UK government under the Conservative Party, under pressure from Beijing, employed extreme efficiency and abnormal administrative means to ensure Andrew Leung could complete the procedure to give up his nationality in time, it alleged.

[They] practically intervened with the presidential election of Hong Kongs legislature, affected the autonomy of Hong Kongs legislature, and even violated the basic promise of Hong Kong people ruling Hong Kong in the Sino-British Joint Declaration.

Eddie Chu wishes the UK authorities will play a more neutral, fairer and more transparent role in any affairs or decisions that affect Hong Kong, and does not pander to Beijing, it said.

He said he has written to UK Home Secretary Amber Rudd to request UK authorities to meet with him and release key information on the incident.

He also said he will host a news conference outside the UKs Home Office at 8pm Hong Kong time.

(RTHK) October 17, 2016.

Lawmaker Chu Hoi-dick led a small protest outside the UK's Home Office in London on Monday. He wants to find out whether the new Legco president, Andrew Leung, is breaking the Basic Law by holding the post.

Chu says he has doubts about Leung's claim that he has given up his British nationality. Chu says Leung's application was handed in less than two weeks, and that it normally takes 40 days for a Hong Kong resident to complete the process.

Leung says he had renounced his British citizenship before being elected to the post of Legco president on October 12. Chu said that if the procedure had already been completed by then, then the British government must have given Leung special treatment in order to help Beijing.

According to the Basic Law, the council's president cannot have right of abode in a foreign country. Leung has produced several documents to back his renunciation claim. But lawmakers want Leung to produce one called a declaration of renunciation.

(SCMP) October 18, 2016.

Newly elected lawmaker Eddie Chu Hoi-dick was in London on Monday demanding answers from the UK government over the how the new Legislative Council president gave up British citizenship.

Chus office said he wanted to meet Home Office officials, including Home Secretary Amber Rudd, for an explanation of why Andrew Leung Kwan-yuen, of the pro-Beijing Business and Professionals Alliance, had his renunciation of British nationality processed so quickly.

On departing late on Sunday, Chu said in a video posted on his Facebook page: I have to fly to London to try to get more information because there is little hope that I can get much from Leung or the Legco secretariat. One important question I would raise is how long it would normally take for a nationality renunciation application to get processed.

Chu said he suspected the Conservative government might have given Leung quicker, preferential treatment under pressure from Beijing.

Leung had faced a challenge to his presidency because legally the president must be a Chinese national with no right of abode in any foreign country. Leung only applied to give up his British nationality on September 22. On the day of the election, he revealed papers that seemed to show he gave up the nationality.

In a letter, dated Monday, to Rudd, Chu criticised the UK for helping in putting a puppet for Beijing on the presidential seat of Legco. He said that had disappointed Hongkongers. This incident casts doubts over the autonomy of the Hong Kong legislature and the UKs commitment to the Hong Kong people ruling Hong Kong principle in the Sino-British Joint Declaration, Chu wrote, accusing Rudd of kowtowing to Beijing. Chu said he wanted the government to confirm the authenticity of Leungs documents, and to find out if the officer who signed Leungs papers had been in contact with any [Chinese] officials.

Leung said on Monday: I have repeatedly explained the situation. But some people refuse to accept. I am very pleased to see someone take the trouble to clarify the matter for me.

A spokesman for Chus office said he had paid for the trip on his own and had no plan to claim it on his offices expenses.

In a live interview on TV programme Impact by BBC World News on Monday night Hong Kong time, Chu said: I want to question [British officials] in order to clarify what happened between the Home Office and Andrew Leung. Chu queried why Leung applied so late for the renunciation, adding that he understood the process to be one which usually took 40 days.

The nomination for Legco president closed on October 5 and the election took place on October 12. Chu said he suspected that Leung was so confident about his application because he might have secured a guarantee from either the British or Chinese government that the process would be sped up.

The lawmaker said on a radio programme on Tuesday morning that Catherine West of the Labour Party in the UK would file written questions in parliament on whether the UK was under pressure to speed up Leungs renunciation of his British citizenship. I will come back soon, for Wednesdays Legco meeting, Chu said.

So what happened in the United Kingdom?

(Chu Hoi Dick's Letter to UK Home Secretary Amber Rudd MP, 17th October 2016)

...

Our conclusion is that the Conservative government has been extremely efficient and take utterly extraordinary practice to ensure that Mr. Leung would be able to meet the election deadline for his renunciation. In short, the Conservative government has helped in putting a puppet for Beijing on the Presidential seat of the HK Legislative Council.

The Conservative government has shown its eagerness to please the PRC during this saga, or at the very least, they had been careful to avoid offending or angering the PRC. The attitude shown in this case is so different to the self-assured image set by PM Theresa May's recent scheduling to trigger Article 50 of the Treaty of Lisbon. It appears as though Theresa May, of all people, has inherited David Camerons style of habitual kowtowing to Beijing.

The Conservative governments flattery to Beijing, as well as the unfathomable mess by their civil servants in response to Andrew Leung's unduly reckless request may nevertheless embarrass UK people. The discretionary power exercised by the UK Government has been arbitrary, inconsistent and violated standard practices. These acts must be an embarrassment for the British people. While the British governments forceful escorting of a Beijing assigned candidate, against concerns of legitimacy, to the throne of Chairmanship at the Hong Kong Legislative Council, is surely disappointing to the Hong Kong people.

(Chu Hoi Dick's Facebook, 17th October 2016)

Chu Hoi-dick had arrived at Britain on 17th October. The purpose of this trip was to investigate and demand for a response from the British government concerning the renunciation of Andrew Leung.

Chu, Alex Chow, and other Hong Kong people residing in London had just gathered and protested outside the Home Office, protesting against the British governments giving in to the demands of the Chinese government, granting discretion to Andrew Leungs application of renunciation. The British governments decision had sabotaged the neutrality of the government, and had severely interfered the autonomy of Hong Kong; such act is equivalent to manipulating the election of the Legislative Council, and had impaired the integrity of the Home Office.

Chu will be on BBC, attending an interview at 3 p.m. British time (10 p.m. Hong Kong Time) . Our Facebook page will be live streaming the interview, providing simultaneous information and also views and opinions from Britain.
(Update: As the interview was conducted in the studio, we are unable to provide live streaming of the interview. We apologise for any inconvenience caused.)

Chu will also be meeting Catherine West, the shadow Foreign Office Minister at 5 p.m. British Time (12 a.m.Hong Kong Time), discussing with West the incident and the handling of such by the British government.

We will be updating continuously the latest news. Stay tuned for further information.

Special thanks to all Hong Kong people assisting us in UK!

(BBC World Service)

Philippa Thomas: What do you trying to say to them?

Chu Hoi Dick: What I am trying to say... I want to put questions to them, in order to clarify what had happened between the Home Office and Andrew Leung. Because we have found information, and the internet saying that the normal days to process a renunciation request is around 40 days, but Andrew Leung did his application on 22nd September, so he got his renunciation ready in only 8 days. So the problem is why he was so confident that he can manage to do this. We are suspicious that, he was so confident because he got guarantee from the British government, or Beijing government that he could get a speed up process.

(Chu Hoi Dick's Facebook) October 18, 2016.

[Abroad in England: The Labour Party will follow up the incident in the parliament]

Chu had met with Catherine West, the Shadow Prime Minister on 17th October at 5 p.m. British time (12 a.m. Hong Kong time), discussing the problematic application of renunciation made by Mr Andrew Leung.


Caption: Labour Party Shadow Foreign Secretary Catherine West

West pointed out that the application and the handling procedures are unusual, and had agreed to report to Jeremy Corbyn and Emily Thornberry, the Shadow Foreign Secretary. She will be questioning Boris Johnson on the matter, and will be demanding for an appropriate response during the Parliament debates.

Chu had suggested during meeting for the Labour Party to question the Prime Minister concerning the handling of Leungs application. West had agreed to the suggestion, and Chu had begin drafting question contents for the Labour Party as reference, in hope that the British government will provide further information.

Reading between the lines, here is what happened. Chu Hoi Dick sent a letter to Home Secretary Amber Rudd (MP, Conservative Party) and got no response, so the Rudd meeting was off. So Chu and a few people stood outside the Home Office to protest and got no attention. Chu got a meeting with Catherine West (Labour Party MP in Hornsey and Wood Green). West said that she would report to Jeremy Corbyn (MP, Leader of the Labour Party) and Emily Thornberry (MP, Shadow Foreign Secretary).

- Why did Labour Party MP Catherine West agree to meet with Chu Hoi Dick? West has a master's degree in Chinese politics from the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. She can speak conversational putonghua. Thus she could be expected to give a sympathetic hearing to all persons Chinese.

(Wen Wei Po) Internet comments:

- Lee Ching-hei (Civic Passion): "Is there anything more fucking embarrassing than having the door slammed in your face? Yes, that would be flying over there by airplane and having the door slammed in your face!"

- Arthur K.H. Lee: Legislator Chu Hoi Dick traveled all the way to England in order to prove that Andrew Leung's document was authentic ... Legislator Chu seemed more and more like the China Liaison Office's B-team while acting as the Communist Party mole inside the Legislative Council."

- Kevin Yam (Progressive Lawyers Group): What is so praiseworthy about Chu's investigation work in the United Kingdom? This is a dead issue once Andrew Leung produced the document on September 30. Why do we have to walk down the dead-end road because someone has some gimmickry in store? Just because he tried that does not mean that he is accomplishing anything. The public should be skeptical of legislators who are smart alecks looking for excitement, but without any wisdom and realism.

Internet comments:

- Why did Home Secretary Amber Rudd refuse to meet with Chu Hoi Dick? Look at Chu's letter to Rudd. Chu Hoi Dick needs help from an adult on at least one thing:

If Chu is trying to secure a meeting with Rudd, there should not be conclusions like: "the Conservative government has helped in putting a puppet for Beijing on the Presidential seat of the HK Legislative Council." This is enough to put the kibosh on.

- If several guys are standing outside the Home Office holding a sign that says "Give Hong Kong answer", would you go out and talk to them?

- "Give Hong Kong answer" is what? Give an answer to Hong Kong? Give the answer from Hong Kong? Give an answer in Hong Kong style?

- Why did Chu Hoi Dick's Facebook present Catherine West as the Shadow Prime Minister? There is no such post as the Shadow Prime Minister in the opposition party. If Catherine West is the Shadow Prime Minister, why does she need to report to the Shadow Foreign Secretary Emily Thornberry? Isn't the reporting structure the other way around?

- Catherine West was first elected to Parliament in 2015. She barely knows Parliament, so how is she going to be Shadow Foreign Secretary? Does the Labour Party have so few experienced MP's now?

- Chu Hoi Dick's Facebook contains plenty of good news about meeting some very important persons. But when he got back to Hong Kong, he said on radio: 「睇嚟英國政府呢一面唔係好理我哋」. "It seems that the British Government does not pay us much attention." That is an honest assessment of the situation.

- What does Greensense have to say about the carbon footprint as a result of a pointless round trip by airplane?

- That airplane ticket must surely cost at least $10,000 (economy class). Not to worry, because it will be covered under the $203,860 annual allowance for entertainment and traveling by Legislative Council.

- Chu Hoi Dick fared better than Jeremy Tam:

- (Wen Wei Po) June 3, 2016.

Yesterday at 11am, Tam arrived at International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) headquarters in Thailand in order to meet with the person in charge over the matter of the breach of security by Chief Executive CY Leung's wife and daughter at the Hong Kong International  Airport.

He wrote: "I had been in constant contact with ICAO. I told them that I will be presenting a letter at this hour. But when I called the ICAO worker from the security room, I was told that every office worker is in a meeting. Therefore nobody can meet me to accept the letter. Furthermore, the ICAO worker even refused to give me his name. I went out of the security room to call Hong Kong, and they lowered the gate and locked the glass door to stop me from returning. I cannot imagine that an international organization can treat its visitors in such a way. I will look for other ways to get the letter to them."

So Tam stood outside the gate and waited for ICAO workers to leave. Finally he spotted someone who looked as if he might be a senior ICAO official. So he intercepted the vehicle and "successfully handed over the letter." Tam said that this "worker" took the letter and promised to deliver it to the secretary-general. Of course, nobody knows if the letter will go straight to the rubbish bin. In any case, Tam's show was done and he returned to Hong Kong.

- London is a dangerous place for Chu Hoi Dick, because there are many weitou country squires living there. They are even rougher and tougher than their Hong Kong cousins.

- Wasn't Chu Hoi Dick afraid of his life and got police protection? So why does he make such a high-profile trip with live Facebook coverage all the way?  Did the Hong Kong police travel with him to provide protection?

- Why won't the UK Home Office tell Chu Hoi Dick anything? Please read Data Protection Act 1998.

- Chu Hoi Dick said on radio that the Home Office replied that they do not comment on individual cases. This is a foregone conclusion. Just Google 'home office'+'not comment on individual cases'.

This is the way that the Home Office handles all such inquiries. The answer is not going to be different because Chu Hoi Dick traveled to England to inquire the Home Secretary on behalf of the people of Hong Kong (who did not authorize him).

- Wishful thinking:

Yellow running dogs: "Oh, motherland!" "We remember the colonial era fondly!"
Reaction: "Fuck off! If you can even betray your own people, you will only betray me some day if I take you back!"

- Wan Chin's Facebook: Chu Hoi Dick, Alex Chow and a bunch of Hongkongers residing in London went down to protest outside the Home Office about the United Kingdom government succumbing to Chinese pressure to give special treatment to Andrew Leung, thus destroying the neutrality and system of governance. The result is that Hong Kong self-determination was damaged, the Legco presidency was manipulated and the UK Home Office lost public trust."

Wan Chin continued: "Chu Hoi Dick showed us the image of Hongkongers on an international stage -- dishonest, ignorant, cowardly and useless. Chu Hoi Dick managed to see a Labour Party Shadow Foreign Minister, who may become the Foreign Minister if the Labour Party ever becomes the ruling party. Chu Hoi Dick showed us that he met with this very important person."

"The answer that the United Kingdom gave to Chu Hoi Dick was the rudest possible 'No comment.' After Chu Hoi Dick rudely displayed 'Home Office: Give an Answer' outside, he got the treatment that he deserved."

[595] Money Talks (2016/10/18)

(SCMP) October 17, 2016.

Two newly elected localist lawmakers indicated on Monday that they would retake their oaths properly on Wednesday to keep their seats, avoiding the prospect of a major showdown in the Legislative Council after many were offended by the pairs antics at the swearing-in ceremony a week ago.

Youngspirations Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang said he and party colleague Yau Wai-ching would consider compromising to avoid being disqualified. Many people hope we can achieve our ideals and goals through our seats in Legco. For these ideals and goals, I would not mind sacrificing my personal reputation, Leung said.

But both insisted they had done nothing wrong and brushed off mounting calls for an apology and their resignation, as well as threats of legal action against them. In the oath, it doesnt mention any specific person ... I dont know how we could have offended anyone, Leung said.

At the inaugural Legco meeting last Wednesday, the pair pledged allegiance to the Hong Kong nation, referring to the sovereign state as Chee-na, a variation of the derogatory Shina used by Japan for China during the second world war. They also displayed a banner with the slogan Hong Kong is not China while they were being sworn in. Their oaths were invalidated by Legco secretary general Kenneth Chen Wei-on.

Mok Ka-kit, a student at City University, applied for a judicial review in the High Court on Monday over the legality of the oaths taken by the Youngspiration pair. Mok asked the court to disqualify Yau and Leung on the basis of unconstitutional oaths taken under the Oaths and Declarations Ordinance. According to the law, Legco members are required to swear allegiance to the Special Administrative Region of Hong Kong, and refusal to take the oath properly could lead to disqualification .

In a separate judicial review application filed on Friday, solicitor Dr Siu See-kong, who failed to win a Legco seat in several past attempts, argued that Yau had lost her right to sit in the chamber as a Chinese national by advocating independence for the city. Siu asked the court to seek an interpretation from the national legislature of the requirement to be a Chinese national to run in Legco elections. Apart from Yau, the Electoral Affairs Commission was named a co-defendant in the case. Leung was not.

Eric Cheung Tat-ming, a legal scholar at the University of Hong Kong, said the court challenges were mere political gestures and did not have strong legal grounds. They havent failed to take their oaths so far, he said.

Over a dozen adverts appeared in local newspapers on Monday, slamming the Youngspiration pair and demanding they apologise and quit.

While Leung maintained his pronunciation of China as Chee-na was due to his Ap Lei Chau accent, a group of residents from the island rejected his excuse. Leung Chung-hangs terrible action has made those of us who were born and bred in Ap Lei Chau angry, they said in a joint statement.

Leung and Yau are set to retake their oaths on Wednesday in front of new Legco president Andrew Leung Kwan-yuen, along with architecture representative Edward Yiu Chung-yim, whose oath was also invalidated.

Pan-democratic legislators, meanwhile, called on Andrew Leung to be transparent about the standards he would use to judge the retaking of the oath as well as the legal advice he had received. The Legco president replied that he would announce his decision on the matter on Tuesday.

(SCMP) October 18, 2016.

In a sign of a toughening stance, Legislative Council president Andrew Leung Kwan-yuen has invalidated the oaths of two more lawmakers whose oaths were originally accepted last week. The decision brings the total number of lawmakers who must retake their oaths of office to five.

They are Youngspiration duo Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching and architecture sector representative Edward Yiu Chung-yim all three of whose oaths were rejected last week and Lau Siu-lai and Wong Ting-kwong of the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong. Lai read her oath slowly last week, pausing six seconds between every word. Wong had omitted Hong Kong in his rendition. The Legco president described Lai as not serious in delivering her drawn-out oath.

Andrew Leung is scheduled to administer the oath to the five on Wednesday.

(SCMP) October 18, 2016.

The High Court will decide on Tuesday evening whether to stop two lawmakers-elect from retaking their oaths in the Legislative Council after the government filed a last-minute application for a court order a day before the pair were scheduled to make their declarations. The hearing will start at 9pm.

High Court judge Mr Justice Thomas Au Hing-cheung said he would need to consider the arguments from interested parties before making any urgent orders.

The action was filed against Youngspiration lawmakers-elect Yau Wai-ching and Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang as defendants. Legco president Andrew Leung Kwan-yuen was also named a co-defendant.

The government informed Yau and Baggio Leung about the application earlier on Tuesday.

The Legco president said he had instructed the lawyer representing the council that he objected to the governments application for a judicial review of his decision to allow Yau and Leung to take their oaths on Wednesday. I will stick to my schedule unless the court issues an injunction, Leung said.

(SCMP) October 18, 2016.

Declaring full-frontal war on Tuesday night, the Hong Kong government took the unprecedented step of mounting a legal challenge to disqualify two pro-independence lawmakers on grounds that they had contravened the Basic Law during their swearing-in last week.

In a last-minute bid, the administration sought but failed to obtain an interim injunction to bar Youngspiration pair Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching from retaking their oaths on Wednesday morning at 11am.

But Mr Justice Thomas Au Hing-cheung did allow an application for a judicial review against Legislative Council president Andrew Leung Kwan-yuens decision over the retaking of the oaths.

The hearing on the application has been set for November 3.

In court, the lawyer for Andrew Leung argued that the governments move was a serious deprivation of the constitutional rights of the two lawmakers-elect. I want to emphasise the president has an important institutional duty to protect the institution elected by different sectors of society, Jat Sew-tong SC, acting for the Legco president, told the court. [He has to] safeguard the interests of all elected councillors. The call would be a very strong one to make if the court was to take the irreparable action to disqualify the two, Jat warned.

Hectar Pun SC, for Sixtus Leung, argued that it was incorrect to say his client had violated the Oaths and Declarations Ordinance. Article 104 of the Basic Law is irrelevant in this case, Pun said. The barrister also said there was no urgency justifying an interim injunction.

Barrister Jeffrey Tam, for Yau, said disqualifying the pair would affect the operation of the legislature.

But Johnny Mok Shiu-luen SC, representing the government and a member of Beijings Basic Law Committee, argued that the Basic Law provision on oath-taking in Article 104 was intended to put emphasis on Chinas sovereignty.

These people are sending a message to the world and also to the public that we can function as a member of Legco without pledging allegiance to the HKSAR of the Peoples Republic of China, he said.

To allow them to take the oath again, Mok added, would create a state of confusion as to what is the meaning of the further acts undertaken, which could include initiating bills or giving speeches in Legco. In court, Mok called them ostentatiously unfit persons to be Legco members for even a moment.

Signalling that the action was not without public support, Mok said: The public would be disappointed if they see that these people who blatantly attacked and challenged the constitutional regime can return and resume office.

The legal action sets the stage for a protracted constitutional battle as the Hong Kong government is seeking to ban elected lawmakers from entering the chamber on the ground of their oath declaration. Mainland authorities might be forced to step in, one analyst warned.

The court challenge came hours after Leung Chun-ying vowed to take follow-up action against the Youngspiration pair for altering their oaths.

The pan-democratic camp accused Leung Chun-ying of ruining the separation of powers by inviting the courts to intervene in Legcos domestic affairs. The chief executive pays no respect to the dignity and the independence of our legislature, Civic Party lawmaker Dennis Kwok said.

(SCMP) October 19, 2016.

Two pro-independence lawmakers were unable to retake their oaths yesterday after their pro-establishment rivals forced the session to be aborted by walking out, plunging the Legislative Council into further paralysis and uncertainty at the beginning of its new term.

In denying the localists a second chance to be sworn in, after they insulted China and referred to Hong Kong as a nation when they modified their oaths last week, pro-establishment politicians were hailed yesterday as lawmakers who love the country and love Hong Kong by state news agency Xinhua.

Two pro-independence lawmakers were unable to retake their oaths yesterday after their pro-establishment rivals forced the session to be aborted by walking out, plunging the Legislative Council into further paralysis and uncertainty at the beginning of its new term.

In denying the localists a second chance to be sworn in, after they insulted China and referred to Hong Kong as a nation when they modified their oaths last week, pro-establishment politicians were hailed yesterday as lawmakers who love the country and love Hong Kong by state news agency Xinhua.

Our action was in response to many Hong Kong residents and Chinese all around the world who were angered, said Starry Lee Wai-king, chairwoman of the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong. We cannot allow those who insult Chinese to retake the oath with no remorse.

Another localist lawmaker, Lau Siu-lai, became collateral damage as the session ended before she could retake her oath.

The High Court on Tuesday night rejected the governments last-minute application for an interim injunction to stop the two localists from retaking their oaths.

But the court allowed the administration to seek a judicial review of Legco President Andrew Leung Kwan-yuens decision to hold a second swearing-in session, for which a hearing will be held on November 3.

Pro-establishment lawmaker Junius Ho said his camp would do everything possible to shut out the localist pair, including tabling a motion to have the next swearing-in session put on hold until the court ruled on the legality of allowing them to retake their oaths.

But that will be difficult to achieve because such a motion will need the democratic camps support to pass, raising the prospect of further chaos in Legco.

The drama in the chamber took all of 19 minutes yesterday.

Just as the Youngspiration pair were set to retake their vows, the DABs Gary Chan made a quorum call to check if at least half of the 70 lawmakers were present.

As the bell rang for 15 minutes, all pro-establishment lawmakers walked out, leaving only the 29 members of the opposing camp behind and prompting the Legco president to adjourn the meeting to next Wednesday.

The Youngspiration pair said they would not bow to demands for an apology.

We bear the expectations of tens of thousands of voters. If we apologise so easily, it means we cannot live up to their expectations, Yau said.

Baggio Leung added: If any legislator ... could be obstructed by the pro-Beijing majority ... to discuss politics and express their views with such measures, then whats the point of the election?

About 300 protesters outside Legco cheered after the walkout, and called the two localists dogs.

The Legco president said it was unfortunate he had to adjourn the meeting, but added we are far from a constitutional crisis.

Andrew Leung insisted he had the constitutional duty to let the duly-elected localists perform their duties, but noted that the pro-establishment camp also had the right to express their views by leaving their seats.

With oath-taking incomplete, the new Legco is unlikely to deal with any bills or other matters.

Internet comments:

- Hong Kong Basic Law Article 104.

When assuming office, the Chief Executive, principal officials, members of the Executive Council and of the Legislative Council, judges of the courts at all levels and other members of the judiciary in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region must, in accordance with law, swear to uphold the Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China and swear allegiance to the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China.

 CAP 542 Legislative Council Ordinance Section 73

An elector, or the Secretary for Justice, may bring proceedings in the Court against any person who is acting, claims to be entitled to act, as a Member on the ground that the person is disqualified from acting as such.

Hong Kong Basic Law Article 48

The Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region shall exercise the following powers and functions:

...

(7) To appoint or remove holders of public office in accordance with legal procedures;

- (SCMP) In the oath, it doesnt mention any specific person ... I dont know how we could have offended anyone, Leung said.

- "I was talking about the Zionist illuminati and I didn't mention any specific persons ... I don't see why the Jewish people in the audience should feel offended."

- "I was talking about the niggers stealing the election for Hillary Clinton, so why did President Barack Obama get so upset? I wasn't talking about him at all."

- (SCMP) Eric Cheung Tat-ming, a legal scholar at the University of Hong Kong,  They havent failed to take their oaths so far.

- That means that they haven't taken their oaths so far, in case you can't parse what he was saying.

- (SCMP) Youngspirations Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang said he and party colleague Yau Wai-ching would consider compromising to avoid being disqualified. Many people hope we can achieve our ideals and goals through our seats in Legco. For these ideals and goals, I would not mind sacrificing my personal reputation, Leung said.

- Here is the real reason:

(Fact sheet on "Legislative Council in figures")

Member's remuneration, medical allowance and reimbursement package, October 1 2015-September 30 2016

Monthly remuneration (HK$) for Member who does not serve on the Executive Council = $93,040.

End-of-service gratuity: 15% of remuneration received

Yearly medical allowance (HK$) = $32,400

Yearly operating expenses reimbursement accountable component for office operation (HK$) = up to $2,385,510

Yearly operating expenses reimbursement non-account component for entertainment and traveling = up to $203,860

Per/term one-off expenses reimbursement setting up and information technology reimbursement = $250,000

Per/term one-off expenses reimbursement winding up = $198,793

The total income from four years as Legislative Councilor is:

($93,040/month x 48 months) * 1.15

+ ($32,400/year x 4 years)

+ (2,385,510/year x 4 years)

+ (203,860/year x 4 years)

+ $250,000

+ $198,793

= $16,071,680

This does not include any of those donations that you "hold in your pocket temporarily" with no accountability.

- Peanuts Theater

The two Youngspiration legislators who said "Shina" to insult the Chinese people
Kneel down for the sake of the $100,000 monthly salary
Yau Wai-ching/Leung Chung-hang
Abandon their principles and bottomlines to file a written petition to be allowed to re-take their oaths

- Here is the "Teacher" Lau Siu-lai's student speaking in her style: "Teacher (six seconds pause), today (six seconds pause) is (six seconds pause) the (six seconds pause) conversation (six seconds pause) test (six seconds pause). Please (six seconds pause), how (six seconds pause) much (six seconds pause) time (six seconds pause) do (six seconds pause) I (six seconds pause) have (six seconds pause) between (six seconds pause) two (six seconds pause) words (six seconds pause). If (six seconds pause) I (six seconds pause) fail (six seconds pause) this (six seconds pause) exam (six seconds pause), then (six seconds pause) you (six seconds pause) must (six seconds pause) give (six seconds pause) me  (six seconds pause) a (six seconds pause) good (six seconds pause) reason (six seconds pause), because (six seconds pause) I (six seconds pause) am (six seconds pause) only (six seconds pause) imitating (six seconds pause) you (six seconds pause). Otherwise (six seconds pause) you (six seconds pause) will (six seconds pause) have (six seconds pause) to (six seconds pause) apologize (six seconds pause) to (six seconds pause) me (six seconds pause) in (six seconds pause) public (six seconds pause).

Lau Siu-lai is upset that Andrew Leung's decision against her is based purely on subjective reasons. She demands that Leung give her a complete set of objective criteria. But if her students talk the same way to her, her class would by dysfunctional.

- (Sky Post/Hong Kong Economic Times) Do you support the government seeking a judicial review to stop Yau Wai-ching and Leung Chung-hang from taking the oath of office?

11,292 participants
96% agree
4% disagree
0% no opinion

- (Soap HK) Andrew Leung decided to let Yau Wai-ching and Leung Chung-hang take their oaths at the next session. Thanks to the incoherent positions of Leung and Yau, public opinion has become cleared. In the Economic Times/Sky Post online poll after two days, 95% of the 40,000 or so participants approve the Secretary for Justice's judicial review to stop the two from re-taking their oaths. The signature campaign to condemn Yau Wai-ching has 110,000 participants. The signature campaign to condemn both Yau Wai-ching and Leung Chung-hang has more than 510,000 participants. If the initial opinion is to make them apologize first before re-taking their oaths, their intransigence has caused the public demand to swing to disallowing them to take their elected posts altogether.

- How did they come up with the order in which the five legislators re-took their oaths. Pro-establishment Wong Ting-kwong (DAB) was the first to be successfully re-sworn in. Yiu Chung-yim of the architectural, surveying and planning sector was the second to be sworn in, with no more chicanery. Yau Wai-ching, Leung Chung-hang and Lau Siu-lai were due up next, but the pro-establishment legislators walked out. Why would have happened if Wong Ting-kwong were the fifth in the order?

- That poodle dog Yiu Chung-yim just gave up "genuine universal suffrage"!

- The order is based upon the number of strokes in the Chinese character of the family name. Of the remaining three legislators-elect, Lau Siu-lai will still be in the third slot. So if the pro-establishment legislators walk out at the next oath-taking, Lau would still be stranded out there.

- Lau indicated that she would speak at normal pace the next time, because she had already made her point the first time around. Previously she was taking the position that her first attempt was at perfectly normal pace and she didn't understand why anyone would find her impossible to understand.

- Here is the "Teacher" Lau Siu-lai's student speaking in her style: "Teacher (six seconds pause), today (six seconds pause) is (six seconds pause) the (six seconds pause) conversation (six seconds pause) test (six seconds pause). Please (six seconds pause), how (six seconds pause) much (six seconds pause) time (six seconds pause) do (six seconds pause) I (six seconds pause) have (six seconds pause) between (six seconds pause) two (six seconds pause) words (six seconds pause). If (six seconds pause) I (six seconds pause) fail (six seconds pause) this (six seconds pause) exam (six seconds pause), then (six seconds pause) you (six seconds pause) must (six seconds pause) give (six seconds pause) me  (six seconds pause) a (six seconds pause) good (six seconds pause) reason (six seconds pause), because (six seconds pause) I (six seconds pause) am (six seconds pause) only (six seconds pause) imitating (six seconds pause) you (six seconds pause). Otherwise (six seconds pause) you (six seconds pause) will (six seconds pause) have (six seconds pause) to (six seconds pause) apologize (six seconds pause) to (six seconds pause) me (six seconds pause) in (six seconds pause) public (six seconds pause).

Lau Siu-lai is upset that Andrew Leung's decision against her is based purely on subjective reasons. She demands that Leung give her a complete set of objective criteria. But if her Community College students talk the same way to her, her class would be dysfunctional.

- After the pro-establishment legislators walked out to stop the proceedings, Lau Siu-lai got on radio and told them to stop wasting time and money. And speaking with a six second pause between words is not wasting time and money?

- From the United States, there is IOKIYAR: It's okay if you're a republican. So it's okay if pan-democratic camp filibuster but it's not okay if the pro-establishment camp filibuster. Why? Because FREEDOM DEMOCRACY HUMAN RIGHTS JUSTICE UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE UNIVERSAL VALUES.

- (RTHK) After the walkout, the pro-establishment legislators addressed the press. But pan-democrats Leung Kwok-hung, Chan Chi-chuen and Chu Hoi Dick jumped in front of the cameras to engage in a round of mutual acrimony.

- Hey, the best part was when they started throwing luncheon meat at each other!

- What do the vegetarians/vegans have to say about this? What does Greensense have to say about this anti-conservation action?

- (Hong Kong Free Press with video) October 19, 2016.

Opposition lawmaker Cheng Chung-tai was the first lawmaker to be ordered to leave a Legislative Council meeting this term after he turned Chinese and Hong Kong flags on the desks of pro-Beijing camp lawmakers upside down.

Cheng, of Civic Passion, began his protest minutes after the pro-Beijing camp walked out of the chamber on Wednesday. The walkout was an effort to prevent Youngspirations Baggio Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching from retaking their oaths until they apologised for their pledges last week, which the camp deemed to be an insult to Chinese people.

As pro-Beijing lawmakers had placed flags of the Peoples Republic of China and Hong Kong on their desks, Cheng left his seat and flipped them over one by one. His move was spotted by pro-Beijing lawmaker Ann Chiang Lai-wan, who shouted at Cheng to stop.

Cheng Chung-tai, what are you doing? What are you doing? You flipped our national flags? Chiang shouted, before she returned the flags to their original state.

Cheng and Chiang shouted at each other before she left the chamber again. As Chiang left, Cheng once again turned the flags upside down.

LegCo president Andrew Leung Kwan-yuen then ordered Cheng to return to his seat.

You should not leave your seat and mess up the seats of other members, he said.

Cheng disregarded the warning and was ordered to leave. Security guards in the chamber approached him to ask him to leave, though Cheng was not obliged to as the meeting was in recess.

Cheng said on his Facebook account that he was responding to the walkout action. He said the action raised the oath taking incident to a political struggle [and] ignored Hong Kong peoples livelihood and interests.

What was funny was that the pro-Beijing camp installed Chinese and Hong Kong flags on their desks in order to make the Communist Party happy, but they left the chamber so easily, leaving the country behind, leaving only the president whos a British person in the chamber, he said.

I am disappointed by such low and cheap patriotic acts, therefore I flipped the Hong Kong flags upside down on behalf of Hong Kong people to show my discontent, he added.

(Video) https://www.facebook.com/HongKongGoodNews/videos/1245897368817530/

- Cheng Chung-tai was the only one in the pro-democracy camp to show us how to engage in valiant resistance. As a result of his action today, we are much closer to Hong Kong independence.

- Old man, did you forget to take your medication today?

- CAP 2401 National Flag and National Emblem Ordinance

Section 7 Protection of national flag and national emblem

A person who desecrates the national flag or national emblem by publicly and willfully burning, mutilating, scrawling on, defiling or trampling on it commits an offence and is liable on conviction to a fine at level 5 and to imprisonment for 3 years.

Cap 2602 Regional Flag and Regional Emblem Ordinance

A person who desecrates the regional flag or regional emblem by publicly and wilfully burning, mutilating, scrawling on, defiling or trampling on it commits an offence and is liable-

(a) on conviction on indictment to a fine at level 5 and to imprisonment for 3 years; and
(b) on summary conviction to a fine at level 3 and to imprisonment for 1 year.

- (Hong Kong Free Press) October 20, 2016.

Pro-Beijing lawmaker Edward Lau Kwok-fan has reported a fellow lawmakers flag-flipping protest to the police and urged them to investigate and prosecute in accordance with the law.

Localist lawmaker Cheng Chung-tai of Civic Passion turned Chinese and Hong Kong flags on the desks of pro-Beijing camp lawmakers upside down twice during a meeting of the Legislative Council on Wednesday. He did so in protest of the camps walk-out, which prevented three lawmakers from retaking their oaths to assume office.

Lau said that as a Chinese person, as a Legislative Councillor of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, Peoples Republic of China, there are some things that cannot be done there are also some things that cannot be tolerated.

Lau, a newly elected lawmaker from the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong, wrote to the police saying that he provided about ten lawmakers with the Chinese and Hong Kong flags, and Cheng intentionally turned them upside down.

During the course of events, someone urged him [to stop], but he did not pay attention, and repeated the action later, Lau wrote.

He was referring to Ann Chiang Lai-wan, his party colleague, who shouted at Cheng to stop before she returned the flags to their original state.

Lau claimed that Chengs actions violated section seven of the National Flag and National Emblem Ordinance and the Regional Flag and Regional Emblem Ordinance.

The ordinances state that any person that desecrates the flags or emblems by publicly and wilfully burning, mutilating, scrawling on, defiling or trampling on them is committing an offence, and is liable upon conviction to a fine and to imprisonment for three years.

I hereby ask the police to launch an investigation immediately over Cheng Chung-tais illegal action and prosecute him in accordance with the law, Lau wrote.

- (NOW TV) A man carrying a yellow umbrella with the words "I want genuine universal suffrage" sat down in the demonstration zone. The demonstrators cursed him out and tossed their placards at him. Somebody ripped up the umbrella. The man eventually left under escort by Legco security guards.

- (Hong Kong Free Press) October 19, 2016.

Raphael Wong Ho-ming, vice-chairman of the League of Social Democrats, was assaulted by protesters outside the LegCo building on Wednesday morning, Apple Daily reports.

Wong told the newspaper that he was observing protesters from afar when someone approached him and started shouting insults. They punched and kicked him, leaving a shoe print on his trousers. They attacked me for a minute or two, until the security guards came and pulled them away, Wong said. I had not said anything, or provoked them in any way.

They said they were Chinese people, but they are not fit to be called Chinese, Wong said. Their actions were insulting to Chinese people. They said Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching shamed China, but I think they are the ones who shamed China.

- You can pillory or defend High Court judge Mr Justice Thomas Au Hing-cheung's ruling in this case, but the poor opinion of the Hong Kong judiciary is set by the many other court cases. On this day, here is another good one:

(Oriental Daily) October 19, 2016.

34-year-old Lee Yun-kin owns and operates a dart club in a Sun Po Kong industrial building. On March 18, he raped a 22-year-old female customer who had been given an alcoholic drink laced with drugs. He was charged with rape at first, but the charge was reduced to sexual molestation. Sentencing took place yesterday.

Firstly, the judge read out the psychologist's evaluation of the female victim. She is suffering from post-traumatic stress syndrome and depression. Meanwhile the probation officer's report said that the defendant is a person with good character and supported by his family; he actively participates in volunteer work and he cares a lot about small animals and senior citizens. He has accomplished a lot in the sports of dart, representing Hong Kong in competition. The judge praised him for entrepreneurship in the dart club that he founded with his friends.

The judge gave serious thought to whether the defendant should be sent to jail and became concerned that jail would destroy the defendant's life. Since the probation officer wrote that community service might be appropriate, the judge decided to impose a sentence of 240 hours of community service. The judge admitted that the sentence does not reflect the severity of the crime. The judge warned the defendant that he does not want to appear in this court ever again.

- (HKG Pao) The pan-democrats call the pro-establishment camp's walkout shameful. Previously pan-democrat Leung Ka-lau (Medical Functional Constituency) was famous for his infinite, purposeless filibustering of legislation such as the Private Columbaria Bill, Fire Services (Amendment) Bill, Medical Registration (Amendment) Bill, etc. But the insults hurled by Yau Wai-ching and Leung Chung-hang against China and its people have suddenly unified the pro-establishment camp into launching their own filibustering. Here the cause was clearly defined (contra Yau Wai-ching and Leung Chung-hang) and the time period was clearly defined (November 3 when the judicial review takes place. Public opinion polls show support rates of more than 90%. Of course, they would do it. And this is the best thing that has happened to them.

- (HK01) According to informed sources, when Yau Wai-ching and Leung Chung-hang said "Shina" and wore the "Hong Kong is not China" shawl, the Central Coordination Group for Hong Kong and Macau Affairs immediately went into action with this golden opportunity. Various sectors in the government and political parties were mobilized, although not everyone knows the whole battle plan. The sources said that the highest level of the Central Government has issued the directive: "We are not afraid of chaos in Hong Kong, but we must continue to stick to our principles." So this battle will continue indefinitely. If the court refuses to issue an injunction, Beijing may act to interpret the Basic Law on its own.

- (Wan Chin's Facebook) Why am I so angry today? Because many people think that I am criticizing Youngspiration as fake Hong Kong independence elements who want to hurt Hong Kong because I want to be in the by-election. The times have changed. The Chinese Communists will get their own legislative council seats back. At first, they brought these two fake Hong Kong independence elements out to stop the Civic Passion/Proletariat Political Institute/Hong Kong Resurgence Order. Then they brought out "The Shina Talk" in order to destroy genuine Hong Kong independence. After those two lose their jobs, the Chinese Communists will take back those two seats. Why do you vote for young people to resist the Communist bandits? You think that they are dashing? Do you think politics is a physical battle, with shields and spears? Will the young people of Hong Kong fucking wake up already?

- (SCMP) Horace Chin, father of localism, draws red line against secession. By April 28, 2017.

You would never guess who wrote it Horace Chin Wan-kan, who is often called the father of localism. He especially singled out Chan Ho-tin, founder of the Hong Kong National Party, and Edward Leung Tin-kei of Hong Kong Indigenous, in an article in the Chinese-language, anti-government website Stand News this week. I cant believe it, but Chin actually offers a subtle analysis of why those who advocate independence have brought untold damage to Hong Kong.

His argument, if I understand him correctly, is that secessionists like Chan essentially make Hong Kong people out to be a separate ethnic entity from the rest of China. By turning Hongkongers into a bona fide ethnic minority fighting for independence or self-determination, they are practically inviting the central government to intervene.

They also encourage patriotic mainlanders to hate or at least suspect Hong Kong people who might think they are not part of the Han race. In his previous writings, Chin has argued that a fully democratic China would produce even more patriotic mainland Chinese bent on taking an imperialistic stance over Hong Kong.

In Stand News, Chin writes that the successes of local independence advocates in district and Legislative Council elections in the past year have actually damaged the cause of Hong Kongs freedom and autonomy. You can say that again, Chin. You are absolutely right.

In his own defence, he writes that his brand of Hong Kongs autonomy has nothing to do with race or ethnicity, but is rooted in the constitutional principles enshrined in the Sino-British Joint Declaration and the Basic Law.

In his books, Chin has often characterised Hong Kong as an autonomous city state. And of course, the city does, in many ways, function like one. We impose our own law and taxes, print our own money, control our own borders and have our own representation in many transnational bodies like the World Health Organisation and the International Olympic Committee.

This has given some people the illusion that we can attain full or nearly full sovereignty.

The key issue is whether Hong Kong, as a special administrative region, should be viewed as something like Shenzhen or Macau, or more like Singapore. Once you accept Hong Kong is an inalienable part of China, the answer is clear.

- (SCMP) Legcos a joke, but its no laughing matter. By Alex Lo. October 20, 2016.

The government failed to obtain a court injunction to bar the localist Youngspiration pair from retaking their oaths. So the pro-establishment lawmakers did its dirty work yesterday by walking out of the Legislative Council chamber, thereby halting the meeting because of the insufficient quorum.

The pan-democrats feigned outrage at the mass walkout, never mind that it has been one of their favourite delaying tactics against the government. They were getting a dose of their own medicine.

But the pro-establishment camp did not come out any better. Its members have long professed disgust at such tactics, yet did it anyway at the start of the new legislature.

The High Court ruled there was no urgency in granting a temporary injunction, though it has agreed to take up the governments judicial review to disqualify Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching from becoming legislators. Shouldnt the government-friendly lawmakers have waited for the legal challenge to take its course?

In staging the walkout and sabotaging the oath-taking session, the pro-establishment lawmakers showed contempt for the court as well as for new Legco president Andrew Leung Kwan-yuen.

They may have succeeded in their immediate goal of stopping Sixtus Leung and Yau from taking up their duties. But they have forfeited whatever moral high ground they had claimed against delaying tactics previously used by the pan-dems in the legislature.

The unedifying spectacle at Legco that started last week with the localist pairs childish and offensive oath-taking continued yesterday.

There was a long shouting match between the two camps outside the chamber. Long Hair Leung Kwok-hung threw luncheon meat at his opponents. Inside the half-empty chamber, Cheng Chung-tai of the radical Civic Passion walked around and turned upside down the small national and bauhinia flags on the desks of Beijing-friendly lawmakers. Ann Chiang Lai-wan, of the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong, turned the flags right side up and chased after him.

He waited until she left the chamber and did it again. I compared the new Legco to a kindergarten in a recent column. But thats insulting to young children, who behave much better than many of our lawmakers.

Henceforth, nothing is sacred and everything is fair game in Legco. We can expect legislative mayhem and breakdown in the next four years

- (YouTube) RTHK

Leung Chung-hang (Youngspiration): This matter ... Andrew Leung once said that if the whole thing were to be done the same way, it won't pass. But at least I will still add something.

James To (Democratic Party): Actually what I want to ask is: What is the purpose of adding something? What is the purpose of adding something?

Leung Chung-hang: For any legislator, he has to complete his oath first before he can go on to take care of other parliamentary duties.

James To: You want to complete the process. What is the purpose of adding something extra?

Leung Chung-hang: About this ... let us see what can be said. Because we are in the judicial process, many things cannot be discussed.

James To: There is something that I find it hard to understand. Of course, when you talk about something ... apart from expressing your political ideas, you want to get more people to support you. Is it possible that among your supporters, some of them think that you said something ... that is, you upset them. For me personally and for many of my supporters, we disagree with what Legislator Leung and Legislator Yau said. Objectively speaking, when you talk about accents, many people are incredulous.

Ip Kwun-lum (RTHK host): "Hong Kong is not China" ... is it logically meaningful? Is the word "Shina" offensive? Actually, what good does this do for society?

Leung Chung-hang: This is ... this is ... er ... we put many factors into this. We brought out many discussion points.

Ip Kwun-lum: But the result is that the word "Shina" offends the people of China. This is the strongest effect.

- I don't have a clue what Leung Chung-hang is saying. Shortly afterwards, Leung Chung-hang's office issued a clarification:

... I emphasized: When I made the oath at the first meeting of the Legislative Council on October 12th, I did not alter any part of the oath. I do not intend to alter the oath which will be as demanded by the Chairman the next time.

When I mentioned that I will add certain contents in the oath, I do not mean that I will alter the oath. I will complete the oath in accordance with the legal standards, and then I will use other means to express my anger at the government for interfering with Legislative Council matters.

I solemnly reiterate that I do not intend to refuse or ignore to take the oath.

I know exactly what he is going to do. The first time around he crossed his finger while holding the Bible.

The next time around he will cross his fingers behind his back!

- (TV Tropes) Sometimes when a character is forced to make a vow, oath, promise, gesture, etc. they don't actually mean, they will cross their index and middle fingers in a way hidden to the character they're talking to but visible to the audience, to show they're actually lying. Most often the person will have their crossed fingers held behind their back, but off to the side, under a table, or somewhere else hidden is also possible. In real life, this gesture is mainly used by children, especially since it's not a reasonable thing for an adult to do. Therefore, the trope is generally associated with characters who are very young or just act like they are.

- But Leung Chung-hang has still not answered James To's question: "What is your purpose?"

- (Kinliu) By Chris Wat Wing-yin. October 24, 2016.

In old movies, people held three fingers in the air and swear: "... may I be struck down by thunderbolt if I fail to keep the promise."

Today we are in modern society with rule-of-law. When there is no clear evidence (such as a written contract or a video recording), we have to take an oath to swear that what we said is true. For example, suppose you misplaced your secondary school diploma and that school went defunct three decades ago. You can go down to the Civic Affairs Bureau to take an oath, and your sworn statement is now your diploma. Four years ago, a young man who only studied to third year secondary school made a sworn statement that he had studied to fifth year secondary school. He was detected, found guilty of deception and punished accordingly.

So when Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching make false oaths in front of the people of Hong Kong, why are we told that we must pretend not to see it? This is incomprehensible.

All of Hong Kong knows that Leung and Yau do not uphold the Basic Law and they will not be loyal to the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China. Instead people are saying: "What don't you guys just read the text of the oath? If you can pronounce the words correctly, we'll just pretend that we never saw what else you have been doing."

Why kind of legal system is this? What kind of value system is this? Suppose a playboy wears a shawl with the words: 'I support polygamy', smirks at his soon-to-be wife and swears: "I take you to be wife. I promise to be true to you in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health. I will love you and honor you all the days of my life." And the playboy slurs the word "true" into "lewd" and also the word "love" to "rough." Oh, did the bride object? Let's do it over again.

This is a situation in which someone is blatantly lying. But the legal scholars say that they can pass as long as they read out all the words. So what is the point of making an oath? As a parent, I don't know how to teach my children anymore.

Two days ago, Leung and Yau traveled to Taiwan to address National Taiwan University students in their capacity of pro-Hong Kong independence young people. They were there to share the experience of Hong Kong independence. They were even invited by the Taiwan Radical Wings to a discussion forum titled: "The awakening and future of Hong Kong independence young people." But they either woke up or lost their way, and they missed the event because "they went to the wrong location and/or their telephone ran out of battery."

When they talk and walk Hong Kong independence, why would we believe that their oaths are truthful? Why do we want to give them another chance to deceive the people? If this is rule-of-law, then this is absurdist rule-of-law.

The reason why Leung Chung-hang, Yau Wai-ching, Lau Siu-lai, Nathan Law, Yiu Chung-yim and Chu Hoi Dick upset us with their oaths is that we all know that they were lying, we saw that they were lying and they showed us in no uncertain terms that they were lying. So why is no one saying that they should be punished in accordance with the law?

When a citizen makes a false oath, the maximum penalty is seven years in jail. But when our elected legislators make a false oath of office, they will get $4 million per year in salaries/subsidies. So is Hong Kong really under rule-of-law or rule-of-man? Will the Heavens strike down the liars with thunderbolt?

- (Oriental Daily) October 25, 2016.

An Fengshan, spokesperson for the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council of the People's Republic of China, said yesterday criticized Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching for conspiring with Taiwan independence elements. "The obstinate Taiwan independence elements and Hong Kong independence elements got together to plot to divide the nation. They will be firmly opposed by compatriots in mainland China, Taiwan and Hong Kong. " Thus, the State Council has now defined Leung and Yau as pro-Hong Kong independence elements.

- Legislator Regina Ip said that the Central Government may issue a White Paper on separatism. The Hongkongese Revolution Channel (Facebook) responded: "Go all the way! If you get the National People's Congress Standing Committee to interpret the law, I will riot!!"

  • [594] Forget It, Jake, It's Chinatown (2016/10/12)

    • (Talking Point Memo) October 5, 2016.

    A segment that aired Monday on Fox News' "The O'Reilly Factor" is making a lot people question if we're really in the year 2016 because of its tired depictions of Asian-Americans.

    The "Watters' World" segment showed Fox News' Jesse Watters going to New York City's Chinatown neighborhood to poll residents about the election, given Donald Trump's tendency to mention China during his rallies and debatesand stop for a foot massage while he was at it.

    That conceit led to Watters mocking the people he interviewed, asking passersby questions like whether it was the "year of the dragon" or if they knew how to do karate. He also asked a young man if he could give him Chinese herbs from his parents' store that would help with "performance."

    Am I supposed to bow to say hello? Watters asked two women.

    After airing the segment, host Bill O'Reilly noted that people in Chinatown seemed to know "what was going on" with the election. Watters scoffed at that observation.

    "Some people say it's insulated and they don't interact with American politics but it looked like everybody knew what was going on," O'Reilly remarked.

    "You thought people knew what was going on?" Watters asked.

    Watters then called Asian-Americans a "gentle" and "patient" group of people, and O'Reilly predicted that some would find the segment offensive.

    "It's gentle fun," O'Reilly said. "So I know we're going to get letters. Inevitable. But it was gentle."

    The Asian American Journalists Association released a statement condemning the segment and demanding Fox News issue an apology.

    The Asian American Journalists Association (AAJA) is outraged and shocked by the Oct. 3rd segment of Watters World on Fox News The OReilly Factor. The segment was billed as a report on Chinese Americans views on the U.S. presidential election but it was rife with racist stereotypes, drew on thoughtless tropes and openly ridiculed Asian Americans.

    Jesse Watters, OReilly Factor Correspondent and Host of Watters World, committed a litany of offenses, from asking Asian American women, Do I bow to say hello? to asking an Asian American man if he knew karate. He mixed in stereotypes of various Asian groups, conflating Koreans with Chinese and Japanese communities. The segment used clips of martial arts movies and interviewed Asian Americans whose primary language isnt English in order to mock them.

    Its 2016. We should be far beyond tired, racist stereotypes and targeting an ethnic group for humiliation and objectification on the basis of their race. Sadly, Fox News proves it has a long way to go in reporting on communities of color in a respectful and fair manner.

    Host Bill OReilly called the segment gentle fun. There was nothing gentle or fun about it. It was rude, offensive, mocking, derogatory and damaging.

    Fox missed a real opportunity to investigate the Asian American vote, a topic not often covered in mainstream news. With a population of 15 million, Asian Americans remain the fastest growing ethnic group in the U.S. Between 2000-2010, our community grew by 45 percent, compared to 10 percent for the overall U.S. population.

    While the largest Asian American communities continue to be in states like New York, California, and Hawaii, the fastest growing populations of Asian Americans include potential swing states like Nevada, Arizona, and North Carolina.

    There has been tremendous growth of Asian American representation throughout government. There are now over 600 elected officials at all levels, according to the National Asian Pacific American Political Almanac.;

    We deserve far better treatment and coverage than weve been given by this Fox News report.

    AAJA MediaWatch demands an apology from Fox News to our community and a meeting with the shows producers to understand how this segment was conceived and greenlit to air. More importantly, we want an explanation for how this type of coverage will be prevented in the future.

    Sincerely Paul Cheung, AAJA President & AAJA MediaWatch committee

    (Fox News, Watters' World: Chinatown edition) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJmnLzw8NA4

    (Talking Points Memo) October 11, 2016.

    Fox host Bill O'Reilly is standing by a tone-deaf segment that aired on his show last week and mocked Asian-Americans, saying in a radio interview Tuesday that "The O'Reilly Factor" is not a "politically correct" show.

    O'Reilly told "The Bernie and Sid Show" that he feels the backlash to the controversial "Watters World" segment, in which contributor Jesse Watters interviewed and mocked Asian-Americans on the streets of New York City's Chinatown, was a coordinated attack by liberal media outlets. Originally, he said, there had been few complaints.

    "All of sudden, 36 hours later, we get this barrage," he said. "And the wording was almost exactly the same from all these left-wing websites, almost exactly the same. So we know it was a coordinated attack."

    O'Reilly said Watters had done what he described as a similar segment in Little Italy the week prior, and that Watters would not be fired for the Chinatown piece just because people live in a "perpetual state of grievance." He did note that he would have edited the package differently, but said it was "gentle fun."

    Hes not getting fired," O'Reilly said. "We are a program that is not politically correct.

    For his part, Watters gave a non-apology last week on Twitter: My man-on-the-street interviews are meant to be taken as tongue-in-cheek and I regret if anyone found offense.

    (CCTV America: People react to Jesse Watters' controversial Chinatown segment) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0srOFlXY93c

    (The Daily Show) 'Go Fuck Yourself!' The Daily Show shreds Fox's Jesse Watters over Chinatown segment https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOY6M2GMXfw

    Internet comments:

    - What has Chinatown got to do with Hong Kong? Everybody knows that "Hong Kong is not China."

    - How about watching Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton sing a karaoke duet in Cantonese? https://www.facebook.com/patriciasy.wong/videos/775538309254347/ . What has the United States got to do with Hong Kong? Nothing, really. This is just so you can lighten up a bit, because life is pretty grim otherwise.

    (SCMP) October 11, 2016.

    Facing the prospect of symbolic protests by Hong Kongs newly elected localist lawmakers being sworn in on Wednesday, the government has warned that those who refuse to take their oath properly may lose their Legislative Council seats.

    Legislators must take their oath in a manner and form that is lawful, the government cautioned in a statement released on the eve of the first meeting of the new Legco. Article 104 of the Basic Law requires oath-taking lawmakers to swear to uphold the Basic Law as well as allegiance to Hong Kong as a special administrative region.

    At least two of the six localists, who have called for Hong Kong independence or self-determination, have spoken of plans to get round the rules by working their pro-independence calls into the wording of the oath.

    On Tuesday, the government stressed that lawmakers oath-taking was a constitutional requirement and the form of the oath was prescribed by the Oaths and Declarations Ordinance. If a member swears his or her oath in a manner or form that is inconsistent with the ordinance ... the oath offends the Basic Law and will therefore be unlawful and of no legal effect, the statement read. Any person who declines or neglects to take an oath duly requested which he or she is required to take shall vacate office or be disqualified from entering it.

    Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang, a newly elected lawmaker from localist group Youngspiration, remained defiant. He said he planned to get round the rules by ways that could satisfy the mini-constitution while not compromising his position. But fellow localist Eddie Chu Hoi-dick said he would most probably take the oath in a proper way. I dont think its important to make a fuss over the oath, he said.

    Incoming lawmaker Starry Lee Wai-king, chairwoman of the government-friendly Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong, said she would raise the issue with the Legco secretariat if anyone failed to meet the oath-taking requirement.

    Pro-Beijing newspaper Ta Kung Pao reported on Tuesday that Beijing could resort to an interpretation of the Basic Law if Hong Kongs courts failed to make a ruling on lawsuits arising from lawmakers failure to take their oath properly. No one should underestimate the central governments determination in getting rid of Hong Kong independence, the report quoted an authoritative source as saying.

    But a source familiar with the governments position said the localists were expected to exercise restraint, otherwise they would not be able to assume office.  Officials are more worried about localists calling for Hong Kong independence or self-determination at [future] Legco meetings, the source said.

    The Basic Law states that lawmakers are immune from legal action for statements made in Legco meetings.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) October 11, 2016.

    In response to media enquiries, the government published a statement Tuesday afternoon on the oath-taking process. The oath was prescribed by the Oaths and Declarations Ordinance, it said.

    It said the taking of an oath that accords with the requirements of Article 104 of the Basic Law is a mandatory constitutional obligation imposed on all members-elect of LegCo, according to a 2004 judgment made by Mr. Justice Michael Hartmann.

    If a member swears his or her oath in a manner or form that is inconsistent with the Ordinance, thereby altering the substance of the oath itself, the oath offends Article 104 of the Basic Law and will therefore be unlawful and of no legal effect, the statement read. The Clerk to LegCo has no jurisdiction to administer such an oath. Should such a scenario arise, the Clerk should draw it to the attention of the LegCo President when one is elected for a ruling.

    Section 21 of the Ordinance provides that any person who declines or neglects to take an oath duly requested which he or she is required to take shall vacate office or be disqualified from entering on it, it added.

    The government also said that it looks forward to all 70 members of the LegCo completing the oath-taking requirement tomorrow in an orderly manner in compliance with the law so that LegCo business in the new term may commence without delay.

    (EJ Insight) October 12, 2016.

    The government was so hung up on the content of the Legco oath of office that it went out of its way to remind the legislators-elect about the relevant provisions in the Basic Law, along with a citation from a court ruling.

    As it turned out, three newcomers from the localist camp Edward Yiu, Yau Wai-ching and Baggio Leung added their own oath to the official version during Wednedays ceremony.

    Yau and Leung flashed a Hong Kong is not China banner when they took their oath. The oath was quickly rejected by the Legco secretary general.

    Just to make sure none of this came to pass, the government on Tuesday issued a statement to remind the lawmakers that Article 104 of the Basic Law requires all oath-takers to swear allegiance to the Special Administrative Region of the Peoples Republic of China and uphold Hong Kongs mini constitution.

    It then cited a 2004 High Court ruling which invalidates any form of oath inconsistent with the prescribed version. Such oath will be considered unlawful and of no legal effect.

    Really? Did the government have to go to such lengths or hasnt it heard of the separation of powers between the executive and legislative branches (one provides checks and balances to the other, remember?)

    Sure, the government can issue all sorts of reminders but this is a matter for Legco itself.

    It has its own rules of procedure for reciting the oath of office and it will be the one to decide whether the requirements have been met, not the government.

    Does it matter?

    Four years ago, Wong Yuk-man drowned out some words (Peoples Republic of China, for instance) in his oath with a cough to dramatize his opposition to Beijing. He did a retake of the oath and all was well again with the world.   

    The important thing to remember is that the governments reminder was mainly directed at the localists.

    The one thing it dreaded was not that the oath would be changed beyond recognition or purpose but that the word independence might be inserted.

    The worst fear of this administration is the constant popping up of that word among localists and pro-independence supporters and its worst nightmare is a scenario in which the idea catches on among ordinary Hongkongers.

    What will Beijing say now about Leung Chun-yings fitness for a second term if he cannot put away what they consider malignant forces?

    That aside, the government was also trying to deflect public attention from Andrew Leung, the presumptive Legco president, amid allegations he holds a British passport and is therefore ineligible for the role.

    Leung said he had renounced his British passport when he ran in the Sept. 4 elections but until now, he has yet to show any proof of renunciation.

    Opposition lawmakers are champing at the bit to confront him with this issue, convinced that if he stayed and presided over its meetings and deliberations, these could be rendered illegal.

    Leung was up against the Democratic Partys James To but given that the pro-establishment camp holds the balance of power in the chamber, Leung was a shoo-in for Legco president.

    Leung would be the first Legco president from the small-circle functional constituency. In 1998, when he first sought election, he ran unopposed.

    Clearly, the government tried to manage two scenarios here. One was much ado about nothing.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) October 12, 2016.

    New lawmakers have protested and raised questions over the Legislative Council secretary-generals decision to reject oaths taken by three incoming lawmakers.

    Kenneth Chen Wei-on, the top official of the Legislative Council Secretariat, rejected the oaths of incoming lawmakers Sixtus Baggio Leung Chun-hang, Yau Wai-ching, and Edward Yiu Chung-yim. All three added new phrases to their oaths.

    Chen questioned whether Leung and Yau understood their oaths, as they displayed a flag that read Hong Kong is not China potentially contradicting the oaths wording.

    However, Baggio Leung insisted he and Yau have completed their oaths, and it was the responsibility of the LegCo secretariat to confirm them.

    Both Leung and Yau once read China as Chee-na. Yau referred to the Peoples Republic of China as the Peoples Refucking of Chee-na.

    In response, Leung claimed that the different pronunciation of words in their oaths were because of their accents. He said he has an Ap Lei Chau accent.

    Nathan Law Kwun-chung, who added phrases before and after his oath, said lawmakers were having a meeting with the LegCo secretary-general and their legal advisors.

    Law said he, Eddie Chu Hoi-dick and Lau Siu-lai who also protested during their oath taking believed the rejected oaths of the three lawmakers should be validated by the Legislative Council Secretariat.

    He [does not] have the power according to the [Oaths and Declarations] Ordinance, Law said. The three should be allowed to be validated so lawmakers can participate in the presidential election, and their oaths should be considered by the president-elect.

    According to the LegCos rules of procedures, no Member of the Council shall attend a meeting or vote therein until he has made or subscribed an oath or affirmation in accordance with the provisions of the Oaths and Declarations Ordinance (Cap. 11).

    The Ordinance stipulates that the oaths of LegCo members should be taken at the first sitting of the session after a general election and before the election of the LegCo president which shall be administered by the Clerk to the Council.

    Lawmakers Long Hair Leung Kwok-hung, Fernando Cheung Chiu-hung, Law, Chu and Lau remained in the chamber in an attempt to resolve the oath issue with the Secretariat.

    In 2012, former LegCo president Jasper Tsang Yok-sing allowed lawmaker Raymond Wong Yuk-man to retake his oath a week after the first failed attempt. Wong obscured some words by coughing during his first oath, namely Republic in Peoples Republic of China and Special Administrative Region.

    (SCMP) The C-Word: Why Hong Kong Localists have offended all Chinese. By Chow CHung-yan. October 30, 2016.

    A few days after Hong Kong localists Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching called China Chee-na during their swearing-in ceremony as the citys newly elected legislators, Leung went on radio to defend himself.

    First, he tried to pin it to his accent. When the radio host pointed out that he seemed to have no problem pronouncing China properly on other occasions, Leung admitted that he did use the word Chee-na. But he shrugged it off as nothing important or offensive.

    In the oath, it doesnt mention any specific person I dont know how we could have offended anyone, Leung said. He then went on to say that even Sun Yat-sen, the founding father of modern China, used the term at some point in his writing.

    To understand why so many people, including those who dont like the central government in Beijing, feel offended by Leung and Yaus antics, some historical perspective is needed.

    The Chinese word 支那 [Chee-na] first appeared in the Buddhist scriptures of the Tang dynasty (6th century). It is believed to be the phonetic translation of the ancient Sanskrit word cina. Some see this as the origin of the English word China, but there is no conclusive evidence to support that.

    For most of its history, the term has had no derogatory meaning. Some scholars even argue that it is actually not the name of any particular country, but a loose expression for land of the east.

    The Chinese themselves almost never use it. In fact, even Zhongguo the Middle Kingdom was not often used in ancient times. Before the 1911 revolution, China existed not as a nation state in the Westphalian sense. It was a civilisation with an unbroken line of imperial dynasties. People referred to themselves as people of the great Qing or people of the great Tang. Few would call themselves people of Zhongguo, even fewer would use Chinese.

    The word Chee-na was introduced to Japan whose writing system borrowed heavily from Chinese in the Tang dynasty. But it was used only as a geographic term rather than the name of any particular country or people.

    For centuries, Japan followed its neighbours tradition and addressed China by its dynasty name. This changed after the outbreak of the Opium War in 1839 between China and Britain. The humiliating defeat of the Qing empire and the loss of Hong Kong shattered Chinas millennia-old worldview and its sense of cultural superiority. The Chinese civilisation entered a century of sharp and painful decline.

    Japan, on the other hand, quickly reinvented itself after the Meiji Restoration. It was the most successful, in fact the only, Asian country that transformed peacefully from an ancient regime into a modern nation state. Japan gradually lost its respect for the giant across the sea and started to look at China with contempt and a predatory interest.

    The first Sino-Japanese war in 1894 ended in total disaster for the Qing court. The Chinese elite were shocked to their core. Within two decades, the Qing dynasty was overthrown and China was declared a modern republic.

    Initially, China and Japan enjoyed a decade-long golden relationship shortly after the war. Many Japanese intellectuals were genuinely sympathetic towards China and hoped to get their Asian brethren back up on their feet.

    Many Chinese revolutionary leaders from Sun Yat-sen to Chiang Kai-shek and Zhou Enlai (周恩來) lived or studied in Japan. The modern Chinese language, in turn, borrowed extensively from Japanese. Chee-na, together with many other words like economy, democracy and police, was reintroduced back to China.

    At that time, the word had no obvious derogatory implication. In the run-up to the collapse of the Qing empire, people increasingly stopped seeing the Manchurian court as the legitimate representation of the Chinese civilisation. Japanese scholars ceased to refer to China as the great Qing. More and more of them started to use the word Chee-na as a neutral geographical expression.

    Sun and some early Chinese national revolution leaders did use the word in their writing at that time as they refused to see themselves as the subject of the Qing and the modern Chinese state had yet to come into being.

    But then the meaning of the word started to undergo a dramatic transformation. It was increasingly used in Japan as a demeaning way to address China and its people, implying that they were a sub-class. Japanese scholar Sato Nobuhiro, founder of the Greater Asia concept, used the term in his influential book, A Secret Strategy for Expansion, to suggest that China existed not as a political entity but a mere geographic expression. His work became the intellectual inspiration of Japanese imperialism towards China.

    Chee-na quickly became a taboo word in China. While in Japan, it was used more and more as an insult. The Chinese government banned the use of the word shortly after the establishment of the republic. In 1930, the Nanjing (南京) government formally requested Japan to stop using it to address China. The Tokyo civilian government complied but the imperialist advocates continued to use the word. It implied that China was not worthy to be recognised as a sovereign state and it existed only as a geographical expression. This was used to justify Japans aggression.

    The psychological association of Chee-na with Japanese aggression and invasion became inseparable following the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War. It was widely used in the propaganda materials of the Japanese military.

    Today, using the word will inevitably bring back that painful history to Chinese people everywhere, particularly those who had witnessed and endured all the horrors of the war.

    When Leung and Yau used the word in their oaths, they perhaps intended to insult the government in Beijing. But by picking a word so emotionally associated with the memory of foreign aggression, they succeeded in offending all Chinese.

    (New York Times) November 9, 2016.

    Where does the term Chee-na come from?

    Aoki Masaru, a Japanese Sinologist, argued that it originated in early Sanskrit transcriptions of Qin, the name of the dynasty that unified China more than 2,000 years ago, according to a 2012 essay by the historian Joshua A. Fogel. Qin, pronounced chin, may have contributed to the countrys name in many Western languages. With the spread of Buddhism from India, and the translation of scriptures into Chinese, the word entered China and then Japan. Professor Fogel, who teaches at York University in Toronto, wrote that the Japanese used the name Chee-na for centuries, but especially from the 19th century through World War II.

    Before the founding of the Republic of China in 1912, the country had no official symbols or constitution, noted Xu Guoqi, a professor of history at the University of Hong Kong who is writing a book titled The Idea of China. Its last imperial dynasty, the Qing, was established by Manchu invaders in the 17th century. Many Chinese nationalists and reformers in the final years of Qing rule such as Liang Qichao and Zhang Taiyan used the term with no hidden bad meaning, he said.

    Chee-na was one of many names these intellectuals used to refer to their country, said John Delury, a professor of Chinese studies at Yonsei University in Seoul, South Korea. Some of the intellectuals were involved in the anti-Manchu resistance and had gone into exile in Japan, he added.

    They felt their country had been stolen for hundreds of years by an invading, non-ethnically Chinese, Manchu people, and now they were trying to get it back, Professor Delury said. They were searching for a name for the new nation, he said, that would differentiate it from the Qing dynasty.

    When did Chinese people begin to view the term Chee-na as a slur?

    The term is the name for China that has most exercised Chinese opinion throughout history, Professor Fogel wrote in his 2012 essay.

    Jan Kiely, a professor of Chinese studies at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, said in an email that strong feelings were stirred in Chinese people when the Japanese Empire used the word to refer to China during its incursions into Chinese territory, from the 1894-95 Sino-Japanese War through World War II. For many Chinese today, Professor Kiely said, Chee-na recalls the sufferings of the occupation and references a Japanese imperial sense that the Chinese were inherently inferior.

    On Monday, Li Fei, the chairman of Chinas parliamentary committee on the Basic Law, the mini-constitution that governs Hong Kong, criticized Mr. Leung and Ms. Yau for using the term. I especially condemn insults to the country and the nation, Mr. Li told reporters in Beijing. I hope Hong Kong people do not forget how Chinese were slaughtered by the Japanese invaders, and especially that the Japanese invaders committed huge crimes when they occupied Hong Kong.

    Professor Kiely said that public memory of World War II had surged in China over the past two decades in tandem with rising nationalism, thanks in part to a proliferation of state-sponsored memorials, museums, exhibitions and documentaries about the war.

    If the term Chee-na can be perceived as a slur against Chinese people, why did the two Hong Kong politicians include it in their oath-taking remarks?

    Professor Delury said the politicians appeared to be making a satirical comparison between the Chinese governments current control over Hong Kong and Japans invasion in the 20th century. He said it was significant that the remarks were made in the context of what is normally an oath-taking ceremony that is designed to indicate submission to the Chinese government.

    After taking the oath in the Legislative Council, Mr. Leung attributed his pronunciation of China as Chee-na to his local Hong Kong accent. But Ming Sing, a professor of social science at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, said in an interview that some people in Hong Kong dismissed that explanation as moral hypocrisy, because Mr. Leung had previously made a point of attacking pro-democracy legislators for their purported unwillingness to challenge the Chinese government.

    He was perceived to cover up his real intent, Professor Sing said.

    Professor Sing said that many people in Hong Kong also believed that the two politicians remarks at the oath-taking ceremony handed the Chinese government a pretext to reinterpret the Basic Law, which was negotiated before Britain returned the territory to Chinese rule in 1997. He said they fear the Basic Law may be interpreted in a way that could undermine the rule of law and political freedoms in Hong Kong.

    Internet comments:

    - Hong Kong Basic Law Article 104.

    When assuming office, the Chief Executive, principal officials, members of the Executive Council and of the Legislative Council, judges of the courts at all levels and other members of the judiciary in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region must, in accordance with law, swear to uphold the Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China and swear allegiance to the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China.

    - Legislative Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, Oaths and Declarations (Amendment) Bill 1997

    I swear that, being a member of the Legislative Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China, I will uphold the Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China, bear allegiance to the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China and serve the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region conscientiously, dutifully, in full accordance with the law, honestly and with integrity.

    (name of person making the oath)

    - Legislative Council Oaths (British colonial era)

    Part IV Promissory Oaths

    19. A member of the Legislative Council shall, as soon as possible after his appointment, or in the case of an elected member after the commencement of his term of office as an elected member, take the Oath of Allegiance or the Legislative Council Oath, which shall be tendered by the Governor, or other member presiding. (Amended, 23 of 1985, s. 3)

    Oath of Allegiance

    I swear that 1 will be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Second, Her Heirs and Successors, according to law. So help me God.

    Legislative Council Oath

    I, swear that I will uphold the law of Hong Kong, and that I will conscientiously and truly serve the people of Hong Kong as a member of the Legislative Council. So help me God.

    - Hong Kong Cap 11 Oaths and Declarations Ordinance

    Section 19. Oath of Legislative Councillors

    A member of the Legislative Council shall, as soon as possible after the commencement of his term of office, take the Legislative Council Oath which-

    (a) if taken at the first sitting of the session of the Legislative Council immediately after a general election of all members of the Council and before the election of the President of the Council, shall be administered by the Clerk to the Council;

    (b) if taken at any other sitting of the Council, shall be administered by the President of the Council or any member acting in his place.

    Section 21. Consequence of non-compliance

    Any person who declines or neglects to take an oath duly requested which he is required to take by this Part, shall (Amended 123 of 1997 s. 16)

    (a) if he has already entered on his office, vacate it, and
    (b) if he has not entered on his office, be disqualified from entering on it.

    - (Parliament.uk) Swearing in and the parliamentary oath.

    Oaths of allegiance to the Crown are fairly common in British public life and are similar to those in other countries where a declaration of loyalty is made to the state.

    Members of both Houses of Parliament are required by law to take an oath of allegiance to the Crown on taking their seat in Parliament.

    Until the oath or affirmation is taken, an MP may not receive a salary, take their seat, speak in debates or vote. They could also be fined 500 and more important have their seat declared vacant as if they were dead if they attempt to do so.

    Similar restrictions apply to Members of the Lords: they may not sit, vote or receive allowances until they take the oath or affirmation.

    The wording of the oath is prescribed by the Promissory Oaths Act 1868. The form and manner of administering the oath are set out in the Oaths Act 1978.

    An MP takes the oath by holding the sacred text in his or her uplifted hand and says the words of the oath.

    I (name of Member) swear by Almighty God that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth, her heirs and successors, according to law. So help me God.

    - (Green Left Weekly) October 13, 2004

    From his September 12 election to the Legislative Council, pro-worker activist "Long Hair" Leung Kwok-Hung fought to modify the oath of allegiance he had to give on October 6 in order to take up the seat. Leung, who is one of 30 popularly elected councillors in a chamber of 60, wanted to include an oath to democracy, freedom and the people of China and Hong Kong.

    In the last few years, democracy activists have been mobilising to demand a more democratic interpretation of the territory's mini-constitution, called the Basic Law, with fierce resistance from Beijing. Leung has been prominent in this movement, whose demands include that the territory's chief executive and the Legislature Council be elected entirely by popular vote by 2007 and 2008.

    Leung's initial application to modify the oath was rejected, and he was warned that he could be disqualified from his elected position if he did not stick to the official wording. On October 4, Leung asked the High Court to review the decision. The High Court decided, less than three hours before the oath was due, that the matter was outside its jurisdiction.

    For those three hours, Hong Kong's top discussion point was what Leung would do. For weeks, the media had extensively discussed the officials' attempt to block Leung's pro-people pledge. As Reuters explained on October 6: "Since his shock victory in the September 12 poll, Mr Leung has dominated local headlines for his salvoes against the government."

    Leung arrived shortly before the oath ceremony in the Che Guevera T-shirt he frequently wears. He warmly greeted the pro-democracy protesters outside the building and made himself an impromptu black armband out of a banner to symbolise his respect for the students massacred by Beijing in Tiananmen Square on June 4, 1989. Forced by dress regulations to wear a collared shirt (which he left unbuttoned) through security, Leung quickly removed it when inside, causing a stir among the conservatively suited parliamentarians.

    Shortly before Leung's turn to make his oath, he removed his Che T-shirt to reveal a black T-shirt emblazoned, "Rehabilitate the June 4 actions [of the pro-democracy students in 1989], return the government to the people". Leung raised his left arm, now with the black band on his wrist.

    When his name was called, he immediately responded loudly at his waiting position with the slogans: "Rehabilitate the June 4 actions, return the government to the people, end one-party rule [in China] and release the political prisoners". Leung then walked to the platform where the oath was to take place, raised his head high and announced loudly: "I hereby declare I pledge my allegiance to the people of China and the citizens of Hong Kong, I oppose the collusion between the officials and the businesspeople, I will defend with all I can democracy and justice and fight for human rights and freedom."

    Then Leung moved on to the official vow, which he uttered with apparent difficulty, resulting in an unconventional reading. For example, his proclaimed allegiance to the Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China, in Chinese grammatical ordering, sounded like it was directed to the people of China, with the republic and SAR artificially tagged on.

    After the official vow, Leung went on to loudly and smoothly declare, In English and then Chinese: "Long live democracy, long live the people, power to the people." He then added in Chinese, "oppose 'small-circle' elections [those based on token, privileged electorates]. Popular elections for the chief executive and the Legislative Council!" Leung then went straight back to his seat, without signing the written oath.

    Leung's actions caused an uproar. Some pro-government legislators tried, unsuccessfully, to challenge the validity of Leung's oath because he didn't sign the official document. He now faces two more challenges: Beijing's officials in Hong Kong have asked for a legislative review to decide if Leung's action constitutes contempt of parliament, warranting his disqualification, and the Legislative Council is trying to force Leung to pay for its costs in the High Court case, some HK$200,000.

    Leung argued in court that his case was in the public interest, and his costs should be token. Despite the court expediting the case on public interest grounds, and the justice secretary's lawyers also because of its merit as a public interest case, the Legislative Council has rejected the defence.

    Leung, who could lose his seat if he is ordered to pay and cannot, couldn't afford legal representation, and spoke for himself in court. A judgement on the cost question is expected shortly.

    - (New York Times) January 21, 2009.

    In 25 seconds, President Obama became president again.

    Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. re-administered the oath to Mr. Obama on Wednesday evening, one day after the two men stumbled over each others words during the inauguration ceremony at the Capitol.

    For their do-over, the two men convened in the White House Map Room at 7:35 p.m. for a brief proceeding that was not announced until it was completed successfully.

    Are you ready to take the oath? Chief Justice Roberts said.

    I am, Mr. Obama replied. And were going to do it very slowly.

    After a days worth of chatter over whether the president had been properly sworn into office he transposed a couple of words in the oath after being incorrectly prompted by the chief justice advisers to Mr. Obama decided Wednesday afternoon to try it one more time.

    Only hours after aides told reporters there was no reason to administer the oath again, they concluded it was easier to do it on the first day, rather than have someone challenge the legitimacy of his presidency.

    We believe that the oath of office was administered effectively and that the president was sworn in appropriately yesterday, Gregory B. Craig, the White House counsel, said. But the oath appears in the Constitution itself, and out of an abundance of caution, because there was one word out of sequence, Chief Justice Roberts administered the oath a second time.

    While about two million people were on hand to watch the first swearing-in, a figure that does not include the hundreds of millions who watched it on television in the United States and around the world, only nine people witnessed the do-over. There were four aides, four reporters and a White House photographer present on Wednesday evening. Mr. Obama raised his right hand and did not use a Bible.

    All in all, it was a curious end to a chaotic first full day of Mr. Obamas presidency.

    The trouble began at the swearing-in ceremony on Tuesday when Chief Justice Roberts misplaced a word in the oath, saying: That I will execute the office of president to the United States faithfully. The word faithfully is supposed to appear between will and execute.

    Mr. Obama, who had been studying his lines, briefly interrupted Chief Justice Roberts initially, which could have thrown the chief justice off course. Then, he paused awkwardly after saying, that I will execute.

    So the chief justice gave it another try, but still did not get it quite right, omitting the word execute.

    There are no rules against a do-over. When questions were raised about whether it was proper for Calvin Coolidge to have been sworn in by his father, a notary public, after the death of Warren G. Harding in 1923, Coolidge took the oath again from a federal judge.

    At a luncheon after the first swearing-in on Tuesday, Chief Justice Roberts could be seen on camera telling the president that the mistake was my fault. So he agreed to travel to the White House he took along his black robe for Take 2.

    Congratulations again, Mr. Roberts said after the flawless recitation. Thank you, sir, Mr. Obama said before turning to the small group of reporters in the room, called the pool, and saying, The bad news for the pool is theres 12 more balls.

    Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=274_VdeckAU

    - (SCMP) October 18, 2012.

    People Power lawmaker Wong Yuk-man has finally taken his Legislative Council oath of office - after a second attempt.

    Instead of skipping key words in the oath by coughing at strategic moments as he did the first time, Wong started by praying "for God to forgive him for making a dishonest oath", but was stopped by Legco president Jasper Tsang Yok-sing.

    Wong then proceeded to read out part of his oath in different tones of voice. For example, in the Cantonese phrase yan man gung wo gwok, which means "People's Republic", he read out some words in an unusually loud voice while pronouncing the others in a hushed tone.

    When he had completed the oath, he went on to shout slogans: "Down with the Hong Kong communist regime, down with [Chief Executive] Leung Chun-ying." He was again quickly stopped by Tsang, who asked him to return to his seat.

    But Wong's second attempt at taking the oath was not without controversy. Independent pro-government lawmaker Paul Tse Wai-chun criticised Wong's manner of oath-taking, asking Tsang to judge whether Wong had legally completed the oath.

    "Wong was taking his oath in an unwilling manner," said Tse. "He held the Bible in his hands and [tried to] ask God to forgive him. It was completely insincere. It will seriously hurt the integrity of the legislature."

    But Tsang ruled that Wong had legally completed his oath. "If there are those who think that Wong's oath-taking was against the law, then the person can challenge it according to the Basic Law and the law of Hong Kong," he said.

    Wong is the first lawmaker since the handover to take his oath of office twice because the first oath was considered invalid.

    Last Wednesday, Wong punctuated his loyalty pledge with coughs, skipping words such as "Republic" and "Special Administrative Region".

    At the time, Wong insisted that he had completed the oath, saying: "Of course I finished it Sometimes you will cough while you are reading."

    But after seeking legal advice, Tsang said that Wong's oath could lead to a legal challenge, and approved Wong's request to retake his oath yesterday.

    - Here is the verbatim transcription of Yau Wai-ching's "oath":

    I YAU Wai-ching do solemnly swear that, I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to the Hong Kong Nation. And will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the fellows of Hong Kong.

    I Yau Wai-ching, solemnly, sincerely, and truly declare that and affirm that, being a member of the Legislative Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic (pronounced as re-fucking) of China (pronounced as Gin-na), I will uphold the Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic (pronounced as re-fucking) of China (pronounced as Gin-na), bear allegiance to the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic (pronounced as re-fucking)  of China (pronounced as Gin-na), and serve the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region conscientiously, dutifully, in full accordance with the law, honestly and with integrity.

    - James To (Democratic Party) suggested that it is not permissible to delete parts of the oath statement, but it is possible to add to it. Here is my proposed version:

    I swear that, being a member of the Legislative Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China, FUCK YOUR MOTHER'S STINKING CUNT I will uphold the Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China, FUCK YOUR MOTHER'S STINKING CUNT bear allegiance to the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China FUCK YOUR MOTHER'S STINKING CUNT and serve the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region conscientiously FUCK YOUR MOTHER'S STINKING CUNT, dutifully FUCK YOUR MOTHER'S STINKING CUNT, in full accordance with the law FUCK YOUR MOTHER'S STINKING CUNT, honestly FUCK YOUR MOTHER'S STINKING CUNT and with integrity FUCK YOUR MOTHER'S STINKING CUNT.

    (name of person making the oath FUCK YOUR MOTHER'S STINKING CUNT)

    - Starry Lee (DAB) said that if anyone excises some words from the oaths or otherwise shout aloud (either themselves or through other allies) afterwards, she will challenge the validity of the oath.

    - Chu Hoi Dick's calculation is that he went through all the trouble to get elected to the Legislative Council because there are things that he wants to fight for in the capacity of legislative councilor. So why give up the Legislative Council seat because of the unwillingness to articulate the Oath and go back to be the voice in the wilderness?

    - People cursing people outside the Legislative Council before the oaths: https://www.facebook.com/patriciasy.wong/videos/775538309254347/

    - (Oriental Daily) Here are the specifics:

    In Yiu Chung-yim's first attempt, he inserted the phrase: "Fight for genuine universal suffrage" in the middle. In his second attempt, he read the required text and then added "Fight for genuine universal suffrage" at the end.

    Leung Chung-hang chose to use English as the language for his oath. He made a preamble which is not in the formal text in which he said that he wants to "keep guard over the interests of the Hong Kong nations." (sic; yes, there was an 's' after nation). Then he wore a "Hong Kong is not China" shawl to read the formal text while crossing his fingers over a bible. In his reading, he pronounced "China" as 支那("Shina").

    (WiKipedia) Shina.

    ... The Second Sino-Japanese War fixed the impression of the term "Shina" as offensive among Chinese people. In 1946, the Republic of China demanded that Japan cease using "Shina".

    In China, the term Shina has become linked with the Japanese invasion and Japanese war crimes, and has been considered a derogatory and deeply offensive ethnic slur ever since.

    - Yau Wai-ching also used English. She pronounced "The People's Republic of China" as "The People's Refucking of China." She also displayed a "Hong Kong is not China" banner.

    - Lau Siu-lai read the text very slowly, pausing five seconds or between words. She was asked to repeat the oath. So she now owns the record for the longest Legislative Council oath ever.

    Video: https://www.facebook.com/HongKongGoodNews/videos/1236879429719324/ (beginning at 5:00 into the video)

    Video:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0IALxF0PWI This is the same oath sped up for 30 seconds.

    - Leung Kwok-hung showed up with a yellow umbrella and a copy of the August 31st National People's Congress Standing Committee resolution. He read the text in broken phrases. Afterwards he ripped up the copy of the resolution.

    Video: http://news.tvb.com/local/57fdab4f6db28c1d6db469f4

    - Nathan Law also made statements before and after his oath, including never pledging loyalty to any regime that kills its own people. He chanted "The hope is with the people; changes begin with resistance." He also mispronounced the word "Nation."

    - (Apple Daily) Here is a verbatim transcript of what Yau Wai-ching said:

    I YAU Wai-ching do solemnly swear that, I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to the Hong Kong Nation. And will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the fellows of Hong Kong.

    I YAU Wai-ching, solemnly, sincerely, and truly declare that and affirm that, being a member of the Legislative Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic (pronounced as re-fucking) of China (pronounced as Shina), I will uphold the Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic (pronounced as re-fucking) of China (pronounced as Shina), bear allegiance to the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic (pronounced as re-fucking)  of China (pronounced as Shina), and serve the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region conscientiously, dutifully, in full accordance with the law, honestly and with integrity.

    - The US House of Representatives oath of office is:

    I, XXX, do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion, and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.

    But now this treacherous newcomer has just said:

    I, XXX, do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the Aryan Nation against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion, and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me Satan.

    The argument here is that this representative was elected by voters as an Aryan Nation candidate and therefore he is only responsible to those white supremacist Satan-loving voters. In so doing, he is upsetting all non-racist Americans and/or all non-Devil-worshippers.

    How long will this US Congressman last before being impeached? Who is going to stand by his side to defend his freedom of speech?

    - In Cantonese, there is a saying about people "who want to showcase their bravery but still want to wear a helmet." In other words, they want the best of both worlds.

    Fact: You are not a legislative councilor until you have taken the oath as witnessed by Legislative Council's secretary-general.

    So why do you have to do something silly during the oath such that the secretary-general cannot qualify you?

    If Yiu Chung-yim's first attempt with "genuine universal suffrage" inserted in the oath was rejected, then why won't he walk out? Why did he pull out a helmet by reading the full text and then append "genuine universal suffrage" at the end in order to pass?

    And why did Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching blame their native accents on the mis-pronunciations? What kind of helmets are they wearing?

    Right now those three are not yet Legislative Councilors. Will they keep wearing those helmets and hope for the best? Remember, Leung Kwok-hung already tried the judicial review and failed. I predict that eventually these three revolutionary martyrs will go back and take the oaths to the satisfaction of the Legco Secretary-general.

    - While they sit out, do they still get paid? They earn $93,000 a month. Every day is worth $3,100.

    - Yes, they will get paid until as such times when they are formally ousted.

    - Native accents? I think I am going to pronounce Yau Wai-ching's name hereafter as "You Feed Sperm". This sounds about the same in Cantonese, but I mispronounced it because I have a Cheung Sa Wan accent (or something).

    - (YouTube) Leung Chung-hang held part of his post-oath interview in English. First, he was asked about the situation. He said that he was waiting for ... but he doesn't know the word "secretariat" in English and someone in the audience prompted him. So his English is not so hot. This leads a female reporter to ask: "If your English is so bad, then why did you choose to use English to take your oath? Why not use Cantonese?"  Leung said: "Practice." The reporter asked: "Why practice on such a solemn occasion?" Leung said: "An official ceremony is a very good place for us to practice."

    - And because Leung Chung-hang muffed it, this could now mean that his elected position will be vacated. Good job!

    - Leung Chung-hang could not pronounce "China" in the oath due to his poor English, but he had no problems with pronouncing "China" when he shouted "Hong Kong is not China." He explained this as the reason why he needs practice, because he is still inconsistent with his pronunciations. Some Ap Lei Chau residents probably speak very good English, but Leung said that they all speak like him. Thanks a lot!

    - (YouTube) Along comes a longtime Ap Lei Chau resident who said that he has been insulted and demeaned by Leung Chung-hang.

    - (Facebook) A New People's Party district councilor Chan Ka-pui interviewed a dozen or so Ap Lei Chau residents and asked them to pronounce "People's Republic of China." They didn't have any problems. None except two had heard of something called the Ap Lei Chau accent, and those two only heard about it from the Leung Chung-hang statement. Chan said that she runs remedial English classes from her office and she welcomes Leung Chung-hang to join.

    - (Oriental Daily) A 75-year-old Ap Lei Chau native said that the proper pronunciation of China is "China." He and other natives demonstrate the local accent of Ap Lei Chau-style Cantonese as used by the boat people (=fishermen and their families who live on boats).

    - Ap Lei Chau district councilors, residents, businesses and organizations took out an advertisement to condemn Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching for insulting Ap Lei Chau residents as well as all Chinese people around the world.

    - (Talking Points Memo with video) November 1, 2016.

    The Donald Trump supporter who made headlines for screaming Jew-S-A at a Arizona campaign rally on Saturday says he was just trying to show solidarity with Latinos.

    George Lindell, a painter for hire and ardent opponent of Hillary Clintons, told the Arizona Republic in a Monday interview that he saw a group of Latino attendees, including children, at the Phoenix rally.

    According to Lindell, the children cut their own cheers of "USA" short because they were embarrassed that the chant came out Joo-S-A.

    "They felt they wouldn't fit in because of their accent," he told the Republic.

    To boost their morale, Lindell said, he struck up the cheer Jew-S-A, which luckily happened to be the way he has pronounced the country's initials since his childhood in the Latino-heavy Maryvale neighborhood of Phoenix.

    Thats always the way Ive said it: Jew-S-A, he told the Republic. I like the way it sounds. I like Jew-S-A because it has more flair.

    At the Phoenix rally, Lindell broke into his favorite chant repeatedly, also swinging by the press pen to call journalists the enemy and scream youre going down!

    Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway condemned his behavior as deplorable and insisted it was not representative of the GOP nominees supporters.

    Lindell insisted he was no bigot and would never denigrate Jewish people or any religious or ethnic group, telling the Republic were all created equal.

    Asked to clarify one comment he made under his breath, however, Lindell told the Republic he said, The Jews run the country anyway.

    This was just his way of horsing around, he added.

    - (RTHK) At the RTHK Forum, a citizen pronounced Leung Chung-hang's name as "Penis Still Itching" and Yau Wai-ching's name as "Again Feed Sperm" in Cantonese. The citizen said that this was due to his Causeway Bay accent.

    - Leung Chung-hang said on RTHK: "Shina" has different meanings. When Japan invaded China, that is what they called China. When Sun Yat-sen lobbied for support overseas around 1900, he used that term. Today people in southern Europe pronounce it this way.

    - If Leung Chung-hang has made such a detailed study of the use of the word, how can his tongue still slip during the oath?

    - Once upon a time, the Japanese used the term (支那そば shina soba) for ramen noodles because they originate from China.

    - That's because those two really are Japs who are accustomed to saying "Shina":

    - Shina is not always bad.

    Example 1: Urban Dictionary: Shina: Synonymous with perfection. Pure awesomeness. Beautiful, sweet, and just plain amazing. If you're lucky enough to meet a Shina, never let her go. You could never do better because there is no better!

    Example 2: Wikipedia: Shina people: The Shina are the Dardic people originating in southern GilgitBaltistan, Chitral and western part of Kohistan district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan, as well as Dras Valley and Gurais/ Kishenganga Valley region in northern Kashmir of India. They also live in some parts of Pakistani Kashmir. They speak an Indo-Aryan language, called Shina language, with varied dialects.

    Example 3: Sheena, Queen of the Jungle movie "She alone has the power to save paradise."

    Example 4: Sheena Easton: Strut

    - If Shina is not always bad, then we can surely say things like "Little Japan" (小日本) and "Radish head" (蘿蔔頭) to the Japanese people without fear of offense.

    - The word "Shina" can frequently be heard in movies and on television. Here is a screen capture of such a person.

    This Japanese army officer said that the Shina army is sneaky because they often lay down minefields during defensive battles.

    - If Shina is not so bad as Youngspiration insists, then why don't Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching simply acknowledge that this was exactly what they said? Why blame it on some non-existent Ap Lei Chau accent?

    - They can't even admit to a feeble joke (which does not qualify as a statement of protest) and instead engage in evasions that they don't even believe in themselves.

    - If you want a serious discussion of Shina, read Joshua A. Fogel, New Thoughts on an Old Controversy: Shina as a Toponym for China Sino-Platonic Papers, 229 (August 2012)

    - (Oriental Daily) October 19, 2016. Yesterday morning, Okinawa citizens demonstrated outside the American military base and faced off against the riot police. One policeman yelled at the demonstrators: "Shut up! Shina-jin!" The video was posted onto YouTube. The Okinawa police investigated and said that the policeman was a tactical unit officer on loan from the Osaka Prefecture. The policeman admitted that he did so. The police spokesperson said that they are deeply sorry about this kind of behavior. They have instructed the police force about this and they promise that this will never happen again. Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga told the press that the words of the policeman were "improper" and expressed his regret. "Shina-jin" was used by the Japanese during the Second World War to insult the Chinese people. Certain Japanese people believe that the anti-American demonstrations in Okinawa are guided by the Chinese government and therefore they insult the demonstrators by calling them "Shina-jin."

    - According to Leung Chung-hang, there is absolutely no reason why the Japanese police and government have to issue any kind of apology.

    - (SCMP) October 25, 2016.

    Chee-na. The word has been playing on 81-year-old Lam Chuns mind these past couple of weeks, keeping her awake at night.

    Moved equally by anger and heartache, Lam has decided to join a rally organised by an alliance of 25 pro-Beijing groups on Wednesday morning outside the Legislative Council complex to protest against the Youngspiration duo for using the offending word in their oath-taking when the new term opened on October 12.

    They have chosen to put themselves on the wrong side of history, Lam told the Post, her eyes glinting with emotion. Whatever political stance you may have, you never insult your countrymen.

    Lam, now retired and a volunteer at New Territories Association of Societies, has never taken part in a protest before. But this time, she said she felt compelled to join in. A turnout of 10,000 is expected, according to alliance spokesman Tsang Heung-kwan.

    A former member of the guerrilla squad East River Columns Hong Kong and Kowloon Independent Brigade during the second world war when she was in her teens, Lam said: Do you know why the Japanese used the term to call Chinese? It was to imply that they were treating us like pigs and they could kill us whenever and wherever they liked.

    The word Chee-na is a variation of the derogatory term Shina used by the Japanese during the war against Chinese people.

    When the Youngspiration pair Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching, both of whom favour Hong Kongs independence from China decided to use the word when they took their oaths, they unleashed anger in their own city that now appears to have boomeranged back at them. The fallout has triggered a legal challenge of their status that could see them losing their seats.

    On that chaotic morning of October 12, Yau went further and referred to the Peoples Republic of China as the Peoples Re-f****** of Chee-na.

    Lams colleague in the East River column, Ho Ming-sze, 95, was as angry as Lam.

    You can have dissatisfaction with the Chinese government and the Communist Party ... How could the two guys use the term used by the Japanese during the war to insult the Chinese compatriots? he asked.

    Ho, a former head of the United Front Work Department at Xinhuas Hong Kong branch Beijings defacto embassy in Hong Kong during the colonial time, also accused Leung and Yau of being ignorant about history.

    Ho said he was too frail to take part in Wednesdays rally but hoped Beijing would come up with measures to clamp down on the two localists.

    It is not just the likes of Lam and Ho who went through the travails of war who are upset. Thirty-something accountant Felix Chan who voted for Yau in last months general election said he was also disappointed in the duo. If I do not need to go to work, I think I will go to join the rally too. We voted them into the Legco because we wanted them to protect Hong Kongs interest. But they had acted like primary pupils.

    While the pro-Beijing camp and other community groups have demanded a public apology from the Youngspiration pair, the pan-democrats have also distanced themselves from their localist allies, saying they could not support their acts during the oath-taking.

    The Youngspiration duo has remained defiant and refused to offer an apology. Leung at first said it was his Ap Lei Chau accent that caused him to pronounce China as Chee-na and later said that the term Shina used to be a neutral term without special connotation. He also argued he had not insulted anyone during his oath-taking because Chee-na was not a person.

    Ironically, the oath-taking farce coincided with a similar controversy in Japan recently over two local policemen shouting shina-jin at protesters opposing the construction of helipads for the US army in Higashi, Okinawa prefecture.

    The Osaka prefectural police department, from which the officers were sent, quickly reprimanded the two policemen for the indiscreet and inappropriate comments. Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga also criticised the officers behaviour as inappropriate and extremely regrettable. It must not be forgiven, he was quoted as saying by Kyodo.

    Respected scholar of Hong Kong history, Professor Joseph Ting Sun-pao, rejected the two politicians excuses as childish.

    Professor Ting said the term was mainly used by the Japanese after the Mukden Incident, also called Manchurian Incident, in 1931, which saw the Japanese invasion of northeastern China, then known as Manchuria.

    The reason the Japanese used it was to agitate the Chinese while trying to show superiority towards the Chinese people.

    After the second world war, the Allied Forces concluded in an investigation in 1946 that the word Shina carried derogatory overtones and ordered the Japanese government to ban the use of it in all official writings, he said.

    Since then, the word Shina and its derivatives have been replaced by Chugoku in Japanese. Only some right-wing extremists would still use the term out of hatred for China and its people.

    In one of the widely cited essays entitled On Japanese Expressions for China, by renowned sinologist and historian Professor Joshua Fogel of the University of California, Santa Barbara, he said that Shina was rarely used prior to the middle years of the Edo period, which is the period between 1600s and 1860s in the history of Japan.

    When the term was employed in the early 18th century, It carried only positive connotations, Professor Fogel wrote. At the time it was believed to reflect an Indian pronunciation of the toponym for China which Buddhist travellers ... had often used centuries earlier.

    Professor Chiu Yu-lok, who teaches Hong Kong history at the Open University, said the term already had special negative meaning in todays context.

    The two young people must know the term carries negative meaning or else they would not have employed the term to refer to China when taking the oath, said Professor Chiu, adding: Nowadays young people use the term very casually, especially on the internet.

    In the Hong Kong context, the term is becoming more commonly used on some online forums since the rise of the so-called anti-locusts campaigns against Chinese tourists some two years ago. Some Hong Kong people criticised mainland tourists for snapping up goods in Hong Kong, flooding the streets, and causing a nuisance to others.

    Professor Chiu also said the lack of a proper Chinese history course in the secondary curriculum was to blame.

    Young people do not fully understand the context of the term [Shina] because many of them have not studied Chinese history in secondary schools.

    Chinese history is not an independent, compulsory subject. What sort of understanding can you expect from our young people about Chinese culture and Chinese history?

    Without knowing the history of China, it is difficult for the young people to develop a sense of belonging to the motherland. The dispute itself can be a good civic education perhaps, added Professor Chiu.

    Professor Ting said the Youngspiration duo had only themselves to blame in creating the political crisis. They have made a big mess. It has gotten too big and is out of their control now.

    - (YouTube) Leung Chung-hang: "I like a certain actor very much. His name is Chilam Cheung. Should I call him Chee-lam? or Chi-lam?" Legislator Shiu Ka-fai: "The actor is named Chi-lam. The word that you used was Shina. The two words have different sounds. Please do not drag Chilam Cheung down into this. Moreover, please do not drag all of us Hongkongers down into this ... what you are doing now is not to challenge the Chinese government, not to challenge the Hong Kong government, but to challenge every Chinese person in China, including myself. We totally refuse to tolerate your action."

    Leung Chung-hang: "In what way does this flag of mine contradicts the contents of the oath? This is a statement of fact. Hong Kong is not China." RTHK City Forum host So King-hang: "Just then Leung Chung-hang has shown us how to pronounce CHINA." Legislator Leung Mei-fun: "Just then you said CHINA many times. If you can say it, you should admit that you intentionally pronounced it as SHINA. Leung Chung-hang, you should admit that you intentionally pronounced it as SHINA. You don't need to say now that it was your Hong Kong accent. Nobody is going to believe it. Why are you coming out here to give explanations? That is because you know that many audience members have heard you and felt insulted. I demand that you must apologize first. The apology should be written and sent to the Legislative Council chairman, and then you can seek another opportunity to retake the oath."

    - (Oriental Daily) October 17, 2016. After offending persons of Chinese descent all around the world leading to 200,000+ global signatures (note: 291,682 as of 10pm October 17) against them, Yau Wai-ching came back with this explanation: The oath did not include anything about people or culture, only the government. In other words, they only intended to insult the government and not the people/culture. Therefore they don't have to apologize. Leung Chung-hang said that the oath did not refer to any person, and therefore he can't see how people were insulted. Leung emphasized: "I did nothing wrong."

    - PLEASE! "Shina" does not refer to the People's Republic of China or the Chinese Communist Party. The word fell into disuse in Japan by official decree in 1946. Shina refers to the place known since antiquity as China (including Hong Kong), and the people who come from there (including Yau Wai-ching and Leung Chung-hang) are "Shina-jin". The People's Republic of China was founded on October 1, 1949.

    - Cartoon: "In politics, even a single day is too long. Have you moved your goal posts today?"

    - (HKG Pao) At first, Yau Wai-ching and Leung Chung-hang devised what they thought was a clever way of insulting China and its people in the manner of "Elementary School Chickens." They thought that they could muddle their way through with verbal sophistry. But they were thoroughly routed. Every new explanation that they came up with offended more people, putting themselves, their fellow travelers and their supporters into the dark abyss. This is the best possible illustration for political stupidity.

    - (Stand News) By Wan Chin. October 19, 2016.

    The two Youngspiration devils came up with the Shina idea, but do they know what hit them and what is killing Hong Kong as a result?

    Everybody knows that the Chinese Communists was helped by the Soviet Union to oust the Kuomintang and take over China. But their internal propaganda insists that the Chinese Communists were the true heroes of the War of Resistance Against Japan, and their great victory over Japan gave them the legitimacy to rule China. The Shina talk resurrects the ignominy of the Japanese invasion of China. As such, the Chinese Communists cannot and will not yield an inch. Sure, there is freedom of speech in Hong Kong. But how can a legislator not think about how China would react? Can you just babble? After they said it, can they just wrap themselves around Hong Kong's system and ask the rest of the people of Hong Kong to join them to fight the Chinese Communists?

    By comparison, if a legislator in some small country insults China and the Chinese Communists lodge a stern diplomatic protest and threaten the severance of all ties, do you think that this legislator will have to resign to placate China?

    You can call the mainlanders names like locusts and barbarians, and they won't mind. They probably recognize this to be true to a certain degree anyway. But if you call China "Shina" when you are a legislator-elect and  you want to add "re-fucking" as well, then there is no way out. If the Chinese Communists don't fight you all the way, they might as well as give up ruling China.

    When Hongkongers scream "locusts", "barbarians", etc, it does not matter to them. But once you say "Shina", all bets are off. They will fight to the bitter end even if it means destroying Hong Kong altogether. And when they go all out, then Hongkongers will learn what is called nation-building, governance, inviolable sovereignty, territorial integrity, etc. If the young people of Hong Kong want to fight for Hong Kong independence, this is how they must be.

    This is the moment to test the rationality and will of the people of Hong Kong. I support neither Youngspiration nor Andrew Leung Kwan-yuen. They are all Hong Kong sinners. They showed us some cleverness but they are causing Hong Kong's future and system to be destroyed by the enraged Chinese Communists. They knew beforehand that this was going to happen. But they went ahead anyway. They are immoral Hong Kong sinners.

    - Leung Chung-hang said on RTHK: "During the oath I wore a shawl with the words 'Hong Kong is not China'. This is a statement of fact, just as an apple is not an orange. I don't understand why the secretary-general would ask me if I understand the contents of the oath."

    - "Hong Kong Is Not China"? I checked the map:

    This statement is true: Hong Kong is just one little black dot whereas China is the big yellow chunk in the middle. In the same way, an apple is not an apple tree, Philadelphia is not the United States, Osaka is not Japan, Marseilles is not France, Perth is not Australia, etc.  Everybody know this to be true. What then is the purpose of saying so? Why not have another truism on the shawl, such as "My mother does not have a penis"?

    - Leung Chung-hang said that "Hong Kong Is Not China" is a statement of fact. And One County Two Systems is dead if one cannot be allowed to say that.

    When Legislative Councilor Leung Chung-hang goes home to night, he will tell his mother: "I am not family." When her mother breaks down in tears, Leung will say: "That was a statement of fact. If I cannot be allowed to say that, our family is finished!" Her mother is going to cry some more ...

    - Legislator Shiu Ka-chun said that the China in "Hong Kong is not China" may refer to "the hard white material that is made of baked clay and used to make plates, bowls, etc." Therefore "Hong Kong is not China" is a truism.

    - Legislator Lam Cheuk-ting (Democratic Party) said: "Hong Kong is not China" is logically correct because Hong Kong is not China just as "New Territories is not Hong Kong."

    - If it is a truism, then why say it? Isn't it a waste of time to say "my big toe is not my foot" or "an atom is not a molecule"? The answer is that these people don't dare to say "Hong Kong is not part of China" so they used a short-cut with plausible deniability while still causing a debate.

    - (Oriental Daily) At RTHK City Forum, Leung Chung-hang explains that the English-language phrase "Hong Kong is not China" is a truism just like "apple is not orange." At which point, the host said: "Leung Chung-hang has just shown us how to pronounce China properly." (laughter all around)

    - (Hong Kong Free Press) October 13, 2016.

    The Hong Kong is not China flag that he wore on his back during the Legislative Council swearing-in ceremony was only fashion, Sixtus Baggio Leung Chun-hang has said. Leung, who belongs to the localist Younspiration party, spoke about his controversial oath-taking on RTHK radio on Thursday.

    He pronounced China as Chee-na during the oath because he had an accent, he said.

    Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5kyipoMrFEc

    Legislative Council Secretary Chen Wei-on told Leung that he did not have the authority to administer his oath on Wednesday because the flag gave him reason to doubt whether Leung had understood the meaning of the oath.

    On the radio Thursday morning, Leung was asked why he pronounced China differently on air. He responded that he was working hard to correct his Ap Lei Chau accent.

    Leung was then asked whether he would be able to pronounce the term properly next week, when he is expected to take the oath again. The lawmaker said he didnt know and that he would try his best. He also said that he was unsure whether he would still be using English, or if he will be able to pronounce the other words correctly.

    [Chen] said that I didnt understand the oath maybe he thinks my English is bad, he said.

    Leung said that his pronunciation of China as Chee-na was not offensive and that Sun Yat-sen, a Chinese revolutionary who was the first president of the Republic of China, also used the term.

    Chee-na is similar to the Chinese pronunciation of the archaic Japanese name for China, Shina. The meaning of the word was neutral, but it became a derogatory term for Japanese people to refer to Chinese people during the Sino-Japanese wars. Although the term was later dropped and replaced by Chugoku, Shina still bears an offensive meaning to most Chinese people.

    - The tricks were only with the speaking and the props, but Yau Wai-ching also rolled her eyes. What's her excuse? That she is naturally cross-eyed?

    - Leung Chung-hang also said that the two of them wanted to inject some humor into the oath ceremony, but some people just don't get it. Well, there is a time for everything. You can tell Polish jokes, but not when you are addressing the Warsaw Chamber of Commerce. You can tell jokes about how stupid and barbaric Jiaozhou people are,  but not when you are addressing the Jiaozhou Compatriots Association. You can tell black jokes, but not when you are the keynote speaker at the annual meeting of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. In this case, it is not that Leung and Yau didn't know that legislators should respect the law (such as the Oaths and Declarations Ordinance); they did it precisely because they know that these 'jokes' would offend.

    - "Elementary school chicken"! A typical "elementary school chicken" trick is to say FUCK! aloud while the teacher has turned her back to write on the blackboard. When the teacher asked who said it, nobody said anything and therefore the class was collectively punished. Afterwards our elementary school chicken tells everybody that he is the toughest kid in school and he has the teacher under his control. In this case, Yau Wai-ching and Leung Chung-hang played some word games, came up with all manners of ridiculous excuses while winking and nudging and, at the end of the day, think that they have overthrown the Chinese Communist regime and established a new Hong Kong Nation.

    - (SCMP) Vulgar Legco rebels must be suffering from deep self-hatred. BY Alice Wu. October 16, 2016.

    US presidential candidate Donald Trumps fixation over pronouncing China like the last two syllables of vagina has caused quite a stir and a lot of laughs (thank you, Alec Baldwin), but at least it makes some sense now now that the recording of him in a lewd discussion with TV host Billy Bush has been made public.

    And then we had two Hong Kong lawmakers go out of their way to call China Cheena (or Shina if you wish) in taking their Legislative Council oath. Its a derogatory twist, more offensive than calling ethnic Chinese Chinks. Cheena isnt just another word for China. It carries degrading connotations (the dehumanisation of the Chinese people by imperial Japan), and painful historical wounds (Japanese invasions). It is unacceptable, unfit for the public sphere and displays a lack of concern for human decency. And, as in the case of Trump, it should raise the question of whether the pair who purposefully uttered it possess the necessary judgment, temperament and character for public office.

    Instead of admitting their intention to taunt and offend, Youngspirations Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching chalked it up to their accent. Yau then accused critics of discrimination. Thats as ridiculous as Trumps accusations of moderator bias, being given a defective microphone and, more recently, blaming locker room talk for his disgusting comments about women.

    Leung refused to acknowledge the offensiveness of the term, citing Sun Yat-sens use of the word. But the term did not reach its full derogatory status until May 1930, more than five years after Suns death, when the then government of China rejected the name and made it clear others cannot determine what their nation is to be called. Perhaps Leung should go a step further, and blame Sun for dying before Cheena had lexically evolved fully into being offensively oppressive. Suns use of the word does not cure its evolved perniciousness. To assume so would be to embrace a deliberate ignorance of history.

    By Leungs logic, negro should be acceptable, too, given that Abraham Lincoln used the word. Fortunately, Leung is wrong, or the US Army would not have had to apologise in 2014 for mistakenly stating that the word was acceptable in referring to black or African American personnel.

    Like Trump, Leung and Yau take people for fools. Perhaps most ironic is that their shared sense of arrogance and entitlement is very much like that of the Japanese imperialists.

    There is little doubt that Leung and Yau intended to offend. The most despicable part may be their refusal to admit it. Yau, who recently made banging part of public discourse, managed to go one step further in bastardising the public sphere that is an integral part of democracy. Im talking here of her deliberate mispronunciation of republic, turning it into another derogatory term. Swearing doesnt require special skills. Being sophomoric isnt an excuse. Being completely ignorant of the extent of ones insensitivities is, as Hillary Clinton told Trump in the first presidential debate, liv[ing] in your own reality.

    If some suspect Trump to be a pathological narcissist, it is not unreasonable to suspect that Leung and Yau suffer from a form of extreme self-hatred. Self-hatred isnt just a strong dislike of oneself, it also refers to hatred of ones own race or nationality. To Leung and Yau, its not just about welcoming and accepting antagonistic views of Chinese or China, its about creating and perpetrating it. They have, in fact, gone over the edge and are inflicting self-harm.

    And, in this sense, we should perhaps be more concerned for Leung and Yau than Trump. What transpired in the Legco chamber on Wednesday reminds me of what the late Toni Morrison wrote in The Bluest Eye: They seemed to have taken all of their smoothly cultivated ignorance, their exquisitely learned self-hatred, their elaborately designed hopelessness and sucked it all up into a fiery cone of scorn that had burned for ages in the hollows of their minds― cooled― and spilled over lips of outrage, consuming whatever was in its path.

    - Lighten up, will ya? Here is a Hong Kong Golden Forum music video of Nasty Shina Style.

    - Hong Kong people don't know much about the meaning of Shina. (New York Times) Japan's Wartime Savagery? Better to forget it.

    - How is some word-twisting going to achieve Hong Kong independence? Of course, it won't. So why do this? Because you have to do something while you wait for Hong Kong independence to arrive?

    How will it arrive? If you talk to the pro-independence people, none of them will talk about armed resistance or anything like that. The asymmetric war is too lop-sided, as in 2 million People's Liberation Army armed with nuclear bombs versus zero Hong Kong Republican Army. Instead, they talk about 支爆 (The China meltdown). This is the moment when Shina implodes spontaneously, with the central government melting away while the rest of Shina breaks into many independent fragments such as Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan, Xinjiang, Tibet, Yunnan, Fujian, Guangdong/Guangxi, Jiangsu, Northeast provinces, Southern Mongolia, etc.

    When will it arrive? Soon. Quite soon. Any day now. In the interregnum, we will just sit and twiddle our thumbs. To while away the time, we are putting on some word-play for you.

    Why not armed resistance? We have all studied the situation in Ireland (link):

    The provisional Irish Republican Army, or IRA, is an outgrowth of an older group known as the Irish Republican Army, which fought an insurgency that successfully challenged British rule in the whole of Ireland in the early years of the twentieth century. The 1916-1921 warfare culminated in the creation of an independent Irish Free State in 1921. But in exchange for its independence, the old IRA's leadership agreed to allow Ireland's six northern counties to remain under British rule. Britain reconstituted these provinces as Ulster or Northern Ireland, and inside the IRA, significant elements rejected this partition and launched a civil war ultimately won by the pro-treaty Irish forces

    In 1969, the IRA splintered into two groups, the Dublin-based "officials," who advocated a united socialist Ireland by peaceful means, and the Belfast-based "provisionals," who vowed to use violence as a catalyst for unification.

    At first, the provisional IRA, or "provos" conducted sniper attacks, assassinations, and several small bombings in the province, and appeared to have little public support. Then, in January 1972, British troops opened fire on a Catholic rally in Londonderry, killing fourteen unarmed people. PIRA recruitment soared, and the official wing of the organization fell away into obscurity. Their violent comrades proceeded to launch a series of bombing campaigns around Northern Ireland and in Britain targeting both military targets and civilian populations. So-called "Loyalist" groups determined to retain British rule sprung up to challenge them, and in the crossfire, together with British military and Northern Irish police forces, some 3,600 people would die before a peace accord was signed in the late 1990s.

    Hong Kong independence urgently needs to have its own Londonberry massacre. So far the Hong Kong Police has not cooperated, so our pro-independence leaders need to press a lot harder. At the Mong Kok riot, the two shots fired into the air unfortunately didn't kill anyone. What is needed is  the live Facebook broadcast of machine guns mowing down hundreds of peaceful demonstrators, but nobody wants to volunteer for the supreme sacrifice -- they are too busy posting on Facebook about the China meltdown and the subsequent coming Hong Kong independence.

    - If you want to resist the Chinese Communists, you can fight them. Why would you proceed to insult the Chinese people, including your own ancestors?

    - (Wen Wei Po) October 13, 2016.

    Civic Passion chairman Cheng Chung-tai may have been outshone by Youngspiration yesterday, but Civic Passion still had its say on Facebook.

    Wan Chin: If the central government can accept the insults from Youngspiration, then the people of Hong Kong can indeed carry out a revolution for independence.

    Wong Yeung-tat's wife Chan Sau-wai wrote: "A bunch of fucking neo-pan-democratic self-determiners repeatedly copied Raymond Wong's old oath game. Only Civic Passion's Cheng Chung-tai displayed steadiness, dependability and responsibility. They are at two completely different levels." As for Yau Wai-ching, Chan said: "It is either fucking or else it is fucking. I can laugh myself to death."

    Chan To wrote to those voted for Youngspiration: "Enjoy what you voted for."

    Yip Ching-hang explained the meaning of "Re-fucking": "Fucking restart sex at the Legislative Council."

    When Yau Wai-ching demanded Leung Mei-fun (BPA) to apologize for being critical of her Hong Kong-accented English, the Civic Passion Weitou Guy wrote: "I fuck your grandma! What kind of fucking Hong Kong accent do you call that? How long have you been a Hongkonger? Why don't you fucking go back to your mainland hometown! Stinking cunt! Don't fucking call yourself family with others!"

    - (Kinliu) By Chris Wat Wing-yin. October 13, 2016.

    ... The two incoming Legislative Councilors joked that it was their Ap Lei Chau native accent, made fun of the 35 million Chinese killed in the War of Resistance Against Japan and insulted 1.4 billion Chinese people around the world.

    On the next day, Apple Daily published empty slogans: "Legislative Councilors should be going after corruption and government-business-rural squires-triad gang collusion ..." The other opposition members clamped their mouths. Nobody came out to defend "Fucking Shina." This showed that the two had gone too far this time.

    Raymond Wong was around the Legislative Council for a long time, but he never did anything to offend all 1.4 billion people. Leung Kwok-hung traveled to mainland China but he never had to be scared due to detention. Politics has red boundaries. It is fatal for new politicians not to realize where those boundaries lie.

    Yesterday, the Legislative Council secretary-general gave Leung Chung-hang, Yau Wai-ching and Yiu Chung-yim two opportunities to get it right. But they refused to read out the oath and even used obscene language. As a result their oaths were not accepted. Legislative Council chairman Andrew Leung said that the three will get another chance next Wednesday. That is a mistake.

    ...  How would a judge react in a Hong Kong courtroom? Hong Kong has rule of law, and the oath is a legal statement. If Andrew Leung cannot even follow the simple law, then he should not be a legislator. Those three individuals should have been barred from office. They were given two opportunities which they squandered away. Nobody forced them to do what they did; they willingly gave up their seats.

    - (Silentmajority.hk) October 13, 2016.

    Global Times had an article about the oath ceremony at the Hong Kong Legislative Council. "A small number of elected legislators did so to attract attention, because certain people welcome this." Apart from anger, there was more pity about the Pearl of the Orient. "We are somewhat pessimistic about the future of Hong Kong ... because these repeated soap operas contribute nothing to Hong Kong's development beyond some political spectacles."

    Once upon a time, the mainland Chinese basically think of Hong Kong as being civilized, orderly and prosperous. This impression has been altered by these chaotic developments. "Gradually, the mainland Chinese no longer care whether Hong Kong prospers or decays. Mainland China is not responsible if Hong Kong does not want to deal with their own radical political forces. If more and more mainlanders feel this way, then this won't augur well for Hong Kong."

    - T.S Eliot: Little Gidding

    There are three conditions which often look alike
    Yet differ completely, flourish in the same hedgerow:
    Attachment to self and to things and to persons, detachment
    From self and from things and from persons; and, growing between them, indifference
    Which resembles the others as death resembles life,
    Being between two lives - unflowering, between
    The live and the dead nettle. This is the use of memory:
    For liberation - not less of love but expanding
    Of love beyond desire, and so liberation
    From the future as well as the past. Thus, love of a country
    Begins as an attachment to our own field of action
    And comes to find that action of little importance
    Though never indifferent. History may be servitude,
    History may be freedom. See, now they vanish,
    The faces and places, with the self which, as it could, loved them,
    To become renewed, transfigured, in another pattern.
    Sin is Behovely, but
    All shall be well, and
    All manner of thing shall be well.
    If I think, again, of this place,
    And of people, not wholly commendable,
    Of not immediate kin or kindness,
    But of some peculiar genius,
    All touched by a common genius,
    United in the strife which divided them;

    - (SCMP) By Alex Lo. October 14, 2016.

    It was embarrassing to watch. Long Hair Leung Kwok-hung and Abraham Razack fought over a microphone. One newly elected young localist waved a protest banner like she was doing a striptease and used what sounded like swear words in reading her oath. Another pronounced China as Chee-na, a variation on the derogatory term Shina used by Japanese occupation forces during the second world war.

    To top it all off, most of the pan-democrat lawmakers tore up their voting papers for electing the Legco president and threw the pieces into the air like confetti.

    When Sixtus Baggio Leung Chun-hang of the localist party Youngspiration was asked why he said Chee-na when he delivered his oath in English, he excused himself by claiming he had an Ap Lei Chau accent. There is no such accent, any more than there is a Hong Kong nation, a fictitious entity to which Leung and fellow localist Yau Wai-ching swore allegiance in their oath.

    Yau and Leung were rightly disqualified from taking up their Legco duties. They also unfurled a banner that said Hong Kong is not China. Thats true in the sense that Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen are not China, but they are all parts of China. You may challenge the Chinese communist state but lets not insult the Chinese nation and the Chinese people.

    Some of us had hoped that the youngsters the so-called umbrella soldiers would learn to act like adults when they formed political parties and entered the Legislative Council. As it turned out, entering the new legislature was more like the first day of kindergarten. Civic Passions Cheng Chung-tai was the only localist who read the oath as it was written. I dont think the way I take the oath today would amount to any effective resistance, he said.

    Exactly, a voice of reason! Dont sweat over the procedural stuff. By threatening to paralyse Legco, young radicals will just further delegitimise a legislature for which many people already have a low regard. They have to decide whether they just want to crash the party or do something useful.

    There are bigger fish to fry, fat cats to go after. Independent Eddie Chu Hoi-dick has almost single-handedly managed to put the Heung Yee Kuk on the defensive and exposed the governments shady dealings with the kuks strongmen in the New Territories.

    Expose real scandals; dont just throw temper tantrums in the Legco chamber.

    - (Wen Wei Po) October 15, 2016. How to miss the elephant in the room: a survey of responses from pan-democratic legislators about Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching.

    Alvin Yeung (Civic Party): No comment on Leung Yau about what they said and whether they should apologize. Instead he said that Wong Ting-kwong (DAB) should be deplored for missing "Hong Kong" in his oath and thus insulting the people of Hong Kong.

    Kwok Wing-kin (Civic Party): No comment on Leung Yau about what they said and whether they should apologize. Instead Kwok criticized the Legislative Council secretary-general for acting inappropriately for something that should be decided by the Legislative Council chairman.

    Jeremy Tam Man-ho (Civic Party): Whether they should retract or apologize is up to them to decide, because they did it and only they know whether it was because of their accents or whatever else. Should the Legislative Council follow up on the matter? Tam said that chairman Andrew Leung (BPA) had British citizenship once upon a time.

    Kwok Ka-ki (Civic Party): The actions of those two were indeed "hugely controversial." However, different people have different views, so it is up to those two to explain their views. He said that he is an equal to Leung and Yau and therefore has no right to demand that they retract or apologize. The matter should not be decided by the Legco secretariat because only the chairman has the authority to declare whether an oath was valid or no, although he/she does not have the power to make a moral judgment.

    Tanya Chan (Civic Party): Those two should decide whether to retract or apologize. Right now the priority is to decide whether the Legco secretary-general has the right to oversee the oath.

    Claudia Mo (Civic Party): No direct response to the question. She said that she respects freedom of speech, and that adding things in various places of an oath is not wrong. She said that Leung and Yau "merely added things" and it is up to the overseer and the oath taker themselves to judge. She says people are different in "ethics, morality, language and political judgment."

    - (HKG Pao) Claudia Mo said: "I mind very much those people who pile on afterwards to criticize them non-stop. I understand that many people in Hong Kong don't approve of their behavior during their oaths. I won't name names, but you are hurting feelings when you call them nave for wanting the people of Hong Kong to pay for their actions."

    Wu Chi-wai (Democratic Party): Disagree with what the two said, but this is their problem. The relevant persons should deal with it. These are individual actions for which those individuals will be held responsible.

    Helen Wong Pik-wan (Democratic Party): What they said was inappropriate, but people have freedom of expression and they have to judge whether the action was appropriate. The two were elected by popular vote and therefore should not be ousted "because of certain speeches." If the legislators acted inappropriately, the voters can oust them in the next election.

    Andrew Wan (Democratic Party): I personally view that this sort of offensive speech was neither appropriate nor necessary. Wan said that he opposes the "Hong Kong independence" movement. However this time it was only a verbal demonstration without physical action. Is it permissible to verbally express an ideological concept? Instead the Legislative Council should be more concerned about the suppression of freedom of expression. He said that the two can decide themselves whether to apologize to the general public.

    Lam Cheuk-ting (Democratic Party): I oppose inserting obscenities into the oath, and I oppose language that insults the nation. They should decide themselves whether to retract or apologize, because they were elected by the people. Should the Legislative Council follow up? Well, that should be done after they have been sworn in.

    Hui Chi-fung (Democratic Party): Yau and Leung reflected "the views of some of the citizens" in the manner that some of the citizens would express themselves. Although Hui disagrees with them, he said that they should decide whether to retract or apologize.

    Kwong Chun-yu (Democratic Party): No reply.

    - Let me write Kwong Chun-yu's response in the style of his famous novels: "Yau, Wai-Ching, and, Leung, Chung-hang, are both, ultimately, adults. They should, as they should, decide on, whether, to retract, or, apologize. Or, whatever."

    James To (Democratic Party): No reply.

    - (Ta Kung Pao) October 14, 2016. James To said that "it was mere humor to relax the atmosphere without any element of insult."

    - (TVB) October 15, 2016. James To said: "You use some words that ordinary citizens feel are terms of insult because some of your supporters agree with this. The problem is that you also want more people to support you. I don't understand what your thinking is, because this may upset many of your supporters too. I think that this is very unwise. That is, it absolutely should not have been done."

    - Why this 180-degree reversal of position by James To? After his first comment, he drew mockery with many examples of "humor":

    Example: When James To gets to meet Barack Obama, he should greet with: "Hiya, nigger, give me five, man!"

    Example: When you get to meet James To, you should begin with: "Legislator To, how come you are not wearing a green hat today?" After all, isn't the fact that his lawyer wife left him for a taxi driver really funny? Hahaha.

    - If he accuses you of insulting him, you tell him that plenty of Irishmen wear green hats.

    Example: If James To's parent passes away, you should pay tribute at the funeral by singing the Cantonese birthday song: "Congratulations! Congratulations! I wish you the same happiness every day every year ..."

    Example: When the teacher tells your son to recite poem, he pauses 10 seconds between every word. What should the teacher do? Laugh at the 'humor'?

    Example: Legislator James To gets impatient while waiting to go through airport security screening. So he says aloud: "Let me through. I'm carrying a bomb." He gets arrested and sent to prison for exercising his right to make a humorous remark.

    Charles Mok (independent): The two should be given another opportunity to take the oath. Mok says that you do not know the deep meaning of why the two said what they said, so you should ask them directly. Most importantly, the two were popularly elected and so the process should be handled as quickly as possible. He said that the two should not have to be ousted as a result, because the Legislative Council should be focusing on legislation instead of "political accusations."

    Leung Kai-cheung (independent) If the two deem it necessary, they will apologize to the public. Different members of the public have different views, so the two will decide for themselves. The other issues should left for the Legco chairman to deal with. Individual legislators should not be interpreting or commenting.

    Ip Kin-yuen (Professional Teachers Union) The two should take responsibility for what they did. I regret seeing them use certain insulting language on such a solemn occasion. Everybody knows that saying these things on this occasion will generate a huge response. Society does not want to see or hear such insults. The Legislative Council has a set of rules, and we should abide by the relevant procedures.

    - (HKG Pao) October 18, 2016. Ip Kin-yuen: Sometimes legislators hurl insults at government officials and other legislators. I disapprove of this type of behavior which is disallowed by the Legco rules. But compared to the current incident, all previous ones are trivial, because the target of the insult this time is an entire race. Everybody knows that insulting a race, tribe or other group is going to inflame hatred. A politician should avoid doing so. How can you go out and insult an entire race of people? When you do this, you hurt others and you will also suffer the blowback. We are all watching closely how they deal with this. They should consider whether to apologize or resign.

    - Why is Ip Kin-yuen taking such a progressive position now? That's because he is the Education sector legislator and he is with the pro-democracy Professional Teachers Union. Earlier the pro-establishment Hong Kong Federation of Education Workers had come out with a survey that 76% of all teachers condemned the actions of Yau Wai-ching and Leung Chung-hang. So Ip Kin-yuen could no longer afford to waffle.

    Shiu Ka-chun: The two young legislators know how to think for themselves and be responsible to the people of Hong Kong and the people of China. They can think for themselves. Since we are peers, it is inappropriate for us to tell them what to do.

    - ... but we have no problems with telling Andrew Leung that he must resign as Legislative Council chairman ...

    Leung Yiu-chung (Neighbourhood Workers Center): Legislators should be responsible for their own speeches and actions, so I won't comment about what other legislators did. Each legislator is popularly elected, so they will be accountable to their voters. As for whether "Shina" is insulting, Leung said: "I don't care." He said that the chaos resulted because the Legco secretary-general did not have a set of standards for overseeing the oath.

    Leung Kwok-hung (League of Social Democrats): The two have explained that they were not making insults. Since they have "clarified", there is no need to apologize. Let us wait until next Wednesday for the re-taking of the oath to see if there is anything inappropriate.

    - Hey, Leung Kwok-hung, I fuck your mother's stinking cunt ... oh, why are you upset about this? ... you must be making a mistake ... it must have been my Yuen Long accent ... so there we have it ... since I have clarified, there is no need for me to apologize ... so why don't you just go home and fuck your mother?

    Cheung Chiu-hung (Labour Party): The legislator councilors are elected by the citizens who monitor their every move with total transparency. The two Youngspiration legislators may have felt that their speeches were appropriate for their supporters. As for adding their own political opinions into the oaths, the best watchdog system for the legislators is for the voters to decide next time whether to re-elect these legislators.

    Chu Hoi-dick: The two legislators should accept responsibility for their actions and decide for themselves whether to apologize to the public or not. We should have a tolerant attitude towards this affair, because Hong Kong is a free and diversified society with different political viewpoints.

    Lau Siu-lai: I have no comment. I have said so on many occasions that they should decide for themselves whether to retract or apologize.

    Nathan Law (Demosisto): The law should be used to decide whether they completed their oaths. At this time, there is no "reasonable basis" to say that they violated their oaths. They were elected by the people, so their voters will hold them accountable for their actions.

    Lee Kwok-lun: These two legislators are adults and must take responsibility for their actions. I personally respect anyone's speech and actions. The Legislative Council needs to finish all the oaths as soon as possible.

    Cheung Chung-tai (Civic Passion): No reply.

    - (RTHK) Ex-legislator Ronny Tong Ka-wah criticized the pan-democrats for refusing to reject clearly unacceptable behavior. On something that was clearly wrong, they chose instead to dodge around.

    - On RTHK City Forum, Leung Chung-hang said that the Legislative Council Ordinance does not allow him to be ousted unless two-thirds of the Legislative Councilors so vote. Leung said that 30 out of the 70 are pan-democrats (who will support him no matter what). Therefore he told people to shut up until they get the required votes.

    - (Oriental Daily) October 17, 2016. As the common sayings goes, you cannot never wake someone up when he is pretending to be asleep. Some people pretend not to understand, so you can never make him understand. This incident has shown us the ugly hypocrisy of the traditional pan-democrats. We have pan-democrats praising the "humor" in the oath-taking; saying that the qualification of the chairman is more important than individual actions by legislators; observing that these actions reflect socio-cultural changes ... But absolutely none of them came out to denounce the insulting behavior in loud and clear terms.

    Yesterday ex-legislator Lee Cheuk-yan showed up on RTHK City Forum and said that since Leung Chung-hang was popularly elected, he is responsible only to those who voted for him. Of course, Lee also said that he does not agree with what Leung said, in the same way that someone might say: "You think that XXX is very pretty, but I don't think that she is that hot."

    The traditional pan-democrat is too gutless to become a radical, but also too gutless to oppose the radicals.  They should be cast away by the times. Ultimately, the rapid deterioration of politics in Hong Kong and the increasing social rifts can be attributed to the traditional pan-democrats for defending indefensible actions.

    - (SCMP) Its time for Hong Kong pan-democrats to stand up and condemn localist lawmakers offensive behaviour. By Gary Cheung. October 17, 2016.

    Two weeks ago, newly elected lawmaker Nathan Law Kwun-chung wore a suit and tie to take part in an edition of the Posts Redefining Hong Kong debate. It was the first time I had seen the Occupy student-activist so formally dressed. He later explained that the invitation had asked attendees to come in business attire, and so he respect[ed] the occasion.

    Sadly, respecting the occasion is no longer something we can expect of some people, particularly, it seems, young activists who champion lofty ideals. At the swearing-in ceremony for new legislators last Wednesday, Younspirations Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching pledged allegiance to the Hong Kong nation and pronounced China as Cheena, a variation of the derogatory Shina. Both held up banners bearing the words Hong Kong is not China, while Yau mispronounced the Peoples Republic of China as Peoples Re-f****** of Cheena three times. Their oaths were invalidated and they must take it again on Wednesday.

    The two localists stole the limelight all right. They may even take pride in shooting to international fame, as media organisations such as the BBC reported on their oaths being rejected.

    But what they did was an example of failing to respect the occasion, which was a solemn ceremony for lawmakers taking office. Blaming the mispronunciation on their accent just shows that they are good at peddling low-grade humour; anyone with common sense will find their defence laughable.

    The two localists, who aim to use the legislature as a platform to advocate for the citys self-determination, picked the wrong fight. What did they think they could achieve by staging this ugly show, apart from capturing media headlines and drawing condemnation from different quarters of the community? Their offensive act will only further discredit the Legislative Council, whose credibility is already in question after the spectacles of object-hurling and filibustering by members over the past few years.

    It is disappointing that most pan-democrats have not criticised the two localists antics or at least distanced themselves from the pair. Worse, more than a dozen pan-democratic and localist lawmakers signed a joint statement arguing that the two youngsters and Edward Yiu Chung-yim, whose oath was also declared invalid after he added phrases such as universal suffrage to it, had properly taken their oaths. The lawmakers also called on Legco secretary general Kenneth Chen Wai-on, who oversaw the oath-taking, to resign for wrongly declaring their oaths invalid. The fact is that Leung and Yau had altered the official wording of the oath, a move inconsistent with the Oaths and Declarations Ordinance.

    Since the Occupy Central movement, many traditional pan-democrats have been reluctant to condemn the inappropriate acts of the young activists so as not to alienate young voters. It appears that the activists are infallible, and whatever they do and say is justifiable.

    In February 2013, when Lawrence Ma Yan-kwok, a barrister and member of the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong , denounced pan-democratic lawmaker Long Hair Leung Kwok-hung as not a f**king Chinese at a meeting in Legco, Mas use of foul language drew widespread disapproval from pan-democrats at the time. Why the double standards now?

    It is high time for the pan-democrats, who enjoy the support of many Hong Kong voters, to differentiate right from wrong.

    - (Hong Kong Free Press) Enough puerile hijinks, lawmakers its time to grow up. By Kent Ewing. October 18, 2016.

    Okay, kids, thats enough puerile hijinks, banner-waving and profanity; its time to grow up, get serious about both yourselves and your city and, of course, take the oath.

    If Hong Kongs brash new flock of youthful lawmakers did not hear this message loud and clear from the public after their shameful shenanigans during the swearing-in ceremony at the Legislative Council last week, then they are even more stubborn and immature than their actions have already demonstrated. Well see this Wednesday, when they will be given a second chance to make the standard LegCo pledge of allegiance without inserting the f-word or otherwise insulting the Hong Kong and central governments, not to mention just about everybody else in the city.

    Hopefully, after a week of reflection, Yau Wai-ching and Sixtus Baggio Leung Chun-hang of Youngspiration and Edward Yiu Chung-yim of the Architectural, Surveying, Planning and Landscape functional constituency have figured out a way to underscore their anti-establishment sentiments without resorting to mangling and defiling the oath they are expected to take and thus subsequently getting booted out of the council to which they were only recently elected.

    Voters who shook the status quo by catapulting these three radical localists into the LegCo chamber presumably wanted them to actually serve a full, four-year term and to use their newly acquired office as a bully pulpit for change and reformnot to self-immolate before that term even begins in the futile flames of obscene rhetoric and juvenile protests.

    Other rebel lawmakers such as independent Eddie Chu Hoi-dick and Demosistos Nathan Law Kwun-chung managed both to make known their opposition to the powers-that-be at home and in Beijing while at the same time safely navigating their way through the oath. Indeed, in contrast to Yau, Leung and Yiu, the elder statesman of Hong Kong radicalism, Long Hair Leung Kwok-hung, appeared positively dignified as he recited the oath while hoisting a yellow umbrella in homage to the pro-democracy umbrella revolution that swept over the city for 79 consecutive days in 2014.

    The terrible threesome added cheeky words of disrespect as they recited their oathswith Yaus the Peoples Refucking of Chee-na (in place of the required Peoples Republic of China) taking the prize for subadult expressions of protest. For good measure, Yau and Leung also carried banners that read Hong Kong is not China.

    In the aftermath of the rejection of their oaths by LegCo Secretary-General Kenneth Chen Wei-on, their middle-school brand of logic and dissent has continued as they insist, again with cheeky disdain, that they did nothing wrong. After all, its true in a strictly literal sense that Hong Kong is not China. As for the trios deliberately disrespectful rewordings and mispronunciations, dont blame them for any confusion caused by their local accentsLeung called his particular manner of expression Ap Lei Chau, after the small, densely populated island located off Aberdeen in Hong Kongs Southern District not known for any distinctive patois.

    For those who dont know, Chee-na sounds a lot like the derogatory term used for China by the Japanese during their occupation of the country in the 1930s and 40s. Yaus the Peoples Refucking of China speaks for itself.

    Hey, all this grand-standing and wordplay would be really clever and funnyif, that is, the Hong Kong electorate were composed of people mostly aged 12 and younger. As it stands, however, the vast majority of us would like to see a far more serious approach to resisting the alarming erosion of the citys autonomy, core values and freedoms enshrined in the Basic Law. But thats not happening.

    Nearly 20 years after the handover from British to Chinese rule, Hong Kongs older generation of LegCo pan-democrats has failed to bring about any significant change to the citys top-down, Beijing-controlled politics. Indeed, things have gotten worse under their watch, giving rise to a new radicalism that has brought violence and the no-compromise language of abuse and ridicule to the LegCo chamber.

    Lets face it, these days most ordinary Hong Kong people would rather go to a funeraleven their ownthan a rally sponsored by any of the citys politicians, no matter their party or ideology. The histrionic posturing, mindless sloganeering and divisive tactics and rhetoric are a complete turnoff.

    Just witness the melee that preceded the vote for the new LegCo president, which followed fast on the heels of the farcical oath-taking political theatre staged by the three localists. Andrew Leung Kwan-yuen, an altogether uninspiring, pro-Beijing lawmaker from the Business and Professionals Alliance functional constituency, was finally elected president on a vote of 38-0 following procedural manipulations by his supporters and a walkout by pan-democrats who challenged his dual nationality in the United Kingdom, forbidden under the Basic Law.

    Leung claimed he had renounced his British nationality, but he waited until the day of the vote to produce letters from the British government showing that he had registered to do so. That didnt satisfy the pan-dems, and so chaos ensued.

    It would be nice and neat if you could blame the newly elected radicalsYau, Leung and Yiufor this additional, opening-day LegCo embarrassment but, their oaths having earlier been rejected, they were barred from voting for president. Even without them, it seems LegCo remains a hopelessly fractious and ineffectual body as a new term opens.

    Maybe its not just Hong Kongs newest and youngest lawmakers who need to grow up. They all do.

    - (SCMP) Hong Kongs ignorant rebel lawmakers dont understand their duty to the people. By Y.S.J. Fung. October 18, 2016.

    It was a sad day for most Hong Kong people to witness the farcical stunts broadcast live on TV during the solemn swearing-in ceremony for all lawmakers-elect on October 12. When the basic core reality that Hong Kong is a part of China is not acknowledged, it does not matter any more how shamelessly some of the veteran lawmakers, as well as several of the newcomers, played their games.

    It is aggrieving that the two young localists could stoop so low as to refer to China as Cheena, a variation of the derogatory term Shina the Japanese used while they occupied China during the second world war. Its obvious that they are ignorant of world history and the history of China and Hong Kong, or have no decency of character.

    This is also true of Demosisto lawmaker Nathan Law Kwun-chung, who, while taking his oath, read out to the Legislative Council the famous statement by Mahatma Gandhi: You can chain me, you can torture me, you can even destroy this body, but you will never imprison my mind. Again, it is clear that this young man had no idea of the circumstances under which Gandhi said what he did and how and for what he fought all his life: Gandhis cause was the Indian independence movement, which sought to create an Indian state free of British rule. He was also committed to a philosophy of peaceful resistance. Who and what gave this young man the misconception that he is in any way near the situation faced by Gandhi?

    Perhaps we cant really blame these young people, who grew up during the tail end of the colonial era and have never experienced the harshness of our colonial masters. Tsang Tak-sing, the former secretary for home affairs, was imprisoned for two years at the formative age of 17 in the late 1960s for distributing anti-British pamphlets near his school. What were the now acknowledged leading lights of Hong Kongs democracy movement, such as Martin Lee Chu-ming, doing then? They did not seem to have any thought of liberating Hong Kong from colonial rule. What have they been teaching their young followers?

    The sudden switch to democracy through the introduction of representative government, after British prime minister Margaret Thatcher realised that Hong Kong must be returned to China, was a classic example of how the British sowed the seeds of instability. It was government by a few for a few, and when it was forced to leave, the vacuum it left provided fast-food ingredients for a democracy, without allowing time for its gradual development, which inevitably generated havoc and encouraged self-destruction.

    It now seems unlikely that the three troublemakers who had to retake their oaths will repeat their stunts; they will do anything to stay in office they need a platform to pursue their agenda. Yet, it is clear that they do not understand the moral implications of an oath of office and what the general public expects of them in the execution of their duties.

    By tradition, an oath of office symbolises the special demands we make on public servants, and the responsibilities and privileges that go with the office. It symbolises the trust we place in our office-holders because they, more than other citizens, have pledged to act in the public interest. An oath goes beyond mere legality.

    We ask and expect of office-holders the highest morals and commitment a person can give. In exchange, this person is granted access to significant power in society. However, these vast powers can be used or abused for ones own interests rather than for the general good. A public functionary must be held accountable for their actions.

    We expect our public servants to not only act in the interest of the public but also, up to a point, uphold certain values even in their private lives. It is political suicide for these newcomers to continue to behave as street fighters now that they have been voted into the legislature.

    While these young adults rudely declared their unwillingness to be related to China in any way, there is a need for them to realise and accept that there are very many more in Hong Kong who not only love Hong Kong and want it to succeed and prosper, but also care for their motherland. It is more than just the feeling of pride that the nation has become the second-largest economy in the world and the home of companies like Alibaba, Tencent and Huawei, which are becoming global brands; it inspires a vision to teach our young, through our own example, to do whatever little we can to help Hong Kong and indeed the whole of China to become stronger on every possible front.

    It is time for the localists and the other rebels in the legislature, whose purpose of office seem to be to make Hong Kong ungovernable, to reflect deeply on their behaviour. They should know that to gain the trust and respect of the people of Hong Kong, they have to work for the betterment of the territory, and not its annihilation. After all, as Legco members, their duty is to the whole community, and not just to those who voted for them.

    - (SCMP) No one wins when Hong Kong lawmakers play patriot games. By Michael Chugani. October 18, 2016.

    Come everyone, lets play patriot games. To play, you must answer a question. Whats more traitorous a Beijing loyalist who surrenders his British passport at the last minute to qualify as Legislative Council president or two young localists who use the derogatory Japanese wartime word Chee-na to describe China while swearing in as legislators?

    Heres a clue: Andrew Leung Kwan-yuen clung to his British nationality while portraying himself as a Chinese patriot. He dumped it only for political expediency. Youngspiration legislators Yau Wai-ching and Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang humiliated their own race with an insulting Japanese occupation word for China. But then they deny being Chinese even though their names, yellow skin, black hair and eyes betray them.

    So, mirror, mirror on the wall, whos the most patriotic of them all? Give the mirror a break. It can only accurately reflect whats in front of it. It cant know whats in Andrew Leungs heart even though hes disowned his British nationality. Nor can it know if Yau and Leung were even aware of the historical context of Chee-na. I wasnt until the pairs use of it caused anguished outrage among Chinese people. They were likely clueless too until coached into using it by people who knew exactly how to hit a raw nerve.

    Patriotism is a shield that defends noble causes yet is defenceless against those who use it as a political tool. The opposition has, predictably, taunted Andrew Leung for simultaneously holding British nationality and a top position in the loyalist camp. Theyre using this as a lever to dislodge him as Legco president, arguing he didnt renounce his British nationality soon enough.

    The loyalist camp sees nothing wrong with Leungs British passport but plenty wrong with the Youngspiration pairs use of Chee-na. It wants to use that as a lever to dislodge the two as legislators. How patriotic are people who play patriot games? Was Chief Executive C.Y. Leung being patriotic when he nudged his wife to close her umbrella during the national anthem on a rainy national day after liaison office boss Zhang Xiaoming closed his? Are people such as Long Hair Leung Kwok-hung patriotic when they burn the Japanese flag in front of TV cameras?

    The true patriots are the ordinary Hongkongers genuinely upset by the use of Chee-na. The Youngspiration pair will have a second chance to swear in on Wednesday. Will they be sensible enough to eat humble pie?

    - (HKG Pao) October 20, 2016.

    Supporter Mr. Chiu called in on radio to tell Leung Chung-hang: "Do you think you look very cool now? Are you playing the elementary school chicken at this moment?" Leung said that four years is not a long time and therefore he wants to do each step as best as he can, including making political statements, evaluating legislation and stopping bad laws. Mr. Chiu said that if you want to attack the system, you have to join the system first. "But we voted to send you into the Legislative Council. You are standing at the gate and you are poised to enter, but you have to pause and take a piss in public. And now you are shut out on the outside looking in. Tell me, how can we not be disappointed in you? Please wake up! Please grow up quickly!"

    - It is said that 870,000+  Chinese people all over the world have signed an online signature campaign to condemn Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching. Remember who Leung and Yau are?

    Leung Chung-hang won 37,997 (6.5%) votes in 7th place in the New Territories East Legislative Council election.

    Yau Wai-ching won 20,643 (7.4%) votes in 6th place in the Kowloon West Legislative Council election.

    As such, they are only responsible to their voters (37,997 and 20,643 respectively). They are not responsible to other residents in those districts, or other Hongkongers outside those districts or the rest of the world outside Hong Kong. So to all those 870,000 signatories: GO FUCK YOURSELVES, YOU SHINA DOGS!

    As for this caller Mr. Chiu who claimed to be a Youngspiration supporter, those 37,997 and 20,643 have given Leung and Yau carte blanche to do as they please. So Mr. Chiu, GO FUCK YOURSELF, YOU SHINA DOG!

    - (EJ Insight) No one emerges well from the oath farce. By Lam Hang-chi. October 25, 2016.

    New blood is supposed to bring in new dynamics and catalyst for change.

    But the absurd oath-taking row triggered by two newly-elected Legco members, which really marks a travesty of decency and ceremonial rituals, has been a big letdown to many.

    Following the incidents of the past couple of weeks, I wont be surprised if there is some shared remorse among those who cast their votes for Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching in the Legislative Council election last month.

    Im not suggesting that showing ones stance, of dissent, when taking oath is morally wrong. Yet, in the Youngspiration duo case, their political careers might have already come to an end before they could even officially embark upon them.

    Amid an uproar from Beijing loyalists, and given the governments determination to drag them down, the chances of the two young radical lawmakers-elect taking office appear to range from slim to almost none.

    Many ordinary Hongkongers are also perturbed about the whole controversy.

    Among other localist Legco first-timers, Civic Passions Cheung Chung-tai has done his show better. After repeating the hackneyed oath pledging allegiance and loyalty, which Cheung couldnt treat with more contempt, he paused and then chanted rewrite constitution, Hong Kong people first.

    His oath was deemed valid as there was no twist, omission or admission in wording.

    Now, we know how inept Leung and Yau have been.

    I know there are some who rubbernecked at the scene to their hearts content, but the pair has gained nothing from the farce, which, as it turned out, was show of a red rag to the bull.

    The actions of the Leung and Yau have given a perfect excuse to Beijing lackeys and the SAR authorities to suppress radical opponents and score extra brownie points with their mainland bosses.

    Leung and Yau have made a fool of their voters and comrades in arms. The takeaway from the whole incident is that they have no brain for the long battle inside the chamber. And dont expect them to be able to deliberate on bills properly even if they can manage to hold on to their seats.

    I have reason to question Leungs integrity after he, with a smirk in front of the camera, blamed his Ap Lei Chau accent for pronouncing China as Shina, saying hes been living on the island for too long.

    Does he think Hongkongers are all idiots?

    To some extent they are even worse than the bunch of rubber stamps that stack the legislature, as the pick of voters in an open election turns out to be a big disgrace to the system itself.

    Now I only hope people wont lose confidence in future elections.

    As for the aggravated patriots, they should not make a fuss out of the word Shina either. Nor should they rush to link the word to treason.

    Shina originates from Sanskrit. In contrast to its current derogatory connotation, for most part of history it was a respectful word for China, particularly in the Buddhist classics, meaning literally the faraway land of wisdom.

    The word entered the Japanese vocabulary in the 9th century amid the nations frequent cultural exchanges with the Imperial China, when the Tang dynasty ruled the central kingdom.

    It was only after the 1912 Revolution, and the demise of the Qing dynasty, did Chinese officials begin to feel affronted by this word.

    In 1913 the Republic of Chinas top envoy in Tokyo demanded in a dmarche that Shina be abolished in Japans official documents. The request was rebuffed. Chinese people only found more negative nuance in Shina as Sino-Japanese ties deteriorated and ultimately descended into belligerence eighteen years later.

    Now, when members of the pro-Beijing bloc have lost no time bombarding Leung and Yaus choice of the word, isnt it ironic that many of them have foreign passports and are Christians themselves?

    It appears to me that they have two masters to submit to: God as Christians and Beijing as lawmakers. But dont forget that the Chinese Communist Party is, as always, atheist.

    And, I wonder how Beijing may feel when quite a few local politicians say they will let God decide when asked about their political ambitions.

    - (SCMP) Legco brouhaha reveals dark side of the rule of law in Hong Kong. By Bryane Michael. October 31, 2016.

    Numerous irregularities at the start of the 2016 Legco session have brought the role of law in politics to the fore.

    Are the ousted Youngspiration lawmakers allowed to modify the swearing-in oath? Does the Legco president need to show written proof that he renounced his UK citizenship before applying for his post? Can the Legco president decide unilaterally to keep certain Legco members out of the chamber by himself?

    At the heart of the present gridlock lies a Kafkaesque political environment where all parties try to use the letter of procedural law to get their own way.

    Everyone has heard of the politicisation of law. The mainlands Communist Party shapes PRC law based on their political objectives. Politics shapes Chinese law. Full stop. The reverse is happening in Hong Kong.

    Advocates from the pan-dem camp cite rules giving the Legislative Council president, Andrew Leung Kwan-yuen, the authority to let Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching retake their oaths. The Hong Kong government cites rules allowing it to challenge that decision through a judicial review. Supposedly the two had contravened the Basic Law.

    How can words spoken by politicians contravene Hong Kongs fundamental law? Does anyone doubt these politicians uphold the Basic Law or hold allegiance to Hong Kong (as stipulated in the Basic Laws article 104) as they see it?

    Why not just ignore these members oaths as the usual, useless political speech it is. Ignoring this behaviour is better than tying up the chamber over trifles.

    What is the objective of the law? To remove democratically elected lawmakers over technicalities? What is wrong with the Basic Laws article 79.7, which allows for censuring the Youngspiration pair by a two-thirds Legco vote?

    Hong Kong has become too bedazzled by the rule of law to focus on the goals of such rule. Supposedly, Andrew Leung violated article 71 of the Basic Law by failing to declare and renounce his British passport. Yet, where exactly is the harm?

    A simple thought experiment can put the recent imbroglio into perspective. Would the Texas legislature react similarly if two of its representatives vowed fidelity to the country of Texas and pronounced America as Yankee-land? Who cares? The facts remain the same. Texas remains part of the US, just as Hong Kong to China. No speech can change that.

    Yet, banning the Youngspiration pair would have real consequences. The Legco presidents lawyer may have argued in court last week that banning them from retaking the oath would seriously deprive them of constitutional rights. He was wrong. Banning them would deprive us of our constitutional rights. When we move from words into actions, things change.

    Chinas overzealous reaction turned these childrens trifling speech into an affront to Chinas own dignity and face. The best way now to save face lies in ignoring them.

    I do not know which side is right or wrong. But people in both camps should keep two timeless legal maxims in mind. Sticks and stones may break our bones, words will never hurt us. No harm, no foul.

    Dr Bryane Michael is a senior fellow with the University of Hong Kongs Asian Institute for International Financial Law

    - Ah yes, this article will surely put a halt on further arguments. In summary, oaths are worthless. I agree wholeheartedly. Let's get rid of all oaths, because they are worthless. In addition, we save a lot in time and money after we do away with these worthless rituals.

    - Hey, fellow, every action is going to impact somebody or the other one way or the other. Getting rid of all oaths means getting rid of wedding vows. We all know that wedding vows are worthless. Months after she promised to love you and honor you all the days of her life, she is asking for a divorce and half your assets. She certainly did not wait until death do you apart.

    But wedding vows in Hong Kong are witnessed by lawyers, who make big money. Look at Andrew Cheng Kar-foo, formerly of the Democratic Party. He gave up his Legislative Council post ($93,000 monthly salary) because he can make much more every weekend taking wedding vows. Hey, ten wedding vows at $10,000 on one Saturday is already $100,000. So you better know what you are talking about first!

    - Why are oaths required from witnesses in a court trial? If you swear to tell the truth and then you lie, you commit perjury and you will be punished. If oaths are worthless, then everybody should feel free to perjure themselves anytime.

    - If oaths are removed from courts, it will create a new class of professional witnesses who will say whatever you pay them to say with no fear of retribution.

    - (Wikidiff) An oath is a solemn pledge or promise to a god, king, or another person, to attest to the truth of a statement or contract.

    Since oaths are worthless, contracts are worthless too. So why should the 2016 Nobel Prize in Economics be awarded to two contract-law specialists?

    - (SCMP) Barred Hong Kong lawmakers overstepped the mark and offended the publics sense of decency. By Perry Lam. December 8, 2016.

    According to Scott Fitzgerald in The Great Gatsby, a sense of fundamental decencies is parcelled out unequally at birth. He may be right. But if you decide to go into politics, you have no choice but to develop that sense. It is a political virtue that one day may save your ass as well as your job.

    That, in short, is the object lesson of the oath-taking saga that resulted in two pro-independence lawmakers being kicked out of the Legislative Council.

    Hong Kong people are not known for their accommodation to the wishes of the Chinese government.

    So why hasnt Beijings interpretation of Article 104 of the Basic Law making it punishable by disqualification if oaths are not taken accurately and solemnly sparked a political crisis? If a crackdown on unlicensed street hawkers was enough to incite protesters to throw trash bins and glass bottles at the police, what could have made them accept the throwing out of two duly elected legislators without a fight? In the eyes of Hongkongers, is democracy really no match for their beloved fishballs?

    The answer, I guess, is simple. By using the f word to distort republic in the nations name and by deliberately mispronouncing China as Chee-na, Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang and Yau Wai-ching violated most Hong Kong peoples sense of decency. While they might find Beijings action high-handed and self-serving, they were not sorry to see the two removed from the legislature. They might even feel a sense of justice.

    - (HKG Pao) April 29, 2017.

    Recently China Liaison Office legal department director Wang Zhenmin said that he wants the people of Hong Kong to respect the Chinese system. Yau Wai-ching chimed in and wrote: "Respect is bidirectional. It is up to others to give your face, but it is up to you to lose it. You lost face first, so there is no way for others to give face to you. To give face to you is to insult oneself."

    On this occasion, I genuinely support Yau Wai-ching. Yau disrespected the Chinese people previously, so today nobody gives her any respect. It is as simple as this.

    (SCMP) September 26, 2016.

    A waiter has denied throwing water bottles and pushing two police officers to the ground during the Mong Kok riot during the Lunar New Year holiday in February.

    Chan Pak-yeung, 30, appeared at Kowloon City Court after prosecutors withdrew a rioting charge and accused him of assaulting police and resisting an officer in the first trial over the riot.

    Magistrate So Wai-tak heard that Chan did not dispute the fact that he was near the junction of Nathan Road and Nelson Street at 3.30am on February 9, or that he was arrested at the scene before being taken to a Mong Kok police station. But his lawyer questioned if he was the same person who threw the bottles.

    Police constable Kwan Kwong-wa on Monday testified that Chan struck his shin with a water bottle while he was clearing Nathan Road of burning roadblocks placed by protesters.

    He said he immediately shouted at Chan to stop, but the waiter ignored the warning and threw another bottle before he turned towards Prince Edward.

    Kwan gave chase and quickly caught Chan outside a jewellery shop, but recalled that he struggled to cuff both of his hands.

    The man used both his hands to push me and kick my shin, Kwan continued. Then he pushed me to the ground, causing both of my knees to hit the floor. It was very painful. A medical examination at Princess Margaret Hospital showed he suffered a minor bruise on his chest, and abrasions on both knees.

    The incident was partially captured by TVB footage and CCTV cameras outside the jewellery shop, according to prosecutors.

    Kwan said Nathan Road was crowded at the time with more than 300 protesters, with about 100 swearing and shouting at him to release Chan. But he denied using excessive force during the arrest out of anger or tiredness from long hours of duty.

    Another constable Lau Chi-wai further recalled that some protesters threw glass bottles and rubbish bin covers at them as they tried to restrain an emotional Chan. His resistance caused me to fall, he added.

    The trial continues.

    (Oriental Daily) September 26, 2016.

    Civic Passion member Chan Pak-yeung was charted with assaulting a police officer and resisting arrest.

    At Kowloon City Court, police officer Kwan Kwong-wah testified that he was on duty in Mong Kong that night. He observed that somebody had blocked off Nathan Road with garbage and recycling bins. He and his colleagues approached to disperse the crowd and clear off the obstacles. As he got ready to move the recycling bin, a man threw a plastic bottle containing liquid at him and struck him in the lower leg. He shouted to the man to desist. The man threw another plastic bottle at him, hitting him in the chest. The man then fled. Kwan gave pursuit and told the man that he was under arrest. The man twisted his upper body, bumped Kwan and kicked him in the lower leg. Kwan lost balance and dropped down on his knees. The man was eventually subdued. Kwan identified the man as Chan Pak-yeung. Kwan added that many demonstrators were cursing out the police and shouting "Release him!". They also tossed objects and garbage bins at the police. Kwan was hit in the head and back.

    (Oriental Daily) September 27, 2016.

    Chan Pak-yeung testified in court today. He said that he learned that the police had fired two shots and so he decided to go down to Mong Kok and check things out. He observed that somebody threw bottles twice at the police and fled, passing right by him. The police then came up and arrested Chan.

    Chan said that the policemen tried to trip him. Chan was afraid that he might suffer abrasions on the ground, so he tried to keep his balance. As such, he couldn't have kicked the police officer. Chan said that his right hand was cuffed and injured as a result, so he could not have shoved the police officer with both hands. Chan said that a female police officer ordered him to kneel down three times. Chan said that he felt insulted.

    Chan said that after he was taken back to the police station, the police made him take off all his clothes but they did not search him. Chan said that he lost his eyeglasses and asked the police to look for them. The police couldn't find them.

    (Wen Wei Po, Oriental Daily) September 28, 2016.

    During summation, the prosecutor said that the defendant claimed that the person who threw the bottles at the police wore black clothes and a mask, but did not wear glasses. The surveillance videos at the scene do not show such a person present. The defendant claimed that he was a spectator, but why would the police arrest the defendant who has no prior record and was not the perpetrator who was running away? The police officer was only 3 meters away from the defendant with no obstacles in between.

    The prosecutor said that the defendant fought back ferociously and it took three PTU officers to bring him down to the ground. After being arrested, the defendant did not complain about being wrongfully arrested, and complained instead about certain irrelevant matters.

    The defendant explained that he was scared and confused at the time, and therefore did not tell the police that they had arrested the wrong person.

    In summation, the defense said that one of the arresting police officers had been on duty for 20 hours and admitted that he was tired and that the situation was chaotic. This police officer did not mention whether the defendant wore eyeglasses, and does not remember it in court. A female police officer admitted that if the suspect was masked, then the eyeglasses would be a key feature and duly noted. The defense also summoned a pastor who testified that he had never seen the defendant not wear eyeglasses.

    (SCMP) October 6, 2016.

    A Hong Kong waiter was jailed for nine months for throwing water bottles and resisting police during the Mong Kok riot in February, becoming the first person to be convicted over the violent clashes on Lunar New Year night.

    Sentencing Chan Pak-yeung, 30, magistrate So Wai-tak likened the defendant to a rioter who treated police officer Kwan Kwong-wa as a moving target when he launched two water bottles containing liquid at the officer in the early hours of February 9.

    The night saw some of the fiercest clashes engaging local police since the citys handover to the mainland in 1997. Protesters hurled bricks at officers and set objects alight in the busy Kowloon district. A policeman fired shots skywards on the night.

    The court ruled that Chan threw the bottles and struggled violently to resist arrest, prompting others at the scene to throw other objects such as rubbish bin lids at the officers handling him.

    Apart from the bottles, the circumstance at the moment has to be taken into consideration, the magistrate said.

    His action made the situation worse and endangered the police officers safety, So added, noting the court needed to protect law enforcement officers.

    After hearing the sentence, Chans supporters in the court gallery yelled: Ridiculous!

    The policeman fired shots, one supporter shouted.

    Chans application for bail pending an appeal was rejected. He was immediately taken away to be locked behind bars.

    Former lawmaker Wong Yuk-man criticised the court for making Chan a political prisoner and said he would contact him to explore filing an appeal.

    Although the maximum jail sentence for assaulting a police officer under the Offences Against the Person Ordinance is two years, Civic Passion radical activist Alvin Cheng Kam-mum said outside court on Thursday another group member received only three weeks in jail for throwing a water bottle at a police officer on a separate occasion.

    Before sentencing, So convicted the defendant on one count of assaulting a police officer and another of resisting an officer.

    The court earlier heard that Chan brought gloves and something to protect his neck on the night in question before going out to see what was happening in Mong Kok.

    [Understood] if the protector was to shield him from pepper spray, but why the gloves? he asked.

    The magistrate said Chan tried to play down his participation.

    He also rejected the defendants argument that officers had mistaken him for someone else whom he claimed actually threw the bottles. So said an officer had been paying attention to Chan throughout the incident.

    Internet comments:

    - Before sentencing was pronounced, I had full expectations that the magistrate would impose 80 hours of community service. I had already come up with the most likely excuses:

    1. The testimonies of the police officers were unreliable. For example, the police did not know the brand of the bottled water that was thrown. Was it mineral water? distilled water? green tea? The police also did know how many ounces of water was in that bottle (which is important because the degree of injury depends on the weight).

    2. The video showed that the defendant did not intentionally throw the bottle at the police officer. The latter had failed to make any observable attempt to step aside to avoid being hit.

    3. The video showed that the bottle touched the police lightly without causing any injuries.

    4. The video showed that the defendant struggled after being apprehended. This occurred because he could not ascertain that these were police officers. Instead he thought that they were South Asian robbers and he reacted like any regular Hong Kong citizen when robbed.

    ...

    Hey, you think that I write in jest, but here is the actual newspaper report:

    (Apple Daily) October 6, 2016.

    The defense pleaded that the 31-year-old defendant was born and raised in Hong Kong. At the time of the incident, he was a graphic designer who moonlighted as a waiter. The defense presented the letters from 21 fellow students, 14 church goers, his former principal and his former teachers. The defense said that the police officer who was attacked did not suffer serious/permanent injuries and throwing bottles was not especially violent. Therefore, the defense thought that community service would be appropriate.

    The magistrate said that the defendant was convicted after a trial, which meant that he was not genuinely contrite over his actions. The magistrate said that while throwing a plastic bottle was not destructive, it was clear that the defendant used the police officer as a moving target. The action made the situation veer out of control as others followed the example to throw objects at the police officers. Although this was a first offence, a jail term was necessary to protect the personal safety of frontline police officers, to maintain the morale of the police and to uphold the social order.

    The magistrate sentenced the defendant to 9 months in jail for assaulting a police officer and 4 months for resisting arrest. The two jail terms are to be served concurrently. This means that his total jail time is 9 months. Chan asked for bail pending appeal. The magistrate denied the request.

    - It is far too early to celebrate. The magistrate issued a 9 month jail term, but the appeals judge may reduce it down to 80 hours of community service because this outstanding young man has letters from kindergarten/primary school/secondary school principals, teachers and classmates, churchgoers from six faith denominations and leaders from ten volunteer organizations. Or something like that.

    - Don't forget to add that the defendant is genuinely contrite. But as soon as his jail sentence is lifted, he is going to come out to flash the V-sign at the press outside the courthouse.

    - The magistrate declined to grant him bail pending appeal, which means that Chan Pak-yeung begins to serve his sentence immediately. Even if he appeals and gets bail, it will be weeks or even months later.

    - Chan Pak-yeung used to host a Civic Passion talk show with Cheng Chung-tai. Now the former is heading to jail while the latter is going to be an honorable Legislative Councilor. This is a realization of the maxim: Smart people use their mouths; stupid people used their hands. So who was smart and who was stupid here?

    - This proves another assertion about the Civic Passion leaders, who are said to push their underlings forward to fight the police while they leave the scene. On that fateful day, their great leader Wong Yeung-tat was at the scene. Wong was even arrested, but quickly released without charges.

    - Chan Pak-yeung declared that his occupation is graphic designer. That sounds nice. But when pressed for details, he declared that he was a part-time waiter. A 31-year-old part-time waiter is a not-so-young wastrel. When is he ever going to settle down and get a real job?

    - Under Common Law, a precedent is a principle or rule established in a previous legal case that is either binding on or persuasive for a court or other tribunal when deciding subsequent cases with similar issues or facts. This case has set the precedent of 9 months in jail for throwing a plastic bottle of water at a police officer during the Mong Kok riot. When the others come on trial for throwing bricks at the police in the same Mong Kok riot or setting fire to a taxi, the sentence cannot be less. We do have rule of law, right?

    - The trial of Raymond Wong Yuk-man for throwing a glass cup of water at Chief Executive CY Leung is still going on. Under this precedent, the sentence should be 9 months or more.

    - (SCMP) October 19, 2016.

    Former lawmaker Wong Yuk-man was convicted of common assault on Wednesday for hurling a glass at Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying during a Legislative Council meeting two years ago. The case marked the first conviction of a lawmaker for conduct within the deliberation chambers.

    Wong, 64, did not react in the courtroom after the lengthy verdict of more than two hours was read out at Eastern Court.

    Magistrate Chu Chung-keung said glass throwing was uncivilised behaviour that put the chief executive in fear of immediate unlawful violence at the scene.

    The high-profile case had called for the citys first testimony by a chief executive, with Leung claiming that he froze during a question-and-answer session on July 3, 2014 because he was shocked by the noise of the shattering glass behind him. He also said he did not see who threw the glass in the first place, but was worried there might be a second attack.

    His testimony was supported by lawmaker Wong Ting-kwong, who testified to seeing Wong standing on a desk to throw sheaves of paper and something shiny that he later concluded was glass after hearing it shatter on the floor.

    The defendant, meanwhile, said in his defence that he had no intention of hurting anyone when he threw the objects and explained that he could not have aimed properly because of a previous eye operation.

    He said the paper was intentionally thrown towards a location where no one was standing, and he switched to throwing water only when there were not many documents left on the table. He said the glass was released accidentally as security guards were pulling him back.

    But the magistrate found the former lawmakers evidence contradictory and inconsistent, in contrast with that of the 25 prosecution witnesses, whom he described as honest and reliable.

    Citing Legcos CCTV footage, Chu said it was evident that Wong had intentionally and forcefully thrown the glass because he was in full control of the hand he used, despite security guards trying to pull him down from the table, and that the extent of his arm movement was consistent with how he threw the paper.

    Anyone hearing glass shattering in their proximity would feel shocked, but [that shock] might not be expressed, Chu continued. It is understandable for [Leung] to worry about a second attack.

    The court session drew a full house of reporters and Wongs supporters, some of whom murmured and even made loud comments as the magistrate delivered his verdict. You must be joking, one woman said. Throwing [a] glass is different from throwing [it] at people.

    The former lawmaker, who was not legally represented throughout the trial, elected not to give mitigation. I have nothing to say after hearing your verdict, he told the magistrate.

    Wong will be sentenced next Tuesday.

    - (SCMP) October 25, 2016.

    Former lawmaker Wong Yuk-man, 64, was jailed for two weeks on Tuesday for hurling a glass at Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying during a Legislative Council meeting two years ago.

    But he was not immediately remanded after magistrate Chu Chung-keung granted his bail application pending appeal. Bail was set at HK$5,000.

    The Eastern Court case marked the first conviction of a lawmaker for protesting within the deliberation chambers.

    Wongs supporters swore at Chu and told him to go to hell as the magistrate was retreating to his chambers.

    Wong said outside court that he had expected a jail sentence. But he added that an appeal was definitely needed, or people like Long Hair Leung Kwok-hung would go to jail a few more times when luncheon meat, which the lawmaker threw in the meeting chamber last Wednesday, could also incite fear, and one could go to jail without hurting anyone.

    How can you criminally prosecute a legislative protest? he asked.

    Chu compared the case to that of social activist Chan Tak-cheung, who was jailed three weeks for throwing an egg at financial secretary John Tsang Chun-wah.

    He adopted a starting point of three weeks for sentencing and said the current case called for a deterrent sentence that he reduced by a week to acknowledge that Wong had not brought the glass into the chamber to stage a protest.

    Though the defendant said he was only staging a legislative protest ... his behaviour was violent and uncivilised, Chu said. This trend ought not to be promoted.

    Common assault is punishable by imprisonment for one year.

    The magistrate said last week that he did not have the slightest hesitation in finding Wong guilty as the glass throwing was uncivilised behaviour that had put the chief executive in potential danger and fear of immediate unlawful violence at the scene.

    The high-profile case had called for the citys first testimony by a chief executive, with Leung claiming that he froze during a question-and-answer session on July 3, 2014 because he was shocked by the noise of the shattering glass behind him.

    The citys top official also said he did not see who threw the glass, but was worried there might be a second attack.

    Wong argued that he had no intention of hurting anyone and said he only let slip of the glass by accident because he was pressed by security guards.

    His actions were part of a legislative protest to support the pan-democratic lawmakers, guided by a principle to not harm the innocent, he said.

    But the magistrate did not accept Wongs evidence because he found it evasive, contradictory and inconsistent, in contrast with the testimony from Leung whom he described as reasonable, convincing and honest and the 24 other prosecution witnesses.

    Citing CCTV footage of the incident, Chu ruled out an accidental attack because he saw Wong had full control of the hand he used and concluded the throw was both intentional and forceful.

    Anyone hearing glass shattering in their proximity would feel shocked, he said. Leungs shock, worry and concern is reasonable.

    - Civic Passion vice-chairman Alvin Cheng Kam-mun cited the case of another Civic Passion member Marco Lee who committed a similar offence but was sentenced to only 28 days in jail. Therefore Cheng concluded: "This must be political prosecution." (Passion Times) Raymond Wong said: "As Yau Wai-ching said, when you can't even fuck, of course you will fight to the death to find a way out."

    - Raymond Wong also pronounced Chan Pak-yeung to be the "First Political Prisoner of the Fishball Revolution."

    - The key comment at Passion Times is: We people and the gods above are all angry! We support Chan Pak-yeung to appeal the sentence. Of course, this means that we will donate money to pay for the legal bills! So click through on this page: http://www.passiontimes.hk/?view=raise&host=%E6%9F%8F%E6%B4%8B.
    Donate more money more frequently!

    - The defense presented a video that showed Chan Pak-yeung being subdued by the police. They forced him to kneel, they stomped on him, they tripped him down, they seized his eyeglasses and so on. But the magistrate convicted Chan all the same to become the first resister convicted in the Fishball Revolution.

    - Passion Times believes that this is the heaviest sentence since Occupy Central began. They are wrong. The honor goes to someone else: (Oriental Daily) July 17, 2015.

    Ng Ting Pong, nicknamed Capone, was charged with assaulting three police officers at Admiralty Centre on December 1st 2014. The magistrate found Ng guilty of three charges of common assault, and sentenced him to 10 months in jail.

    - The magistrate's court has a maximum jail sentence of 2 years. Some of the Mong Kok riot cases have been transferred out of the magistrate's court to the District Court, where the maximum sentence is higher. So the Justice Department has in fact reckoned this to happen.

    - Chan Pak-yeung is said to be with the Wo On Lok (和安樂) triad gang. This is a branch of the Wo Shing Wo family. Wo On Lok is usually known under its nickname of "Aerated Water House (水房)" because its origins were based at an soda water bottling factory. Wo Shing Wo is democratically run as its leader is elected every two years by the general membership. However, the various factions do not necessarily honor the election results. At one time, they had four elected 'leaders' at the same time.

    When Chan Pak-yeung arrives at the "Big House", the Wo On Lok person-in-charge may or may not offer protection to this nominal member (known as 掛藍燈籠 'hanging out a blue-colored lantern') . He will be in big trouble if not, because he was convicted for assault of a police officer and therefore the prison guards will turn a blind eye to any abuse by inmates.

    - Civic Passion is an unusual organization, not because many members belong to triad gangs but because those people come from rival triad gangs. This is common among the triad gangs whose names start with Wo (和, harmony), but it is unusual when the gangs compete against each other (for example, Wo Shing Wo versus Sun Yee On). For example, Raymond Wong's father was a closed friend of Heung Chin, the founder of the Sun Yee On (New Righteousness and Peace Commercial and Industrial Guild) gang.

    - Now that we have the first martyr of the Fishball Revolution, Hong Kong Indigenous immediately announced: "Our organization Hong Kong Indigenous will do everything possible to assist any martyrs who are due to appear in court." After starting the Mong Kok riot, Hong Kong Indigenous immediately got on the Internet to raise money to help the martyrs. "All donations will be used to assist the martyrs who were arrested." They said, "We will not abandon any single martyr." However, Chan Pak-yeung (Civic Passion) received no help whatsoever from Hong Kong Indigenous. So this has resulted in a backlash against Hong Kong Indigenous.

    - Hong Kong Indigenous gets the glory, and Civic Passion gets to go to jail.

    - At least Hong Kong Indigenous has the decency not to ask people to donate more money more frequently to them.

    - Chan Pak-yeung lost his case badly because he could not afford to hire his own senior barrister and had to rely on the free lawyer-on-duty. As a result, his defense was incoherent. Meanwhile Hong Kong Indigenous' Ray Wong had $530,000 cash plus 100 Viagra pills on hand ...

    - For example, Chan Pak-yeung argued that the police used excessive force to arrest him, including a female officer who made him kneel down. For comparison, see how gently Lee County police officers treated a female teenager (video).

    In any case, the point is not how the policewoman handled him. The point is whether he committed the said act of assaulting a police officer and whether he resisted arrest afterwards. His lawyer did not tell him to focus on those two charges. That was negligence.

    - (Oriental Daily) November 17, 2016. Chan Pak-yeung applied for bail, but the magistrate rejected his application. Chan will have to serve in jail during the appeal process.

    - (SCMP) March 8, 2017.

    A waiter sentenced to nine months in jail for throwing water bottles and resisting police during the Mong Kok riot said in his appeal on Wednesday a magistrate was wrong to use silence against him.

    Chan Pak-yeung, 30, was convicted last October after magistrate So Wai-tak of Kowloon City Court found he was not an honest witness when he claimed that he was only present to observe a major social event and police had confused him with the true assailant in identical clothes.

    One of the five reasons given was that Chan, a member of Civic Passion, remained silent and did not question the arrest even after being cautioned.

    But defence counsel Robert Pang Yiu-hung SC argued such considerations were not permissible, as seen from past Court of Final Appeal judgments. It is inappropriate in Hong Kong to use a persons silence against him in any way, he told Mrs Justice Judianna Barnes Wai-ling at the High Court. He said a caution was only meant to remind suspects of their right to remain silent, therefore a court could not draw a negative inference when one decided to keep quiet even if it defied common sense. The magistrate made a mistake, Pang said in challenging what he described as an unsafe conviction and manifestly excessive sentence.

    The prosecution did not press the issue of silence, but said a re-examination of the evidence would lead to the same conclusion and uphold the conviction. Its inherently impossible for police officers to casually arrest someone who was just standing when there are so many protesters watching, the prosecutor said.

    Chan was convicted of assaulting police and resisting an officer. Videos played in court showed it took at least three officers several minutes to apprehend him outside a jewellery shop in Mong Kok on February 9 last year.

    - (Wen Wei Po) March 8, 2017.

    The defense said that the policeman testified that he cannot remember whether the person wore glasses or not, so the possibility of misidentification exists. The magistrate also ruled that the defendant was not a reliable witness and rejected the testimony. But since defendants deserve the benefit of doubt, the magistrate should have considered the possibility that the defendant's version might be truthful. Finally, the magistrate failed to consider the defendant's right to maintain silence.

    The prosecutor said that there were 200 to 300 persons at the scene. The time between the assault and the arrest was minutes. There is no way for the policeman to describe each and every detail of the attacker. Besides the identification was based upon the clothes and mask, and the policeman's vision never left the scene.

    The prosecutor noted that the video segments showed the defendant vigorously resisting arrest, so that police officers were tumbling and losing balance. The defendant testified that he did not resist vigorously. This is sufficient to cast doubt on the veracity of the defendant's testimony on the part of the magistrate.

    The prosecutor accepted that the magistrate was incorrect in the interpretation of the silence of the defendant, but said that this was not the key element in the verdict/sentence.

    The prosecutor said that there were many demonstrators at the scene, and they imitated the defendant's actions, there would be more destruction of social peace. Therefore 9 months in jail was not obviously excessive.

    (Oriental Daily) March 29, 2017.

    Earlier Chan Pak-yeung filed an appeal on his verdict/sentence. Today, the High Court judge rejected his appeal and sent him back immediately to serve his sentence.

    (SCMP) March 30, 2017.

    A waiter, jailed for nine months for throwing water bottles and resisting arrest during the Mong Kok riot last year, has failed to overturn his conviction and sentence.

    Chan Pak-yeung, 30, waved goodbye to his family and supporters as he was escorted away from the dock to serve his sentence on Wednesday.

    The High Court refused his applications after finding the trial magistrate did not make any material errors that would jeopardise the safety of the conviction nor impose a manifestly excessive sentence on charges of assaulting and resisting police.

    Madam Justice Judianna Barnes said the court must send a strong message that courts will not tolerate or condone assaults inflicted on police officers in execution of their duties.

    Sentencing must carry a deterrent effect, she said on Wednesday. While the magistrates starting point of nine months in sentencing was rather severe, the court does not find it manifestly excessive based on the serious circumstances in the present case.

    In a written judgement, Barnes said So Wai-tak is an experienced magistrate who had considered all the evidence to find the officers reliable in Chans identification and that it was not possible for him to be an innocent bystander observing a public assembly when he was equipped with mask and gloves.

    While she sided with the defence in finding So committed a very serious error in drawing negative inference from Chans silence upon arrest, she agreed with prosecutors that it was not a material error as she found the magistrate would have reached the same conclusion without it.

    Among the past examples cited by defence was an Occupy case before the same magistrate, in which a protester was jailed for four weeks for similarly throwing a water bottle. The case of activist Ken Tsang Kin-chiu jailed for three weeks for resisting arrest was also referenced.

    But Barnes concluded they were not comparable as the present case took place at the height of the Mong Kok disturbances, with the possibility of clashes erupting at any time.

    She also noted that sentencing at the magistrate level carried no binding effect nor reference value to the higher court.

    (Wen Wei Po) March 30, 2017.

    The defense questioned whether the magistrate considered the possibility that the police arrested the wrong individual, because the arresting officer could not remember whether the arrestee wore glasses or not.

    Madam Justice Judianna Barnes disagreed. She said that when the policeman was hit by the water bottle, he cried STOP! The man threw another water bottle and the policeman charged up to make the arrest. The entire episode took less than 5 seconds without the man ever leaving the line of sight of the policeman. There was no need to make an arrest by recognizing the face. Therefore whether the arrestee wore glasses or not was unimportant.

    (Wen Wei Po) (Oriental Daily) October 28, 2016.

    On February 12, Scholarism member Derek Lam, "Captain America" Andy Yung and others appeared at Kowloon City Court. Civic Passion member Chu Po-sang was there to support the defendants. In the lobby of the court house, Chu clashed with members of the Defend Hong Kong Movement. Firstly, the female Lee Wan-fong saw Chu using a hat to cover his face and pulling a coat over his head, and asked Chu to remove his coat. But Chu used his right shoulder to ram Lee. A male Shum Shi-gai intervened, and Chu punched Shum on the right neck.

    Today in court, Chu Po-sang pleaded guilty to two counts of common assault. The defense pleaded that the defendant committed the crimes in a moment of rashness. As of now, Chu has quit Civic Passion and will not participate in any more organized activities. Therefore Chu will not be a recidivist.

    Sentencing will be held November 10, pending the report from the probation officer.

    (Oriental Daily) November 10, 2016.

    Chu Po-sang was sentenced to 160 hours of community service. The defense pleaded that the probation report was positive because he leads a steady life, is willing to accept responsibility and shows remorse. Since recidivism is unlikely, he should be given a chance.

    - Before the incident, Chu Po-sang already had a full-time occupation as a super-fan of Taiwan celebrity "Chicken Cutlet Girl." What (if anything) is he going to do about that? He can't devote even more time to her because he has no time left to spare already.

    (Apple Daily) November 15, 2016.

    27-year-old restaurant cook Chan Cheuk-hin is facing a charge of disorderly conduct in public, while 20-year-old tutor Chan Yu-kei is facing two charges of assaulting police officers. These charges were reduced from the original riot charges. Both defendants have pleaded not guilty.

    The prosecution showed videos taken on the early hours of February 9 around Nathan Road. Certain people were chanting to tell the police to open fire. The police dispersed the crowd with pepper spray and baton charges.

    Police sergeant Choi Kwok-wai testified that he saw two colleagues chasing a suspect and getting surrounded by the crowd. So he and other uniformed officers went up to help. Choi was grabbed around the neck by a man in beige pants. He turned around to chase that man. Suddenly the blue jeans-clad Chan Yu-kei pushed him with both hands and punched him in his chest. Choi hit Chan Yu-kei on the forearm with his baton. Chan was subdued, and began bleeding in the head and nose. Choi and others gave him help. Choi said that police officers are allowed to use a higher level of force when attacked, and that was why he struck back with the baton after being punched by the defendant.

    On cross-examination, Choi admitted that he was not aware of the presence of Chan Yu-kei initially. He saw Chan only after he felt the pain in his case. Choi said that Chan Yu-kei moved quickly. Choi said that he felt pain, but there were no marks. Because the police were busy and many of them were injured, Choi continued to work and did not go for a medical examination.

    Chief inspector Chong Sing-yat said that the police had moved a garbage bin back on the sidewalk when the defendant Chan Cheuk-hin threw it back onto the roadway. He raced up and grabbed Chan Cheuk-hin's backpack. Other people in the crowd grabbed Chan to free him. Eventually Chong and another senior superintendant subdued Chan Cheuk-hin.

    (Video) Arrest of Chan Yu-kei.

    (Oriental Daily) November 16, 2016.

    The defense chose not to call any witnesses. The two defendants did not testify themselves.

    The defense said that when the Chan Cheuk-hin threw the garbage bin on the road, the crowd did not move. They only moved after the police chased Chan Cheuk-hin. Therefore, the subsequent chaos was caused by the police and not by Chan Cheuk-hin.

    The defense said that three police officers were approaching where Chan Yu-kei was standing, so there was no reason why he should provoke them. He pushed sergeant Choi Kwok-wai as a natural reaction, but he was beaten bloody as a result. The police said that there was another police officer who was also attacked, but they could not locate this officer. The defense questioned whether this police officer was carrying out in accordance with the law.

    (Oriental Daily) November 17, 2016.

    In mitigation, the defense said that Chan Cheuk-kin is a restaurant cook whose employer is willing to continue to employ him. Chan Cheuck-kin cares about society. When he saw others throw garbage cans, he followed suit. The defense said that Chan Yu-kei is still studying in order to enter university and he works as a part-time restaurant waiter. Chan Yu-kei cares about society and participates in school activities. His principal and teachers are praising him. The defense said that the case was not serious, his victim did not incur any injuries and he failed to obey the law because he was affected by the atmosphere at the scene.

    (The Stand News) November 17, 2016.

    With respect to Chan Cheuk-hin, the magistrate said that pushing a garbage bin that the police sergeant has just restored back onto the road is clearly a disruption of public order and an intentional violation of social peace. Therefore, the defendant Chan Cheuk-hin is found guilty of disorderly conduct in public.

    With respect to Chan Yu-kei, the magistrate found him guilty of one count of assaulting the police sergeant Choi Kwok-wai but not guilty of the other count of assaulting an unidentified police officer. The defendant Chan Yu-kei was cut in the forehead when the police wrestled him to the ground. The magistrate said that it was justified because Chan brought it upon himself.

    The two defendants were remanded in custody until sentencing on December 2, 2016.

    (SCMP) December 2, 2016.

    Two men were jailed for up to three months for separately throwing a rubbish bin and assaulting police during the Mong Kok riot in February, marking the second conviction over the violent clashes after a 30-year-old waiter was earlier sentenced to nine months imprisonment for throwing water bottles and resisting police.

    But the two men were both immediately freed on HK$10,000 bail by the Kowloon City Court on Friday, pending an appeal against the conviction. Chef Chan Cheuk-hin, 27, was jailed for 21 days for throwing a rubbish bin, while tutor Chan Yu-kei, 20, was jailed for three months for pushing and punching a police sergeant in Nathan Road during the riot on February 8 and 9.

    Magistrate Veronica Heung Shuk-han said in her verdict that assaults against police cannot be tolerated as they would harm the forces team spirit. She also noted that the chef could have expressed his demands peacefully but he instead chose to provoke officers by throwing objects.

    Defence counsel Philip Wong said that his client Chan Cheuk-hin regretted his one-off, impulsive behaviour and promised not to reoffend. Hes learnt his lesson, he said. Meanwhile, Wong argued that the extent of police assault was comparatively less serious for his other client. He only pushed once and no weapons were used, he added.

    The court heard that the younger Chan had already been remanded for 15 days, while his co-defendant was remanded for 12 days before he was granted bail by the High Court.

    Behaving in a disorderly manner in a public place is punishable by a HK$5,000 fine and 12 months imprisonment, while assaulting police is punishable by up to two years of jail.

    (Oriental Daily) March 2, 2018. HCMA 695/2016

    Chan Yu-kei's appeal was turned down by the High Court today. The judge said that Chan has not provided any evidence for "legitimate self-defense" when he pushed and punched the police sergeant.

    Another of Chan Yu-kei's reasons was that the police officer made a mistaken identification. The judge said that the police officer never took his eyes off Chan so there is no possibility of mistake.

    Chan also complained that the police officer hit him on the head with a baton. The judge said that the injury on Chan's head was not caused by a baton.

    (Oriental Daily) November 22, 2016.

    32-year-old video producer Cheuk Ling-kon was charged with one count of assaulting a police officer.

    The first witness was Police Tactical Unit officer Siu Chi-neng. He testified that at around 3am on February 3, he and several dozen police officers were at the intersection of Nathan Road and Argyle Street heading in the direction of Tsim Sha Tsui. At the time, there were masked demonstrators throwing rocks, glass bottles and garbage bins at them.

    At around 3am, the police continued to push southwards. Siu and some of his colleagues turned into Shan Tung Street towards Portland Street. Some demonstrators cursed the police and threw bricks. Some demonstrators picked up bamboo poles to face off against the police.

    At this time, a man dressed in black, carrying a black backpack and wearing goggles and surgical mask, used a bamboo pole about 3 meters long to thrust at Siu's shield. Siu used his shield to ward off the blow and warned the man to stop attacking the police. But the man refused to listen and used his bamboo pole to poke Siu again. As the police line advanced, the man turned around and ran towards Portland Street. The man fell down on the ground, whereupon Siu and another officer subdued him on the ground. Siu put handcuffs on the man while his colleague arrested the man for possessing a weapon of assault, assaulting a police officer and unable to produce identification. The defendant was brought into a police van and taken down to the Mong Kok Police Station for investigation.

    (Oriental Daily) November 23, 2016.


    The defendant Cheuk Ling-kon left the courthouse in the company of friends who were dressed the same way.

    The prosecutor played a videotape in which the defendant could be seen being subdued by the police. However, the videotape does not show if and when the defendant attacked the police. The defense played another videotape in which the defendant held a mobile phone and a camera, but no bamboo pole.

    So the case rests upon the police officer said that his eyes never the defendant during the 30 seconds between the defendant making the attack and the police subduing him. The defense said that the defendant was an innocent photographer who got pushed onto the ground when the police line advanced and then arrested wrongly by the police.

    (Oriental Daily) November 23, 2016.

    During cross-examination, the defense said that when the defendant was taken back to the Mong Kok Police Station, a detective in a white shirt told the two police officers: "You be the victim. You be the witness." Shortly afterwards, the detective told the two police officers to switch roles. Officer Siu Chi-neng denied that this was the case.

    Siu said that he was carrying a shield which he used to keep the defendant down on the ground. Meanwhile police officer Fu Yeung-po testified that he observed Siu subduing the defendant and went up to help. Upon cross-examination, Fu said that he was the person carrying the shield in the video. However, he does not remember whether Siu carried a shield or not. The defense said that the defendant explained to Fu that he was there to film. Fu denied that this happened.

    (Oriental Daily) January 3, 2017.

    The magistrate thought that the testimonies of the police officers were reliable and sincere. He believes that the police officers were indeed attacked by someone wielding a bamboo pole. However, the videos presented by the prosecution did not record the attack. The videos only showed the defendant holding a mobile phone camera on one hand and another piece of photography equipment with a light on the other hand. Therefore the magistrate also believed that the defendant was filming at the time.

    The magistrate said that the video showed a piece of photography equipment on the ground emitting light. Since the bamboo pole is a heavy object, the defendant could not be holding both the bamboo pole as well as the photography equipment at the same time. Although the police were reliable and sincere, misidentification is a possibility. Therefore the magistrate found the defendant not guilty of assaulting a police officer.

    The magistrate said that even though the defendant wanted to film, he should not do so at the very front of the police line, because it increases the difficulty of the job for the police as well as putting himself at risk.

    The defense asked for the prosecution for the legal fees. The defense said that they had proposed before the trial began to settle with a good behavior bond. The magistrate said that if the defendant really felt that he had done nothing wrong, there was no reason for him to ask for a settlement. So the magistrate refused to grant the legal fees.

    (Wen Wei Po) December 15, 2016.

    This afternoon, the police went to an apartment in Yu Cheong House, Yu Ming Estate, Cheung Kwan O district to arrest a 24-year-old salesman named Chan. The arrest was made after the Organized Crime Unit investigators reviewed surveillance videos and identified the suspect. The police removed evidence including a pair of shoes, clothing and a laptop computer from the apartment. According to information, Chan said that he was intoxicated that night and threw bricks along with others at the scene.

    On November 10, the Organized Crime Unit investigators went to Mei Tung House, Mei Tung Estate, Wong Tai Sin district to arrest a 25-year-old waiter named Tang. The police removed evidence including a mobile phone, athletic shoes and a bicycle helmet. According to information, Tang said that he passed by scene after work and got infected by the atmosphere to throw bricks and rock the street signs.

    So far the police have arrested 79 men and 11 women with ages from 14 to 70 in conjunction with the Mong Kok riot.

    (Oriental Daily) December 19, 2016.

    17-year-old waiter Chan Ho-man pleaded guilty to the charge of causing bodily injury while committing an assault. This was reduced from the previous charge of deliberately injuring a person.

    According to the police officer Wong Chak-fai, the defendant came out of the crowd and threw a brick at Wong from ten meters away. The brick hit Wong on the left knee, causing bleeding. The defendant fled, but he was subdued by other police officers present at the scene. Under police caution, Chan admitted that he had come to support the demonstrators and picked up a brick to throw at the police.

    In mitigation, the defense said that yesterday is Chan's birthday. On the evening of the Internet, Chan heard about the incident and went down to Mong Kok to offer support. He committed the crime in a moment of excitement. The defense said that Chan did not intend to engage in violence when he left home to head towards Mong Kok, and that Chan cannot control the others who were digging out the bricks from the pavement. The magistrate asked: "Can he control his own hand and feet, and their actions?" The defense concurred, and said that Chan is willing to accept the consequences.

    The magistrate Heung Shuk-han ordered Chan Ho-man remanded in custody pending reports from the probation officer and the Detention Centre.

    (Oriental Daily) December 20, 2016.

    This morning magistrate Heung Shuk-han received a package today. When she opened it, she found a 5-inch box cutter inside. She immediately told the court to call the police.

    (Metro Radio) January 9, 2017.

    Magistrate Heung Shuk-han sentenced Chan Ho-man to an 18-month probation order. She said that the three weeks of pre-sentencing detention should constitute a profound lesson on the defendant who spent his 18th birthday behind bars.

    The magistrate characterized the defendant as "having a volatile personality, easily influenced by others, immature thinking, lack of good judgment, weak in self-control, dim awareness of abiding by the law and directionless in life." Therefore she believes that he acted in a moment of rashness for which he should be held personally responsible. Since the defendant is repentant and has no prior records, an 18-month probation order with night curfews is appropriate. The magistrate said that the box cutter incident did not figure in her ruling.

    Internet comments:

    -  Chief Justice Geoffrey Ma's speech at Ceremonial Opening of the Legal Year 2017:

    This past year has again seen the Hong Kong courts deal with important cases in public law. Many have been high profile ones. The outcomes of those cases have at least provoked much discussion; sometimes the reactions have been loud. At times, some people and groups from various sectors have voiced criticism of the courts simply because of outcomes to cases not to their liking. Admittedly, courts and judges are not and ought not to be immune to criticism. I fully accept the right of people to comment on the work of the courts, but of course hope that such comments whether in criticism or even praise, should be informed and measured.

    An understanding of the approach of the courts is important in this discussion. The basic starting point is a facet I have already highlighted the concept that all are equal before the law. Many take for granted the impressive statue representing justice standing at the top of the front facade of the Court of Final Appeal. This is the statue of the ancient Greek goddess Themis (in Roman mythology, she is named Justitia). Themis is blind‑folded and holds in one hand the scales of justice, a sword in the other. These are symbols of the administration of justice, which are often taken for granted just look at the number of legal institutions around the world using Themis to represent justice. However, the significance of these symbols of justice bears repetition from time to time in case this is overlooked in any discussion about the law.

    The blindfold represents the approach of the courts in ignoring the identity of the parties who appear in them. No person or institution has any added advantage or correspondingly disadvantage in the courts by reason of who they are or what they represent. This is of course the concept of equality which I have already emphasised. That no person gains an advantage before the courts by reason only of status is easy to appreciate. What is, however, often not quite as well appreciated is that no person should suffer any disadvantage in the eyes of the law by reason of who they are or what they represent either.

    Over the past year or so, I have sometimes received complaints from members of the public criticising the courts for the way they have dealt with certain cases. Dissatisfaction is expressed in the courts either not convicting persons of crimes or even where there were convictions, in imposing what are seen to be light, inadequate punishments. Correspondingly, dissatisfaction is also expressed when the courts have convicted or imposed what are seen to be heavy punishments. Whatever motivated these criticisms or comments, it is crucial to bear in mind the approach of the courts. In highly charged or high profile cases, all parties are treated in exactly the same way by the courts as in any other type of case. There is no added value or distinctions. Accordingly, legal principle and legal procedures apply in the same way. Thus, in a criminal case, a defendant will only be convicted if on the available evidence the prosecution proves the case beyond a reasonable doubt. If a conviction results, then any sentence imposed will be determined according to standard and well known sentencing principles. There is no discount or increase to reflect the personal identity of the accused. And where there is any perceived error in the conviction or acquittal, or in any sentence imposed or not imposed, the legal system under which we operate in Hong Kong has a system of appeals going up to the Court of Final Appeal.

    January 17, 2016. The Blind Rule of Law. By Chris Wat Wing-yin.

    In November 2014, two transportation workers tossed eggs at Joshua Wong outside the courthouse. Later the two pleaded guilty to common assault. The magistrate Cheung Kwun-ming fined them each $3,000. The Department of Justice thought that the sentence was too light and appealed. The magistrate reconsidered and changed the sentence to 2 weeks in jail and a fine of $120 for Wong's laundry expense, because the defendants did so with premeditation.

    Also during Occupy Central, three men threw pig intestines at Jimmy Lai. The magistrate said that the defendants clearly wanted to insult Jimmy Lai and create a psychological impact. The defendants were found guilty and sentenced to 18 weeks in jail.

    In 2016 during the Fishball Revolution, 17-year-old Chan Ho-man threw a brick at a police officer, hitting the left knee to cause bleeding. The magistrate Heung Shuk-han said that the defendant was young and ignorant and committed the crime in a moment of rashness. Since the police officer did not suffer a serious injury during the course of performing his duties, the magistrate sentenced the defendant to 18 months of probation.

    The commonality is that these people all threw objects. Those who threw eggs and pig intestines went to jail. The one who threw a brick got probation. The one who attacked the law enforcement officer did not have to serve jail time; he did not even have to pay for his victim's medical expenses. The one who threw the egg has to pay for the victim's laundry bill.

    I am an ignoramus in law. I am not commenting, and I don't dare to raise any doubts. I only want to ask: Chief Justice Ma, you say that everyone is equal before the law. But where exactly is the equality to be found?

    Demosistō, October 5, 2016

    URGENT STATEMENT: JOSHUA WONG DETAINED BY THAI AUTHORITIES

    Joshua Wong, Secretary General of Demosistō, left Hong Kong last night via Emirates (Flight EK385) en route to Bangkok, Thailand, where he has been invited to speak at an event hosted by Chulalongkorn University. The flight has arrived on schedule at around 11:45 p.m. local time.

    We have, however, been unable to contact him until 4:18 a.m. Hong Kong time, when Netiwit Chotipatpaisal, the Thai student-activist expected to meet Wong in Bangkok, notified us that Wong has been detained at Suvarnabhumi Airport. According to Chotipatpaisal, the Thai authorities have received a letter from the Chinese government earlier regarding Wongs visit. His request to see Wong, who is still currently in custody, has also been declined.

    Demosistō strongly condemns the Thai government for unreasonably limiting Wongs freedom and right to entry, and requests the immediate release of Wong. In the meantime, we request the Hong Kong Immigration Departments assistance in assuring Wongs safety.

    Demosistō
    October 5, 2016

    (Hong Kong Free Press) October 5, 2016.

    The Demosistō partys Joshua Wong has been detained at Bangkoks Suvarnabhumi Airport, reportedly at the request of China. The 19-year-old activist, who was one of the leaders of the 2014 Occupy protests, was due to speak about democracy at Chulalongkorn University. Demosistō condemned the move and quoted Netiwit Chotipatpaisal, a Thai student-activist Wong was due to meet, as saying that he had been detained at immigration.

    According to Chotipatpaisal, the Thai authorities have received a letter from the Chinese government earlier regarding Wongs visit. His request to see Wong, who is still currently in custody, has also been declined.

    Author Jason Y. Ng told HKFP that the incident was troubling: Before Joshua left, I helped him map out his itinerary and told him that theres a 70% chance that he would either be stopped from boarding his flight in Hong Kong or refused entry in [Bangkok] Now that it actually happened, I cant say its unexpected but its nonetheless disappointing and troubling, he said. Ng said Wong is expected to be put on the next Emirates flight back to Hong Kong, departing at 2pm. Sophie Richardson, China Director of Human Rights Watch, tweeted: Beijing says, Jump! Bangkok says, How high?

    Hong Kong immigration say they have contacted the Chinese consulate in Thailand whilst NGO Amnesty International say they are monitoring the case.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) October 5, 2016.

    As news came through that Joshua Wong, the secretary general of Demosistō had been detained at Bangkoks Suvarnabhumi Airport on his way to speak on democracy at Chulalongkorn University, his party deputy and colleague, Agnes Chow, spoke out: There is no way to stop people thinking.

    I believe that when there are more and more people who believe and agree with what we think, they cannot prevent peoples views about democracy even if they stop people from crossing the border like this, said Chow. I think this incident clearly shows that the Chinese government is trying to use all possible ways to silence the voice of democracy to stop those from Hong Kong spreading [their ideas] to other countries and civil societies. Chow said that the more suppression there is, the more there would be resistance, and that there was a lot of attention from the media even though Wong was prevented from entering Thailand.

    Wong is expected to be deported back to Hong Kong on Emirates flight EK384; his name is on the manifest, a source told HKFP.

    (The New Atlas) October 5, 2016.

    Thai PBS in its article, "HK democracy activist Joshua Wong detained in Bangkok," would claim:
     

    Wong, 19, famed for his galvanising role in the citys 2014 pro-democracy umbrella movement, was held as he landed at the airport late Tuesday, his party Demosisto said in a statement, citing a Thai student activist, Netiwit Chotipatpaisal, who was due to meet him. 

    Wong was invited by Thai student activists to take part at an event marking the anniversary of a military crackdown in October 1976. 

    Demosisto strongly condemns the Thai government for unreasonably limiting Wongs freedom and right to entry, and requests the immediate release of Wong, the statement said.

    What Thai PBS fails to mention is that Joshua Wong and his party, "Demosisto," are US-funded and directed, and represent Western interests attempting to subvert Chinese control over its own territory of Hong Kong, as well as undermine national sovereignty across the entire Asian region.

    Indeed, the entire "Occupy Central" movement, also referred to as the "Umbrella Revolution," was led by US-backed opposition figures, including Joshua Wong, Benny Tai and Martin Lee, the latter of which was literally in Washington D.C. lobbying for backing just months before the 2014 protest began.

    While the US State Department's National Endowment for Democracy (NED) initially denied it provided any assistance to the movement and denied specifically that Martin Lee served any role in leading the protests despite his Washington visit, NED through its subsidiary Freedom House, would eventually invite Wong, Tai and Lee back to Washington afterwards to award them for role in leading the protests.

    At the award ceremony titled, "Three Hong Kong Heroes," Lee would shuffle onto stage with an umbrella prop in hand, a virtual admission to his leadership role in the protests and confirmation that NED's previous statement was intentionally false.

    Wong's political party, Demosisto, headed by Nathan Law, is also tied directly to the US State Department's NED. 

    Nathan Law in particular was featured on the US State Department's National Endowment for Democracy (NED) website "World Movement for Democracy" in a post titled, "Democracy Courage Tribute Award Presentation." In it, NED would write in regards to the award presented to Nathan Law:

    The Umbrella Movements bold call in the fall of 2014 for a free and fair election process to select the citys leaders brought thousands into the streets to demonstrate peacefully. The images from these protests have motivated Chinese democracy activists on the mainland and resulted in solidarity between longtime champions of democracy in Hong Kong and a new generation of Hong Kong youth seeking to improve their city. The Hong Kong democracy movement will face further obstacles in the years to come, and their idealism and bravery will need to be supported as they work for democratic representation in Hong Kong.

    The ceremony was yet another in a long line of post-Occupy Central award ceremonies the US State Department conducted, rewarding its proxies for their efforts in the streets of Hong Kong in 2014.

    In 2015, Malaysia too would confront Wong and his attempts to spread US-backed subversion across Asia.

    That PBS would also report in an article titled, "HK student activist Joshua Wong denied entry to Malaysia," that: 

    Immigration officials on Tuesday barred Hong Kong student activist Joshua Wong from entering Malaysia at the Penang International Airport in Bayan Lepas, The Star Online reported. 

    Wong was scheduled to attend a forum titled The Uprising of Youth and New Social Activism in Singapore and Hong Kong at Auditorium A in Komta on Tuesday night.

    It is also worth noting that after Wong was denied entry, US-funded organisations posing as nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) immediately took to social media in an attempt to criticise the Malaysian government's decision.

    Malaysian online news service, The Star, in an article titled, "Hong Kong student activist Joshua Wong denied entry to Malaysia," would further elaborate:
     

    "Malaysia... explain why he is sent back to Hong Kong? Afraid of more street protests," tweeted Bersih 2.0 chairman Maria Chin Abdullah.

    Bersih, like Joshua Wong's Demosisto, is openly funded by the US State Department and represents Washington's, not the people of Malaysia's interests. Bersih would be revealed in 2011 to have received funding and training from the US State Department via the National Democratic Institute (NDI), another NED subsidiary.
     

    It is perhaps ironic that Wong himself and his supporters portray him as a "democracy activist," considering that one of the central principles of democracy is the concept of self-determination. Self-determination means that a nation's people themselves determine what course of action is in their best interests, free from the influence of foreign interests.

    The concept of self-determination underpins the national identity of many nations across Southeast Asia, having had their respective national destinies dictated to them at various points throughout their history by European colonialism. Independence and self-determination across the region represent hard-fought achievements threatened by US-backed political fronts wielding "soft power" in place of the overt "gunboat diplomacy" practised by the British Empire in days past. 
     
    Worse than mere foreign backing, Wong and his Demosisto political party work ceaselessly to promote the parting demands made by British colonial administrators as Hong Kong was returned to China in 1997. These demands, including upholding the "one country, two systems" and "Basic Law" drafted just ahead of the British handover of Hong Kong, are echoed by the current governments of both the United States and the United Kingdom. 

    Thus, Wong and his political party, Demosisto, work contra to Hong Kong's self-determination, promoting the parting policy of the British Empire imposed on a still emerging China in 1997. 
     
    By Wong meddling in the internal affairs of neighbouring Asian states, attempting to bolster US State Department efforts elsewhere to create proxy political fronts to serve Washington rather than local interests, he is also trampling the concept of regional self-determination, and thus of democracy itself. 

    In Thailand specifically, Wong sought to support anti-government agitators likewise seeking to subvert Thai sovereignty and return to power political parties loyal to Washington. 
     
    Wong's admirers find among themselves a common denominator of affinity toward the United States and American politics. They believe themselves to be enlightened supporters of freedom, democracy and human rights, despite the reality of US foreign and domestic policy standing firmly against all three of these basic and essential principles. 
     
    From the invasion and occupation of foreign nations around the globe, to the detainment and torturing of people worldwide, to the violence and brutality American police deploy against the American population at home, to the invasive abuse of the American people's right to privacy, American politics in reality exist separately from the ideals cadres of indoctrinated foreigners have been led into believing the US stands for.

    Wong and his Demosisto political party and other US-backed political fronts like them, represent a danger to freedom, democracy and human rights, serving as a facade behind which US special interests hide their true, self-serving agenda and all of the abuse that surrounds it. By serving as a facade for foreign interests, merely posing as a proponent of democracy and self-determination, it is Wong and those like him that truly endanger democracy's future in Asia, not those awaiting him at airports, turning him and his US-backed agitation away. 

    Internet comments:

    - (SCMP) While Demosisto could not confirm whether mainland China had exerted pressure on Thailand over Wongs visit, Nathan Law said his group has sought help from human rights groups and lawyers in Thailand to verify this. If it is true, it is rather outrageous for China to ban activists in such way, he said.

    - Well, get used to it. It will get worse if Hong Kong goes through self-determination to become an independent state.

    First of all, which countries are going to have diplomatic ties with Hong Kong? China will offer the choice: Either China or Hong Kong -- you choose. Everybody is going to choose China over Hong Kong.

    Next, if you get into trouble overseas, who can you ask for help? Right now you can get the Chinese consulate/embassy to help because you are a Chinese citizen (of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region). Afterwards, you cannot do that and there is no Hong Kong consulate/embassy anywhere in the world.

    - "China should not act this way." But China acts this way (with respect to Taiwan, for example) because it can and therefore it will.

    - (The Standard) A deputy commander of the Suvarnabhumi Airport immigration office confirmed Wong had been declared persona non grata. The Nation daily reported today that Police colonel Pruthipong Prayoonsiri, deputy commander of the Suvarnabhumi immigration office, said China has sent a request to the Thai government to seek cooperation to deny him entry to the kingdom. "As a result, the Immigration Bureau blacklisted him and held him for deportation. When officers informed him, Joshua Wong did not oppose it," Pruthipong said.

    - What is on this letter from the Chinese government to the Thai government? Does it just say: "Do not admit Joshua Wong?" or "Do not admit Joshua Wong, or else?" or "Do not admit Joshua Wong because ...?" What is "..."?

    - (Reuters) Pruthipong later told Reuters he had not spoken to the newspaper, did not know if Wong had been blacklisted and declined further comment.

    - (Reuters) Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha said Wong's expulsion was a matter for China, not Thailand. "Why he was sent back is China's issue," Prayuth said.

    - (Ming Pao) At the press conferece, Chan-ocha said: "The reason why Wong was sent back is a Chinese issue." "It is a Chinese issue, not a Thai issue." "He has returned to China." "The Chinese officials ask to take him back. This is a matter for the Chinese officials, and there is no need to intercede." "They are all Chinese, whether from Hong Kong or mainland China." So after Thailand decided to refuse entry, Wong was kept in solitary confinement pending expulsion. At that point, the Chinese Embassy staff appeared and asked to arrange for Wong to return to Hong Kong. Of course, the Thai authorities were only too glad to have the matter taken out of their hands. Hongkonger or mainland Chinese person, what's the difference to them, right? It's just a Chinese issue, right?

    - (SCMP) He already went back to China, junta leader Prayuth Chan-ocha told reporters. Officials there have requested to take him back. Its Chinese officials business. Dont get involved too much. They are all Chinese people no matter Hong Kong or mainland China.

    - Actually, what Chan-ocha said was that it was China's responsibility for letting Wong get on the airplane and fly to Thailand. Once there, Thailand decided that it was too sensitive for Wong to be there for the 40th anniversary of the Thammasat University (Bangkok) massacre. So Wong was sent back to Hong Kong. In other words, Wong should never have been allowed by China to leave Hong Kong!

    - Ming Pao: "Did the Chinese ask for Wong not to be admitted into Thailand? The Chinese Embassy said that they don't know: The embassy is still closed for the National Day holidays."

    The Chinese embassy in Thailand replied to Ming Pao's inquiry that they had received a request for assistance from the Hong Kong Immigration Department. As a result, they have contacted an airline on behalf of Joshua Wong and arranged for a ticket to return to Hong Kong.

    - Demosistō advocates self-determination (自決) by the people of Hong Kong. But 自決 can also be interpreted as 自己解決 (to solve by oneself). So when Joshua Wong was blacklisted and locked up, should he have tried to solve the problem by himself? Or beg the Chinese Embassy to solve his problem for him?

    - (SCMP) October 5, 2016.

    Hong Kongs justice minister brushed off suggestions that China played a role in restricting Wongs entry to Thailand, saying it was purely a domestic decision. On reports about Thailand being under pressure from China, first I have absolutely no information, and second, I personally do not believe such a matter would be an issue that requires international pressure, Secretary for Justice Rimsky Yuen Kwok-keung said before departing for a duty visit in Bangkok. It is purely Thailands own handling of an individuals entry into the country as a tourist, Yuen said. He added it was standard international practice for any country to exercise control measures at the border.

    - (SCMP) October 7, 2016.

    Hong Kongs justice minister blamed differences in translation for confusion over whether the Thai prime minister admitted Chinas role in stopping student activist Joshua Wong Chi-fung from entering Bangkok.

    Rimsky Yuen Kwok-keungs remarks, which Wong dismissed as irrelevant, came as Thai police were quoted as saying that Beijing had not requested that the 19-year-old be sent back to Hong Kong after he was detained at Suvarnabhumi airport on Wednesday and held in solitary confinement for more than 10 hours.

    Wong had flown to Thailand to deliver a speech on democracy for university students. The talk coincided with the 40th anniversary of a deadly government crackdown in Bangkok.

    Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha had been quoted as saying that officials there [in China] have requested to take him back. Its Chinese officials business.

    After a visit to Bangkok promoting legal business on Friday, Yuen cited a Thai junta spokesmans public statement that Thai authorities were not subject to instructions from other countries when sending Wong home.

    I think what the Thai prime minister said was it was a matter for China, Yuen said. From what Ive seen, there seems to be different translations. I have not been in a position to clarify the differences in translation.

    Yuen, though, was referring only to the part its Chinese officials business. He made no reference to Prayuths comment that officials there have requested to take him back.

    On the day Wong was detained, the justice secretary said the case would not have triggered international pressure for action. He did not respond to media questions on Friday night on whether he stood by that position.

    Wong said he was not provided with a translator and spent the night in a 50 sq ft cell, away from other detainees. He was given water and food. The activist, who subsequently gave a video speech from Hong Kong to students at Chulalongkorn University, criticised Yuen for missing the core question.

    He could have asked Thailand why I was not allowed to seek legal advice, call Hong Kong immigration or contact my family, Wong told the Post.

    Does Secretary Yuen think agencies like Bloomberg and Reuters mistranslated the prime minister? he added, referring to media that reported the quotes that were challenged by Yuen.

    Yuen said Thai officials had made it clear they rejected Wongs entry with reference to his past activities Wong was a key student leader in the 2014 Occupy movements that paralysed the city for nearly three months. Yuen said people should accept that every country had a right to exercise immigration control, even though one may agree, one may disagree.

    Thailands deputy police commander, Sriwara Rangsipramanakul, was quoted by Thai media as saying there was no pressure from any country. He said Wongs detention was purely a decision taken by Thailands Immigration Office, according to a report by Matichon Online on Friday.

    - How are things in Thailand, politically speaking? Is it a democracy? A monarchy? A military junta?

    (Hong Kong Free Press) Demosistō's Agnes Chow, spoke out: There is no way to stop people thinking. I believe that when there are more and more people who believe and agree with what we think, they cannot prevent peoples views about democracy even if they stop people from crossing the border like this. I think this incident clearly shows that the Chinese government is trying to use all possible ways to silence the voice of democracy to stop those from Hong Kong spreading [their ideas] to other countries and civil societies.

    This imparts zero information about Thailand itself.

     (SCMP) Hong Kong-based human rights lawyer Michael Vidler, who had advised Wong on previous occasions, said that there was no legal basis to detain the activist other than for the period he was waiting to be put on a plane back because he had been rejected entry in Thailand.

    It would be difficult to think of any offence he would have committed to justify having detained him for another reason, Vidler noted. He said that it was very possible that Chinese authorities shared information with Thai authorities. In the worst case scenario, he may have been detained in Thailand at the request of the Chinese authorities as appears to have been the case with one of the Hong Kong publishers, Vidler said, referring to Gui Minhai, a bookseller who went missing in Thailand last year.

    We are talking about an authoritarian military regime that took power in a military coup, he said. One would hope this is simply the case of the military regime in Thailand not wanting Joshua to speak to Thai students about democracy and therefore simply refusing his entry ... but given recent events regarding Hong Kong publishers, naturally Hong Kong people have concerns that there are more serious reasons for Joshua being detained, Vidler noted.

    So you get the impression that Thailand is ruled by an authoritarian military regime which is a Pekingese poodle. That is why Thailand is so afraid of letting the democracy message come through the door.

    (Associated Press) A Thai security report obtained by The Associated Press said that more than 10 police officials from the Royal Thai Police Special Branch and Immigration Police were waiting for activist Joshua Wong of the Demosisto Party when he arrived. The government has shown zero tolerance for dissent and has cracked down hard on its own student activists who have protested the military rule. It has detained students, stopped speeches from taking place and last month Thai authorities threatened to arrest Amnesty International speakers who were set to hold a news conference to release a report detailing allegations of torture at the hands of the military and police, causing the rights group to cancel the event.

    Alright, you are now equipped to go and read Politics of Thailand (Wikipedia). After reading it, are you as clear as you thought before? Do you think that one-person-one-vote with civil nomination/national self-determination will solve Thailand's domestic socio-economic-political problems?

    - If you really want to learn from Thai politics, you can read this:

    (Next City) How the Urban-Rural Divide Became a Street War in Bangkok. By Flora Bagenal. January 27, 2014.

    She was voted one of Bangkoks most eligible ladies by Tatler magazine in Thailand, appears at exclusive parties all over the capital and is heir to a $2.6 billion family fortune. But the day 28-year-old Chitpas Bhirombhakdi climbed onto a tractor and led the charge toward a police roadblock in the protest-choked streets of Bangkok, the young beer heiress also became a symbol of Thailands so-called silver spoon revolution, and the urban-versus-rural strife that has brought the capital to a standstill. Related Stories

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    The act of rebellion by Chitpas, whose father owns the brewery that makes Singha beer, one of Thailands best-known brands, was filmed and quickly circulated online in December. The reaction was telling. Within the city limits of Bangkok, she became an instant hero of a growing movement to topple the government, which has thrust Thailand into a state of emergency. Outside Bangkok, however, the countrys mostly rural working-class voters saw her actions as further proof that the protests are merely a tantrum on the part of Thailands urban elite.

    Shes rich, and she lives in rich peoples circles, scoffed Patsadaporn Chantabutr, a 45-year-old teacher living in one of the rural provinces in the north of Thailand.

    Such is the upside-down world of Thailands increasingly fraught political divide. From the Soviet Union to the Arab Spring, weve come to expect revolutions led by disgruntled and downtrodden workers, disenfranchised citizens fighting for an end to the monopoly on power by the rich and influential. But whats happening in Thailand right now is just the opposite the countrys wealthier urban class are the ones who have taken to the streets, demanding a disruption to the status quo. Known as yellow shirts, they are well-educated middle-class housewives, lawyers and bankers, TV personalities and comedians, and the vast majority of them come from the capital city of Bangkok. They wear designer sunglasses to rallies and carry wads of cash in expensive handbags to give to protest leader Suthep Thaugsuban, who himself possesses a large personal fortune.

    The protesters, whos movement is called the Peoples Democratic Reform Committee, are several months into an attempt to force Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra to resign. Their rebellion started when the government attempted to pass an amnesty law that was widely seen as an attempt to allow Yinglucks brother, the former Prime Minister and billionaire businessman Thaksin Shinawatra, to come out of self-imposed exile without facing corruption charges. For the past three months Suthep and his followers have besieged Bangkok with daily protests and rallies in an attempt to shut down the city and delay a snap election called by Yingluck for February 2.

    Their ultimate goal, says Suthep, is to replace the government with an unelected peoples council in order to suspend democracy until electoral reforms are introduced which will tackle corruption and end the Shinawatra familys monopoly on Thai politics for good.

    Their enemy are the majority of Thais who live in the rural north and northeast, a group almost always characterized as uneducated and easily manipulated. They are the red shirts, and are said to be die-hard supporters of Yingluck and Thaksin, who they credit with introducing a raft of populist policies that have helped lift previously neglected rural communities out of poverty.

    That the protests would take place in Bangkok was a foregone conclusion. Its the only big city in Thailand, and a vastly disproportionate level of the countrys wealth and power is concentrated here. The economic miracle that has made Thailand one of the power-players of Southeast Asia is far less apparent in rural provinces, where people still live off the land as they have for decades. In many ways, Bangkok still rules the provinces as on overlord of colonies, rather than as the capital of a democratic country, wrote political commentator Voranai Vanijaka last week in the Bangkok Post.

    This imbalance has only fanned the flames of the conflict, as voters from the north see an aloof urban class trying to shut rural Thailand out of the democratic process. Eighty percent of Thais want to exercise their right to vote, says Mahawon Kawang, a red shirt from Yinglucks hometown of Chiangmai. [The protesters] look down on the people from the north, but democracy is for everyone. They cant pick and choose.

    Kawang, for his part, hosts a radio talk show and holds a masters degree. Hes not the kind of country bumpkin that Bangkoks protesters imply is too easily manipulated to be allowed to vote, the type that Singha heiress Chitpas was referring to when she said that Thais outside Bangkok, especially in rural areas, lack a true understanding of democracy.

    (Chitpass comments werent without consequence: sales of Singha plummeted around the country, and red shirts posted pictures online of themselves pouring the beer on their feet a scathing insult in Thailand.)

    While the urban-rural divide does basically delineate the conflict, its also true that some rural communities are turning against the government. In Pichit, a fertile belt of rice paddies in Thailands central plains, farmers have for weeks been blockading roads and holding protests against the very government they used to support. The promise of big subsidies for farmers helped sweep Yingluck to power in 2011, but those subsidies havent materialized, and in Pichit, as many as 40,000 farmers have not been paid for harvests they sold to the government in October, forcing many families to take out high-interest loans to pay for fuel and fertilizer for the next seasons planting.

    And so, last week hundreds of farmers said they were ready to join the protests in Bangkok, crossing Thailands intractable color divide. The announcement was a huge boon to Suthep and his supporters, who seized on the opportunity to mock the government for turning its back on its core electorate, the rural poor.

    In any normal political arena, this would strengthen the argument for a fair and speedy election, offering the underdog an easy way to win support from the disgruntled masses. Not in Thailand, however, where protesters still say they would prefer to suspend democracy and sabotage elections rather than risk losing again at the ballot box. The Democrats have not won an election since 1992.

    We want to make sure the farmers get paid, but it wont help us win, said a spokesman for the democrats in Pichit. Rural people are nave. They will always vote for who offers them more money, and we dont want to do the same as Thaksin.

    This is where, says political commentator Vanijaka, the us-versus-them mentality, encouraged by the constant typecasting of who supports who in Thailand, hurts the country most.

    We are a web of tribal networks based on hierarchy, relationships, loyalty, nepotism and benefits, he writes, adding that both sides need to move away from overly simplistic narratives of red versus yellow. As soon as we realize it doesnt help to be divided and that democracy is about compromise, the sooner Thailand will be unified again.

    - Thailand is torn apart by Red versus Yellow. The United States is torn apart by Red versus Blue. Taiwan is torn apart by Red/Blue/White versus Green. Hong Kong is torn apart by Yellow versus Blue ...

    Can democracy help to mend? You win an election and you take over the government. Your opponent will do everything in their power to stop you from governing effectively (through vetoes, filibustering, demonstrations, strikes, slander, street clashes, civil wars, etc).  Eventually the people will conclude that there is no hope for you to remain in charge and they vote your opponents in. Roles are reversed. You will now do everything in your power to stop them from governing effectively (through vetoes, filibustering, demonstrations, strikes, slander, street clashes, civil wars, etc). So the cycle starts all over again. The people are the big losers regardless of who wins the elections.

    - Here is a contemporary update from Thailand. (The New Atlas) October 5, 2016.

    The South China Morning Post in its article, "Thai activist invites Hong Kongs Joshua Wong to address Bangkok students," would provide further details regarding why Wong was attempting to enter Thailand before being turned away by immigration.

    The newspaper would admit that:

    A Thai pro-democracy activist is hoping Joshua Wong Chi-fung, an Occupy leader and founder of political party Demosisto, will inspire young people to raise their voices in his military-ruled country.

    Netiwit Chotipatpaisal, a 20-year-old political science student, believes Thailand may see an Occupy-like movement in a few years time and has invited Wong to speak in Bangkok.

    Considering the fact that Wong's political movement, including the so-called "Umbrella Revolution" from which it sprang, is in its entirety a creation of the US State Department, one can only surmise that Netiwit Chotipatpaisal seeks also to attract US funding to create chaos in Bangkok's streets, just as US-funded agitators did in Hong Kong in 2014.

    The newspaper would continue by stating:

    Netiwit has been involved in several campaigns and groups pushing for reform of the Thai education system. He is now planning to follow in the footsteps of Wong and launch a party.

    I am learning from Demosisto. We have to fight from inside and outside the system, he said.

    Netiwit's group already staged an "umbrella protest" in the wake of Wong's being turned back to Hong Kong by Thai immigration authorities.

    In reality, Wong's party, Demosisto, focuses primarily on undermining China and upholding British colonial dictates laid out as the UK returned territory it had seized from China 156 years earlier. Both Demosisto, and the "Umbrella Revolution" itself lacked any practical political platform relevant to the actual people of Hong Kong. That may be why the 2014 protests waned before holdouts were driven from the streets, not by Hong Kong police, but by angry residents.

    Undoubtedly the United States and its favoured political parties in Thailand will attempt other means of seizing back political power and overwriting Thailand's national institutions. Having suffered irreparable setbacks after the 2014 coup and waning popularity as well, Thailand's opposition has attempted to reinvent itself through US-funded organisations posing as "nongovernmental organisations" (NGOs).

    These organisations, though run by foreign organisations including the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), Open Society, the Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand (FCCT) and even the US Embassy in Bangkok itself, attempt to portray students like Netiwit Chotipatpaisal as independent activists who have built up their movements on their own and who just "so happen" to have the summation of the Western media's attention and support on their side.

    If and when they take to the streets as Netiwit hopes, the Western media and the US Embassy will be there, conflating their numbers, exaggerating any measures the government may take to control their disruptive behaviour and possibly using the mobs as cover for pre-planned violence as the US and their partners within Thailand's opposition did in 2009 and 2010.

    For Thailand's government, an easy way to dash Netiwit 's hopes of becoming Thailand's "Wong" is to urgently reform NGO laws exposing and heavily restricting those organisations who claim to be "nongovernmental" and "independent" while being entirely funded and directed by foreign governments abroad.

    Like Wong's US-backed political front, Netiwit's "movement" lacks any real practical policy platform and seeks only to disrupt political stability in Thailand.

    Netiwit and his circle of followers insist on being treated as "equals" by their elders but lack the humility to admit they have no constructive contributions to make toward improving society besides disrupting national stability and reciting political slogans parroted from foreign-funded agitators like Joshua Wong.

    If and when Netiwit and others like him decide to pragmatically tackle issues like quantifiably improving education, creating sustainable jobs, cleaning up the environment and/or improving national infrastructure, then perhaps they will earn support from the public. Until then, they will be required to feign such support by relying on the US State Department and the Western media and their ability to transform agitators into "democracy activists."

    - Eventually the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People's Republic of China will be asked about this episode. You can replay this video:

    (Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People's Republic of China) Spokesperson Hua Chunying's Regular Press Conference on May 27, 2015.

    Q: Joshua Wong, the convenor of the Hong Kong student activist group "Scholarism" was denied entry into Malaysia. A Malaysian official said yesterday that the order of rejection was issued because Wong's speech might hurt Malaysia's ties with China. What is China's comment on that?

    A: I have seen the report, but I am not aware of the specifics. We respect Malaysia's exercise of entry and exit administration in accordance with the law.

    - Reference: Joshua Wong refused entry into Malaysia, May 26, 2015.

    - (AP) China's Foreign Ministry said in a brief statement that it was aware of reports of Wong's detention, but did not say whether China had asked Thailand to detain him, only that it respected Thailand's ability to manage the entrance of people into the country "in accordance with law.'' 

    - (RTHK) October 10, 2016. Asked whether Beijing was behind Wongs expulsion, Vice Foreign Minister Li Baodong said the Thai authorities were acting according to their countrys immigration requirements and laws. He said Beijing respects the decision and Thailands sovereignty and dignity.

    - Each country has its "right to exercise of entry and exit administration in accordance with the law." Such laws will be general (such as "on grounds of national security" as determined by the government).

    What is Thailand's reason for rejecting Joshua Wong? Before even going, Wong posted on Facebook: 眾所周知泰國政局不穩，政府濫權貪污不是新鮮事物，靠攏中共亦是其明顯取態。(Everybody knows that Thailand is politically unstable. It is nothing new that its government misuses its powers and is corrupt. They are also clearly close to the Chinese Communists). And now this person, who has been convicted of incitement and participation in unlawful assemblies, wants to address Thai students and activists to share the Occupy Central experience. Does Thailand need another Battle of Bangkok?  Been there, done that.

    - People apply for visas to visit the United States. Some applications are rejected. Does the United States Consular Service ever explain why? No. So this is the international standard.

    - The Thai Embassy says that foreigners are required by Thai immigration to have one of visa types:

    1. Tourist (TR)
    2. Business (B)
    3. Education (ED)
    4. Retirement or Marriage (O)

    Joshua Wong is none of the above, unless you consider "agitation" to be a form of business activity.

    - Joshua Wong wrote: "I arrived early in the morning in Bangkok and I was illegally detained by Thai Customs. After cutting me off from outside contacts and confiscating my passport, they kept me in solitary confinement at the airport detention centre. I was lucky to return to Hong Kong now. These more than ten hours of experience was really terrifying. I am sorry to get everybody worried." How does the Thai Customs "illegally detained" Joshua Wong?

    - (SCMP) In Joshua Wong's words, They accused me of violating the Immigration Act but did not explain. I consider the incarceration illegal. Thus spake Joshua Wong, and therefore it is the truth.

    - Ha! Joshua Wong is technically correct when he said that the Thai officials did not explain (verbally) to him. The truth is that they gave him a written legal notice:


    The relevant law is Immigration Act BE 2522.

    Section 12: Aliens which fall into any of the following categories are excluded from entering into the Kingdom :

    7. Having behavior which would indicated possible danger to the public or likelihood of being a nuisance or constituting any violence to the peace or safety of the public or to the security of the public or to the security of the nation , or being under warrant of arrest by competent officials of foreign governments.

    Also: You must be resided at TRANSIT AREA always, and be ready for the expulsion which shall be set up by the authorities at any moment. Any offense, evasion, escaping or leaving the premise without permission is forbidden.

    - You are forgetting something! It is public knowledge that Joshua Wong is dyslexic. You can give him a legal document, but he can't read it!

    - Thailand government's Facebook post:

    - (NOW TV) 26 pan-democratic legislative councilors plus Cheng Chung-tai strongly condemned the Thai government for refusing Joshua Wong entry when he has not broken any Thai law. They demand that Hong Kong Immigration Department, Security Department and Justice Department intercede with the Thai government.

    Please read the relevant Thai law again: It is not about prohibiting anyone for past crimes, but for "possible danger to the public or likelihood of being a nuisance or constituting any violence to the peace or safety or the public or to the security of the nation." And that is always a judgment call.

    - The Thais say that Wong is dangerous and you say that he is not. This is unprovable and unverifiable. We can argue from here to eternity and it will never be resolved.

    - The only way to prove/verify this is to let Joshua Wong enter Thailand and address the students. If there is no riot, then you can say: "See! I told you so!" If there is a riot, then you can say: "Well, who could have guessed?"

    - (YouTube) Legislative Councilor Ip Kwok-him (DAB): "I think that this is a very irresponsible statement. All countries have their own policies. What did he do himself that causes this country not to trust him and make him persona non grata? I think that he should know."

    Also with respect to whether China gave a blacklist to Thailand, Ip Kwok-him said: "I think that this is an absurd statement. Why would Thailand share a blacklist with various countries? When Student Wong goes to Thailand, the issue is whether Thailand welcomes you or not. I don't see any possible connection between the Chinese Central Government and this incident."

    Also with respect to Wong said that he was glad not to be disappeared just like Gui Minhai, Ip Kwok-him said: "I think that he should not over-estimate himself. He should reflect on his own past actions."

    - "Twelve hours of solitary confinement was terrifying"? How about this clip of Wu Jing waking up in a Thai prison in the movie SPL2?

    - At first, Joshua Wong said that more than 10 Immigration/Customs officers met him at the airport. Later on radio, he upped the ante to "more than 20 police and immigration officers stopped and surrounded him on the air bridge from the plane to the terminal at Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi Airport."

    - Here is Ip Man versus 10 Japanese soldiers. Joshua Wong is twice as powerful.

    - (Kinliu) By Chris Wat Wing-yin. On his flight back to Hong Kong, Joshua Wong wrote a long essay about his experience. He used the word 臭格 (literally, a stinking partition) six times. This term appears in triad gang lingo, but it is not as well-known in the general population.

    A "stinking partition" is not just a jail cell. It is a space at a temporary detention center. When triad gangsters get arrested, they are segregated by the respective gangs. For example, if two gangs were arrested for fighting in the street, they cannot be put in the same common space because they will start fighting again. They cannot even be put in with the general population of detainees because there may be unidentified gang members within. Therefore they have to be put into isolation partitions.

    Each partition is equipped with a squat toilet, which is basically a hole in the floor to defecate/urinate into. For safety reasons, there is no running water. That explains the name "stinking partition."

    Joshua Wong also used words such as: wanting to cry; terror; fear; anxiety; worries; concerns; ...

    For example, "When I entered into the 50 square foot 'stinking partition' at the detention center, I was very confused, scared and anxious ... how will the Hong Kong government respond? Will they just act as if nothing is happened? At that moment, I really wanted to cry ... this detention experience is ten times, one hundred times more scary than the five times in which I was arrested in Hong Kong ..."

    So Student Wong must be really scared. I am reminded of what gang leaders often say in movies: "Once you choose this path, you expect that you have one foot is in the coffin and the other foot is in jail." Such must be joining the Revolution too.

    If a revolutionary is unprepared to sacrifice himself but only want others to go to jail, then isn't this too naive and selfish? The first Mong Kok riot trial has seen the person who assaulted a police officer sentenced to 9 months in jail. So as the leader of the 79-day Occupy Central and the charge at Government Headquarters, do you think that you can travel around the world in the glow of the glory while your followers stew in prison? At least you could have said: "When I got into this, I was prepared for this day! Twelve hours in a 'stinking partition' means nothing. Twelve years would not have scared me!" With a leader like this, believers will kowtow and the flames of the Revolution will rage on.

    But now we have in Joshua Wong a triad leader who wants to cry after 12 hours in a 'stinking partition'. Is he worth following?

    - All sorts of people are refused entry into Thailand. (Daily Mail, February 10, 2016)

    A woman has been refused entry into Thailand because she ripped pages out of her passport to use as toilet paper during a night out. Faye Wilson, 28, was left red-faced when she found herself being escorted on a flight home by a security guard after being turned back at the airport by Thai immigration officials. The hairdresser, from the Lake District, said she had been a 'bit drunk' when she and a friend used the passport pages as toilet paper after being caught short several years prior.

    She was planning on spending a month in Thailand before working for a year in Australia - but was quickly turned back at the airport in Bangkok after catching a connecting flight from Dubai.

    Ms Wilson said: 'Thai immigration just opened my passport and started looking through it, and asked "what's happened here"? I just said that I had lost the pages because I was too embarrassed to explain the real reason. Before I could explain more, they had deported me back to Dubai and then to Glasgow and confiscated my documents.' Ms Wilson had her passport taken off of her and was escorted back to Britain with a security guard.

    - (Oriental Daily) Youngspiration said that all signs are that Thailand is under the control of the Chinese Communists. Therefore they will boycott tourism to Thailand!

    - In Hong Kong, we can also boycott Thai rice (Best Buy, Empress Thai, Farm Value, Gelephant, Gphoenix, Golden Grand, Imperial Banquet, Royal Umbrella, Silver Spoon, Thai Harvest, etc). Obviously we already refuse to eat Chinese rice. Japanese rice is contaminated by Fukushima radiation. So we should all buy Australian rice (Double Ram, Kangaroo)!

    - In Hong Kong, we can also boycott the Thai-style massage parlors, Thai restaurants, Thai food (tom yum goong (spicy shrimp soup), som tum (spicy green papaya salad), gaeng keow wan kai (green chicken curry), gaeng daeng (red curry), pad thai (fried noodles), khao pad (fried rice), etc).

    - According to the Hong Kong Tourism Board, 33,374 Thai tourists came in August 2016. All we have to do is randomly assault a few of them to let the Thais know that they are not being welcomed, and that number will drop to zero. This worked well with mainland Chinese tourists (down 11.3% compared to last August), and it will work with other groups.

    P.S. Malaysia refused to let Joshua Wong in, India refused to let Ray Wong and Alex Chow in, Singapore refused to let Joshua Wong in, etc. So these countries should be added to the boycott list, and their citizens should be 'valiantly resisted.'

    - On D100, Lee Wai-ling said that Joshua Wong's experience in Thailand should persuade all of us to get rid of our Hong Kong SAR passports because it carries no diplomatic protection. Yes, let Lee Wai-ling lead us with a public burning of her passport!

    - Ah, the show must go on: (Oriental Daily) About 50 persons including Demosisto members and legislative councilors marched from Admiralty Centre to the Thai Consulate in Fairmont House to protest. About 20 police officers prevented them from entering the lobby building and told them to stay in a designated demonstration area instead. The demonstrators attempted to charge into the building. The police raised the yellow warning banner to warn them to stop. After about ten minutes of chaos, a member of the Thai Consulate came downstairs to accept their letter. The demonstrators dispersed afterwards.

    - This is the standard pantomime show in the "leftist retardism" toolkit. You pretend to push at the police line for the sake of the media cameras. If the media say that they have enough footage, you call it a day.

    - One of these days, the police might just deliberately let you charge through. Then what? You will be lost at sea as to what to do. You are where you say you want to reach, but what do you say?

    - You say, "Excuse me, where is the men's room?"

    - (Wong On-yin's On8 Channel) The politicians missed their big chance. This type of incident has two sensitive spots. Firstly, it shows the importance of Hong Kong independence. Hong Kong has no diplomatic rights and has to depend on Beijing. In this case, the black hand is Beijing and it is useless to ask Beijing for help. Secondly, the people of Hong Kong must stand up to help themselves. This does not mean something feeble like boycotting tourism to Thailand. All the political parties should organize citizens to demonstrate at the Thai Consulate. When there are enough numbers, we should charge. We will be so awesome when we make them close their offices for a few days!

    - Yes, this is very awesome indeed. But does that mean that the Thailand will allow Joshua Wong (or some other Hongkonger like him) to enter the next time?

    - No. Of course it won't. But it is awesome to know that you are awesome.

    - As in the case of Occupy Central, why not ask the question about who is this action going to hurt? Does ransacking the Thai consulate hurt the Thai government, the Hong Kong SAR government, the Chinese Central Government or the Chinese Communist Party? Or those Hongkongers who are seeking consular services?

    - (SCMP) Activist Fred Lam Fai, activist Roddy Shaw Kwok-wah and filmmaker Lo Chun-yip went to Macau and were sent back because they "posed a risk to stability of internal security."

    Why aren't the 26 pan-democratic legislators and Cheng Chung-tai protesting at the Macao Government Representative Office? Because Lam, Shaw and Lo are lightweights who won't draw the media to come out and film.

    - (HKG Pao) Roy Tam (Greensense) was also refused entry. When he arrived by boat in Macau, the Immigration Department officials took away his Hong Kong ID and asked him to fill out entry information. Tam wrote down "Hong Kong" under nationality. The officials told him that "Hong Kong" is not a nation so he should write "China" instead. Tam refused and was sent back. The Macau Immigration Department gave Tam's Hong Kong ID to the boat captain for safekeeping. When the boat entered Hong Kong territory, Tam asked the captain to return his Hong Kong ID. The captain refused. When the boat docked in Hong Kong, the captain handed Tam's ID to Hong Kong Immigration Department officials who handed it back to Tam.

    Tam said that the captain is not a Hong Kong government official and therefore most likely violated Hong Kong law when he held Tam's ID in Hong Kong territory.

    - Roy Tam should have dialed 999 to summon the police and order them to arrest the boat captain for illegal detention of Tam's Hong Kong ID.

    - Look at some cases in which Hong Kong refuses to let visitors in.

    (SCMP) January 28, 2016.

    A controversial hate-speech comedian with links to the far-right was on a plane back to Paris last night after being denied entry to Hong Kong where he had hoped to perform two shows.

    French comic Dieudonne Mbala Mbala was detained by immigration officials at Hong Kong International Airport shortly after 7:30am yesterday after arriving on a flight from Bangkok following a trouble-free show in the Thai capital.

    The block on Dieudonnes entry came after high-level diplomatic interventions by Israel and France, who warned that his planned appearances at a Cyberport venue last night and tonight could have led to disorder and even violence if they went ahead.

    While declining to comment on an individual case, a spokesman for the Immigration Department said: We are committed to upholding effective immigration control by denying the entry of undesireables.

    Dieudonne, who has convictions for inciting racial hatred through his anti-Semitic jokes and comments, insists the gesture is simply anti-establishment. However, he has failed to distance himself from groups and individuals who have posted photographs of themselves doing the quenelle outside synagogues, Holocaust memorials, Jewish schools and even at the infamous Nazi death camp at Auschwitz in Poland.

    After seven hours of questioning the comedian was released.

    Speaking from France his son, Merlin Mbala Mbala , told the South China Morning Post that his father had been told entry was denied for immigration reasons. The official explanation they gave was for an immigration reason. They didnt explain more, Merlin Mbala Mbala said. It seems the immigration officers were aware of his arrival and were waiting for him. Dieudonn wanted to enter as a normal French citizen that has always wanted to visit Hong Kong, which was part of the reason he came, the son added.

    According to organisers, around 300 people were set to watch Mbala Mbala perform over the two nights. Local fan David Chevalier, who was due to watch the performance, criticised what he called the authorities attempts to smoother free speech. It seems all the speech of Dieudonn about freedom, and freedom of speech in Hong Kong and therefore in China is finally hopeless.

    Mbala Mbala tried to enter Hong Kong as a tourist after delays to his working visa application meant it did not arrive in time. Immigration clearly blocked this working visa, Merlin claimed.

    Israeli consul general Sagi Karni praised the government for taking the right measures. Who wants to import anti-Semitism, racism, holocaust denial and sympathy to Jihadist terrorists into this beautiful society? he said.

    (SCMP) September 24, 2016.

    A rights group has urged authorities to treat transgender people with more respect after two women were refused entry to the city at Hong Kong International Airport on Saturday. The two transgender women were visiting the city from Bangkok for sightseeing and shopping. Officials rejected the womens visit because they did not satisfy the purpose of their holiday, the Immigration Department said.

    The pair were told to sign two documents; one to confirm they had completed full gender reassignment surgery and one to confirm they would voluntarily go back to Thailand immediately. After refusing to sign the documents the women returned to Bangkok on Saturday night.

    Lawyer Jonathan Man Ho-ching, representing one of the women, said he could not rule out the possibility of prejudice and discrimination and said there was a lack of understanding ... of different sexes and genders.

    The lawyer said the women were also asked by officials if they were cut already blunt language for asking if they had undergone full gender reassignment surgery.

    Joanne Leung Wing-yan, chairwoman of the Transgender Resource Centre, argued the pairs travel history which included Switzerland, Spain, Taiwan, South Korea gave no reason to ask them to leave. I just hope there will be a different kind of treatment and understanding for transgender people, she said.

    An Immigration Department spokeswoman said the tourists were suspicious and failed to satisfy that they were genuine travellers. She said the travellers would not automatically be approved or denied entry in future.

    (Channel News Asia) September 26, 2016.

    Taiwan lashed out at Hong Kong Monday (Sep 26), saying the city had recently denied visas to several Beijing-sceptic Taiwanese politicians as the island's relations with China worsen.

    Two DPP lawmakers say they were denied visas to attend forums. A third was refused entry when his connecting flight was cancelled in the southern Chinese city in August. A professor with DPP connections was also refused a visa last month and leading protesters from Taiwan's anti-China "Sunflower Movement" say they have been denied visas in the past.

    Taiwan's China affairs minister Chang Hsiao-yueh described the denials as "very unreasonable". "Hong Kong should not have been pressured by China to restrict our lawmakers travelling to Hong Kong," she told reporters. "We express utmost dissatisfaction and regret to the Hong Kong government."

    Chang told parliament later Monday that Taiwan's office in Hong Kong had approached local government officials over the issue but had yet to receive "good results", without elaborating. Taiwanese media quoted a Hong Kong forum organiser as saying China's Taiwan Affairs Office had instructed that "all DPP officials" be denied entry to Hong Kong.

    An immigration spokeswoman in Hong Kong said the department did not comment on individual cases.

    - Indeed, the Hong Kong Immigration Department does not comment on individual cases. Why should Thailand be any different?

    - ALERT: Please update yourselves on the latest realities first! Joshua Wong has just updated the list of complaints. Everybody had better catch up on this before you are trapped talking about the wrong issues.

    (Oriental Daily) October 6, 2016. On radio, Joshua Wong said that the Thai government has the right to refuse entry. Thus, "illegal detention" is out of the door as of this moment. The objectionable things are: (1) Wong should not have been prevented from contacting his family and lawyer; (2) Wong should not have been locked up in a 50 square feet detention cell with no windows; (3) the more than 20 Thai immigration/police officers should have explained to him which laws, rules and/or regulations were broken.

    - Why did Joshua Wong back off on the illegal detention thing? At first, he had said that the Thai government has violated his right to enter/exit. The whole world pointed out that the right to enter/exit for the people of Hong Kong refers to the right of a Hong Kong citizen to enter/exit Hong Kong. It does not refer to the right of a Hong Kong citizen to enter/exit all other places in the world. There is a thing called sovereignty. If a country prefers to be a hermit country that refuses all visitors, so be it. You can't send gunboats in to force them to open their doors for regular tourists, sex tourists, business people, agitators, opium/alcohol/tobacco importers, etc.

    - (Wen Wei Po) October 9, 2016. More than 100 Chinese citizens have been held in detention in Jeju (Republic of Korea). They were refused entry for various reasons and are locked up in a "tiny dark room." The room does not have any furniture and people are just sitting and lying about. They sleep on the floor with no blankets, and they have to pay for their own food (50 RMB for a box of rice with some kimchee on top). According to Mr. Zhang, he and his wife went to Jeju which is visa-free for Chinese citizens. At the Immigration Control, the officer said that the couple did not have a printed hotel booking and therefore rejected their entry. So the couple is now waiting at the airport until the date of their return flight. The Chinese consulate in Jeju said that they have no authority to interfere with local law enforcement.

    - By bailing out on the illegal detention issue, Joshua Wong has just stranded the pan-democratic legislators who signed the letter to ask the Hong Kong Security Department to demand an answer from Thailand about the illegal detention. Hey, now that even the detainee himself does not think it is illegal, what are you guys still screwing around for?

    - Joshua Wong kept making the point that his reception in Thailand (with more than 20 immigration/police officers) is much higher than his earlier reception in Malaysia. In other words, his importance in global politics has just gone up. Yes, it is good to get reaffirmation of your worth.

    - If they gave him a cell with windows, he would have complained about the iron bars. If they gave a cell with bayside windows facing the ocean, he would have escaped to address the university student body.  Duh ...

    - Joshua Wong landed in Bangkok around midnight. What law office is opened at that hour waiting for walk-in business? Even lawyers have to sleep. So everything has to wait until the morning, by which time the Hong Kong authorities have asked the Chinese Consulate to arrange for a return plane trip for Wong.

    - Next time, try taking a daytime plane and not on a holiday. Okay? Or you may have to wait 36 hours.

    - Joshua Wong also complained about not being given an interpreter. At midnight, how many government-paid Cantonese-speaking interpreters are sitting around at Suvarnabhumi Airport waiting to work? So everything has to wait until the morning too.

    - (The Stand) At RTHK City Forum, Legislative Councilor Paul Tse Wai-chun shrugged at the fact that Joshua Wong was locked up for twelve hours. He said that he himself was once taken into a room when he traveled to Hawaii. The reason was that his passport showed that he had visited Iran. Tse said that different countries do things their own way. At the same City Forum, Joshua Wong said that the Central Government must demand the Thai government to apologize for depriving Joshua Wong of his rights.

    - P.S. At RTHK Forum, Joshua Wong said that he arrived back in Hong Kong at 3pm, October 5th, 2016. Nobody from the Secretary for Security downwards to Immigration Department worker contacted him. When didn't the Security Department contact him?

    Eh, if you want the Security Department to do something for you, you should try to contact them directly, lodge your complaint and provide the details. You don't expect them to have to monitor your Facebook/Twitter all the time, and respond immediately to some story or the other. They would be very busy chasing after these stories.

    - (Kinliu) By Chris Wat Wing-yin. October 11, 2016.

    For those of us who have traveled and worked in many countries for decades, there is a well-understood unwritten international rule: the Immigration officer who stamps your passport is always right.

    Thirty years ago, if you join a tourist group to Philippines or Vietnam, your guide will tell you to slip an American money bill inside your passport to hand over. Don't ask why and don't argue with me about your principles. In some counties, they simply won't admit you without the payment. If you want to be principled, you will only delay your entire tour group.

    More than a decade ago, I visited Kashmir. The security was extremely tight. I crossed over from India and that one crossing had seven different security checks while the immigration officers hover with machine guns in hand. Nobody dared to whisper. Many Indian friends warned me that we should never provoke the Immigration departments because they will open fire. There had been too many surprise attacks on them that they cannot afford to be merciful.

    I visited Eastern Europe the year before last. As we crossed over to Croatia, the tour guide told us a true story: "The last time that I took a group to enter a small Eastern European country, the immigration department officers boarded the bus and took away our passports. Then they called us to go one by one to have our passports stamped. After waiting for almost two hours, a tour member lost patience and got to the bus window to complain to the immigration department officer: "What are you guys doing!? You should be ..." The immigration department officer raised his head and said, "Alright, you can wait over there." They stopped processing our group and dealt with everybody else instead. Because one of our tour members spoke up, the entire group waited another four hours and missed our flight connection."

    The tour guide told us this story to caution us. Immigration department officers are always right, so there is no point in arguing with them. Just do whatever they tell you. If you don't like it, you don't ever have to visit that country again. Different countries have different rules, and the United Nations can't supervise them.

    So it was funny that Joshua Wong should condemn the Hong Kong Department of Security for failing to take up his case. Anyone who has traveled abroad knows that different nations have different laws. Does Joshua Wong know how many Hongkongers are refused entry elsewhere? Should the Hong Kong Department of Security take up all those cases?

    In 1991, the Hong Kong tour group guide Au Wing-cheung led a group to tour the Philippines. The Customs Department found drugs in the group check-in luggage. As the tour group guide, Au was held responsible and sentenced to life in prison. Paul Tse Wai-chun was the lawyer who worked this case for many years. In the end, Au served five years before his appeal was upheld. I was one of the reporters who interviewed him on the day when he was freed.

    In the case of Au Wing-cheung, he was clearly innocent but he nevertheless served five years. Joshua Wong went there with clear intent to cause trouble, but he was expelled after being detained for several hours. Wong should count himself lucky.

    - Well, Hong Kong Internet users are much more interested in an issue that Joshua Wong never brought up: Was he searched before being placed in the detention cell? If so, how thorough was that search?

    (The Nation) May 21, 2016.

    Calls are growing louder for prison officials to strike a balance between strict measures and human rights after criticism of body cavity searches conducted on prisoners went viral. The latest incident to grab the attention of traditional and social media relates to a cavity search conducted on a female student charged with violating the National Council for Peace and Order ban on political gatherings after she joined a train rally to the scandal-plagued Rajabhakti Park.

    The directive on conducting searches on prisoners, enforced since 1936, stipulates that body searches must be carried out by someone of the same sex. For females, if a woman prison official is not available another trusted woman can carry out the search.

    Prison officials have taken a hardline approach to body searches following a number of incidents involving prisoners smuggling illegal drugs into prisons by swallowing them or inserting mobile phones into someone's anus or vagina. Three phones have been inserted into an anus before.

    Prison officials have said they do not want to carry out body cavity searches as they feel uncomfortable doing them and know prisoners feel the same. Many times they prefer to order prisoners to sit and stand many times in the hope that any inserted contraband will fall out.

    - Foreign intervention? (Associated Press) A spokesperson at the U.S. Embassy in Bangkok said that they were monitoring developments surrounding Hong Kong activist Joshua Wong and that they were urging Thai authorities to clarify his status. "We support individuals exercising their universally recognized fundamental freedoms of opinion expression peaceful assembly and association throughout the world," said Steve Castonguay.

    - (Wen Wei Po) October 8, 2016. Suppose a South African citizen travels to Indonesia and is refused entry. I can understand that the South African embassy in Indonesia making some noise to demand to know the reasons behind the decision. But isn't it strange that the loudest noise should come from the Brazilian embassy in Indonesia? What is the connection between this South African citizen and Brazil?

    In like manner, why does the United States of America seem to be so interested in this Joshua Wong fellow, as opposed to countless others who are refused entry at the borders all around the world?

    - The United States of America refuses entry to millions each year. For example, the United States of America/NATO own the responsibility of instigating, aiding and abetting the Syrian Civil War which created millions of civilian refugees. So far, the United States of America has accepted 15,000 Syrian refugees with great reluctance. What does the United States really have to say about their concern about the Syrian refugees' most basic freedom to live?

    - (BBC) December 23, 2015.

    A London imam has said he was prevented from travelling to the US and his visa was revoked over concerns about one of his 28,000 Facebook followers.

    Ajmal Masroor was travelling to New York just before Christmas and was stopped from boarding at Heathrow. He told BBC London US officials never gave him a clear reason and said his treatment was "an absolute scandal". The US Embassy said it was "in contact with the individual" but refused to make any further comment.

    Mr Masroor, a spokesperson for the Islamic Society of Britain, said he was invited to lead Friday prayers at a mosque in New York and was due to deliver some lectures at conferences while there. He was also hoping to see a few relatives before returning to London after the short break.

    He said: "Unfortunately just as I was about to board the plane the American official, that's what he claimed, took me aside and said your visa has been revoked, and he still hasn't given me clear reasons why, apart from the suggestion that they made that they have got somebody on my Facebook that they want to talk to and they don't like. "So its ridiculous, it's an absolute scandal."

    Mr Masroor said he was asked if he knew a person through social media, but the imam said he did not recognise the name or know the person. "If there is any reason to believe that I have been involved in anything illegal, anything that violates any law in any country in the world, take me to court, find me guilty, put me in the prison, but to revoke my visa with no reason and giving no concrete evidence is just ridiculous. Profiling people based on their religion, especially being a Muslim and flying makes a mockery out of what we call a democracy and freedom."

    - And then this Donald Trump fellow wants to build a 20-ft-tall wall on the US-Mexico border to keep out the wetbacks from exercising their universally recognized fundamental freedoms of opinion expression, peaceful assembly, association and movement. And he wants to Mexicans to pay for constructing that wall or else face the wrath of The Donald.

    - The Honorable Legislative Councilor Nathan K.C. Law writes to Secretary for Security Lai Tung-kwok, and Internet users checks his logic and grammar. Firstly, he said Lai can call him but he does not leave telephone/fax numbers. Next, he said that Joshua Wong was detained and sent back without cause, after which he proceeded to say that the Thai authorities told Joshua Wong that he has been "blacklisted." So was it with cause or without cause?

    - (Hong Kong Free Press) October 11, 2016.

    Hong Kong lawmaker Long Hair Leung Kwok-hung was detained on Monday morning along with eight others as they entered Macau. They intended to present a letter to Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, who is visiting the city.

    The group of nine, which included Tam Tak-chi, the vice-chairman of pro-democracy group People Power, was sent back to Hong Kong after being detained for around six hours. The League of Social Democrats (LSD), Leungs party, said the group was unreachable until 3pm.

    According to a live video broadcast shortly before his arrest, Leung said that police were already waiting when he arrived in Macau. He said: I dont know what this group of police officers are doing, but this time we may not even be able to get into [Macau].

    Leungs group began protesting as they walked towards immigration control. Meanwhile, the police said that it was a restricted area and that it was forbidden to congregate and call out slogans. The nine were then taken away by police, and given documents stating that the reason for refusing their entry was due to the violation of Macaus internal security law.

    Kwok Yiu-cheong, a member of the LSD who was arrested, said that he was forced to delete photographs relating to their petition from his phone before being released.

    In their protest and in the petition letter, the group called for universal suffrage as well as an end to one party rule. They also called for the vindication of political prisoners such as Liu Xiaobo.

    After returning to Hong Kong, Leung told reporters that the methods of the Macau police had retrogressed and that he had never gotten off the boat to have people come towards him immediately, like in spy or kidnapping films. He also said that the Macanese authorities did not answer any questions. Leung said: if they were going to deport us then [we] would leave immediately there is no reason to [stay] a few more hours.

    - Karl Marx's most quoted statement was" history repeats itself, the first as tragedy, then as farce." (The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon) If Joshua Wong's expulsion was tragedy, then this second coming was a farce.

    - This is the epitome of "leftist retardism." Do you think the actions of these nine people today will (1) get universal suffrage with civil nomination for Hong Kong; (2) end one-party rule in China; (3) release Liu Xiaobo and other political prisoners in China; (4) resurrect Li Wangyang?

    So why do they still carry on with this? Because those goals are irrelevant. What is relevant is that they get media exposure and then they can solicit donations for money to continue their fight for those goals. But God forbid should those goals be realized, because they will have to find new reasons to solicit donations.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) October 4, 2016.

    Four pro-democracy incoming lawmakers have urged the government to take back the rights of approval for One-Way Permits.

    The Peoples Republic of China Permit for Proceeding to Hong Kong and Macao, otherwise known as the one-way permit, is a travel document that permits Chinese citizens to move permanently to Hong Kong and Macau. Currently, only China can approve the permits.

    Although the four incoming lawmakers independent Lau Siu-lai, Yau Wai-ching of Youngspiration, Jeremy Tam Man-ho of the Civic Party, and Dr. Cheng Chung-tai of Civic Passion hold different political stances on the pro-democracy spectrum, they all agreed that the approval of permits was an issue on which they could collaborate in LegCo. The four were speaking at a public forum held by the Polytechnic University of Hong Kong on Monday.

    Some were concerned that new immigrants would be deprived of the rights to reunite with their families if the Hong Kong government regained the approval rights to the permits. Cheng said it was precisely because the government did not have the right of approval that they were unable to plan welfare policies accordingly.

    Yau proposed abolishing the one-way permit policy: I am not closing the borders to Chinese citizens, but why are immigrants from China not part of the same approval system as immigrants from the rest of the world? She said that Chinese citizens could apply to move to Hong Kong through proper channels.

    Lau said that it was important for new immigrants to assimilate into Hong Kong society. Through doing so they would develop a sense of belonging towards the city. Civil education could be used to promote the Hongkonger identity, she said.

    The four incoming lawmakers said that it was important that the issues were widely discussed by the public, so as to foster consensus and exert pressure on the government for change. The theme of the forum was Hong Kong in 2047, Hong Kong independence, and Resistance in LegCo. Around 200 people attended.

    Hong Kong Basic Law Article 22

    For entry into the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, people from other parts of China must apply for approval. Among them, the number of persons who enter the Region for the purpose of settlement shall be determined by the competent authorities of the Central People's Government after consulting the government of the Region.

    (Wikipedia) People's Republic of China Permit for Proceeding to Hong Kong and Macao

    A People's Republic of China Permit for Proceeding to Hong Kong and Macao (Chinese: 中华人民共和国前往港澳通行证) or One-way Permit (Chinese: 单程证) is a document issued by the People's Republic of China allowing residents of mainland China to leave the mainland permanently to settle in Hong Kong or Macau.

    The travel restriction was needed to prevent large volumes of people coming to Hong Kong or Macau and preventing illegal immigration.

    Although the permit is specifically for the purpose of family reunion, not for general immigration, the scheme is controversial. Hong Kong currently has a quota of 150 people per day and the waiting time for spouses is currently 4 years. Journalist Ching Cheong alleges that the scheme, whose beneficiaries are at the sole discretion of the PRC government and outside of the vetting procedures of the Hong Kong Immigration Department, is an infiltration mechanism by spies and friends of the regime into Hong Kong; those that are not filled by spies become a graft mechanism for officials. Martin Lee said that the policy is part of the CPC's strategy of long-run "Tibetisation" of Hong Kong, aimed at marginalising Hong Kong people and their core values over time.

    Internet comments:

    - In the Chinese-language Hong Kong Internet, the reporting on this public forum has been completely overwhelmed by a single comment from Yau Wai-ching (Youngspiration).

    (Facebook video)

    Yau Wai-ching: What we are facing is an increasingly restricted space for existence. How do we change our existing circumstances? It is not enough to think about it, but we actually have to do it. What we are facing is that as soon as we graduate, we have repay our grant loans. We cannot afford to pay the rent for an apartment. Even if we want to fuck, we can't find a room in which to fuck. This is a very real problem. This is the problem that we are facing. Therefore every single one of you here in the audience must think about how to use your own power to do something. This is something that I hope that we can do when we come here.

    - (Oriental Daily) When Yau Wai-ching used the term ("扑嘢"), she said that she could find a more suitable term. Will she used the same term at the Legislative Council? She does not preclude that possibility.

    - The term ("扑嘢") is more vulgar than coition, coitus, copulate, do it, have relations, be intimate, make love, engage in sexual intercourse, sleep together, went to bed with. It is closer to bang, bone, bonk, fornicate, fuck, get laid, get some ass, go all the way, hump, plug, root, score, screw, shag.

    - The term ("扑嘢") refers to animalistic copulation with no love or tenderness involved. So this is the john going down to find and bang a prostitute once a week without remembering what she looks like afterwards. All the time the prostitute is watching television and asking: "Are you done yet? Are you done yet?"

    - (Oriental Daily) On the next day, given that this is the only thing that the world is talking about and nobody cares about what else was said at that public forum, Yau Wai-ching had to expound further.  The most frequent question is this: Given that Yau is making $95,180 a month in Legislative Council salary, is she really unable to rent a motel room for 3 hours? Yau explained that she was merely quoting what others have said and not from her own personal experience. As a university graduate majoring in Chinese Literature, she said that she could not find a more appropriate term at that moment.

    - Spoof: "I want genuine fornication" on yellow ribbon banner. "It's alright not to build any public housing. I recommend that the industrial buildings be converted into fuck rooms with free condoms provided for all those who want to fuck!" "If I have to choose between fornication and deprivation from eating meat, I would rather fuck!"

    - Here is Yau Wai-ching's policy platform:

    - I want genuine fornication

    - I want genuine climax

    - I want genuine fornication in country parks be legalized

    - I want genuine fornication in public places be legalized

    - I want the Legislative Council building be converted into a multi-storey multi-purpose fuck palace

    - I want the Leisure and Cultural Services Department to conduct classes on Kamasutra sex positions

    - I want the Education Department to introduce genuine study/practice classes on fornication beginning with Year One Primary School.

    - I want the Hong Kong Government to raise genuine fornication as an issue for the United Nations to establish universal/international standards.

    - I want the Hospital Authority/Health Department to distribute free Viagra, Cialis, Levitra, Indian God Lotion, Spanish fly, rohypnol, gamma-hydroxybutyrate (GHB), Special K, etc.

    - I want the age of consent to be removed altogether. (Note: Right now, the age of consent for sexual activity is 16 between a male and a female and two males (gay men), and there is no law concerning the age of consent for two women (lesbian women). This is clearly discriminatory.)

    - Hong Kong senior citizens benefit from the Elderly Health Care Voucher Scheme which pays $2,000 per annum to each elder aged 70 or above. In like manner, young people in Hong Kong aged 29 or less should receive $20,000 per annum in Young People Fuck Care Vouchers which can be presented to various motels and hostels around town.  This is good economic policy too because it stimulates consumer spending.

    - (Oriental Daily) On Facebook, Yau Wai-ching explained with a Marxist analysis. In the year 2016, young people have put in more almost twenty years of their young lives to study and get a job. Each year they quietly look forward to their promotions and raises while paying their taxes. However, the government only took their money and never gave them anything in return. The government squeezed the last ounce out of their labor without giving them any chance of forming a family and owning a private space of their own.

    - They paid their taxes and the government never gave them anything in return? Do infrastructures (roads, bridges, tunnels, piers, airports, public hospitals, parks, etc) just fall out of the sky? Who is paying for the Fire Services Department? Et cetera, and so on, und so weiter.

    - If you go back in time to 40 or 50 years ago, the young people of Hong Kong had the same problem of not having private space for intimacy. Many of them just headed for the parks after dark. In the morning, the cleaners come and they count on being able to find wallets, keys, pens, loose change, panties, bras, etc being left in the bushes. But today's young people won't put up with this. Instead they demand that the government must give them private apartments so that they can fuck their brains out.

    - (The Trent Online) Two Hong Kong university students were caught in the middle of a steamy sexy escapade on a sidewalk! So they don't need a private room to fuck! They can fuck anyone anytime anywhere they want.

    - (HGK Pao) Yau Wai-ching's point at the public forum was that the one-way permit system should be canceled and the right to approve Chinese immigrants be taken back by Hong Kong. Right now, Hong Kong has a daily quota of 150 persons approved by the Central Government. There are qualitative and quantitative aspects.

    Suppose you keep the daily 150 quota but you want the right to screen the quality of those people. Some applicants will state the purpose as family reunion, and that would be hard to turn down on humanitarian grounds. Other applicants will state other purposes (such as economic opportunities, political asylum, etc). It now becomes the responsibility of the Hong Kong Immigration Department to investigate those claims. It is not hard to imagine a backlog of millions of applications stretching to decades of waiting. And please remember that if the original problem was that young people don't have private space to fuck, then keeping the 150 quota won't increase the housing supply.

    Suppose you reduce the daily 150 quota to a significantly smaller number (such as 10 per day). Fewer people arrive daily, and therefore fewer housing space is required. This frees up some space for young people to live and fuck like rabbits. Therefore this is the way to go. As of accusations of being inhumane in separating families, fuck 'em -- they're only Chinese!

    - The problem is that demographics is not on your side. With birth and death rates both being low, Hong Kong has a declining, ageing population. You can only import young people from outside to take care of the elders here. As the other discussant Lau Siu-lai said, she is not opposed to bringing in new immigrants but they must be educated to adopt Hong Kong values because they would be in the opponents' camp otherwise. To phrase it more bluntly, new immigrants must be 'brainwashed'. If you are serious, now is the time to plan and execute this.

    - (Wen Wei Po) Yau Wai-ching is always good for a laugh. This is number four of her famous gaffes.

    #1. When she was asked a question about which Legislative Council rule/procedure she wants to revise, she required the help of her handler to whisper an answer in her ear.

    #2. She proposed to develop offshore natural gas in Hong Kong, without realizing that the fields in question are owned by Zhuhai city in Guangdong province.

    #3. She proposed to revise the school curriculum on teaching Chinese history with Hong Kong as the center. She said that Hong Kong was founded 160 years ago, which is much longer than the age of the People's Republic of China. Therefore, Hong Kong history is absolutely not just a part of Chinese history. She must not know about the dynasties in Chinese history.

    After those gaffes, Yau Wai-ching promised to improve herself. So on this day, she came up with #4.

    - At a minimum for #3, she should have started from the Qing Dynasty and the Opium Wars in order to learn how Hong Kong came into being.

    - If she ignores dynastic turnovers and say that the history of China begins on October 1, 1949, then the history of Hong Kong should also begin on the handover on July 1, 1997.

    - #4 is very effective revolutionary rhetoric. She is telling young people that if they want to fuck, they must overthrow the government. The problem is that even if the government is overthrown, the young people still can't fuck whenever they want to, because these legislators are the same ones who don't want any new construction in order to preserve the environment.

    - P.S. Don't forget to forgive all unpaid student loans.

    - Wan Chin's Facebook comment on TIME article:

    Wan Chin: Yau Wai-ching has made Hong Kong internationally famous as the Capital of Fucking. From here on, foreigners will think Hong Kong women as public toilets that they can enter and leave at will. When Hong Kong women travel overseas, they will be lustily ogled at by foreign men. You can blame Yau Wai-ching for that. The Americans ran the ThunderGo Plan to insert new pan-democrats in the Legislative Council so as to demean the status of Hong Kong women who will be dated for coffee, then fondled and fucked.

    - (HKG Pao) May 5, 2017.

    On radio, Yau Wai-ching talked about 'sex' again. She said that Hong Kong education is deficient in sex education, with zero progress being made in the past 20 years. Of course, she also said that young people do not have personal space to have sex. She said that they can only rent hourly hotel rooms. Sometimes they have to wait as much as one hour to get a room. Sometimes those rooms are substandard which affects the mood negatively.

    Afterwards, she wrote on her Facebook about the contest between personal freedom and public rights. When the two come into conflict each other, Yau explained: "For example, the pro-establishment parties and pro-Communist organizations often use 'freedom of speech' to libel and hurt others. These cannot be forgiven under the excuse of personal freedom ..."

    What does this mean? Does it mean that when Yau Wai-ching insulted the Chinese people with her 're-fucking of Shee-na', there is no excuse of hurting other people?

    (Hong Kong Free Press) October 2, 2016.

    Three people were injured Sunday after Hong Kong police fired shots to stop a knife attack on a man, in a rare case of violent street crime in one of Asias safest cities. Police said those wounded were two assailants and the man being attacked, and that all three were of South Asian origin.

    Five to sixmen, with some carrying knives, were attacking another man, police officer Ma Wai-hing told reporters at the scene of the incident in the citys commercial district of Yau Ma Tei. No further details were given about the attack.

    After verbal warnings were ignored, four shots were fired. Two men were shot, he said. The pair were arrested and hospitalised with wounds to the forearm and waist. They, along with the knife attack victim, are in a stable condition, Ma said.

    Footage uploaded to the website of Chinese language newspaper Apple Daily showed a uniformed officer pointing a gun at a group of men some of whom were wielding knives over a man on the ground before shots were fired. The officer can be heard yelling put down your weapon in Cantonese.

    Police said four shots were fired as the first shot was ineffective in stopping the attack.

    An AFP reporter at the scene said a road intersection was cordoned off around noon, with detectives gathering evidence and two fillet knives lying on the ground.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) October 3, 2016.

    Phyllis Cheung Fung-mei, executive director of Hong Kong Unison an advocacy group for ethnic minority rights told RTHK that they were concerned as to whether the perpetrator was clearly warned.

    [I]f the police can identify that a perpetrator is not ethnically Chinese, they should use English to warn them as well the police should reflect on whether warning only in Cantonese is enough.

    However, Unison told HKFP that their comments were related to the police approach towards ethnic minorities in general, and not made with regards to the shooting on Sunday morning.

    Apple Daily cited sources claiming that the perpetrators and the victim all of South Asian origin were from the same hometown, and were embroiled in a bar fight about a month ago. The police suspect the attacks happened due to a money-related conflict, the newspaper reported.

    (SCMP) October 3, 2016.

    A long-running dispute, that started with an alcohol-fuelled eyeballing confrontation between two groups of Nepali youths drinking in unlicensed bars, led to the weekends machete attack in Yau Ma Tei that prompted police to open fire, according to sources.

    The two men who were shot remained under arrest in hospital last night, one of them in a critical condition, while the victim was recovering from chop wounds.

    On Sunday night, more than 100 police officers raided bars and gaming centres in Yau Ma Tei, hunting for the four missing men. The nine-hour operation ended at 5am yesterday without success.

    Police insiders said investigators traced the dispute back to a heavy drinking session in one of the many unlicensed walk-up bars and kitchens run by families in the neighbourhoods around Shanghai Street and Parkes Street.

    One group was accused of staring at the other, and the confrontation had repeated several times over the past two months.

    Our officers were told that only words were exchanged and the two groups dispersed in most of the incidents, one source revealed. We were told that there was only one fist fight but it was not reported to police.

    He suggested Sunday mornings attack might have been driven by revenge when six members of one group came across a man from the rival group.

    The source said the two groups of men were known to frequent the walk-ups after work and over weekends. It was understood they had Hong Kong identity cards and lived in Yau Ma Tei, Tsuen Wan and Yuen Long. Some of them worked as builders.

    In their circle, [Nepali residents] are used to settling their disputes among themselves, and seldom seek help from police, another source said.

    At around 6am on Sunday, the eventual victim was having breakfast at a dai pai dongwith his girlfriend, a bar waitress, on Parkes Street. The rival gang spotted and attacked him, six of them wielding machetes and hard objects.

    The man, 33, tried to flee but was caught, beaten and chopped.

    Three police constables from the Kowloon West emergency unit two uniformed men and a woman in plain clothes came upon the scene at the junction of Parkes Street and Nanking Street.

    The two policemen fired four shots at two of the attackers, after they ignored warnings to drop their weapons. One man, aged 25, was hit by three bullets in the waist and hip. The second man, 23, was shot in his left forearm.

    He ran off, flagged down a taxi and jumped into the front passenger seat, telling the driver to take him to hospital.

    Hung Sau-fan, 31, the plain-clothes policewoman, dragged him out of the vehicle and subdued him at the scene.

    The taxi driver was smart, a police source said. He drove at a slow speed before our policewoman intercepted the vehicle and dragged the suspect out of the cab.

    Video

    (Oriental Daily) A compilation of various videos. The key moment is at 0:13 when the police ordered the perpetrators to stop but they kept hacking away at their target.

    Internet comments:

    - (SCMP) May 14, 2016.

    Members of the public cannot make their own judgment as the relevant chapters of the Police General Orders are not available for inspection. Fewer than half the chapters are available online, while those that can be viewed may be missing sections.

    So while people can find out from the force website the rules on officers' investments, gambling and even when a constable has to salute a superior officer, information on firearms is absent.

    University of Hong Kong legal expert Eric Cheung Tat-ming says the city lags behind other jurisdictions on transparency of police firearms rules. He believes many reasons for keeping the rules secret are obsolete. "There were concerns in the past about whether making the guidelines public would assist criminals" by informing them of how officers would act in a given situation, Cheung said. "But this should be less of a concern today."

    Media reports had given the public a fair idea of the regulations, Cheung said, and making the rules public would prevent speculation over whether they had been followed.

    Icarus Wong Ho-yin, convenor of monitoring group the Civil Human Rights Front, said people would have greater trust in the force if they could decide for themselves whether rules were followed. "Police should stop reiterating the official line that rules are obeyed and instead explain in greater detail how the guidelines are enforced," Wong said.

    But a veteran policeman, who declined to be named, argued the need to keep guidelines secret may still apply today. "If the guidelines on use of firearms are disclosed, criminals may exploit the rules and make it harder for policemen," he said.

    A police spokesman said chapter 29 of the general orders, which sets out rules on the use of force and firearms, was not disclosed as it covered "operational matters that, if made generally available to the public, may adversely affect the police response to incidents".

    (SCMP) June 22, 2016.

    The Hong Kong Police Force should disclose its guidelines on the use of force for public scrutiny, a human rights group says amid what it claims is a growing trend of power abuse. Police guidelines on the use of force should be monitored by the public, the fronts convenor, Jimmy Sham Tsz-kit, said. But currently even lawmakers have no idea [under what circumstances] when police can resort to force. It is unacceptable.

    - The two persons who were shot today did not know what the police guidelines on the use of force are. If they were told previously, they might have stopped hacking the victim with machetes. Therefore, they should be able to sue the Hong Kong Police for medical expenses as well as punitive damages.

    - As for the person who was arrested by the female police officer Hung Sau-fan, she squatted on him in order to handcuff him. So the person should be able to sue the Hong Kong Police for humiliating him in public by letting a woman sit on top of him.

    - (YouTube) Spoof of revised police guidelines on use of firearms in response to public demand.

    1. If the suspect holds a knife against the hostage's neck, then firearms can only be used if the knife is longer than 4cm.

    2. If the suspect says that he is going to hurt the hostage, the police must ask where the injury is planned and firearms can only be used if a medical doctor agrees that such an injury is fatal.

    3. The suspect must provide his particulars and then the police must search Google/Facebook to retrieve the details. Firearms can only be used if the suspect has a bad background.

    4. If (1)-(3) all allow for firearms to be used and more than one armed police officer is present, then a meeting will be held to determine the order of firing.

    5. Before firing, the suspect must be notified to stand still so that he won't be shot in body parts other than the arms and legs. Once the suspect acknowledges that he understands that he must stand still and then signs on the dotted line in a copy of the Agreement To Be Shot Form (under Police General Orders Chapter 169), the police may open fire.

    6. If the first shot misses, then the next officer in the order will fire the second shot, etc. (If you don't understand this, you can consult the FIFA rules on sudden-death penalty shots.)

    - Legislative Councilor James To (Democratic Party) once said that, in a tense situation, the police should leave the scene and come back at a later time when passions have cooled down.

    - (Oriental Daily) Two male police officers fired four shots, and a female officer subdued a suspect. All three are from the West Kowloon Emergency Unit. The Hong Kong Police Facebook has garnered 4,700 LIKE's so far on the post about the three police officers' "quick and decisive action stopped the violence and saved a precious life."

     - (Kinliu) By Chris Wat Wing-yin. October 3, 2016.

    Five to six South Asians chased after a person with butcher knives. A police patrol team fired four shots to stop them. Two suspects were shot while the others fled.

    So the news reports and Internet comments revolved around those four shots.

    Each reporter asked: Under what circumstances were those four shots fired? Should the shots be fired? Where did the shots land? How did the injured persons respond? Were verbal warnings issued before firing? Did this stay within the police guidelines on the use of weapons? Why was it four shots, instead of three shots or two shots or one shot or no shot? ...

    Anyway everybody wants to find fault with the police. Shots were fired, so you guys are screwed! Somehow everybody forgot that there was a crime in progress and the police are supposed to stop it.

    Fortunately, these four shots were effective -- the crime in progress was stopped and the police guidelines were met. Unfortunately, certain media outlets pushed on with nitpicking. They located NGO Hong Kong Unison executive director Phyllis Cheung Fung-mei who raised the question: Did the police hold adequate communication with the South Asians before firing the shots? She said that the police need to think about whether it is enough to issue a warning in Cantonese, and whether they discriminate against racial minorities when they enforce the law.

    It is one thing for media outlets to be skeptical, but there should be some plausible basis. According to the video from the scene as well as eyewitness testimony, the knife-men were "hacking away at the victim." How do you communicate with a man who was "hacking away at someone"?

    After the police officer use Cantonese to say, "Police! Don't move! If you move again, I will shoot!" he will have to repeat the same in putonghua, English, Hindi, Urdu, Nepali, Tagalog, Thai, Bahasa Indonesian, Vietnamese, Franais, Deutsche, Nihon-go, etc. By that time, the victim would have been hacked into minced meat.

    Holding forth a gun and making a loud shout is global body language. It is applicable anywhere anytime.

    In the 1980's violent gangs came down from mainland China to commit crime in Hong Kong. They held Red Star hand guns, Black Star hand guns, semi-automatic rifles, hand grenades, shotguns, etc and engaged in firefights with the Hong Kong Police. How should the Hong Kong Police communicate with them? In Hunan dialect, or putonghua, or Cantonese?

    As for the issue of how many shots should have been fired, all the editors, reporters and Internet users are wasting their time, because they know nothing about how many shots should be fired when someone is being hacked at by five to six butcher knives.

    When everybody focuses on the four shots, almost nobody mentioned the three to four other suspects who fled the scene? Who are these people? Where do they hang around? Are there composite photos? Where are they hiding now? ... These murderous villains are still living amongst us? Should this deserve even greater attention?

    - The list of commonly used languages does not include sign language. It is entirely possible that the perpetrator is deaf! It would be discriminatory not to consider this vulnerable minority group, according to the reasoning of Unison.

    - The two male police officers who fired the shots had their gun hands wrapped up so that technicians can take samples of gunshot residue.

    On January 15, 1980, police officer John MacLennan was found dead, being shot five times in a locked apartment unit in the Hong Kong Police quarters in Ho Man Tin District. On March 12, 1980, the Coroner's Court voted by 2-1 that MacLennan died of unknown cause. On May 23, 1980, the Department of Justice declared that there was sufficient evidence that MacLennan committed suicide. Yes, he shot himself five times in the head before he died. On July 8, 2016, the government acted under public pressure to form an investigative committee. After hearings held over 134 day with 110 personal testimonies recorded in 13,000 pages, the committee ruled that MacLennan committed suicide.

    - (Facebook) Cable TV reporter Cheung Man-ho posed a question about a Cheung Sha Wan police shooting: "Why did the police have to shot to death a good citizen who was hacking at someone with a knife?"

    Internet users have long-lasting memories and they will never let him forget that he said this.

    - Phyllis Cheung Fung-mei, executive director of Hong Kong Unison, dared to go where angels fear to tread. Her comments to RTHK drew thousands and thousands of negative comments.

    - Spoof conversation:

    Policeman: Mister, do you speak or understand Cantonese? (in Cantonese)
    Knifeman: (uses a machete to hack at the victim on the ground)
    Policeman: Ni hao, ni neng bu neng jiang putonghua? (How are you? Can you speak putonghua?)
    Knifeman: (hacks the victim to death; turns to walk towards the policeman)
    Policeman: Wait, can you speak English (in English)?
    Knifeman: (hacks the policeman with his machete)
    Policeman: (hits the red button to call police dispatch) Home? Please arrange for Indian, Nepali or Pakistan interpreters to tell the other party to stop hacking me. In addition, please arrange for an ambulance ...

    - There is what the policemen should have said in English first:

    Hey Guy, What are you doing here?
    What is holding on your hand?
    Or you are playing with your friend?
    Can you stop your action?
    I am so sorry to tell you if you don't stop, I may shoot you?
    Hey, are you serious? It's seems you don't want to stop.
    OK, guys, this is my last warning. Otherwise I really will shoot you.
    I am so sorry to inform you that I am ready to shoot.
    Yes, everything is ready.

    - This case is clear proof that it is dangerous to visit mainland China. Suppose you travel north and try to rape someone, the police will tell you to stop in putonghua. If you don't understand, they may shoot you.

    - So why don't you learn putonghua before you visit mainland China? Are you like one of those Chinatown residents who have lived there for eight decades while still speaking only Taishanese dialect and nothing else?

    - Phyllis Cheung's exact words were: "If the police know that the other party is not of Chinese descent and does not understand Chinese, then they should use English or other bilingual means to communicate."

    This rests on a pile of assumptions. Firstly, if the other party is not of Chinese descent and does not understand Chinese, then English can be used. This assumes that anyone in Hong Kong (permanent resident or transients) speak either 'Chinese' or English. There are plenty of people who don't speak either; of those who speak 'Chinese', there are plenty who speak some dialect other than Cantonese. Secondly, what is this other "bilingual means"? The police asks in Cantonese while the other party responds in Urdu? Vice versa? Or should the police wait for an official Urdu interpreter to arrive while the hostage bleeds to death?

    - The perpetrators in this case are Nepalese. They are most likely third-generation descendants of Gurkha soldiers in the British Army. Except for their external racial appearances, they are thoroughly Hongkongers. If the police scrutinized them carefully, they would recognize them as such instead of brashly shooting them. One of them is supposed to be in critical condition.

    - Please take a look at the videos taken at the time of the incident. It was pitch dark in the street, and there is only a split second to decide what actions to take in order to save the victim.

    - If it was your mother who was being hacked by machete-wielding psychos, would you still demand the police establish visual identification and verbal communication first?

    - If Phyllis Cheung was being raped by a South Asian, the police arriving at the scene should wait for an interpreter to arrive in order to establish communication.

    - Did RTHK get Phyllis Cheung to comment because they want to attack the Hong Kong Police? Or did they set her up to fail?

    - Why is Hong Kong Unison so hostile to the Hong Kong Police? This is no surprise if you learn that Margaret Ng (Civic Party) is a vice-chairman on the Executive Committee.

    - Unison defends the right of the attackers to be duly informed of possible police actions. What about the rights of that Nepalese man lying on the ground and being hacked by five to six men with machetes and glass bottles?

    - Unison demands that the police should also establish communication with the victim: Are you really hurting? Wow, did that blow just then really hurt? Would you like us to stop your attackers? ...

    - According to a taxi driver: "The perpetrator jumped onto my car and said, 'I am in pain. Driver, please take me to the hospital'. His Cantonese was very fluent." This female police officer used her body to block the taxi from leaving and arrested the perpetrator. Post facto, we have established that this one attacker speaks Cantonese fluently.

    - (Oriental Daily) According to the police, at around 605am, two Emergency Unit officers were patrolling near the intersection Parkes Street and Nanking Street when they saw 5 to 6 South Asian men attacking another South Asian male with weapons. The two police officer approached and ordered them to stop without effect. After issuing a verbal warning, the two police officers fired two shots each to stop the action. Two persons were arrested for injuring another person and taken to the hospital for treatment. The police said that the police were about 10 meters away from the attackers. All four shots were directed at the attackers. One of the attackers was shot in the arm, and the other in the waist. After firing the first shot, the attackers continued to attack. Therefore the police officers deemed that more shots have to be fired.

    - (Hong Kong Unison) Hong Kong Unison focuses its work on serving ethnic minority Hong Kong residents and their families. Apart from permanent residents, ethnic minorities in Hong Kong also include foreign domestic workers, refugees/ asylum seekers/ torture claimants and expatriate workers.

    So when this incident took place, it was a good opportunity for Phyllis Cheung to get some public attention on ethnic minority Hong Kong residents. Unfortunately, this came through as defending the right of the attackers to hear the police warning in their native languages.

    - (Hong Kong Free Press) Unison told HKFP that their comments were related to the police approach towards ethnic minorities in general, and not made with regards to the shooting on Sunday morning.

    - According to Wei Zheng, Prime Minister for Emperor Tang Taizhong in the Chinese Tang Dynasty, early 7th century: "Water can carry a boat; it can also sink a boat."

    - (Independent) October 2, 2016.

    Police shot dead a black teenager in front of his younger sister in a killing that has sparked angry protests in Los Angeles.

    Officers from the citys police department said Carnell Snell Jr was killed after they noticed the car he was travelling in had a paper licence plate and believed the vehicle may have been stolen. While in pursuit the police claim the 18-year-old got out of the vehicle with another man and started to flee. 

    Sergeant Barry Montgomery said they chased Mr Snell Jr to the back of a house, where they shot him. The other man, believed to have been the driver of the car, fled the scene and is currently on the run. Sgt Montgomery said a gun was removed from the scene, but Mr Snell Jrs family deny he was armed.

    His younger sister, Trenell Snell, said she was sitting with friends outside the house when she saw her brother running from police. She said she began to run as well and heard gunfire. She dropped to the ground and saw her brother was being handcuffed on the ground. At the end of the day, the cops came and shot my brother, she said. Killed my brother.

    Mr Snells mother, Monique Morgan, told reporters she had asked authorities to let her see the her sons body to confirm it was him, but claimed her request had been refused.

    - "Forget it, Jake, it's Chinatown."

    - (New York Post) January 19, 2014.

    Cops bloodied an 84-year-old man and put him in the hospital Sunday when he jaywalked at an Upper West Side intersection and didnt appear to understand their orders to stop, witnesses said.

    Kang Wong was strolling north on Broadway and crossing 96th Street at around 5 p.m., when an officer told him to halt because he had walked against the light.

    Wong, who lives a block away, appeared to not understand the cop, the witnesses said.

    The guy didnt seem to speak English. The cop walked him over to the Citibank near the northeast corner of 96th and Broadway, said one witness, Ian King, a Fordham University law student. [The officer] stood him up against the wall and was trying to write him a ticket. The man didnt seem to understand, and he started walking away.

    The cop tried to pull him back, and thats when he began to struggle with the cop, said King, 24. As soon as he pushed the cop, it was like cops started running in from everywhere.

    Wong was left bleeding and dazed with cuts to his face. He was cuffed and and taken to St. Lukes Hospital. After several hours, he was hauled off to the 24th Precinct station house.

    His 41-year-old son, a lawyer who would not give his name, first said at the station house Sunday night that did not wish to discuss his feelings about the incident. I dont want to talk about anything like that in front of all these cops, he told the Post. But walking farther down the street, he said, The cops are playing games. They wont tell me what hes being charged with.

    He first heard his dad had been busted in a 6 p.m. phone call from cops, who asked if the elderly man needed medication but would not say which hospital hed been taken to. So the son went to the station house, where he said he got a similar run-around. Finally, he found out on his own that his dad was at St. Lukes and had been arrested for jaywalking. Oh, great! Beating up on an 84-year-old man for jaywalking, he said.

    Neither the hospital nor the cops would allow him to see his dad until after 10 p.m., explaining that since hed not been admitted, he was not a patient, but a prisoner.

    Early Monday, cops fingerprinted Wong and charged him with jaywalking, resisting arrest, obstructing governmental administration and disorderly conduct. He went home, accompanied by several family members, with a desk-appearance ticket.

    Another of Wongs sons, who also would not give his name, said the family will probably press charges against the cops, adding: He was just walking across the street with other people, and they picked him out. How could they do that to an 84-year-old man.

    - Unison should press the NYPD to make their police officers learn Chinese.

    - Unfortunately there is not one single Chinese language to learn. Based upon the various generations of immigrants, the New York City Chinatown has significant numbers of persons speaking:

    - Taishanese
    - Cantonese
    - Putonghua
    - Fujianese

    Most Chinatown residents cannot speak/understand all of these languages/dialects.

    First, there was the Japanese video PEN-PINEAPPLE-APPLE-PEN.

    Then the Hong Kong Police came up with BELT-BUCKLE-SEAT-BELT (alternate copy @ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lbPhp13iZjY  )

    (SCMP) September 30, 2016.

    An official Hong Kong police video in which serving officers perform a musical routine based on a Japanese internet sensation has been buried under a deluge of social media ridicule after being viewed more than a million times in less than 24 hours.

    Over the same period, the 33-second video which aims to encourage the wearing of seat belts and was posted on the forces official Facebook page on Wednesday had been shared 8,600 times, received 7,500 likes and been commented on by more than 4,400 people.

    From our experiences and observations, timely posts relating to a trendy topic and soft stories are more popular and more likely to attract higher reach on social media platforms, the force said in statement to the South China Morning Post.

    By Thursday night at least one spoof version of the video which mimics the viral internet hit Pen-Pineapple-Apple-Pen was on YouTube.

    One senior officer, who declined to be identified, said: Its an embarrassment, the force looks more like a farce with this video. What were they thinking?

    The clip opens with two t-shirt clad officers one male and one female dancing and singing as they mimic the action of putting on a seat belt while singing the words I have a seat belt, I have a buckle repeatedly.

    It then switches to two male officers in uniform sitting in what appears to be a police van doing the same routine

    The forces Facebook page was flooded with thousands of comments, the majority of which were negative and ridiculing.

    One post on the forces Facebook page by Edith Hung said: I can only see whoever gives permission to implement such brilliant idea intentionally humiliates all the police, trying to make them feel shame.

    The unidentified senior officer said internal reaction and that of ex-officers on closed sites was even more stinging in its slating of the video: You couldnt print many of the comments by serving and former officers in a family newspaper, the officer said.

    Despite the reaction, the force seemed to stand behind the decision: HKP Facebook will continue to utilise the advantages of multimedia including videos, images, texts and other innovative means to engage the community. The HKP Facebook post on 28 September was one of many different types and styles to illustrate our diversified natures of police work, and had attracted a large number of Likes and positive comments, the statement said.

    Pen-Pineapple-Apple-Pen, a Japanese earworm-style music video performed by Piko-Taroa fictional singer-songwriter created by Japanese comedian Kosaka Daimaou whose real name is Kazuhiko Kosaka.

    His song has had more than 7 million views since it was posted on YouTube in August.

    The police force launched its Facebook page almost exactly a year ago in a bid to improve its public image and foster better relations with the community, which had seen public perceptions of the force plummet in the wake of the citys Occupy protests but it quickly created a platform for critics.

    (HGK Pao) September 30, 2016.

    Two days after the Hong Kong Police's BBSB was posted, it had been viewed 1,260,000 times and LIKE'd almost 9,000 times plus more than 3,000 SMILE's.

    Joshua Wong said that the Hong Kong Police should be grateful that the Copyright (Amendment) Bill (nicknamed Internet Article 23) was not passed because the Cyber Security and Technology Crime Bureau of the Hong Kong Police would have to arrest the persons in charge at the Police Public Relations Branch of the Hong Kong Police in accordance with Article 161 of the Crime Ordinance:

    (1) Any person who obtains access to a computer-

    (a) with intent to commit an offence;
    (b) with a dishonest intent to deceive;
    (c) with a view to dishonest gain for himself or another; or
    (d) with a dishonest intent to cause loss to another,

    whether on the same occasion as he obtains such access or on any future occasion, commits an offence and is liable on conviction upon indictment to imprisonment for 5 years.

    Along came Glacier Wong to explain: "How can the video of the Evil Police telling people to use their safety belts have any copyright issues? What has this got to do with Internet Article 23?" She pointed out: "The melody of the song is not the same. Not a single frame from the Japanese video was re-used. The only thing that was copied was the concept. Concepts are not protected by the copyright laws."

    What did Joshua Wong do after making this blistering attack on the Hong Kong Police and receiving blowback? He quietly deleted his post without comment.

    (EJ Insight) September 30, 2016.

    Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying is threatening to sue Apple Daily unless it retracts an editorial alleging corruption. The Sept. 8 article said pursuing Leung for corruption should be made top priority, the Hong Kong Economic Journal reports.

    Leungs lawyers from Sit, Fung, Kwong and  Shum sent a 14-page letter to Apple chief editor Chan Pui-man that the editorial be withdrawn. They said it falsely, viciously and maliciously accused Leung as being corrupt.

    The editorial relates to secret payment Leung received from Australian firm UGL that was reportedly agreed before he became chief executive and consummated after he took office.

    The law firm said Apple insinuated that Leung took kickbacks from UGL and accused it of trying to deter him from seeking reelection in 2017. It demanded a retraction within seven days or legal action will be taken. Also, it wants the newspaper to promise never to publish any related articles.

    The UGL saga was first revealed in October 2014 at the height of the pro-democracy street protests. Reports at the time said Leung received HK$50 million (US$6.45 million) in confidential payment from Australian engineering firm UGL as part of the latters purchase of Leungs real estate firm DTZ. Leung allegedly received the money after he became chief executive and paid no tax.

    The letter cited a November 2014 decision by authorities in Britain, where DTZ had business ties, not to investigate.

    Lo Fung, who wrote the editorial, said he will not be daunted in his efforts to inquire into improper official conduct.

    It was Leungs third legal notice to a newspaper since he assumed office.

    In 2013, Leung demanded the retraction of an article by Joseph Lian in the Hong Kong Economic Journal, claiming it was defamatory. The article accused him of triad links.

    In 2014, his lawyers sent a letter to Australias Fairfax Media to try to stop the publication of the UGL story.

    Meanwhile, Chan said she will hire lawyers to handle the matter, adding Leungs contention that the article was politically motivated is ridiculous.

    The Hong Kong Journalists Association accused Leung of trying to muzzle the media and demanded the notice be withdrawn.

    Ivan Choy, a Chinese University of Hong Kong senior lecturer, said he does not expect Apple Daily to comply with Leungs demands.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) September 30, 2016.

    The Hong Kong Journalists Association (HKJA) said on Thursday that Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying was intentionally targeting the media after Leung sent a letter to Apple Daily on Monday accusing it of defamation. The journalism watchdog said it was shocked and regretted Leungs actions.

    Leungs letter said that an editorial written by Lo Fung and published by Apple Daily on September 8 falsely, viciously, and maliciously accused Leung of corruption over a HK$50 million secret payment from Australian Corporation UGL.

    It also said that this amounted to the usage of the false corruption allegation to prevent Mr CY Leung from exercising his constitutional right to stand for re-election as the Chief Executive of the HKSAR, if he chooses to. The malicious falsehood is consistent with other reports and articles published by Apple Daily since Leung took office, it added.

    The HKJA said that while it understood that everyone had the right to protect themselves against defamation, the Chief Executive should, as the highest official of the Special Administrative Region, be careful about exercising relevant powers.

    Monitoring the person in power is the job of the journalist, and questioning and criticising the mistakes or inappropriate behaviour of those in power is a responsibility of the media as the fourth estate, it added.

    It also said that Leung had never publicly expressed his intention to seek re-election in public, and to suddenly bring up re-election in the letter will lead to public suspicion and concern that Leung is intentionally trying to create a chilling effect.

    Leung previously sent a letter in 2013 to veteran commentator Joseph Lian Yi-zheng, claiming that a commentary piece he had written accused Leung of having links with triads and asking for the piece to be retracted.

    Chan Pui-man, Apple Dailys editor-in-chief, said that the newspaper had already handed the matter over to its lawyers and that sending letters to the media has been a tactic of Leung.

    Singtao News reported a source saying that neither UK or Australian law enforcement agencies had followed up the matter of the UGL payment in the past two years. The source also said that Leung had prepared for the case, and consulted lawyers, and that he was confident of winning a defamation case against Apple Daily.

    In May of this year Next Magazine, owned by Apple Dailys publisher Next Digital, was ordered to pay over HK$3 million to Bawang International Group and its subsidiary after losing a defamation case.

    Jeffrey Tam Chun-kit, of the Progressive Lawyers Group, told HKFP that while claiming defamation is not unusual for Leung, it is rare for politicians in Hong Kong to do so, as it was an image issue.

    While he said that he was uncertain whether Leung was confident about winning the case, Tam also said that the lawyer saying that [the editorial] will affect his re-election, I think that according to the law, it is the same as announcing that he would run for re-election, so the election should begin from yesterday [Thursday].

    (SCMP) September 30, 2016.

    Hong Kongs leader launched another broadside on Friday at Apple Daily for accusing him of corruption, with his lawyers pressing the popular Chinese-language newspaper for a proper explanation of its coverage.

    Lawyers for Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying published in full a legal letter accusing the daily of defaming him with malicious intent to stop him from exercising his legal right to seek re-election with further suggestions the paper had omitted crucial information from Britains Serious Fraud Office.

    The office had decided not to investigate a HK$50 million deal between Leung and Australian engineering firm UGL, Leungs lawyers pointed out in the letter.

    The further disclosure came as legal experts doubted Leung would be able to successfully sue Apple Daily, saying it would be difficult to establish a case of libel in a city that protects press freedom.

    Apple Daily again rejected Leungs demand for a retraction of the editorial that upset the chief executive, raising the possibility of a court battle and questions as to whether Leungs political opponents would be able to pursue the matter in the legislature.

    If you disagree, please let us have your explanation, Leungs lawyers wrote to the paper regarding their suggestion that it knew of British authorities decision not to investigate his case.

    Apple Daily chief editor Chan Pui-man replied that Hong Kongs anti-corruption watchdog was still carrying out its own investigation into the matter.

    Leung has repeatedly denied wrongdoing over the deal with UGL in 2011, months before he became chief executive. The engineering firm had sought to buy out insolvent property firm DTZ, of which Leung was a director.

    The deal made two days before Leung resigned from DTZ and the completion of the takeover stipulated he would receive the money in two instalments in 2012 and 2013. UGL and Leung said the money was to prevent him forming or joining a rival firm.

    The legal letter suggested Apple Daily ought to have known that British authorities had no power to probe whether Leungs agreement with UGL violated British listing rules as DTZ was delisted.

    Leungs move was questionable, especially as British legal authorities, whose judicial decisions are followed by Hong Kong, had ruled that the government was in no position to launch a libel case, according to Ronny Tong Ka-wah, former chairman of the Bar Association, and Professor Johannes Chan Man-mun, former law dean of the University of Hong Kong.

    The legal principle is that government officials ought to be subject to media scrutiny, Tong said. And in Leungs case, there is in fact certain factual basis for Apple Daily to make its claim.

    HKU media law expert Professor Doreen Weisenhaus added that while officials could launch a lawsuit in a personal capacity, there is no tradition of that in recent years.

    Last year the Court of Appeal ruled in support of Ming Paos right to publish an editorial about possible corruption involving the Hong Kong Football Club, Weisenhaus noted.

    Better to read the whole thing:

    Internet comments:

    - Given the malfeasance that was revealed in Bawang vs. Next Magazine, what Apple Daily is doing here is no surprise at all.

    - Apple Daily is "fair and balanced" just as Fox News is.

    - They pick the story that they want to write (namely, CY Leung is engaging in corrupt business activities), they report the information that supports this story and they suppress the information that contradicts it.

    - Why is the law firm Sit, Fung, Kwong and Shum publishing their letter to Apple Daily? Because Apple Daily reported on the letter and, once again, selectively mentioned certain things favorable to their story and ignoring other unfavorable things. Therefore, Sit, Fung, Kwong and Shum published the whole thing for the world to read.

    - Apple Daily believes that they have a right to be selective in what they report based upon what they determine that the public needs to know.

    - Sit, Fung, Kwong and Shum noted that Apple Daily mentioned the UK's Serious Fraud Office may be investigating. There was no further mention afterwards. Either Apple Daily did not follow up with SFO, or else they did not like the response of SFO.

    Apple Daily also mentioned that the UK's Financial Conduct Authority may investigate. There was no further mention afterwards. Either Apple Daily did not follow up with FCA, or else they did not like the response of FCA.

    This is what the whole brouhaha boils down to.

    - Do you think that it is 'normal' for a media outlet to report: The United Kingdom's Serious Fraud Office was poised to investigate CY Leung but they didn't for lack of evidence; the United Kingdom's Financial Conduct Authority was poised to investigate CY Leung but they didn't for lack of evidence.

    - Next Media (Apple Daily/Next Magazine) is not the run-of-the-mill media company. It is a political operation where the normal standards of ethics in journalism are not applicable. They publish these calumnies for political reasons. It has nothing to do with the purpose of journalism:

    The purpose of journalism, write Bill Kovach and Tom Rosenstiel in The Elements of Journalism, is not defined by technology, nor by journalists or the techniques they employ. Rather, the principles and purpose of journalism are defined by something more basic: the function news plays in the lives of people.

    News is that part of communication that keeps us informed of the changing events, issues, and characters in the world outside. Though it may be interesting or even entertaining, the foremost value of news is as a utility to empower the informed.

    The purpose of journalism is thus to provide citizens with the information they need to make the best possible decisions about their lives, their communities, their societies, and their governments.

    - I just picked up this week's Next Magazine. Book A has 64 pages, but Book B is down to 48 pages only. Just a few years ago, both books have more than 100 pages at the same HK$20 cover price. Next Magazine is losing more than $100 million a year, so it is still alive not for business reasons. Rather someone is willing to lose that money for political reasons. Eventually, the vicious cycle (fewer readers->fewer ad pages->less content->fewer readers->fewer ad pages->less content ...) will hit rock bottom with no readers and no ad pages.

    - At its peak, Next Magazine had a circulation of more than 200,000. Today, the circulation is 30,000. How much of it is due to the Internet? And how much of it is due to losing its credibility with readers and support from advertisers?

    - Given what happened in the Bawang vs. Next Magazine, clearly Next Media doesn't mind losing a libel case because it will only be fined several tens of thousands of dollars by judges who do not want to infringe upon freedom of press. That court verdict in this case will be made several years from now, long after the 2017 Chief Executive election. And Next Media will have achieved its political goals of stopping the re-election of CY Leung.

    - CY Leung probably thinks the same. The reason why he is doing this is make clear that Apple Daily/Next Magazine/Next Media is running a political operation to get him and therefore anything that they say in future will be suspect.

    - The whole UGL case is premised upon the fact that the seemingly large payment ($50 million) must involve some form of corruption. However, there has never been any satisfactory explanation as to what corrupt activity is the $50 million paying for. Nothing that UGL does is worth paying $50 million in bribes.

    - How much credibility does Apple Daily have?
    (Center for Communication and Public Opinion Survey, Chinese University of Hong Kong) This is a periodic public opinion poll, in which respondents were asked to rate paid newspapers on a scale of 1 to 10 (1=very low credibility, 10=very high credibility).
     

    Title/Year

    		 1997 2001 2006 2009 2010 2013 2016
    Apple Daily 6.24 5.15 5.51 5.80 5.27 4.98 5.18
    HK Commercial Daily 5.42 5.87 5.78 5.90 5.56 5.21 5.03
    HK Economic Journal 6.60 7.34 7.09 7.04 6.57 6.46 6.06
    HK Economic Times 6.79 6.96 7.08 7.12 6.71 6.78 6.47
    Ming Pao 7.15 7.54 7.24 7.35 6.77 6.74 6.38
    Oriental Daily 6.54 5.76 6.12 6.24 5.75 5.85 5.59
    Sing Pao 6.39 6.48 6.43 6.34 5.88 5.75 5.45
    Sing Tao 6.73 7.13 6.84 7.07 6.53 6.42 5.99
    South China Morning Post 7.18 7.24 7.36 7.57 6.85 6.98 6.54
    Ta Kung Pao 5.24 5.64 5.25 5.58 5.14 4.68 4.21
    Wen Wei Po 5.04 5.93 5.26 5.71 5.37 4.89 4.45

    Compared to ten years ago, everybody is doing worse.

    - On the question of basic trust, Apple Daily reported that they received the letter from Sit, Fung, Kwong and Shum on September 29, 2016. According to Sit, Fung, Kwong and Shum, the letter was delivered and signed for at Apple Daily by an employee at 12:20pm, September 26, 2016. According to an employee of Sit, Fung, Kwong and Shum, the letter was personally delivered at the registered address of Apple Daily. The employee identified himself and asked to deliver a letter to the editorial department of Apple Daily. An Apple Daily employee aged over 40 years old signed and accepted delivery.

    - Rumor mongering? Here is another good one: Andrew Leung (Business and Professionals Alliance) is the most likely person to become the next Legislative Council chairman. So Ming Pao is reporting that Leung holds a foreign passport, which would disqualify him because a Legislative Council president must be a Chinese citizen who is a permanent resident of Hong Kong with no right of abode in any country other than the People's Republic of China. What is the basis of the allegation? Nothing beyond "It is rumored that ..."

    (Hong Kong Free Press) September 22, 2016.

    Two Democratic Party district councilors have criticised the governments statement that they were involved in a soft lobbying session an informal meeting over the controversial Yuen Long housing plan. The governments statement is smearing, they claimed.

    The housing minister claimed on Wednesday that Zachary Wong Wai-yin and Roy Kwong Chun-yu, both Yuen Long district councillors, were involved in the fourth and final informal meeting on the Wang Chau public housing plan held on March 17, 2014. They agreed with the plan of building 4,000 units on a piece of greenbelt land inhabited by more than 100 villagers, the minister said.

    But both Wong and Kwong said that it was a briefing session on the plan, rather than an informal consultation, as they were never asked about the original plan to build 17,000 units.

    Of the 17,000 units, 13,000 units set on a piece of ruined land which was turned into a car park operated by Ping Shan Rural Committee chairman Tsang Shu-wo was delayed after strong opposition from two informal meetings with Tsang and rural leaders, months before the governments meeting with Wong and Kwong.

    On a Commercial Radio programme on Thursday, Wong said that the March 2014 meeting occurred in a meeting room of the Yuen Long district office of the Home Affairs Department and that he was invited by an assistant district officer.  He said it was mostly attended by technical staff from the Housing Department, who introduced them to the 4,000-unit plan. They were consulted as a foot bridge of the project will pass through their constituencies, according to Wong.

    My first opinion was that it was not good to use greenbelt land it should not be used to build flats, and I have reservations, he said. I am sure we never supported the plan on March 17 [2014]. He said he only supported the 4,000-unit plan when it was submitted to the Yuen Long district council on June 24, 2014, as the district councillors agreed there was an urgent need to build public housing. But at the end of the meeting I said this would be the one and only occasion where we would support building flats on greenbelt land there will not be a second time, he said.

    Wong cited a Sing Tao Daily report on Thursday, which cited a government source as saying that he and Kwong were never informed of the original 17,000-unit plan.  [The housing minister] was not only framing us it was smearing, Wong said.

    Internet comments:

    - Here is Roy Kwong's statement:

    CY Leung, I am telling you not to misrepresent me. Other people think that you are the Chief Executive and you can misrepresent people at will. After misrepresenting John Tsang, you are now misrepresenting Roy Kwong? I am not afraid of you, I will not back off ...

    Democracy Party district councilor in the Yuen Long District Councilor Zachary Wong Wai-yin and Legislative Councilor and Yuen Long District Councilor Roy Kwong Chun-yu state

     (1) Kwong Chun Yu and Wong Wai Yin have never ever heard the government proposed 17,000 units in Wang Chau, and they never knew that the project would be done in stages.

    (2) Kwong Chun Yu and Wong Wai Yin was invited on March 17, 2014 to a meeting in the Yuen Long district office of the Home Affairs Department. He only met a manager from the Housing Department with no senior government workers present. Kwong and Wong emphasized that this meeting was not about "lobbying" or "consultation." The manager only informed Kwong and Wong that there will be project to build 4,000 public housing units. Because a pedestrian bridge will go through Long Ping Village in Yuen Long, the two district councilors were consulted. The meeting agenda consisted of only a map of the planned housing location ...

    - Here are the newspaper clippings:


    Hong Kong Commercial Daily, September 26, 2013:  17,000 public housing units planned for Yuen Long brownfield land ... But Yuen Long district councilor Roy Kwong Chun Yu thinks that traffic is overloaded in the district already, and he asked the government to consult the residents about the plan as soon as possible. He said that the residents may not object if the authorities are more transparent. He also said that the proposal is better than using country park land.


    Oriental Daily, September 26, 2013: 17,000 public housing units planned for Wang Chau ... Yuen Long district councilor Roy Kwong Chun Yu said that while he understands that the government wants to find land to build public housing units, the Long Ping residents are worried about traffic congestion, school slots and medical care facilities.


    Ming Pao, January 24, 2014. "Revision of plans for residential land, Yuen Long gets the most: 42,000 units within five years; district councilors worried about congestion." Yuen Long district councilor Roy Kwong Chun Yu pointed out that they Housing Department told the District Council last September that they are studying the feasibility of developing Wang Chau (north of Long Ping Estate in Yuen Long). The initial idea was to build about 17,000 public housing units to accommodate 52,000 person in 34 hectares of land. The number of units is about 40% of what the government announced yesterday for Yuen Long. He expects that the area north of Wang Chau will become an important development point in the district."


    Ming Pao, June 20, 2014. Yuen Long (Wang Chau) public housing project scaled down ...

    Late last year, the Housing Department studied the construction of 17,000 public housing units in Wang Chau (Yuen Long) to accommodate 52,000 persons. The latest proposal submitted to the Yuen Long District Council showed that the Housing Department proposes to build 4,000 units in 5.6 hectares of land north of Long Ping Estate. This is only 1/4 of he original plan. It is estimated that 12,3000 persons will be accommodated when the project is completed in 2025.

    Yuen Long district councilor Roy Kwong Chun Yu said that there is not much opposition within the community to the proposal initially. But even if the Housing Department scales down the project, they still need to solve the problems of shortages in the infrastructure for traffic and social services, so that the new residents will not overload the community even more ...

    - (Hong Kong Free Press) September 22, 2016.

    Past clippings shared on the internet since Wednesday quoted Kwong responding to media enquiries over the Housing Departments plan to build 17,000 flats. Meanwhile, some questioned that Kwong had knowledge of the original number of flats. I believe those were figures intentionally leaked by the Housing Department, journalists should know very well that they received the leaked figures from sources how would I have the figures in my mind? said Kwong, who was recently elected as a lawmaker, told reporters on Thursday. The figures were leaked to reporters, and then reporters asked me the informal meeting did not mention 17,000 [units], it was not mentioned at the district council, there were no top government officials who were in touch with me, Kwong added.

    - When Roy Kwong picked up the newspapers circa September 26, 2013, he would see them report that the Wang Chau project involved 17,000 units. The newspapers asked him (in his capacity as the Long Ping district councilor) for reaction, and he was quoted.

    He is saying that he he was never given the 17,000 figure by any government person. The journalists got the figure from someone (possibly with the government) and asked him (in his capacity as District Councilor) for reaction. So what he said might be literally true.

    But the biggest question is why the total lack of curiosity about such a massive project in his district? No memory?  If he wasn't aware before the media called, he knew afterwards and he should be getting on the phone with the authorities to get the details.

    - If a constituent showed up and asked Roy Kwong, "I read in the newspaper today that 17,000 public housing units are coming here. What's the deal?" What is Kwong going to say? "Nobody told me. I don't know anything and I don't intend to find out either."

    - Roy Kwong took twelve years and six attempts before passing five courses for the Diploma of Secondary Education. So it is understandable that he cannot read newspaper reports.

    - Roy Kwong took twelve years to pass English for the Diploma of Secondary Education. But these newspaper reports are in Chinese, so that cannot be an excuse.

    - Roy Kwong the writer published a book titled: There Is A Kind Of Happiness Known As Forgetting.

    Roy Kwong is very happy when he forgot all about the 17,000 housing units for Wang Chau.

    - Roy Kwong fancies himself to be a novelist writing for young people. So it is understandable that he can only read/write in Internet lingo (known colloquially as 'Martian language'). He needed the newspaper reports to be written thus:

    - Roy Kwong's own writing style is famous for the excessive use of commas. Here is how Kwong would have written this question:

    咁最後出來得4000個單位，咁大落差，鄺俊宇，你，作為，區議會議員，係咪，都，應該，主動追問、跟進呢？#鄺逗號

    If in the end there were only 4,000 units, with such a huge difference, Kwong Chun Yu, you, as, the District Councilor, is it true, too, that you should, actively inquire, follow up? #KwongComma

    -  (Oriental Daily) September 22, 2016. Kwong and Wong said that the March 2014 meeting was mostly attended by technical staff from the Housing Department. The Housing Department said that eight people from their side attended the meeting: (Housing Department) Assistant Director Chung Kam-wing, a Chief Civil Engineer, a Senior Civic Engineer, a Senior Planner and a Civic Engineer, and (Yuen Long Home Affairs Department) Commissioner Mak Chun-yu, a deputy commissioner and a Senior Liaison Officer.

    - (Wen Wei Po) September 22, 2016. At the March 27, 2014 meeting, Kwong Chun-yu and Wong Wai-yin agreed that the Wang Chau project should be scaled back to 4,000 units. At the June 2014 Yuen Long District Council meeting, Kwong and other pan-democrats said that the infrastructure will be stressed even for 4,000 units and demanded a further scale-back. In so doing, Kwong is thinking that nobody wants to see a big influx of residents into their districts. Of course, lots of people need housing but that was not Kwong's concern at that time. More recently, Kwong has turned around and criticized the government for scaling back the Wang Chau project because it is unfair to people who need housing.

    - The Wang Chau story is very confusing, because the same set of people go around saying at various times:

    - "No relocation, no demolition." Not a single family will be moved away from where they live now. Not a single business will be moved from where they operate now.

    - The Fanling Golf Club is public land leased very cheaply to the for-profit organization. The government can take back the land and build public housing estates.

    - No,  the Fanling Golf Club cannot be touched. It is part of our collective memory like Queen's Pier, Star Ferry, Murray House, etc. I promise that I will file endless numbers of judicial reviews if the government tries to claim the land for residential development.

    - Not a single housing unit will be allowed on greenland. New housing units can only be build on brownfield land. I promise that I will file endless numbers of judicial reviews about greenland development.

    - Building on greenland is okay only this once for me. But there will never be a second time.

    - Brownfield land is not fit for human habitation due to the extensive soil contamination from industrial usage. I promise that I will file endless numbers of judicial reviews about environmental pollution effects.

    - Certain businesses squatting on brownfield land should not be allowed to operate in Hong Kong. For example, used car parking lots and electronic waste dumps.

    - Where should the used car parts and electronic waste products go? To China, of course. We'll just pay high enough so that they take in all our toxic stuff. Chinese lives are cheap where as Hong Kong lives are precious.

    But in other ten or twenty years, mainland China will be more prosperous than Hong Kong. They will the ones who export their waste products down to Hong Kong for disposal.

    - 17,000 units are too much for Wang Chau to handle. It must be scaled back.

    - 17,000 units cannot even remotely satisfy the existing demand. It must not be allowed scaled back. We need to cram even more units in.

    - 17,000 units is the minimum goal. Any attempt to scale back is evidence for government-business-rural affairs-triad collusion.

    - 17,000 units can be done in stages with 4,000 units first because the land usage issues are less difficult.

    - 17,000 units cannot be done in stages. It is all or nothing, because any compromise is evidence for government-business-rural affairs people-triad collusion.

    - The most astonishing statement award goes to:

    (Wen Wei Po) Cheng Chung Tai (Civic Passion) said he refused to sign the demand with other non-establishment legislators because he opposes the Wang Chau project. "From the viewpoint of future planning for Hong Kong, it is clear that the Wang Chau project should be shelved. This is the best solution because the various government officials and politicians (collectively known as Hong Kong traitors) won't gain anything. After today's press conference, people finally realize that there is a Localist representative in the Legislative Council." He noted: "The courage of being 1-versus-69 needs the support of everybody."

    What does Cheng mean? Tommy Wong commented: "The problem is that we have not yet dealt with the waste at the source. We must stop accepting new immigrants first. Otherwise we can never build enough housing units for people to build. We have to take over the right to approve new immigrants."

    - If you want to suspend housing until you have to right to approve immigration, you should also suspend expanding other services (such as healthcare, education, etc).

    ...

    - Cartoon of Roy Kwong Chun Yu

    Three years ago: The government should not build so many housing units in Wang Chau!
    Today: So few housing units will be built in Wang Chau -- government-business-politicians-triad collusion!

    - Goldfish memory

    "You clearly knew that there were 17,000 housing units for Wang Chau!"
    "I don't remember whether I saw it or not."
    RTHK video of Kwong Chun-yu's denial at the press conference

    - Photographic evidence of government-business-rural affairs-triad collusion:

    Top left panel: Anson Chan (ex-Chief Secretary) and Kwong Chun Yu (Democratic Party)
    Top right panel: Lam Cheuk-ting (Democratic Party) and Jimmy Lai (Next Media)
    Bottom left panel: Heung Yee Kuk's Tang Ho-nin, Leung Fuk-yuen etc with Wong Wai-yin (Democratic Party) and Chow Wing-kan (Liberal Party)
    Bottom right panel: Lam Cheuk-ting (Democratic Party) with "Scarface" Kong and his aide (Wo Hop To triad gang members)

    - The Chu Hoi Dick phenomenon

    ...
    On March 6 this year, RTHK aired a program which quotes the government as saying that the first stage of the Wang Chau project has 4,000 public housing units. Chu Hoi Dick was interviewed on that program, so he must have seen and known about the saying about the "first stage."

    But the politicos and media were focused on government-business-rural affairs people-triad collusion, so this type of information will be intentionally concealed.

    In that RTHK interview, Chu Hoi Dick played the role of the defender of the earth. As was his wont, it was "no relocation, no demolition." According to his thinking, not even the land for the 4,000 units should be reclaimed by the government.

    But as soon as Chu Hoi Dick was elected, he immediately demanded to know where the 17,000 units were? So what do you want? "No relocation, no demolition"? or "Relocation/demolition ASAP"?

    The Chu Hoi Dick phenomenon is a microcosm of the people of Hong Kong today. On one hand, they want to defend the land and resurrect agriculture/fishery. On the other hand, they want get public housing instantaneously. The same thing happened when they wanted to retain Queen's Pier while solving the traffic problems in Central. This is filled with romanticism as well as self-contradictions.

    Among all the newly elected legislators, I admire Chu Hoi Dick the most. He works hard, he is firm, he is persistent and, most importantly, he understands. Since he understands, he should not gave to run with the other politicians who know nothing. As he said before, he does not belong in Central. But now that he is in Central, I hope that he won't be contaminated into one of those politicians who are trying to steal his show.

    - Chu Hoi Dick's positions are not necessarily self-contradictory.

    Previously, Chu ran unsuccessfully for District Councilor in Pat Heung South. His interest was in his district. If he opposes public housing there, he is listening to the voice of the constituents. If they are for NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) or even BANANA (Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anything), so be it.

    Once elected to the Legislative Council, his interest is in Hong Kong as a whole. People want public housing which has to be placed somewhere. No matter where it is placed, there will be NIMBY-like complaints. So you will just have to make the best of the situation.

    In like manner, he may have opposed the Third Runway at the Hong Kong International Airport. But he may change his mind now because he is responsible to several million citizens and businesses and not just a few dolphins.

    This does not mean that he gets free of the NIMBY mindset. It only means that it is elevated to a different level. For example, he may still oppose garbage incinerators. But garbage has to be incinerated or otherwise disposed of. Well, it can be incinerated as long as it is not in Hong Kong. That means Hong Kong will pay some poor Chinese county to take in their garbage.  That's the essence of NIMBY.

    - If you pay someone to take over your problems, then it is probably SOBBY ("Some Other Bugger's Back Yard"): a particular project may be desirable and perhaps necessary, but only if it is placed somewhere else.

    - (Oriental Daily) September 23, 2016.

    On September 22, Wong Wai-yin and Kwong Chun-yu told the press that the authorities lobbied the rural affairs people secretly and then suddenly changed the Wang Chau plan on the grounds of rural objections over feng shui.

    According to the transcripts of the Yuen Long District Council meetings, a number of rural councilors in the June and December 2014 meetings spoke about ancestral graves and feng shui.

    According to the records, on June 24, 2014, Shap Pat Heung Rural Committee chairman Leung Fuk-yuen said: "This development is using the burial grounds in nearby Kai Shan. I hope the relevant departments will try not to affect the feng shui of nearby villages." On December 16, 2014, Leung said: "There are a number of historical grave sites in A Kai Shan and Fung Chi Village. I recommend that the government handle the issue of grave sites carefully. The planning of housing development should pay attention to the impact on the feng shui of graves."

    Two other rural camp councilors Tsang Shu-wo and Tang Hing-yip also spoke about the feng shui issue in the second meeting. The records also showed that both Wong Wai-yin and Kwong Chun-yu attended the meetings and spoke. They did not object to the statements from the rural councilors.

    When told, Wong Wai-yin said that he remembered that the Wang Chau project was discussed in June 2014. But he has "no recollection" that anyone spoke about the feng shui issue. He said that he might have stepped away when they spoke up. As for the December 2014 meeting, he has no recollection that the Wang Chau project was discussed at all.

    - (Kinliu) By Chris Wat Wing-yin. September 24, 2016.

    A friend of mine routinely sends me the full transcript of the Chief Executive weekly Tuesday press conference. At first I wondered what was so good about these official statements. Eventually, I realized that the Chief Executive's statements are often deliberately misquoted and distorted by the various media organizations. Therefore I am glad that I get to see the original source.

    With respect to the Wang Chau incident, I decided to toss aside the conspiracy theories and I watched the entire broadcast of the press conference by the Chief Executive and other ministers. I heard what they said, what they were asked and what they responded without any editing. The next day, the various media reports took whatever suited their purposes again. So if you want to know the truth, you should watch the full broadcast and then you can compare the various news reports.

    I would like to say something more about the Wang Chau affair:

    Firstly, Chu Hoi Dick said that he "discovered" that the Wang Chau project was suddenly reduced from 17,000 units to 4,000. But this was not "sudden" at all. Hong Kong Economic Journal and Hong Kong Economic Times reported on October 17, 2014 that Wang Chau will be developed in stages, with the first stage being 4,000 nits. Perhaps Mr. Chu reads only Apple Daily and never Hong Kong Economic Journal/Hong Kong Economic Times. Speaking of "suddenness," I think that Mr. Chu's flip-flop from the romantic "No Relocation, No Demolition" to "Development is the only right reason" is most "sudden" of all.

    Secondly, why do politicians like to use the term "feeling for the bottomline" instead of the regular phrases of "consultation" and "lobbying"? "Feeling for the bottomline" carries the feel of secretiveness under the table. It does not matter how you explain it, the use of the term in the headline is the death sentence for you already.

    As for Roy Kwong Chun-yu, he did not expect to be named as the star by Secretary Cheung Bing-leung. When Kwong said that he was "not aware of the Wang Chau project" and "he only met with a Housing Department manager", Secretary Cheung said: "Eight persons met with Kwong Chun-yu in 2014, including a Housing Department vice-minister, the Chief Civil Engineer, a senior planner, a Home Affairs Bureau commissioner ..."

    Actually in 2013 Kwong told seven local media outlets that he was paying attention to the development of 17,000 public housing units in Wang Chau. In April 2014, he told a Ming Pao reporter that he does not oppose the Housing Department for building 4,000 housing units first.

    Everybody said that Kwong's amnesia means that his trustworthiness is bankrupt. But I want to defend Kwong, for he is the miracle kid who tried six times over eleven years before he got a Diploma of Secondary Education with five passed subjects. This showed that Kwong is persistent as well as suffering from learning disabilities (such as memory lapses and cognitive disability). Therefore we don't have to be too harsh. In the next four years, we look forward to more episodes of memory loss, mishearing, misunderstanding, unawareness, etc from Kwong.

    - (Kinliu) By Chris Wat Wing-yin. September 26, 2016.

    Edward Yiu Chung-yim, legislator from the Architectural, Surveying, Planning and Landscape sector, got on RTHK City Forum and said, "How hard is it to reclaim brownfield land? Just pay them enough and they will leave! How hard is it to relocate them? Construct a recycling plant in front of the garbage landfill and you have one-stop garbage disposal ... It is easier than pie!

    Meanwhile, Kwong Chun-yu and Chu Hoi Dick said that the 4,000-unit must be discarded and that the process must be restarted with 17,000 units. It is easier than pie!

    I believe that Chief Executive CY Leung should appoint Edward Yiu, Chu Hoi Dick and Kwong Chun-yu as the Land Reclaim Squad. Given Chu's past embrace of "No relocation, no demolition", Yiu's brilliant speeches as the deputy director of the Future City Research Institute and Kwong Chun-yu's will to take the Diploma of Secondary Education exam six times before passing, they should be able to realize the Wang Chau Utopia in no time.

    But as soon as CY Leung invited Chu Hoi Dick to participate in the monitoring platform, Chu declined.

    During the election campaign, these people said that they want to become legislators because they feel that they don't have much impact sleeping in the streets and therefore they want to enter and reform the system from the inside. Now that they are in the system, they want to go back into the streets and monitor the government from the outside?

    Everybody knows that the Wang Chau area involves various kinds of property rights, various kinds of interests and various types of stakeholders. They are not ThunderGo members and they don't have a common leader. They won't do anyone's bidding. Such is reality, such is the real world. Anyone who has been around in society knows that.

    Let's look at the credentials of our three idealists. Chu Hoi Dick graduated from university and spent a few years at media outlets. In the past ten years, he hasn't held a regular job. Edward Yiu Chung-yim is qualified as an architectural surveyor and property management surveyor, but he has only taught at university. Kwong Chun-yun wrote several books of romantic essays and served as a District Councilor, but he has never worked in the commercial world. These three idealists think that the world is simple, only because they have been detached from the real world for more than a decade.

    CAP A401 National Flag and National Emblem Ordinance

    Section 7. Protection of national flag and national emblem

    A person who desecrates the national flag or national emblem by publicly and wilfully burning, mutilating, scrawling on, defiling or trampling on it commits an offence and is liable on conviction to a fine at level 5 and to imprisonment for 3 years.

    CAP A602 Regional Flag and Regional Emblem Ordinance

    Section 7. Protection of regional flag and regional emblem

    A person who desecrates the regional flag or regional emblem by publicly and wilfully burning, mutilating, scrawling on, defiling or trampling on it commits an offence and is liable-

    (a) on conviction on indictment to a fine at level 5 and to imprisonment for 3 years; and

    (b) on summary conviction to a fine at level 3 and to imprisonment for 1 year.

    (Wikipedia) History of Flag Desecration in Hong Kong

    In 1999, two individuals were convicted for desecration of the Regional Flag of Hong Kong and the Chinese flag. They were found guilty by a magistrate, had the conviction overturned in the High Court but the convictions were restored by the Court of Final Appeal. They were bound over to keep the peace on their own recognisance of $2,000 for 12 months for each of the two charges. In the judgement, Chief Justice Andrew Li said although the Basic Law of Hong Kong guarantees freedom of speech, flag desecration is not legal because there are other protest methods.

    Social activist Koo Sze-yiu has been convicted twice of flag desecration. He was sentenced to a nine-month prison term in 2013 for the offence. However, the sentence was reduced to four months and two weeks after an appeal. In March 2016 he was sentenced to a six-week prison term for burning the regional flag in Wanchai on HKSAR Establishment Day in 2015. Koo responded that "he is happy to be punished as being jailed is part of the life of an activist, and he would continue to protest against the Beijing and Hong Kong governments and fight for democracy."

    CAP 542 Legislative Council Ordinance

    Section 39 When person is disqualified from being nominated as a candidate and from being elected as a Member

    (1) A person is disqualified from being nominated as a candidate at an election, and from being elected as a Member, if the person

    (a) is

    (i) a judicial officer; or
    (ii) a prescribed public officer; or
    (iii) an officer of the Legislative Council or a member of staff of The Legislative Council Commission; or (Amended 48 of 1999 s. 24)

    (b) has, in Hong Kong or any other place, been sentenced to death or imprisonment (by whatever name called) and has not either

    (i) served the sentence or undergone such other punishment as a competent authority may have been substituted for the sentence; or
    (ii) received a free pardon; or

    (c) has been convicted of treason; or

    (d) on the date of nomination, or of the election, is serving a sentence of imprisonment; or

    (e) without limiting paragraph (b), where the election is to be held or is held within 5 years after the date of the person's conviction, is or has been convicted

    (i) in Hong Kong or any other place, of an offence for which the person has been sentenced to imprisonment, whether suspended or not, for a term exceeding 3 months without the option of a fine; or
    (ii) of having engaged in corrupt or illegal conduct in contravention of the Elections (Corrupt and Illegal Conduct) Ordinance (Cap 554); or
    (iii) of an offence against Part II of the Prevention of Bribery Ordinance (Cap 201); or
    (iv) of any offence prescribed by regulations in force under the Electoral Affairs Commission Ordinance (Cap 541); or (Replaced 10 of 2000 s. 47)

    So if you burn the national flag in Hong Kong, you may be found guilty and sentenced to imprisonment for a term exceeding 3 months, and then you are not eligible to be nominated for the Legislative Council election. And there goes your $93,000 per month job.

    What is a valiant resister to do?

    (Wen Wei Po) September 21, 2016.

    Civic Passion ex-leader Wong Yeung Tat (nickname His Royal Highness) lost his bid for Legislative Council and resigned his leadership post. Afterwards he went with his wife Chan Sau Wai (nickname Her Royal Highness) to travel in Taiwan. During the trip, he set the People's Republic of China national flag on fire.

    Because the incident took place in Taiwan, the Hong Kong government cannot charge Wong Yeung Tat with an offence under Hong Kong law. So once again, Wong Yeung Tat has shown us us how to "valiantly resist the Commies" under perfectly safe conditions.

    Video: https://www.facebook.com/terry.wong.568294/videos/1735285676737237/

    (Wen Wei Po) September 21, 2016.

    Civic Passion/Proletariat Political Institute/Hong Kong Resurgence Order have also tell their demonstrators to be 'valiant', but their leaders are accused of always telling others to charge while they skedaddle themselves. In a Ming Pao interview, Civic Passion leader Cheng Chung-tai said that he "won't be able to stand in the front of the battle line anymore." "Everybody has his costs ... I have shown what my costs are. During the Restore Movement, I merely stood there and I was surrounded by more than 20 cops. Was I supposed to attack them? Such are the limitations."

    Meanwhile Wan Chin went down to Occupy Mong Kok to demonstrate how to use a luggage case as a shield. But once the action began, he disappeared from view. When questioned, Wan Chin responded on Facebook: "Do you want me to personally go down to Mong Kok, throw the first brick or the first petrol bomb? If you really want me to do this, I can only say: 'I fuck your mother's stinking cunt'."

    On the night of the Mong Kok riot, Wong Yeung-tat was down at the scene and posted on Facebook: "Let the bricks fly!" But nothing happened with him. During a Legco election forum this year, Wu Chi Wai (Democratic Party) asked why Wong Yeung Tat was always present at the scenes of clashes but seldom arrested. Wong said that different people have different responsibilities. As a leader, Wong has to "educate and protect the masses." Therefore his job is to "lead the resisters" and then "suddenly leave the scene." "Of course I will leave, brother! Why should I be arrested by the cops?" Wu said: "Your idea of leadership is to stand behind the crowd ... by education, you mean that you tell them to throw bricks and get arrested. If that is the case, then you don't even have the most fundamental character as a political leader!"

    (Wen Wei Po) September 21, 2016.

    For the 2016 Legislative Council elections, Civic Passion/Proletariat Political Institute/Hong Kong Resurgence Order fielded candidates in each of the five geographical constituencies. Their slogan was to be elected, resign and use the by-election as a "five district de facto referendum for a new constitution." Of the five candidates, only Cheng Chung Tai was elected.

    In a Ming Pao interview, Cheng said that the Legco election results were less than ideal, and this shows that their policy platform had failed. As a result, their biggest promise (the "five district referendum) of the election is no longer operable. Cheng said that he will keep an eye on Youngspiration and Demosisto and remind them that they promised to introduce a referendum law.

    Immediately their critics rose up. Raphael Wong Ho-ming (League of Social Democrats) quoted Wan Chin: "Does what you say count afterwards?"

    Roundtable Community ex-director Lam Fai said: "The entire Ming Pao interview was about reneging on their previous promises. How can the Hot Dogs (Civic Passion members) live with this?"

    Netizen William Ngan wrote: "As soon as you are sworn into the Legislative Council this coming October, you must resign immediately in order to fulfill your election promise over these past 6 months. You should let 1/5 of the voters have a chance to have a de facto referendum and lay the groundwork for a new constitution by the people. Raymond Wong Yuk-man will also win the by-election and return to the Legislative Council. You guys are worthless without his presence in the Legislative Council."

    Auyueng Ying-kit (People Power) wrote: "I knew all along that you are a snake oil salesman ... When this question was raised during the election campaign, the response was that you will persuade someone else from the other districts to join you ... But now you say that the option no longer exists! This is shameless! You clearly lied before in order to garner votes. Once you are elected, the hell with them!"

    Cheng Chung Tai responded: "Getting someone in the other districts to join in a five district referendum? I tell you that for the political parties, the most important thing is not concepts, it is not political gaming, it is not operability, it is 'resources.' That means money! Give up a job that pays almost $100,000 per month? Plus paid expenses, subsidies and pension? How can these Legislative Councilors who said that they are in this for the money give up? Money! It's all about money!"

    Netizen Lee Ka Fai Hilton said: "So is Cheng Chung Tai (Supersonic Mouse) in this for the money?" Cheng Chung Tai did not answer this question. Instead he wrote: "If so many people want a five district referendum ... this is very simple ... The Civic Party and the Democratic Party each have legislative councilors elected in all five districts. They don't lack resources either. So everybody should pressure them."

    Chan Sau Wai (Her Royal Highness) wrote: "If only one of Civic Passion/Proletariat Political Institute/Hong Kong Resurgence Order candidates lost, the other four can lobby for a fifth person. But now you are asking four others to join you? Three million voters have voted down the five district de facto referendum. The voters want to look for natural gas instead (i.e. Youngspiration) ... you should be going after those who were elected because they variously claim to be for "Hong Kong independence" or "self-determination"."

    (Wen Wei Po) September 20, 2016.

    In January this year, someone fired air-gun pellets to break a window at the People's Liberation Army quarters in Bonham Court, Bonham Road, Sai Wan district, Hong Kong Island. In February this year, someone fired air-gun pellets to break a window at the People's Liberation Army barracks in Cornwall Road, Kowloon Tong district, Kowloon. The police reviewed the surveillance videos in these areas and determined that the same man committed both acts. Early last month, the police arrested Gordon Fong Hang-keung for those actions. They found the air gun, pellets and the sling shot used at his home.

    The police laboratory determined that the muzzle energy of the air gun exceeded the legal limit of 2 joules. Therefore Fong is being charged with two counts of criminal destruction of property and one count of possessing an unlicensed firearm. Fong faces a maximum sentence of 10 years for criminal destruction of property and 14 years for possession of an unlicensed firearm.

    39-year-old Gordon Fong was a member of a pro-Republic of China organization China Youth Service and Recreation Center. In 2011, he ran for district councilor in Nan Cheong South district, Sham Shui Po and lost to a pro-establishment candidate. Fong is the general manager of a technology company. He has a son and a daughter. He graduated from the School of Business at Western Sydney University, Australia.


    Broken window


    Photos of the air gun and pellets  on Gordon Fong's Facebook

    (Oriental Daily) September 20, 2016.

    In court, the defense pointed out that Gordon Fong is a resident of Australia. In June this year, Fong broke a knee bone while playing ball. Therefore he needed to undergo an operation in Australia soon. The defense applied to be in Australia between October 16 and November 7. Previously Fong posted bail of $20,000. The defense proposed to increase the bail to $50,000 while Fong is away in Australia. The magistrate approved his application.

    - I can write the script for the magistrate: "Gordon Fong is a leader in the democratic movement in Hong Kong. His conduct was impeccable when he studied in Australia and he has never been accused of any criminal activity. He has shown concern about social issues and enthusiasm about politics. This case is completely different from other ordinary crimes. While considering the seriousness of the crime, the court must also weight the motives and purposes of the defendant. Since the defendant has expressed regret, the court will impose 80 hours of community service."

    - If Gordon Fong fired shots at military bases in the United States of America, he would have been shot dead already. Nobody would care because this is what he deserves.

    - For many years, the Yellow Ribbons make fun of the Hong Kong independence people about if and when they will ever 'liberate' the People's Liberation Army barracks in Hong Kong. Everybody knows that this is an essential step but nobody even want to talk about it. But now Gordon Fong has actually done it! So how come he is not being hailed as a hero/martyr of the Hong Kong independence/self-determination movement?

    (Oriental Daily) November 21, 2017.

    The judge came to a verdict in the case of Gordon Fong. In terms of the evidence, the prosecution presented evidence found in the areas of the incidents. The defense presented psychiatric reports on the defendant, including him telling the psychiatrist that he had committed the acts mentioned. The judge therefore believed that this was true.

    The judge accepted the conclusion from the psychiatrist that the defendant had low intelligence, autism and schizophrenia. The judge also accepted that the defendant's actions were commanded by voices coming from inside his brain. However, the judge said that this does not affect the defendant's ability to tell right from wrong. The defendant knew that it was wrong, but did it anyway. When the police arrested the defendant, they found a key which opened a locked locker containing the air gun and the pellets. This proved that the defendant realized that the air gun was restricted under the law.

    The judge found the defendant guilty on three counts. Sentencing is scheduled for December 5. Meanwhile, Gordon Fong is remanded to custody in Siu Lam. After Fong heard that he was going to be remanded, he  thanked the judge profusely.

    - Gordon Fong was ordered by the voices inside his brain to shoot at the People's Liberation Army? This is the first time that a Umbrella Revolutionary has mounted such a defense. Gordon Fong is a trailblazer.

    - (Wen Wei Po) November 22, 2017.

    Gordon Fong was arrested at the airport when he returned to Hong Kong on August 15. Under caution, he told the police: "I didn't do it." Later he admitted during a video interview that he had been in a bad mood after quarreling with his wife and imbibed a large amount of alcohol. He had no recollection of what happened. He only remembered that he used an air gun to fire once or twice at a residential building in Kowloon Tong. Afterwards, he took the MTR to Sham Shui Po where he discarded the air gun.

    Later, the police searched Fong's home in Sai Ying Poon and found the air gun, more than 4,300 plastic bullets and more than 600 metal bullets in a locked locker. The police searched Fong's mobile phone notes and found comments such as "The continuation of the great revenge," "firing at the residences of senior PLA officials", etc.

    (Oriental Daily) December 5, 2017.

    At sentencing, the defense pleaded that the psychiatric report showed that the defendant sufered from autism and other mental problems. At present, his condition is stable. Therefore an order for hospitalization is unnecessary. The defense also presented numerous letters written on behalf of the defendant. The defense said that the defendant had reflected while in custody, and will actively seek psychiatric treatment afterwards instead of venting in immature ways.

    The judge said that the destructive behavior of the defendant was not extremely severe and the air gun did not have a lot of firepower. The defendant was hearing voices that told him to do it. The psychiatria report says that the situation has stabilized. Therefore the judge sentenced Gordon Fong to 2 weeks in jail.

    (Wen Wei Po) September 20, 2016.

    On February 9, 2016, 30-year-old Chu Hang Chi posted on his Facebook: "When your seven policemen made the assault, it took one full year for them to be prosecuted on a light charge. Police superintendent Franklin Chu hung around until he retired and he still wants to interfere with the Police Public Relations Branch. The people will find their own way of sanctioning you. You chose to be running dogs of the authorities and you deserve to die. Let it be stated here that I will donate $10,000 to any organization which beats a police officer to death."

    On February 13, Chu went to the Yuen Long Police Station and filed a report that a hacker broke into his Facebook account to post those comments. After Chu finished stating his case, he was asked to sign the statement. At that moment, Chu admitted that he fabricated the case. Under caution, Chu admitted that he was angry and unhappy with the police and made the Facebook post. He filed the false report because he was worried that the backlash would affect his family and his job.

    In mitigation, the defense pleaded that Chu was a senior Immigration Department immigration assistant who has been suspended at this time. Chu expects to be dismissed after a disciplinary hearing. Chu made the Facebook comment because he held "dissident views" but he never expected that society would react to this degree. Even after the Facebook post was removed by Chu, certain Internet users published Chu's personal information and mobilized the public to complain to the Immigration Department. Chu's wife wrote to the court to say that people have threatened to kill Chu and therefore the family was very upset. The defense said that Chu filed the false police report on February 13 because he was worried about the personal safety of his son.

    - (Oriental Daily) September 19, 2016. The defendant was earning $25,000 per month at the time that he was suspended. He believes that he will be dismissed after a disciplinary hearing. Serves him right!

    - This is classical political oppression. What a person does outside his job is his own business. The fact that he works for the Immigration Department is not relevant to his exercise of his freedom of expression. This is naked terrorism by the Hong Kong communist government.

    (SCMP) September 30, 2016.

    An immigration assistant who claimed on Facebook he would donate HK$10,000 to any organisation that beat a Hong Kong police officer to death following the Mong Kok riot in February was slapped with 100 hours of community service by a court on Friday.

    Chu Hang-chi, 30, also faces an Immigration Department disciplinary proceeding that could strip him of his job, from which he has been suspended since his arrest on February 13. But he was still drawing pay until he admitted the offence earlier this month.

    Tuen Mun Court previously heard that Chu and his family had been experiencing harassment since the message was posted in February as their personal information was posted online, with some people threatening to report and kill him.

    That prompted him to file a report with the police days later on February 13, claiming his Facebook account had been hacked. But when he was asked to sign the report, he suddenly confessed that it was he who posted the message out of anger and dissatisfaction towards the police.

    Acting principal magistrate Merinda Chow said one must be cautious in ones speech because it can quickly circulate online. What you wrote caused great noise, she said in sentencing Chu on one count of knowingly attempting to mislead a police officer. Some people felt disgusted and so they attacked you.

    The case centred on a Facebook post on Chus account on or about February 9, following unrest in Mong Kok that saw clashes between police and protesters. The people will use their way to sanction you, the post stated. If you choose to fall as a foot soldier of the empire, then death is not to be regretted. I give my word here, if any organisation is to beat a cop to death, I will donate ten thousand dollars to that organisation.

    The post had referred to the alleged assault of former Civic Party activist Ken Tsang Kin-chiu, for which seven police officers are now standing trial, and one involving passer-by Osman Cheng Chung-hang by the now-retired superintendent Franklin Chu King-wai during the Occupy movement in 2014.

    When the seven police officers assaulted someone, it took a year to charge them with a lesser charge, the post continued. Yet Chu King-wai made it to his retirement and tried to interfere with the Independent Police Complaints Councils decision.

    Counsel Joshua Choy said in mitigation his client had been under a lot of pressure at the time of the post because his wife was suffering from post-partum depression and his infant son had Erbs palsy. He felt perplexed and confused about what was happening in society so he foolishly committed the offence, he added.

    - (Oriental Daily) September 30, 2016. The defendant Chu Hang-chi was suspended in February, but continued to draw half pay. The Immigration Department disciplinary hearing will not take place until the court case is concluded. Now that Chu has pleaded guilty and sentenced, the hearing will surely result in his dismissal. Still, Chu got four months' pay for doing nothing.

    (Wen Wei Po) September 20, 2016.

    On September 1, 2016, Chau Wing-lok wore a vest with the name of Civic Passion legislative council candidate Wong Yeung-tat (Civic Passion) and campaigned outside Tsui Ping Estate, Kwun Tong district. Outside a restaurant in Tsui Tung House, he tried to explain Wong's ideas to a middle-aged couple who were drinking beer. There was a difference of opinion, and Chau argued with a 42-year-old woman. Suddenly Chau picked up a beer bottle and hit the woman over the head. Fortunately the bottle did not splinter into pieces. The hit caused swelling on the forehead of the woman.

    In court yesterday, Chau Wing-lok pleaded guilty to one count of assault that caused bodily harm. Sentencing is scheduled for October 26, 2016 pending probation report.

    The defense pleaded that Chau was "crying" when he met with the other party. This proves that he knew that he was wrong and regretted doing it. The defense said that Chau should be allowed to go on on bail and continue his studies.

    At court today, Civic Passion vice-chairman Cheng Chung-tai refused to either confirm or deny that Chau is a Civic Passion member. However, Chau said in an interview last year that he is a Civic Passion member and he had obtained the permission of Civic Passion chairman Wong Yeung-tat to state his political party membership.

    (Oriental Daily) October 26, 2016.

    At court today, Chau Wai-lok was sentenced to 24 months of probation. The magistrate said that Chau will go to jail if he violates the terms of his probation.

    (SCMP) September 19, 2016.

    A mainland housewife has been jailed for five months and one week for assaulting a local grandmother at the Sha Tin MTR station, in what has been a high-profile case underscoring Hongkongers ongoing conflict with mainlanders.

    The Sha Tin Court on Monday convicted Huang Yufeng, 28, of inflicting grievous bodily harm on Lam Yuet-fan, 55, outside the Maxims cake shop on May 9.

    Lam suffered from temporary loss of speech and unstable emotions and had difficulty walking as a result of the attack.

    Principal Magistrate Andrew Ma Hon-cheung also found the mainlander guilty of assault occasioning actual bodily harm on Lams daughter Bryony Lau Kwan-mei, 28, in the same incident.

    Lau was left with cuts on her face and upper arm.

    The defendant fought back tears as she heard the hour-long verdict. Her lawyer begged for leniency, saying that the defendant was four months pregnant and would like to give birth back home rather than in Hong Kong. She applied for bail pending appeal, but was rejected.

    The court ruled that Huang rushed towards the pair, causing Lam to fall backwards and hit the back of her head. The fall resulted in intense pain and a lump which Lam said was as big as a pineapple bun. Huang then went on to pull Laus hair and assault her.

    Coming to her own defence in an earlier session, Huang, a Guangdong native, said she rushed towards the two in an effort to snatch Laus phone. Huang said the daughter had tailed and filmed her family after two earlier confrontations and threatened to upload the video to the internet.

    Huang denied causing Lams injuries, saying it was Lau who knocked her own mother down. But the magistrate refused to accept her claims, and said video footage of the incident did not corroborate her account.

    Ma said footage showed Huang had no intention of slowing down when she approached the pair, and that Lam had fallen immediately after the accused rushed at them with both arms stretched out. The most probable scenario is that out of anger, [the defendant] slightly lost control and used full speed to charge, in a bid [for revenge] as well as to stop the filming, he said.

    There was also no need for Huang to launch the subsequent assault on Lau, Ma added, as the defendants daughter was protected by her husband at the time. But the magistrate also criticised Laus filming as unwise and unnecessary.

    Ma called the attack serious and said it had left an unerasable impression on Lam, before convicting Huang.

    During sentencing, Ma noted that Lam now walks with a crutch and suffers from speech problems, anxiety and a string of psychological symptoms that she had not recovered from.

    The case highlighted the ongoing conflict between Hongkongers and mainlanders, with the court hearing previously that Huang, moments before the assault that stemmed from a dispute over her child and Lams grandson, had asked the local pair why Hongkongers thought they were so superior.

    The incident was widely circulated on the internet in May when Lams other daughter made a post on Facebook in search of witnesses.

    Huang faced abuse from people both inside and outside the courtroom, and on the internet during the trial. But the magistrate said the case should not be viewed as an incident that escalated from any Hong Kong-mainland conflict. He warned the public that all defendants, be they locals, mainlanders or foreign nationals, should be treated equally, and urged the police to take action against acts that could amount to criminal intimidation.

    In mitigation, Huangs lawyer insisted the case arose from her worry for her family.

    Videos:

    Apple Daily https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHwDrgJE2Hg
    Apple Daily https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dZO6yeAybJg
    Apple Daily https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acl_iNtxRW4

    Internet comments:

    - This case is one of a mainland woman assaulting a Hong Kong mother-daughter couple. It does not fit in the Umbrella Revolution category. However, Principal Magistrate Andrew Ma Hon-cheung said that "all defendants, be they locals, mainlanders or foreign nationals, should be treated equally." That has to be tested against reality. What do you think will happen in the preceding cases about Umbrella Revolutionaries?

    Why does Gordon Fong get to go to Australia for his knee operation while Huang Yufeng goes to jail to deliver her baby? Why can't Gordon Fong get his operation in jail while Huang Yufeng get to go home to deliver her baby?

    What do you think Chau Wai Lok will get for smashing a beer bottle on the head of a woman? 80 hours of community service? No, because that would interfere with his studies. A better solution is one week in jail suspended for one year.

    - (Oriental Daily) The defense said that the Huang Yufeng is a devout Buddhist and four months pregnant. If sentenced to five months and one week in jail, she may have to deliver her baby in Hong Kong.

    By virtue of being born in Hong Kong, the baby is automatically a Hong Kong citizen with right of abode, and the mother can be brought eventually to Hong Kong for family unification. That is the immediate consequence of this verdict. The sentence begins immediately without bail pending appeal.

    - Your calculation is wrong. The magistrate calculated exactly to the time just before the baby was due so that Huang Yufeng can serve the maximum jail time and be released and expelled just before the baby is due. The true calculation is that you may be served to 5 months and 1 week, but you actually serve about two-thirds of the total time because Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays do not have to be served.

    (The Standard) September 2, 2016.

    Activist Sally Tang Mei-ching from Socialist Action who brought three banner poles into an MTR station told the court yesterday that at Stockholm Metro, which is operated by MTR Corp Limited, luggage of up to two meters is allowed.

    Tang, 26, faced two summons for bringing prohibited items of luggage and failure to give particulars of name, address or telephone number or to produce proof of identity when she appeared at Tuen Mun Magistrates' Court.

    She was accused of bringing poles of about 160 centimeters long, violating the 130cm restriction at Kowloon Tong station and refusing to show her identity card despite a request by MTR staff on September 25 last year. Defending herself, Tang submitted a document in Swedish to the court without translation on Wednesday, but did not submit it to the prosecutor.

    Yesterday Tang told deputy magistrate Joseph Lee Jo-ey the document was about the standard of luggage of Stockholm Metro, which is operated by the MTR Corp, and stated that the restriction is two meters. The poles according to Socialist Action's Facebook were for promoting the concept of the Occupy movement.

    An officer from the MTR's rapid response unit, Ho Yan-yee, yesterday testified that she approached Tang and said she would like to measure the poles as she saw Tang carrying the three white plastic poles taller than her. But Tang did not cooperate. Ho said: "Miss please cooperate or else I will prosecute you."

    A man with Tang took the poles from her and said: "No need to pay attention to these staff."

    The staff members eventually got a measurement of 160 cm and requested them to show their identity cards.

    Tang was heard saying: "I won't give it to you, let's wait until the police arrive," and she kept on saying: "Shame on MTR bullying small citizens" with a loudspeaker until the arrival of police before she showed them her identity card.

    A MTR legal staff member, Wong Wing-fai, told the court notices on carriage of luggage were posted near the ticket vending places, it was stated in the notices MTR urban line passengers can only carry luggage of which the total dimensions, the length, width and height do not exceed 170cm and the length of any one side of the luggage does not exceed 130cm. Wong said even though the MTRC relaxed the restriction to 145cm in August, it only applies to musical instruments or sports equipment and application is required. Wong said normal objects including the sticks in the case are subject to the 130cm restriction.

    (SCMP) September 21, 2016.

    A lawmaker-elect said the Legislative Council should find time to review MTR by-laws, after a social activist was fined HK$2,000 on Friday for refusing to produce proof of her identity to staff who stopped her as she carried three 160cm plastic sticks into a station. The two offences were contrary to MTR by-laws, which Long Hair Leung Kwok-hung said need reviewing. There is no reason to violate rights of the public, he said in support of Sally Tang Mei-ching, chairwoman of Socialist Action.

    Tuen Mun Court was previously told that the MTR Corp had imposed luggage height restrictions capped at 130cm to minimise passengers risk of electrocution. But Tang, 26, argued it was ridiculous to consider the three sticks she carried into Kowloon Tong Station on September 25 last year would pose such a danger. She also argued that MTR staff should not be allowed to check passengers personal information.

    But deputy magistrate Joseph Lee Jo-ey sided with prosecutors in finding her guilty of carrying prohibited items of baggage and of failing to produce proof of identity for inspection. He fined her HK$1,000 on each count. Lee said the sticks posed a risk of injury or damage to railway property as they towered over children and even some adults. They would be even higher above the ground when carried during travelling, he said.

    The court heard that Tang had shouted, Shame to MTR, bully small citizens, after her confrontation with staff. I believe Im innocent, she said in mitigation. MTR is a profit-making organisation that is restricting citizens space in order to pack more people into its trains thats why they wont relax the luggage restrictions. This is obvious.

    Under the by-laws, carrying prohibited items of luggage is punishable by a maximum penalty of a HK$2,000 fine. Failure to provide name, address or telephone number or to produce proof of identity carries a higher maximum penalty a HK$5,000 fine and six months imprisonment.

    (China Worker) August 12, 2016.

    CWI member Sally Tang Mei-ching will appear in court on 1 September in a case brought by the MTR, Hong Kongs seventh largest corporation by market value. She is charged with two offences that carry the maximum penalty of six months imprisonment and a HK$7,000 (800 euro equivalent) fine. This is clearly a case of political persecution against a spokeswoman for a well-known anti-big business and anti-establishment political organisation. Many similar incidents are overlooked by the MTR but in this case it is taking a hard line and is determined to bring the issue to court.

    MTR is Hong Kongs rail and metro corporation and also one of the biggest property developers. Its allegations against Sally are that she 1) brought oversized luggage onto the metro system, and 2) failed to show ID and personal information to MTR company staff. The case has aroused considerable publicity in Hong Kong due to Sallys relatively high profile as an anti-government activist and because MTR is heavily criticised on a range of issues from excessive fare increases to its involvement in billion dollar white elephant projects.

    Sally entered a not guilty plea and is determined to fight the case to challenge the MTRs high-handed policies. The ban on oversize luggage is a highly controversial policy in Hong Kong, especially when the company launched a crackdown on the issue, which provoked protests by musicians and other groups. This rule especially hits working class families who dont own a car and need to move large but not dangerous articles by metro.

    Sally was stopped by MTR staff inside Kowloon Tong station in September 2015 for carrying a banner pole, made of lightweight plastic and under 160 cm in length. The Hong Kong MTR imposed a ban on objects over 130 cm in length, while more generous rules apply on other train systems operated by the company internationally (in Stockholm, for example, the MTR-run metro system permits items up to 200 cm in length). Therefore, from a safety perspective, these rules do not make much sense. Furthermore, under the pressure of public criticism, MTR recently modified its rules in Hong Kong allowing some items of luggage up to 145 cm in length.

    When asked by MTR staff to produce her ID, Sally insisted that she would show her ID only to a police officer and asked for the police to be called. There is a reaction in Hong Kong among young people especially to the power of big corporations and concerns over individual privacy, against a background of more repressive government policies and attacks on democratic rights. Because MTR also has extensive financial interests through its electronic card system Octopus, it has been widely criticised over cases where travellers personal information has been sold to other businesses.

    MTR is a big multinational corporation, which was privatised in 2000. It is a major property developer and landlord in Hong Kong. It also invests in railways in different parts in the world, and has obtained contracts to operate rapid transit systems in London, Stockholm, Melbourne, and Sydney. The companys CEO Lincoln Leong Kwok-kuen takes HK$14 million a year in salary! While making huge profits (over HK$10 billion every year or 1.15 billion euro), it has still increased train fares every year, with a trend of increasing accidents and worsening maintenance standards, which has made it extremely unpopular within society.

    Sally Tang Mei-ching is defending herself in court, while the MTR has hired a team of barristers and lawyers against her, again raising questions about how they use public money.

    This case is a bit like David versus Goliath! says Sally. But I have got a lot of support from youth and grassroots working people who are really angry about the way MTR is run today. This case is about challenging the unchecked power of big corporations.

    Socialist Action are demanding:
    Drop the charges against Sally Tang Mei-ching!
    Defend personal privacy rights!
    For a public and fully transparent review of MTRs oversized luggage policy, open to representatives of the public, unions and passengers to create fairer rules.
    For democratic public control and ownership of public transport kick out the profiteers!

    Now for the Chinese press:

    (Oriental Daily) September 2, 2016.

    The prosecution summoned engineering manager Chan Kwok-sun to testify, for he had previously participated in defining the standards on luggage size. Chan said that a long object may inadvertently touch upon the overhead electric cables and cause electrocution, as well as damage the ceilings of the stations and cars. Furthermore, it may interfere with other passengers.

    During cross-examination, the defense asked Chan whether the platform barriers would prevent long objects from touching the overhead electric cables. Chan said that the main purpose of the platform barriers was to prevent people from falling onto the tracks. The defense told Chan that the London and Stockholm subway systems have different luggage size standards, and the Hong Kong MTR Corp operates those two systems as well. Chan said that the London and Stockholm subway systems were joint ventures with different designs for stations and cars. Therefore, "I am completely not surprised that they should have different standards."

    The defense pointed out to Chan that there were 826 incidents in the MTR in 2006 compared to 1246 incidents in 2015 for a huge increase of 51% over ten years. Chan said that the 2006 figure was for the MTR, whereas the 2015 was for the combined post-merger MTR/KCR. If the comparison was made with the sum of MRT plus KCR in 2006 versus 2015, the number of incidents would have decreased instead.

    (Oriental Daily) September 7, 2016.

    According to police officer Choi, the defendant declined to show her ID to the two MTR workers who wore uniforms and carried MTR ID badges. She was only willing to show her ID to the police officer. Choi said that he explained to the defendant that refusal may result in her being ticketed. Choi said that if the defendant gave her ID information only to the police officer, the MTR may demand that information from the police in order to issue a ticket anyway. The defendant said that she understood.

    In summation, the defendant said that the situation was chaotic at the time. Since the witnesses summoned by the prosecution all worked for the MTR, there is a conflict of interest and therefore they cannot be trusted. The defendant said that since the poles that she carried were used for a political activity, she believes that the MTR tightened the regulations in order to deprive the citizens of the right to carry materials on public transportation. The magistrate said that no such evidence was offered to support the contention.

    The defendant said that the MTR continues to raise prices even as their profits are growing. Therefore it is unjust for the MTR to spend so much time and money to prosecute a citizen. The magistrate said that MTR prices are not germane to this case.

    (Oriental Daily) September 23, 2016.

    The magistrate said that the defendant claimed that many other subway systems around the world allow luggage of greater sizes without posing any danger to passengers and therefore she cannot be prosecuted. The magistrate said that this is not the same thing.

    The magistrate said that the defendant claimed that she was not sure that those people who intercepted her were MTR employees. But the two MTR employees wore uniforms with name badges. Furthermore, the defendant then used her megaphone to chant "Shame to MTR, bully small citizens" which showed that she was fully aware that the two persons were MTR employees.

    The magistrate said that the defendant claimed that MTR employees have no right to demand to see the ID's of citizens. However, this right is conferred according to CAP 556B Mass Transit Railways By-laws: Part IX Article 24 Remove of persons from railway premises:

    (1) Any person who is reasonably suspected by an official of committing or attempting to commit any breach of these by-laws, while in or upon any part of the railway premises shall, when required to do so by such official-

    (a) give to that official true and correct particulars of his name and address and of his telephone number, if any, and produce proof to that effect for inspection; and

    (b) produce to that official proof of his identity for inspection. (L.N. 8 of 1998)

    The magistrate concluded that the defendant either does not understand the law or else knowingly disregarded the law. Therefore the magistrate found the defendant guilty on both counts.

    Internet comments:

    - The best bit that they won't tell you in English is this:

    (Oriental Daily) Afterwards, the defendant insisted that she was innocent and that the case was unfair against poor people who could not obtain free legal aid and are therefore forced to plead guilty. Therefore she went to trial in order to protest. Tang said that "法律面前，窮人含忍" (in front of the law, the poor people have to swallow and endure." The magistrate admonished her with "Be careful of your language!" The magistrate said that the defendant showed no remorse and therefore fined her a total of $2,000.

    Why was the magistrate so upset? Tang's phrase is a homonym of "in front of the law, the poor people have to suck cock."

    - $2,000 is a small price to pay the advertising that will enable Sally Tang to be elected to the Legislative Council four years from now. She will be receiving $100,000 per month in salary.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) September 14, 2016.

    Television channel TVB is to stop airing the political debate programme City Forum, a weekly mainstay that has been broadcast live on the channel for 36 years. The programme is produced by RTHK and is known for inviting prominent figures, lawmakers, and academics from different sides to discuss contemporary issues. It takes place at at a public venue, usually Causeway Bays Victoria Park, every Sunday.

    City Forum will still be broadcast on RTHK digital and analogue channels 31 and 31A. TVB and RTHK have been broadcasting the show after RTHK took over ATVs analogue channels in April after the beleaguered broadcasting companys license expired.

    Amen Ng Man-yee, head of RTHKs Corporate Communications Unit, told Ming Pao that the new arrangements were made as RTHK now has its own channels and broadcasting laws did not stipulate that TVB must give RTHK broadcasting time on Sundays.

    Other programmes from RTHK, such as LegCo Review and the political satire programme Headliner will also be broadcast one hour earlier at 6pm. Ng told Ming Pao that as said that as TVBs prime time begins at 6pm, the new arrangements also follow broadcasting rules.

    (HKG Pao) September 19, 2016.

    RTHK's City Forum has always had poor audience ratings, but it has always been haughty. For many years, it had held the Sunday noontime broadcast on TVB when families are eating lunch. TVB wants to move it to Channel J5, but RTHK says no and prefers to broadcast on their own.

    Just when everybody thinks that City Forum is bidding farewell to the public, Apple Daily held a live broadcast of City Forum on Facebook.

    In the past, RTHK has always denied that they are biased. As a government outlet funded by taxpayers' money, they couldn't admit it. Now that they join up with Apple Daily, how can they deny that "they took the government's money to operate as the opposition's mouthpiece"? Will they ever be able to reverse course and become an independent, neutral media outlet?

    Now that Apple Daily has aired a complete live broadcast, their relationship with RTHK is very clear. What will RTHK do? Will they respect the taxpayers, or will they be directed by Next Media (Next Magazine/Apple Daily)? Will they continue to spend the taxpayers' money so as to make sure that Next Media will earn ad dollars through their live broadcasts of City Forum?

    Before the Legislative Council elections, we listed the policies of the various television channels:

    RTHK: Do not download videos and re-air unedited or edited. Even if you list the source, it is unacceptable. RTHK reserves the right to seek legal redress. Even if you record yourself at the scene, you cannot air it.

    TVB: You can record your own video, or use the YouTube videos, but you have to acknowledge the source.

    Cable TV: You can record your own video, or use the YouTube videos, but you have to acknowledge the source.

    NOW TV: You can record your own video, or use the YouTube videos, but you have to acknowledge the source.

    As can be seen, RTHK is the most rigorous and unfriendly towards other media in citing their videos. The other television channels merely ask for sourcing and respect. RTHK forbids re-transmission and even derivative art and live coverage.

    Interestingly, this copyright-sensitive government media outlet has turned a blind eye to what Next media is doing while shouting at all others to stop and desist. Did RTHK give permission to Apple Daily to make live broadcasts of their programmes? Or did Apple Daily violate the copyright of RTHK without permission? Will RTHK pursue the issue?

    So everybody wants to know whether a government department can hold double standards? On one hand, they will generously let Apple Daily make the live broadcast for free, while on the other hand they continue to refuse all else.

    In the past, RTHK has threatened HKG Pao with legal action for using screen captures. We have now decided that we will continue to use photos, sounds and videos from RTHK where appropriate and we will see how RTHK responds.

    If Apple Daily can get benefits and accommodation from RTHK, we should be able to do so in like manner. Let us wait and see if RTHK really has a One Channel Two Systems in place.

    - Internet comments:

    - Most people will watch the TVB channels 81-85, so will watch VIU-TV channel 99 and practically nobody watches RTHK channels 31-33. The RTHK City Forum will get near zero ratings at channel 31 only.

    - Most of time, channels 31-33 are showing old low-definition videos. Who would want to watch them?

    - The interest in the RTHK City Forum is that this is a clown show. You watch it to see innovative ways of insulting people. Otherwise there is no substantive content to speak of.

    - Don't forget the boxing matches with the Victoria Park uncles!

    - Those faked boxing matches are nothing much to watch, because the flying punches always miss the purported targets.

    - Unlike the Miss Hong Kong pageant, the RTHK City Forum does not allow discussants to use foul language on air.

    - ATV went out of business due to lousy television audience ratings. RTHK has worse ratings than ATV. The reason why RTHK is still in business is because it is funded by taxpayers' money.

    - (Apple Daily) According to Apple Daily, 210,000 persons watched their live broadcast of City Forum. Many Internet users demand that Apple Daily continue their live broadcast each week.

    - By comparison, TVB just finished broadcasting the serial drama A Fist Within Four Walls. On the final episode, they had an audience of 2.38 million viewers.

    Furthermore, these numbers are measured by an independent research company and cannot be manipulated by either TVB or outsiders. Website hit rates can be easily manipulated by either the operator or outsiders.

    P.S. This audience does not count the Internet audience at the official or unauthorized websites.

    - The 210,000 (if true) is a cumulative audience -- those who click through and may have watched anywhere from zero second to the entire program.

    - If Apple Daily were to write the headline for this news story, it would have been: "Apple Daily in deep shit! Initial broadcast drew only a ratings of 3; Internet users cursed: 'Dump the fucking program!'"

    - This particular post at Discuss.com.hk has drawn 38,000 hits in under two hours already. How hard is it to get 210,000 hits?

    - RTHK acknowledged that Apple Daily filmed and aired without their permission, but they declined to take further action against Apple Daily. Therefore HKG Pao and other media can do likewise.

    Apple Daily is a business. By airing the RTHK City Forum, they garnered 210,000 hits for which they derive direct and indirect ad revenues. So why are the taxpayers subsidizing RTHK so that Apple Daily can make money?

    - Amen Ng Man-yee, head of RTHKs Corporate Communications Unit, said that RTHK will refer HKG Pao to the Department of Justice if they should publish anything without prior approval. However, Ng did not say whether Apple Daily will be referred to the Department of Justice, and that is the main point.

    - (HKG Pao) HKG Pao will not be accused of "All Talk and No Action." Therefore, they have posted a Vimeo video and invite the RTHK authorities to bring in the Department of Justice.

    This video contains segments of the September 18, 2016 RTHK City Forum which was broadcast live by Apple Daily. The edited video is intended to address the very serious issue of whether the RTHK City Forum host was being fair and balanced.

    - (HKG Pao) HKG Pao has posted a second Vimeo video. This video contains segments of the RTHK program Pentaprism II. The Chinese program title is literally "Left Right Red Blue Green" and purports to allow voices across the political spectrum be heard. Each episode is hosted by a different person invited by RTHK. HKG Pao checked the 164 episodes of Pentaprism II aired in 2016. They found 8 government officials, 59 persons with no clear political positions, 4 unclassifiable, 26 pro-establishment persons and 67 pan-democratic persons. Is this a fair and balanced presentation of the political spectrum.

    Like the first video, this edited video is intended to address the very serious issue of whether the RTHK program Pentaprism II is being fair and balanced. HKG Pao invites everybody to share these videos. Of course, your sharing may cause you to be prosecuted by the Department of Justice as RTHK threatened to do so.

    - (Oriental Daily) September 26, 2016.

    This morning, a Kowloon Tong resident noted that RTHK had hung the Chinese national flag and the HKSAR regional flag upside down. According to RTHK, they were told that at around noon about what was happening with the flags and made the corrections immediately. The RTHK spokesperson said that the security guards were responsible for raising the flags in accordance with the guideline. In this case, it was an unintentional error and the relevant security guards had been told to correct their ways.

    - Only at RTHK, of course.

    - For a 30-minute tv program, TVB uses 10 persons, BBC uses 22 persons and RTHK sues 52 persons. But the real question is: How many RTHK people raised the flags upside down? Answer: As many Poles it took to screw in a lightbulb.

    (IB Times) Miss Hong Kong 2016: Here's everything we know about Crystal Fung. August 9, 2016.

    The Miss Hong Kong beauty pageant is just a month away, and 20 contestants have already proceeded to the next round. Crystal Fung, a 22-year-old who majored in food and nutrition at the University of Hong Kong, has already attracted a lot of media attention after she arrived at TVB city driving a million dollar Tesla electric car.

    It remains to be seen if she'll make it to the final rounds of the beauty pageant, but Crystal is a promising candidate to win the title this year. She has been a popular figure on social media even before entering the Miss Hong Kong 2016 competition, and her Instagram followers have only increased in these recent months. At present, Crystal has more than 23,000 followers on the photo-sharing medium.

    According to Hong Kong entertainment news portal AH Mike, Crystal was once voted the most beautiful girl at the University of Hong Kong, and this has resulted in her gaining a number of modeling assignments as well. Earlier this year, she also represented Hong Kong at the Mary Kay Beauty Contest in Shanghai. Although she did not win the competition, Crystal said she was happy to have performed in front of a large audience.

    This was a great experience for me. I've never walked on such a beautiful stage. I am happy I was able to successfully perform in front of over 10,000 people," she was quoted as saying by AH Mike.

    On the romantic front, Crystal seems to dating a doctor and the gentleman in the picture below seems to be the one who stole her heart.

    A quick scan of her Instagram page also reveals that Crystal is committed to living a healthy lifestyle. But she seems to have a weakness for birthday cakes.


    Miss Hong Kong 2016, Crystal Fung Ying-ying

    Much more interesting is this piece of Crystal Fung presence on social media. Here is one of the many quotable examples:

    Facebook repost of Passion Times's video about an incident in Occupy Mongkok (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBWyBNwwfSc).

    In the video, an anti-Occupy Communist uncle kept using his hands to grope the breasts of a female Occupy participant. The Police came and removed the uncle away from the scene.

    I am not going to stand for this!!! Pok gai, fuck your mother, may your whole family be wiped out!!

    The dirty old man used his hands to squeeze her, the girl kept screaming "Sexual molestation" but he wouldn't stop!
    If someone else didn't intervene and grabbed his hands, the girl would not be able to break away!!
    Everybody saw it. He was clearly filmed and aired on NOW TV.
    What happened to the bastard? The Police patted him on the shoulder and let him go!!!!!
    Huh!??? Is there still rule of law!!!
    If I get molested on the street, with eyewitnesses present, videos taken and the suspect arrested, I still won't be able to fucking tet him prosecuted!!
    In the end, he is going to be released easily!
    Right now, this is no longer about seeking democracy and justice
    This is about the basic issue of personal safety
    If you let them continue, how can anyone dare to walk in the streets!!!!

    Video: https://www.facebook.com/368513580020590/videos/603066293231983/

    Internet comments:

    - In 2015, Louisa Mak was questioned if she was The (Yellow Ribbon?) Miss Hong Kong. This year, Crystal Fung left no doubt that she is the (Yellow Ribbon) Miss Hong Kong. This is going to mean that she will run into protests at her endorsements, appearances, etc.

    - And Crystal Fung had better worry about whether her Home Visit Permit is still valid for traveling to mainland China.


    - Can mainland China invalidate Yellow Zombie Slut Crystal Fung's Home Visit Permit as soon as possible!

    - It is time to trot out the famous quotation from the movie Infernal Affairs: 出得來行，就預左要還 (Once you enter the triad world, you should be prepared to pay the price). When Crystal Fung posted those kinds obscenities on social media, she should be prepared for them to haunt her some day.

    - Crystal Fung was elected by the people through universal suffrage. She received more than 30,000 votes. So even if she turned out to be foul-mouthed, she will continue to represent Hong Kong to the international community. This is the essence of genuine democracy.

    - The Internet has more than a collection of the sayings of Crystal Fung. Since Fung was voted Miss Photogenic, here is the photo of her sans make-up. She looks like a country hick from the Chinese hinterlands.

    - Here is her Form 6 (Secondary School) photo:

    Caption: It is not a dream for a Pork Chop to become Miss Hong Kong

    - Already Crystal Fung has now an Internet moniker: 馮柒柒. Because she liked to use the obscene word 柒 (expletive) so much, she is to be addressed as Fung Expletive Expletive in future.

    - The word 柒 sounds like the word for the number '7'. So Crystal Fung Ying-ying is also addressed as "Fung 7 7".

    - As James Wong once explained, the words 𨳍 ('7') and 𨳊 ('9') are not used interchangeably.

    Both words refer to male erection. 「應硬而不硬者是戇𨳊，不應硬而硬者是笨𨳍」

    𨳍 ('7') refers to the situation in which you want an erection but your member isn't cooperating. So you are fucking losing your big chance.

    𨳊 ('9') '9' refers to the situation in which you don't want an erection but your member has a will of its own. So you are wasting the occasion and embarrassing yourself.

    Yellow Ribbons such as Crystal Fung use these words arbitrarily without understanding their differences. As such, they are more 𨳊 ('9') than 𨳍 ('7').

    - Derivative art on the Internet, still permitted even if the Copyright (Amendment) Bill was passed.

    - The Yellow Ribbons say that TVB is a Chinese Communist media outlet which they have re-named CCTVB. They say that they will only watch HKTV. So why is Crystal Fung participating in TVB's Miss Hong Kong pageant? And now she is going to sign a contract with all sorts of restrictions on her speech and action rights.

    - Here is Crystal Chow's post on the seven evil cops assaulting Ken Tsang. She refers to the television network as CCTVB!!!

    - Crystal Fung might have been immature when she made those posts more than a year ago. But she should have purged everything once she entered the Miss Hong Kong pageant. If she doesn't realize that, then her brain is the size of a pea.

    - If you try to access Crystal Fung's Facebook now, you will get "This Facebook post is no longer available. It may have been removed or the privacy settings of the post may have changed." Too late, though.

    - Crystal Fung has just set up a new Facebook and she is deleting unfavorable comments. Long live Freedom of Speech!

    - Can Crystal Fung claim that all those purported Facebook posts of hers were forgeries? Like this one about bestiality?

    - Louisa Mak must be celebrating wildly. After putting up with the barbs for one year, she finally has a successor to her crown as well as her troubles.

    - She studied at Hong Kong University, so it is expected that she would be foul-mouthed. Why do you act surprised?

    - If she attended school with people like ex-president of the HKU Student Union president Billy Fung, it is the norm to be foul-mouthed, especially for the women.

    - Of course, a female Hong Kong University can be foul-mouthed if she so chooses. It is just that I don't want a Miss Hong Kong for whom I have to worry about if and when she will let out a "Fuck your mother's stinking cunt!"

    - I read this comment: "In Hong Kong, every person from the richest to the poorest has freedom of speech. People can say whatever they want. It is nobody else's business. So who do they think they are to criticize our Goddess of Democracy?"

    Eh, a beauty pageant is not just about finding a beauty. If so, this becomes a contest among cosmetic surgeons. Miss Hong Kong is chosen for other attributes as well, such as cultivation, character and intelligence. You can barrel your way through based upon "freedom of expression." If you think saying Pok gai, fuck your mother, may your own family be wiped out!! is okay, then you are uncultivated and unrefined; you have no character or integrity; and you have no intelligence.

    - If you want to defend Crystal Fung's freedom of expression, then why don't you defend the Hong Kong Youth Development Society's freedom of expression as well? For calling a Crystal Fung a "foul-mouthed woman worse than a prostitute" and calling for a boycott, Facebook has banned the HKYDS account.

    - When Hong Kong University is seeing its rankings tumbling everywhere, it is expected that Miss Hong Kong should go from Loretta Chu (the first Miss Hong Kong in 1977) to Crystal Fung (2016).

    - Crystal Fung is actually following the footsteps of Michele Monique Reis, the 1988 Miss Hong Kong. Reis is famous for a foul-mouthed telephone conversation with tycoon Joseph Lau: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sRdR91JzGE0

    - The Miss Hong Kong pageant is an opportunity for pretty girls to showcase themselves to marry a rich scion. What matriarch would allow her son to marry a foul-mouthed woman? This is a stigma that will stick to Crystal Fung for the rest of her life.

    - (The Stand)

    At the noontime TVB press conference on the day after Crystal Fung became Miss Hong Kong, she replied to press inquiries about her past social media comments by saying that "she was young and didn't know better" in using overly excited language to express her opinions. She said that she was affected by the "passionate atmosphere" among university students at the time and she only did so because she loves Hong Kong. She emphasized that she does not use foul language in private. She said that those things took place two years ago, but she has now matured and entered society. "The same thing will look different when viewed from a different angle." She said that things should be handled with tolerance and positive attitudes.

    - Crystal Fung is 23-years-old today. Is she so mature and learned? Two years ago in October 2014, she was 21-years-old. Was she so immature and ignorant? Nothing much can change in two years. The difference is that there is a pile of money to be made here, and so she has to discard the inconvenient baggage.

    - The discussion forums are also reporting that she is a Civic Passion member. This puts her into a dilemma whether she confirms or disavows, she is going to alienate some easily excitable people.

    - Crystal Fung's tactic is to plead youthful ignorance and to say that she is not normally foul-mouthed. This is unconvincing. A better tactic would be to admit that she was foul-mouthed before because most people around her at the time spoke that way. Since she is now Miss Hong Kong, she promises not to be foul-mouthed because the public has certain expectations for Miss Hong Kong.

    - Even if Crystal Fung never entered the Miss Hong Kong pageant, she would have to face the same issue. When she was still in school, many of her friends may be foul-mouthed and so was she. But once she graduated and got a job, she couldn't expect to behave in the same manner towards her supervisors, colleagues, clients and elders. And if you use obscene language on radio/television, it will be beeped out. These are the social norms today. That is why Crystal Fung has to bail out.

    - Cheese-eating surrender monkey

    - Yellow Ribbon double standards: If someone else committed a youthful error, he/she must resign immediately. If a Yellow Ribbon does the same thing, he/she must be forgiven and even praised for being straight and sincere.

    - The students say that they were born in a time of chaos and therefore have certain kinds of responsibilities. Does this include a responsibility of kowtowing to TVB for a job?

    - On TVB, Crystal Fung was asked about the issue of the students' views on the automatic appointment of the HKSAR Chief Executive as the Chancellor of the universities. Fung said that the students are the foundation of the universities, and therefore the university administration should listen to their demands. That is going to please the students. But in the same interview, she also said that the students commit youthful errors. So why should the university administration commit the youthful errors as demanded by the students?

    - If TVB is really functioning as CCTVB on behalf of the Central Propaganda Department of the Chinese Communist government, then Crystal Fung would be the best choice of Miss Hong Kong. Her recantation is worth as much as the photos of Edward Leung and Ray Wong meeting with US Consulate General employees.

    - When the Facebook sayings of Crystal Fung first surfaced, the Yellow Ribbons rose up in unison to praise her character and courage. In a matter of hours, Fung recanted her youthful mistakes. The Yellow Ribbons collapse into despair first, then turned around to attack her as a hypocrite who sold out the cause for the sake of fame and fortune. Yesterday's Yellow Ribbon Goddess is now the rat scurrying across the street.

    - The fact that Crystal Fung was foul-mouthed is a personal issue. The people of Hong Kong have the right to like or dislike a Miss Hong Kong, and such opinions have been regularly expressed over time. So this should have been a non-issue ... except when the hordes of Yellow Ribbon celebrities rise up to defend Crystal Fung and her foul-mouthed tirades and condemn her critics for being uncultured or suppressing freedom of expression. For example, the past Miss Hong Kong Louisa Mak said that there are words that are even more obscene than expletives (??). This is what makes it an issue. Why are we being told that we should not think for ourselves or express our own opinions? Why are we forced to automatically take a position based upon the apparent political position of the person? Will future Miss Hong Kong pageants include a section on showing how foul-mouthed the contestants can be?

    - (Kinliu) The foul-mouthed Miss Hong Kong. By Chris Wat Wing-yin. September 17, 2016.

    Pity TVB.

    Their normal Miss Hong Kong pageant became a series of public relations disasters. The friendly ambassador for Hong Kong turned out to be a foul-mouthed spokesperson. Most ironically, the preceding Miss Hong Kong Louisa Mak jumped out to defend foul-mouthed language. In so doing, these two highly educated Miss Hong Kong's have destroyed the myth of beauty and brains.

    When her foul-mouthed language on Facebook were posted, Ms. Fung said: "I was young and ignorant, and I wrote in anger. I don't normally speak it." So the next day someone found a video of Ms. Fung using foul language: "My lord, I don't want it ... the foreigners down there are fucking stunned to see us!" This was suggestive and vulgar. Such is our pretty ambassador.

    A public relations disaster is that once a bomb explodes, you pour boiling oil to put out that fire and you end up with a worse disaster.

    Are you entitled to use foul language just because you are young and ignorant? Ms. Fung made those Facebook posts two years ago, when she was twenty years old. How are still young and ignorant at 20? At 20, you can vote. No wonder these young and ignorant people have elected those young and ignorant legislators.

    I remember that the prettiest Miss Hong Kong Loretta Chu was only 19 years old when she was crowned. She was younger than Ms. Fung. She had just graduated from secondary school. She did not attend Hong Kong University or Cambridge University. But she was always well-mannered and comely. She is a grandmother now, but there has never been any scandals around her.

    The healthiest Miss Hong Kong Olivia Cheng was also crowned when she was 19 years old. She had tanned skin and was the holder of the Hong Kong women's high jump record. She picked up golf and was voted the best female golf player in Hong Kong five years in a row. She was also the first Chinese female golf coach. She showed her nude body in a photo album, but no one considered it to be obscene.

    By comparison, our foul-mouthed Miss Hong Kong said that she was young and ignorant? Sorry, many women were young once, they were ignorant but they never used foul language in public. I have many friends who have never once used foul language in their entire lives.

    The former Miss Hong Kong Louisa Mak said: "Actually there are many things that sound worse than foul language ..." This means that if there are worse things out there, then foul language is okay? According to this logic, there are worse crimes than robbery out there, then it is okay to commit robbery? There are worse acts than sexual molestation, then it is okay to commit sexual molestation? ... I finally understood that since there are worse things than throwing bricks, then everybody thinks that it is acceptable to throw bricks.

    It is not a crime to use foul language. But it is a problem for Miss Hong Kong to be foul-mouthed. To put out the fire, it is as simple as making a sincere apology like Leon Lai did. The people of Hong Kong won't blame you for being foul-mouthed; they are upset at you and your supporters for using various excuses to rationalize foul language. It is true that foul language is part of Cantonese culture, but it is the lowest level of Cantonese culture. It is a problem when the educated intelligentsia use the language of the lowest level.

    In a few years time, nobody will remember the name of the 2016 Miss Hong Kong. But Crystal Fung will be known forever as the "foul-mouthed Miss Hong Kong." Will the Wai Yin Association (for former Miss Hong  Kongs) invite Fung to join them? The name Wai Yin refers to intelligence, beauty and propriety. Which standard does Fung meet?

    - For the edification of Louisa Mak, here are the various fines for using obscene language in various public locations according to the respective ordinances:;

    Tram: $100
    MTR: $5,000
    Bus, mini-bus, taxi: $3,000/6 months in jail
    Airplane: $50,000/2 years in jail
    Hospital: $1,000 for first offense ($2,000/1 month in jail for recidivists)
    Sports arena: $2,000/14 days in jail)

    - Louisa Mak may have studied law, but she clearly doesn't think that the law needs to be observed.

    - Why do such ordinances exist? While you can exercise your freedom of speech, the others stuck in the bus with you have the right not to listen to your obscenities. You are verbally harassing this captive audience, which has the right to complain. In the case of your Facebook posts, other people at least have the ability not to read your invectives. Not so in confined public space.

    - (HKG Pao) September 24, 2016. Yesterday at an awards show organized by an automobile brand, Miss Hong Kong Crystal Fung spoke to the press. Suddenly she spoke to the microphone: "Testing microphone, testing microphone, Lo Hoi Pang testing microphone ..." This caused a sensation among the reporters.

    The Hong Kong actor Lo Hoi Pang was well-known for checking the microphone with 盧海鵬試咪 ，屌你老母西！ "Lo Hoi Pang testing microphone ... fuck your mother's cunt ... alright or not?" If the engineer said yes, then it means Lo Hoi Pang can go fuck his mother's cunt; if the engineer says no, then Lo Hoi Pang will repeat the phrase until the system is correctly set.

    The reporters asked Crystal Fung whether she knew that what comes next is an obscene phrase. She acted surprise and said, "No more, no more. I was just testing the microphone. There isn't a next phrase."

    So it would seem that Crystal Fung is maximizing media exposure with her image as the Foul-mouthed Miss Hong Kong. But it is not certain that the automobile sponsor appreciates this sort of thing.

        HKU POP poll 9.3.2016 Predicted # HKRA poll 8.29-9.1.2016 Predicted # Official Official Official
      Name (Party) % of Seats % of Seats # of votes % of votes # elected
    District Council (Second) James To Kun Shun (Democratic Party) 23.0% 1 22.3% 1 243930 12.8% 1
     Functional Constituency Starry Lee (DAB) 24.0% 1 29.4% 2 304222 15.9% 1
     (5 seats) Kwong Chun Yu (Democratic Party) 10.0%   7.0%   491667 25.7% 1
      Kalvin Ho Kai Ming (ADPL) 2.0%   4.0%   17175 0.9%  
      Sumly Chan Yuen Sum (Civic Party) 5.0%   6.7%   28311 1.5%  
      Wong Kwok Hing (Federation of Trade Unions) 12.0% 1 8.7% 1 233236 12.2%  
      Kwan Wing Yip (Neo Democrats) 1.0%   4.3%   23631 1.2%  
      Leung Yiu Chung (Neighborhood & Worker's Service Centre) 12.0% 1 10.0% 1 303457 15.9% 1
      Holden Chow Ho Ding (DAB) 11.0% 1 7.4%   264339 13.8% 1
                     
                     
    Hong Kong Island Gary Wong Chi Him (independent) 3.0%   1.4%   10028 2.7%  
     (6 seats) Christopher Lau Gar Hung (People Power) 3.0%   2.0%   7276 1.9%  
      Regina Ip Lau Suk Yee (New People's Party) 19.0% 1 20.5% 1 60760 16.1% 1
      Cyd Ho Sau Lan (Labour Party) 6.0%   9.0% 1 19376 5.1%  
      Cheung Kwok Kwan (DAB) 12.0% 1 9.9% 1 41152 10.9% 1
      Chim Pui Chung (independent) 3.0%   1.0%   2587 0.7%  
      Cheng Kam Mun (Civic Passion) 4.0%   4.4%   22555 6.0%  
      Nathan Law Kwun Chung (Demosisto) 8.0% 1 4.4%   50818 13.5% 1
      Shum Chee Chiu (independent) 0.0%   0.8%   1654 0.4%  
      Ricky Wong Wai Kay (independent) 11.0% 1 16.1% 1 33323 8.8%  
      Chui Chi Kin (independent) 1.0%   0.8%   670 0.2%  
      Paulus Johannes Zimmerman (independent) 0.0%   3.3%   2550 0.7%  
      Hui Chi Fung (Democratic Party) 7.0%   6.4%   42499 11.3% 1
      Tanya Chan (Civic Party) 14.0% 1 12.8% 1 35404 9.4% 1
      Kwok Wai Keung (Federation of Trade Unions) 9.0% 1 7.2% 1 45925 12.2% 1
                     
                     
    Kowloon West Avery Ng Man Yuen (League of Social Democrats) 4.0%   2.6%   6811 2.4%  
     (6 seats) Jonathan Ho Chi Kwong (independent) 0.0%   0.7%   399 0.1%  
      Claudia Mo Man Ching (Civic Party) 8.0% 1 17.2% 1 32323 11.6% 1
      Leung Mei Fun (BPA) 24.0% 1 12.8% 1 49745 17.8% 1
      Tam Kwok Kiu (ADPL) 3.0%   4.0%   15383 5.5%  
      Chu Siu Hung (independent) 1.0%   1.1%   680 0.2%  
      Raymond Wong Yuk Man (Proletariat Political Institute) 8.0% 1 7.7%   20219 7.3%  
      Helena Wong Pik Wan (Democratic Party) 9.0% 1 13.4% 1 26037 9.3% 1
      Lam Yi Lai (independent) 1.0%   0.7%   634 0.2%  
      Ann Chiang Lai Wan (DAB) 17.0% 1 16.6% 1 52541 18.8% 1
      Kwan San Wai (independent) 0.0%   0.0%   938 0.3%  
      Lau Siu Lai (independent) 11.0% 1 8.1% 1 38183 13.7% 1
      Yau Wai Ching (Youngspiration) 7.0%   8.8% 1 20643 7.4% 1
      Augustine Lee Wing Hon (independent) 1.0%   0.8%   874 0.3%  
      Tik Chi Yuen (independent) 5.0%   5.4%   13461 4.8%  
                     
                     
    Kowloon East Wong Kwok Kin (Federation of Trade Unions) 19.0% 1 15.0% 1 47318 14.4% 1
     (5 seats) Wu Sui Shan (Labour Party) 2.0%   1.5%   2535 0.8%  
      Patrict Ko Tat Pun (independent) 1.0%   1.5%   2444 0.7%  
      Tam Heung Man (The Frontier) 2.0%   2.9%   2603 0.8%  
      Paul Tse Wai Chun (independent) 18.0% 1 10.2% 1 47527 14.4% 1
      Wilson Or Chong Shing (DAB) 11.0% 1 15.9% 1 51516 15.7% 1
      Lui Wing Kei (independent) 1.0%   0.6%   1393 0.4%  
      Wu Chi Wai (Democratic Party) 13.0% 1 18.1% 1 50309 15.3% 1
      Jeremy Tam Man Ho (Civic Party) 14.0% 1 18.4% 1 45408 13.8% 1
      Wong Yeung Tat (Civic Passion) 10.0%   7.2%   33271 10.1%  
      Chan Chak To (Kowloon East Community) 4.0%   2.6%   12854 3.9%  
      Tam Tak Chi (People Power) 5.0%   6.1%   31815 9.7%  
                     
                     
    New Territories West Wong Yun Tat ( Neighborhood & Worker's Service Centre) 5.0%   3.2%   20974 3.5%  
     (9 seats) Andrew Wan Siu Kin (Democratic Party) 10.0% 1 8.5% 1 41704 6.9% 1
      Ko Chi Fai (independent) 0.0%   0.0%   604 0.1%  
      Chow Wing Kan (Liberal Party) 1.0%   1.7%   1469 0.2%  
      Cheng Chung Tai (Civic Passion) 8.0% 1 6.4% 1 54496 9.0% 1
      Kwong Koon Wan (independent) 0.0%   0.0%   810 0.1%  
      Michael Tien Puk Sun (New People's Party) 17.0% 1 16.2% 1 70646 11.7% 1
      Ho Kwan Yiu (independent) 7.0% 1 5.4% 1 35658 5.9% 1
      Leung Che Cheung (DAB) 7.0% 1 9.3% 1 50190 8.3% 1
      Kwok Ka Ki (Civic Party) 6.0% 1 7.0% 1 42334 7.0% 1
      Wong Ho Ming (League of Social Democrats) 4.0%   4.4%   28529 4.7%  
      Lee Cheuk Yan (Confederation of Trade Unions) 4.0%   5.9% 1 30149 5.0%  
      Wong Chun Kit (Youngspiration) 2.0%   3.9%   9928 1.6%  
      Mak Mei Kuen (Federation of Trade Unions) 6.0% 1 7.9% 1 49680 8.2% 1
      Frederick Fung Kin Kee (ADPL) 3.0%   5.2%   17872 3.0%  
      Chan Han Pan (DAB) 8.0% 1 10.0% 1 58673 9.7% 1
      Clarice Cheung Wai Ching (independent) 1.0%   0.0%   2390 0.4%  
      Hendrick Lui Chi Hang (independent) 1.0%   0.7%   812 0.1%  
      Tong Wing Chi (independent) 0.0%   0.1%   2408 0.4%  
      Eddie Chu Hoi Dick (independent) 12.0% 1 4.2%   84121 13.9% 1
                     
                     
    New Territories East Christine Fong Kwok Shan (independent) 6.0% 1 5.1% 1 34544 6.0%  
     (9 seats) Lam Cheuk Ting (Democratic Party) 8.0% 1 5.8% 1 39327 6.8% 1
      Liu Tin Shing (independent) 0.0%   0.7%   850 0.1%  
      Chin Wan Kan (Hong Kong Resurgence Order) 3.0%   3.7%   23635 4.1%  
      Leung Kwok Hung (League of Social Democrats) 6.0% 1 4.6%   35595 6.1% 1
      Cheung Chiu Hung (Labour Party) 6.0% 1 3.2%   49800 8.6% 1
      Alvin Yeung Ngok Kiu (Civic Party) 13.0% 1 14.1% 1 52461 9.0% 1
      Raymond Mak Ka Chun (independent) 2.0%   1.2%   8084 1.4%  
      Andrew Cheng Kar Foo (independent) 3.0%   4.2%   17892 3.1%  
      Elizabeth Quat (DAB) 12.0% 1 12.9% 1 58825 10.1% 1
      Hau Chi Keung (independent) 2.0%   0.7%   6720 1.2%  
      Dominic Lee Tsz King (Liberal Party) 5.0%   5.7% 1 20031 3.5%  
      Tang Ka Piu (Federation of Trade Unions) 2.0%   5.5% 1 26931 4.6%  
      Gary Fan Kwok Wai (Neo Democrats) 5.0%   4.6%   31595 5.4%  
      Estella Chan Yuk Ngor (independent) 0.0%   0.1%   486 0.1%  
      Wong Sum Yu (independent) 1.0%   0.0%   1657 0.3%  
      Leticia Lee See Yin 1.0%   1.5%   2938 0.5%  
      Raymond Chan Chi Chuen (People Power) 6.0% 1 1.8%   45993 7.9% 1
      Sixtus Leung Chung Hang (Youngspiration) 7.0% 1 6.1% 1 37997 6.5% 1
      Ronald Leung Kam Shing (independent) 0.0%   0.4%   305 0.1%  
      Yung Hoi Yan (New People's Party) 4.0%   6.0% 1 36183 6.2% 1
      Chan Hak Kan (DAB) 9.0% 1 11.9% 1 48720 8.4% 1

    Internet comments:

    - Pre-election public opinion polls were not always useful, because voters switched their votes strategically. For example, in the District Council (Second) Functional Constituency, the Hong Kong University Public Opinion Programme said:

    #1 James To (23%)
    #2 Starry Lee (24%)
    #3 Kwong Chun Yu (10%)
    #4 Kalvin Ho Kai Ming (2%)
    #5 Sumly Chan (5%)
    #6 Wong Kwok Hing (12%)
    #7 Kwan Wing Yip (1%)
    #8 Leung Yiu Chung (12%)
    #9 Holden Chow Ho Ding (11%)

    The final results were:

    #1 James To (12.8%)
    #2 Starry Lee (15.9%)
    #3 Kwong Chun Yu (25.7%)
    #4 Kalvin Ho Kai Ming (0.9%)
    #5 Sumly Chan (1.5%)
    #6 Wong Kwok Hing (12.2%)
    #7 Kwan Wing Yip (1.2%)
    #8 Leung Yiu Chung (15.9%)
    #9 Holden Chow Ho Ding (13.8%)

    This happened because Kalvin Ho, Sumly Chan and Kwan Wing Yip suspended their campaigns in order to transfer their votes to Kwong Chun Yu who was sixth in the pre-election poll. Also the Democratic Party called for their voters in certain geographies to switch from the better known James To to the newcomer Kwong Chun Yu. As a result, Kwong Chun became the top vote-getter and almost endangered James To.

    - The pre-election public opinion polls were more useful than you think. The HKRA poll reported the number of undecided's to be above 20% in all geographical constituencies. The media reports on the HKU-POP poll did not report the number of undecided's, but that is also believed to be above 20%. Why are so many people still undecided? Because they want to wait for a reason to vote for someone. None came. In the end, the undecided's came out to vote for anyone who is a fresh face.

    The five big-name traditional pan-democrats (Lee Cheuk Yan, Cyd Ho Sau-lan, Frederick Fung Kin-kee, Gary Fan Kwok-wai and Raymond Wong Yuk-man) lost because whatever they had been been doing for the past decade or more does not work. PERIOD. It is time to do something else.

    - After cleaning out the old farts, we have a bunch of new faces who will help us to realize our long-awaited dreams:

    Praise to the election of Kwong Chun Yu (Democratic Party) as the top vote-getter for a Super Seat!
    We realized the dream that it is possible for someone who took 12 years and 6 attempts to get a passing grade in English in the Diploma of Secondary Education to become a Legislative Councilor!

    Praise to the election of Nathan Law (Demosisto) in Hong Kong Island!
    We realized the dream that it is possible for someone who has failed to complete schooling at the worst university in Hong Kong (Lingnan) and is regularly criticized for illiteracy for his Facebook posts (often deleted immediately afterwards) to become a Legislative Councilor!

    Praise to the election of Yau Wai Ching (Youngspiration) in Kowloon West!
    We realized the dream that it is possible for a 23-year-old female airhead whose patented response to tough questions is automatically a shrug with "I am not going to answer this. I am candidate number 13, Yau Wai Ching. Vote for me on September 3rd!" to become a Legislative Councilor!

    Praise to the election of Lau Siu Wai in Kowloon West!
    We realized the dream that the Hong Kong streets will be filled with roaming unlicensed carts carrying boiling oil to cook stinky tofu!

    Praise to the election of Eddie Chu Hoi Dick in New Territories West!
    We realized the dream that the apartment that we bought in Yuen Long at the exorbitant price of $9,000 per sqft three years ago will soon fetch us $30,000 per sqft because Mr. Chu and his Land Justice League has promised to block all new construction anywhere anytime by anyone.

    Praise to the election of Cheng Chung Tai in New Territories West!
    We realized the dream that we can freely sever relationships with our parents due to political differences because the Honorable Cheng Chung Tai said that we can, we should and we must. Bonus: The Honorable Cheng Chung Tai also promised us that his first order to business is to destroy Jimmy Lai/Next Media! We can't wait ...

    Praise to the election of Sixtus "Baggio" Leung Chung Hung in New Territories East!
    We realized the dream that we will be able to throw bricks (literally) anywhere anytime at anyone in Hong Kong from now.

    - (Oriental Daily) September 18, 2016.

    Before even being sworn in, the newbies are making fools of themselves.

    First, Youngspiration said that they support either Roy Kwong (top vote-getter in District Council (Second) Functional Constituency or Chu Hoi Dick (top vote-getter in geographical constituency) to become the president of the Legislative Council. Clearly, Youngspiration was not familiar with Basic Law Article 71:

    The President of the Legislative Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region shall be elected by and from among the members of the Legislative Council.

    The President of the Legislative Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region shall be a Chinese citizen of not less than 40 years of age, who is a permanent resident of the Region with no right of abode in any foreign country and has ordinarily resided in Hong Kong for a continuous period of not less than 20 years.

    Both Roy Kwong and Chu Hoi Dick are in their 30's. Never mind ...

    Next Roy Kwong (Democratic Party) declared that it is inappropriate for someone from the Functional Constituency to become the president of the Legislative Council, because this person was not elected by the entire voter population. Kwong said: "I recommend James To (Democratic Party)."

    It would seem that James To is in the District Council (Second) Functional Constituency just like Kwong himself, and Kwong apparently has no idea what it is. Never mind ...

    District Council (Second) Functional Constituency (5 seats)
    ID# Name (Party)

    Chances
    801 James To Kun Shun (Democratic Party) Extremely high
    802 Starry Lee (DAB) Extremely high
    803 Kwong Chun Yu (Democratic Party) Extremely high
    804 Kalvin Ho Kai Ming (ADPL) Very slim
    805 Sumly Chan Yuen Sum (Civic Party) Very slim
    806 Wong Kwok Hing (Federation of Trade Unions) Fair
    807 Kwan Wing Yip (Neo Democrats) Very slim
    808 Leung Yiu Chung (Neighborhood & Worker's Service Centre) Fair
    809 Holden Chow Ho Ding (DAB) Fair

    Hong Kong Island (6 seats)
    ID# Name (Party)

    Chances
    1 Gary Wong Chi Him (independent) Somewhat low
    2 Christopher Lau Gar Hung (People Power) Somewhat low
    3 Regina Ip Lau Suk Yee (New People's Party) Extremely high
    4 Cyd Ho Sau Lan (Labour Party) Fair
    5 Cheung Kwok Kwan (DAB) Fair
    6 Chim Pui Chung (independent) Very slim
    7 Cheng Kam Mun (Civic Passion) Fair
    8 Nathan Law Kwun Chung (Demosisto) Extremely high
    9 Shum Chee Chiu (independent) Very slim
    10 Ricky Wong Wai Kay (independent) Somewhat high
    11 Chui Chi Kin (independent) Very slim
    12 Paulus Johannes Zimmerman (independent) Very slim
    13 Hui Chi Fung (Democratic Party) Somewhat high
    14 Tanya Chan (Civic Party) Somewhat high
    15 Kwok Wai Keung (Federation of Trade Unions) Fair

    Kowloon West (6 seats)
    ID# Name (Party)

    Chances
    1 Avery Ng Man Yuen (League of Social Democrats) Somewhat low
    2 Jonathan Ho Chi Kwong (independent) Very slim
    3 Claudia Mo Man Ching (Civic Party) Extremely high
    4 Leung Mei Fun (BPA) Extremely high
    5 Tam Kwok Kiu (ADPL) Somewhat low
    6 Chu Siu Hung (independent) Very slim
    7 Raymond Wong Yuk Man (Proletariat Political Institute) Fair
    8 Helena Wong Pik Wan (Democratic Party) Fair
    9 Lam Yi Lai (independent) Very slim
    10 Ann Chiang Lai Wan (DAB) Extremely high
    11 Kwan San Wai (independent) Very slim
    12 Lau Siu Lai (independent) Extremely high
    13 Yau Wai Ching (Youngspiration) Fair
    14 Augustine Lee Wing Hon (independent) Very slim
    15 Tik Chi Yuen (independent) Fair

    Kowloon East (5 seats)
    ID# Name (Party)

    Chances
    1 Wong Kwok Kin (Federation of Trade Unions) Extremely high
    2 Wu Sui Shan (Labour Party) Very slim
    3 Patrict Ko Tat Pun (independent) Very slim
    4 Tam Heung Man (The Frontier) Very slim
    5 Paul Tse Wai Chun (independent) Fair
    6 Wilson Or Chong Shing (DAB) Somewhat high
    7 Lui Wing Kei (independent) Very slim
    8 Wu Chi Wai (Democratic Party) Extremely high
    9 Jeremy Tam Man Ho (Civic Party) Somewhat high
    10 Wong Yeung Tat (Civic Passion) Fair
    11 Chan Chak To (Kowloon East Community) Somewhat low
    12 Tam Tak Chi (People Power) Somewhat low

    New Territories West (9 seats)
    ID# Name (Party)

    Chances
    1 Wong Yun Tat ( Neighborhood & Worker's Service Centre) Fair
    2 Andrew Wan Siu Kin (Democratic Party) Fair
    3 Ko Chi Fai (independent) Very slim
    4 Chow Wing Kan (Liberal) Very slim
    5 Cheng Chung Tai (Civic Passion) Somewhat high
    6 Kwong Koon Wan (independent) Very slim
    7 Michael Tien Puk Sun (New People's Party) Extremely high
    8 Ho Kwan Yiu (independent) Fair
    9 Leung Che Cheung (DAB) Somewhat high
    10 Kwok Ka Ki (Civic Party) Somewhat high
    11 Wong Ho Ming (League of Social Democrats) Somewhat low
    12 Lee Cheuk Yan (Confederation of Trade Unions) Fair
    13 Wong Chun Kit (Youngspiration) Very slim
    14 Mak Mei Kuen (Federation of Trade Unions) Fair
    15 Frederick Fung Kin Kee (ADPL) Somewhat low
    16 Chan Han Pan (DAB) Somewhat high
    17 Clarice Cheung Wai Ching (independent) Very slim
    18 Hendrick Lui Chi Hang (independent) Very slim
    19 Tong Wing Chi (independent) Very slim
    20 Eddie Chu Hoi Dick (independent) Extremely high

    New Territories East (9 seats)
    ID# Name (Party)

    Chances
    1 Christine Fong Kwok Shan (independent) Fair
    2 Lam Cheuk Ting (Democratic Party) Fair
    3 Liu Tin Shing (independent) Very slim
    4 Chin Wan Kan (Hong Kong Resurgence Order) Fair
    5 Leung Kwok Hung (League of Social Democrats) Somewhat high
    6 Cheung Chiu Hung (Labour Party) Somewhat high
    7 Alvin Yeung Ngok Kiu (Civic Party) Extremely high
    8 Raymond Mak Ka Chun (independent) Very slim
    9 Andrew Cheng Kar Foo (independent) Fair
    10 Elizabeth Quat (DAB) Extremely high
    11 Hau Chi Keung (independent)  
    12 Dominic Lee Tsz King (Liberal Party) Somewhat low
    13 Tang Ka Piu (Federation of Trade Unions) Somewhat low
    14 Gary Fan Kwok Wai (Neo Democrats) Fair
    15 Estella Chan Yuk Ngor (independent) Very slim
    16 Wong Sum Yu (independent) Very slim
    17 Leticia Lee See Yin Very slim
    18 Raymond Chan Chi Chuen (People Power) Fair
    19 Sixtus Leung Chung Hang (Youngspiration) Fair
    20 Ronald Leung Kam Shing (independent) Very slim
    21 Yung Hoi Yan (New People's Party) Fair
    22 Chan Hak Kan (DAB) Somewhat high

    (Suzanne Pepper) June 17, 2016.

    Professor Joseph Cheng Yu-shek, pan-dems candidate coordinator for over a decade, carries on with his mission but says this year is especially difficult. Professor Benny Tai decided to try and do something more. He introduced his idea early this year, perhaps remembering how he launched the Occupy movement with a single dramatically-worded article three years ago, in early 2013. He calls his latest plan Thunderbolt 【雷動計劃】.

    Tai has committed himself to the cause of self-determination for Hong Kong and was targeting especially its new-wave post-Occupy advocates who were not impressed with his good intentions. Someone said his plan would be a nightmare to implement. Someone else said it would be unfair to smaller parties. Prof. Tai means well but doesnt understand anything about electioneering, and so on. He has now revised his plan several times.

    The thunderbolt he proposed was a 50% pro-democracy presence in the Legislative Council come September: 35 of the 70 seats. This would give them stronger bargaining power in future political reform negotiations with Beijing.  Pan-dem legislators had barely managed to hold together their one-third veto-power strength last year in order to defeat Beijings electoral reform mandate. The pressures had been intense. There was little margin for error.

    Tai proposed to accomplish the goal with a logical do-able mix of seats. Democrats should be able to retain their three super seats, and win three more Functional Constituency seats to make nine instead of only six.  The directly-elected Geographic Constituency seats were something else again. They should actually be easy since pro-democracy candidates are still taking 55+% share of the direct popular vote. But they would have to win 23 of the 35 seats instead of only 18 as in 2012: 23 + 3 + 9 = 35.

    To achieve his ideal 23-seat goal, however, Tai said the safest way to avoid splitting the pro-democracy vote would be to limit the number of lists fielded to the number of seats needed: 23 (Apple, Feb. 2).

    At the time, activists were just beginning to make their election plans. But they were all thinking in terms of more, not less. The preliminary hopefuls noted above would add up to close to 40 lists. And that roster is far from complete.

    With Benny Tais plan, not only would pro-democracy parties and candidates have to coordinate and sacrifice themselves for the greater good, but voters would also have to do their part by casting ballots for candidates they probably didnt like.

    So Tai revised his plan. He suggested that in each of the five election districts, idealistic contingents of 10-20,000 voters could be mobilized to vote for candidates that polls identified as being in trouble (Ming Pao, Mar. 3, 23). This version didnt go down very well either.

    One snag was that Tai seemed to be talking about exit polls on Election Day itself, with voters being alerted to come out late in the day. The art of the late afternoon phone call a tactic that the DAB has long been rumored to rely on even though it violates Hong Kong election rules. Still, the pro-Beijing press couldnt resist expressing shock at a law professor making such a proposal (Ta Kung Pao, June 7).

    Undeterred, Tai amended his plan again and gave it a new name: ThunderGo. Several activist groups have also finally rallied to help him out. Theyve formed a new alliance called Citizens United in Action and are designing a new instant messaging app. Their program, called Votsonar, should be able to share data about voters preferences and like-minded candidates, plus their poll ratings as Election Day nears all without actually telling anyone how to vote (Apple, June 14).

    (HK01) September 3, 2016. The Votsonar recommendations:

    Category Name (Party) HKU POP poll %

    Recommended Action for Strategic Voters
    District Council (Second) James To Kun Shun (Democratic Party) 25% Recommendation: Continue support
    Functional Constituency Starry Lee (DAB) 24% Pro-establishment
     (5 seats) Wong Kwok Hing (Federation of Trade Unions) 12% Pro-establishment
      Leung Yiu Chung (Neighborhood & Worker's Service Centre) 12% Recommendation: Switch to vote for
      Kwong Chun Yu (Democratic Party) 9% Recommendation: Switch to vote for
      Holden Chow Ho Ding (DAB) 9% Pro-establishment
      Sumly Chan Yuen Sum (Civic Party) 5% Recommendation: Suspended campaign, switch away
      Kwan Wing Yip (Neo Democrats) 2% Recommendation: Suspended campaign, switch away
      Kalvin Ho Kai Ming (ADPL) 1% Recommendation: Suspended campaign, switch away
           
           
    Hong Kong Island Regina Ip Lau Suk Yee (New People's Party) 22% Pro-establishment
     (6 seats) Tanya Chan (Civic Party) 15% Recommendation: Continue support
      Cheung Kwok Kwan (DAB) 12% Pro-establishment
      Ricky Wong Wai Kay (independent) 12% Independent
      Kwok Wai Keung (Federation of Trade Unions) 9% Pro-establishment
      Nathan Law Kwun Chung (Demosisto) 6% Recommendation: Switch to vote for
      Hui Chi Fung (Democratic Party) 6% Recommendation: Switch to vote for
      Cyd Ho Sau Lan (Labour Party) 4% Recommendation: Switch away
      Cheng Kam Mun (Civic Passion) 4% Recommendation: Switch away
      Christopher Lau Gar Hung (People Power) 3% Recommendation: Switch away
      Chim Pui Chung (independent) 2% Pro-establishment
      Gary Wong Chi Him (independent) 1%  
      Paulus Johannes Zimmerman (independent) 1% Recommendation: Suspended campaign, switch away
      Shum Chee Chiu (independent) 1%  
      Chui Chi Kin (independent) 1% Recommendation: Suspended campaign, switch away
           
           
    Kowloon West Leung Mei Fun (BPA) 22% Pro-establishment
     (6 seats) Ann Chiang Lai Wan (DAB) 18% Pro-establishment
      Helena Wong Pik Wan (Democratic Party) 12% Recommendation: Switch to vote for
      Claudia Mo Man Ching (Civic Party) 10% Recommendation: Switch to vote for
      Lau Siu Lai (independent) 9% Recommendation: Switch to vote for
      Raymond Wong Yuk Man (Proletariat Political Institute) 8% Recommendation: Switch away
      Yau Wai Ching (Youngspiration) 6% Recommendation: Switch to vote for
      Tik Chi Yuen (independent) 5% Recommendation: Switch away
      Avery Ng Man Yuen (League of Social Democrats) 4% Recommendation: Switch away
      Tam Kwok Kiu (ADPL) 3% Recommendation: Switch away
      Jonathan Ho Chi Kwong (independent) 1% Recommendation: Switch away
      Chu Siu Hung (independent) 1%  
      Lam Yi Lai (independent) 1%  
      Augustine Lee Wing Hon (independent) 1%  
      Kwan San Wai (independent) 1%  
           
           
    Kowloon East Wong Kwok Kin (Federation of Trade Unions) 18% Pro-establishment
     (5 seats) Jeremy Tam Man Ho (Civic Party) 16% Recommendation: Continue support
      Paul Tse Wai Chun (independent) 15% Pro-establishment
      Wilson Or Chong Shing (DAB) 14% Pro-establishment
      Wu Chi Wai (Democratic Party) 14% Recommendation: Continue support
      Wong Yeung Tat (Civic Passion) 9% Recommendation: Switch away
      Tam Tak Chi (People Power) 6% Recommendation: Switch to vote for
      Chan Chak To (Kowloon East Community) 3% Recommendation: Switch away
      Wu Sui Shan (Labour Party) 2% Recommendation: Suspended campaign, switch away
      Tam Heung Man (The Frontier) 2% Recommendation: Switch away
      Patrict Ko Tat Pun (independent) 1%  
      Lui Wing Kei (independent) 1%  
           
           
    New Territories West Michael Tien Puk Sun (New People's Party) 16% Pro-establishment
     (9 seats) Andrew Wan Siu Kin (Democratic Party) 9% Recommendation: Continue support
      Eddie Chu Hoi Dick (independent) 9% Recommendation: Continue support
      Cheng Chung Tai (Civic Passion) 8% Recommendation: Continue support
      Leung Che Cheung (DAB) 8% Pro-establishment
      Mak Mei Kuen (Federation of Trade Unions) 8% Pro-establishment
      Ho Kwan Yiu (independent) 7% Pro-establishment
      Kwok Ka Ki (Civic Party) 7% Recommendation: Switch to vote for
      Chan Han Pan (DAB) 7% Pro-establishment
      Lee Cheuk Yan (Labour Party) 5% Recommendation: Switch away
      Wong Yun Tat ( Neighborhood & Worker's Service Centre) 4% Recommendation: Switch away
      Wong Ho Ming (League of Social Democrats) 4% Recommendation: Switch to vote for
      Wong Chun Kit (Youngspiration) 3% Recommendation: Switch away
      Frederick Fung Kin Kee (ADPL) 3% Recommendation: Switch away
      Chow Wing Kan (Liberal Party) 1% Recommendation: Suspended campaign, switch away
      Ko Chi Fai (independent) 1%  
      Kwong Koon Wan (independent) 1%  
      Clarice Cheung Wai Ching (independent) 1% Recommendation: Suspended campaign, switch away
      Hendrick Lui Chi Hang (independent) 1%  
      Tong Wing Chi (independent) 1%  
           
           
    New Territories East Alvin Yeung Ngok Kiu (Civic Party) 15% Recommendation: Steady situation, continue to support
     (9 seats) Elizabeth Quat (DAB) 10% Pro-establishment
      Chan Hak Kan (DAB) 9% Pro-establishment
      Lam Cheuk Ting (Democratic Party) 7% Recommendation: Switch to vote for
      Leung Kwok Hung (League of Social Democrats) 7% Recommendation: Switch to vote for
      Sixtus Leung Chung Hang (Youngspiration) 7% Recommendation: Switch away
      Christine Fong Kwok Shan (independent) 6% Independent
      Chin Wan Kan (Hong Kong Resurgence Order) 6% Recommendation: Switch away
      Cheung Chiu Hung (Labour Party) 5% Recommendation: Switch to vote for
      Dominic Lee Tsz King (Liberal Party) 5% Pro-establishment
      Gary Fan Kwok Wai (Neo Democrats) 5% Recommendation: Switch to vote for
      Raymond Chan Chi Chuen (People Power) 5% Recommendation: Switch to vote for
      Yung Hoi Yan (New People's Party) 4% Pro-establishment
      Andrew Cheng Kar Foo (independent) 3% Recommendation: Switch away
      Tang Ka Piu (Federation of Trade Unions) 3% Pro-establishment
      Hau Chi Keung (independent) 2% Pro-establishment
      Raymond Mak Ka Chun (independent) 1% Recommendation: Switch away
      Wong Sum Yu (independent) 1%  
      Leticia Lee See Yin 1%  
      Liu Tin Shing (independent) 1%  
      Estella Chan Yuk Ngor (independent) 1%  
      Ronald Leung Kam Shing (independent) 1% Recommendation: Switch away

    (SCMP)  September 7, 2016.

    Strategic voting was in great play in the Legislative Council elections last Sunday, but pro-democracy candidates still had a lower success rate in winning seats due to severe infighting and a lack of accurate information flow within the camp.

    Under the system of proportional representation adopted by Hong Kong, votes do not equal seats and parties try hard to maximise their votes strategically sometimes to the extent of voting for candidates other than their first choice because their first choice already has enough votes. Alternatively, they may give their votes to someone else to thwart a popular candidate they dislike.

    Last Sunday, the traditional pan-democrats and localists secured 54.8 per cent of total votes in the elections and won 19 directly elected seats, while the pro-establishment camp bagged 40.3 per cent of votes and took 16 seats.

    Occupy Central co-founder Benny Tai Yiu-ting advocated what he called the Thunder Go plan ahead of the citywide polls, calling on the public to vote strategically.  His team launched a smartphone program to collect voters preferences for the candidates. It also came up with a list of recommended candidates hours before the polls closed on Sunday, advising voters to back those who they said were likely to be in the fight for the last seat.

    Yet the election results suggest that the strategic voting did not work out well for the pan-democrats and localists in New Territories West and Kowloon East, where they failed to win the majority of seats despite bagging 54.8 per cent and 57.5 per cent of total votes respectively.

    In one extreme case in New Territories West, four pro-democracy candidates the Labour Partys Lee Cheuk-yan, Wong Yun-tat of the Neighbourhood and Workers Service Centre, the League of Social Democrats Raphael Wong Ho-ming and Frederick Fung Kin-kee of the Association for Democracy and Peoples Livelihood together garnered 97,524 votes, but none was returned.

    Beijing-friendly Junius Ho Kwan-yiu received 35,657 votes and unseated Lee by 5,508 votes.

    Apart from the New Peoples Partys Michael Tien Puk-sun, who received 70,646 votes, the other three elected Beijing-friendly lawmakers from the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong and Federation of Trade Unions garnered votes ranging from 49,680 to 58,673.

    A study by the Post found that 59 per cent of 27 candidates leaning towards the establishment won the race in the five geographical constituencies, compared to 43 per cent of the 44 pan-democrat and localist candidates.

    Adding to the problem was the Thunder Go scheme, which Ma criticised as unscientific.

    The data they got was drawn from voters who joined the scheme on their own initiative, so it was not a random sample, he said.

    But the scheme organisers treated the data as if it was randomly sampled, then recommended certain candidates and called on voters across the city to vote for them, which ended up twisting the election results, he said.

    For New Territories West, why did Thunder Go suggest people vote for the Civic Partys Kwok Ka-ki but not Labours Lee Cheuk-yan? Whats the basis? Its not clear, he said. Some politicians I talked to tend to think the scheme has its political agenda.

    The pro-Beijing camp managed to distribute the votes more evenly among its candidates because they had many supportive organisations catering to the likes of women, youth and the elderly. They urged members to vote for them, Ma added.

    Democratic Party veteran Sin Chung-kai, who was in charge of the partys election strategy, stopped short of saying they were the victims of Thunder Go, but just a party affected by it.

    Several Democrat candidates, including party vice-chairman Andrew Wan Siu-kin running in New Territories West, were forced to make an emergency appeal on Sunday as Thunder Go recommended people to vote for other aspirants who were less safe. They had good will in helping the pan-democrats gain more seats ... but on what basis did they come up with the list of recommended candidates [to vote for]? Did they ensure their program would not be hacked? Sin said. He called on Tai to come forward and offer the public an explanation.

    (SCMP) September 7, 2016.

    Occupy Central co-founder Benny Tai on Wednesday stopped short of apologising for the Thunder Go plan, a strategic voting scheme which is regarded as a factor leading to the defeat of several veteran pan-democrats in the Legislative Council elections.

    But Tai, a legal scholar at University of Hong Kong, admitted there were deficiencies in the operation of the scheme, which he agreed should be thoroughly evaluated.

    I think it is not about apology. I am sad to see some of my old friends losing their seats but some decisions still needed to be made, he told RTHK on Wednesday.

    I totally accepted the criticisms and I hope people would offer counter suggestions so we could achieve a better effect next time should we advocate a strategic voting again.

    Tai floated his Thunder Go plan in February, calling on pan-democrats and localists to minimise their candidate lists in the Legco elections in a bid to grab more than half the seats in the legislature without much infighting.

    He then changed his focus to advocate strategic voting instead, after those parties failed to coordinate fielding less candidates.

    His team subsequently launched a smartphone app VotSonar ahead of the polls to collect voters preferences on the candidates.

    Those who joined the scheme also deliberated ahead of the polling day and came up with a list of recommended candidates. These candidates were regarded as having a chance of grabbing the last seat in direct elections, based on the latest public opinion polls and participants preference.

    Labour Party veterans Lee Cheuk-yan and Cyd Ho Sau-lan, both not being chosen by the scheme, had lost the seats they held for years, with the former losing to Beijing-friendly solicitor Junius Ho Kwan-yiu by a 5,000 vote margin in New Territories West.

    Critics had questioned the rationale of the schemes decision to recommend the League of Social Democrats Raphael Wong Ho-ming, who had been recording lower popularity ratings, and the Civic Partys Kwok Ka-ki instead of Lee. Wong eventually garnered only 28,529 votes, fewer than Lees 30,149.

    Tai argued that the popularity ranking of the four relatively unsafe pro-democracy candidates in New Territories West was not as important after taking the margin of error into account.

    The [pro-democracy] vote share shows that we could only save two candidates, he said. The scheme participants have decided to back [Kwok and Wong] after four hours of deliberation.

    Tai said the plan had sent out an alert hours ahead of the polls deadline to urge voters to back Lee also, after finding the unprecedentedly high turnout rate could help send one more pan-democrat to the legislature. But the message was delayed because the system was hacked.

    When asked if it was fair to spread the recommended lists to the public when it was only a result of the deliberation by a small group of some 1,000 people per constituency, Tai said: Everyone could start a group [to discuss strategic voting] and the Thunder Go plan is just one of them.

    He said the number of people who were willing to engage in strategic voting was beyond his expectation.

    Tai also dismissed the accusation that his plan had a political agenda to make him the leader of the camp.

    From the very beginning, all I want to do is to help Hong Kongs democratic movement break through the stalemate, he said. I have no way to stop you if you insist on misunderstanding me I do not have a big team and money all I have is only a pen. I cannot see how I could play the role which people suggested.

    The Occupy leader, who had been working closely with pan-democrats, admitted it might take some time to mend the rift with them after the setback.

    My team joked last night that perhaps I am now the most criticised person after [Chief Executive] Leung Chun-ying, said Tai, adding he had not been in touch with any parties since the election so far. We could come together and discuss how to work it out in future.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) September 7, 2016.

    The convenor of strategic voting plan ThunderGo has admitted to underestimating the entire situation on Wednesday after being criticised for causing the pan-democrats to lose the last seats in Sundays LegCo election.

    The ThunderGo plan was announced in early February by law academic and Occupy co-founder Benny Tai. It originally called for pan-democrats to cooperate to obtain more than half the seats in the Legislative Council elections. Information on strategic voting was released to voters who wanted to participate through a messaging app.

    Speaking to the press after appearing on a Commercial Radio programme, he said we definitely underestimated that the effect of strategic voting would be so strong.

    According to an infographic created by commenters on an online forum, the last available seats were won by the pro-establishment camps Paul Tse Wai-chun in Kowloon East and Junius Ho Kwan-yiu in New Territories West. However, just behind Tse and Ho in votes were the opposition camps Wong Yeung-tat of Civic Passion and People Powers Tam Tak Chi in Kowloon East, as well as the Labour Partys Lee Cheuk-yan and the League of Social Democrats Raphael Wong Ho-ming in New Territories West.

    Tam and Wong, who the ThunderGo plan supported, performed worse than the other candidates Wong and Lee, who ThunderGo advised voters to drop. Commenters said that the plan had screwed people over with its missteps. Had it advised voters to support Wong and Lee, the opposition would have won the final seats, said critics.

    However, when asked whether ThunderGo led to veteran lawmakers losing their seats, Tai said he did not believe that ThunderGo was responsible for strategic voting. I believe that Hong Kong vot
    ers did engage in strategic voting, but it was not ThunderGo rather it was what the voter believed they needed to do under such circumstances.

    And the other problem is the fragmenting of the opposition camp, leading to many candidate lists. In this election, even though there is a high turnout, we can see that there has not been great change in the proportion of votes between the pro-establishment and opposition, he said, but there are new forces coming up in the opposition. And I think this is the root of the matter

    Because the system was attacked, he said, information on strategic voting was delayed, and some strategic voters may have followed earlier advice instead. He also said that he could do a study to see if people participated in strategic voting and whether they participated in ThunderGo.

    He told RTHK radio on the same day that he realised Hong Kong voters tend to participate late into social movements. They may not participate in a social movement in the very early stages, [and] strategic voting is a type of social movement, a political movement. But the interesting thing is that in the very last stages, their reactions will be far more than you expect, Tai said, so this definitely poses great difficulties for organisers of movements, which is how to achieve resonance [with the people]. This is something that the ThunderGo plan must reflect on.

    Internet comments:

    - (Bastille Post) Pan-democratic critics of the ThunderGo recommendations said that the list was biased for the large political parties (Civic Party and Democratic Party) and against the small political parties (Labour Party, the various localists, etc).

    In the District Council (Second) Functional Constituency, the goal is to obtain 3 out of 5 seats and the recommendations fit conventional wisdom. James To is safe, and the other two pan-democrats (Kwong Chun Yu and Leung Yiu Chung) need help. Three other pan-democrats have suspended their campaigns in order to help Kwong and Leung too.

    In Hong Kong Island, the goal is to obtain 3 out of 6 seats and the recommendations fit what the HKU POP poll says. Tanya Chan is safe, but the next two Nathan Law and Hui Chi Fung need help. All those behind are to be abandoned. This is the right decision if you believe the poll results.

    In Kowloon West, the goal is to obtain 4 out of 6 seats and the recommendations are to vote for either #3 Helena Wong, #4 Claudia Mo, #5 Lau Siu Lai or #7 Yau Wai Ching. All others are to be abandoned. Well, why is #7 Yau Wai Ching at 6% selected ahead of #6 Raymond Wong Yuk Man at 8%? Thunderbolt said that the decision was made after discussions among the "smart voters" of Thunderbolt, and one-third of them said that they refuse to vote for Wong. Why? The only explanation is that they want to spite Raymond Wong for some reason.

    In Kowloon East, the goal is to obtain 3 out of 5 seats. Jeremy Tam and Wu Chi Wai are safe. All else should vote for #7 Tam Tak Chi. Well, why is #7 Tam Tak Chi at 6% selected ahead of #6 Wong Yeung Tat at 9%? The only explanation is that the "smart voters" at Thunderbolt want to spite Wong Yeung Tat.

    In New Territories West, the goal is to obtain 5 out of 9 seats. Andrew Wan, Eddie Chu and Cheng Chung Tai are safe. The recommendations are for all else to vote for Kwok Ka Ki (Civic Party) and Wong Ho Ming (League of Social Democrats). Well, why is #11 Wong Ho Ming at 4% ahead of #10 Lee Cheuk Yan at 5%? Also this poll has been questioned, because nobody thinks that #3 Eddie Chu Hoi Dick or #4 Cheng Chung Tai should be ranked so highly. Why is incumbent Lee Cheuk Yan ranked so low?

    [Update: 90 minutes before the polls close, Operation ThunderGo announced that voter turnout is high in New Territories West and so the strategic voters should vote now for Lee Cheuk Yan.]

    In New Territories East, the goal is to obtain 6 out of 9 seats. #1 Alvin Yeung is safe. The recommendations are for #4 Lam Cheuk Ting, #5 Leung Kwok Hung, #9 Cheung Chiu Hung, #11 Gary Fan Kwok Wai and #12 Raymond Chan Chi Chuen. The "smart voters" at Thunderbolt decided to abandon the #6 Sixtus "Baggio" Leung and #8 Chin Wan Kan. Why? The only explanation is that the "smart voters" at Thunderbold want to spite Edward Leung (whose puppet is "Baggio" Leung) and Civic Passion/Proletariat Political Institute/Hong Kong Resurgence Order (namely, Raymond Wong Yuk Man in Kowloon West, Wong Yeung Tat in Kowloon East and Chin Wan Kan in New Territories East). The only Civic Passion member to scrape through was Cheng Chung Tai, who was ranked too highly at #4 to be abandoned.

    - Operation Thunderbolt is an excuse for a small number of people (billed as "25,000") to play God and exact vengeance on their real/imaginary enemies.

    - Oy vey iz mir! Here are some of the noteworthy accomplishments of Operation Thunderbolt.

    Kowloon East: Operation ThunderGo recommends abandoning #6 Wong Yeung Tat and voting for #7 Tam Tak Chi in order to grab the fifth and last place from China Liaison Office's favorite son Paul Tse.
    Outcome: Paul Tse 47527 votes; Wong Yeung Tat 33271 votes; Tam Tak Chi 31815 votes.
    Question: Are we better off with abandoning #7 Tam Tak Chi and voting for #6 Wong Yeung Tat?

    New Territories West: Operation ThunderGo recommends abandoning #10 Lee Cheuk Yan and voting for #11 Wong Ho Ming in order to grab the ninth and last place from China Liaison Office's other favorite son Junius Ho.
    Outcome: Lee Cheuk Yan 30149 votes; Wong Ho Ming 28529 votes; Junius Ho 35657 votes.
    Question: Are we better off with abandoning #11 Wong Ho Ming and voting for #10 Lee Cheuk Yan?

    New Territories East: Operating ThunderGo recommends abandoning Baggio Leung in order to save Gary Fan Kwok Wai.
    Outcome: Baggio Leung 35969 votes (elected); Gary Fan Kwok Wai 30662 votes (not elected).

    Smart voters, smart Hongkongers.

    (HKG Pao)

    Yesterday someone put up posters in Tai Hang saying "The Federation of Trade Unions has enough votes already; vote for the DAB instead." The Federation of Trade Unions said that the information is wrong and they did not put up those posters. They believe that someone is trying to influence the vote results. They plan to lodge complaints with the Hong Kong Police and the Electoral Affairs Commission.

    (Headline Daily) September 1, 2016.

    On the eve of the election, a FactWire reporter successfully entered the room where the election materials are being distributed. The reporters were registering and taking out these election materials (including vote registries and ballots). These people were given black suitcases with the words Registration and Electoral Office, and ballots in plastic bags were put into the suitcases. Downstairs more than 10 persons hauling REO suitcases were seen queuing for taxis.

    The Registration and Electoral Office said that the same procedure has been used for many years and there has never been any problems. On this particular day, when the workers found this reporter entering the facility without authorization and taking photos, they stopped him and summoned the police.

    (NOW TV) September 1, 2016.

    TV Most posted a video in which someone portraying a member of the campaign team of Holden Chow (DAB) said that Chow's prospects in the District Council are very promising and that there is no need to vote for him. The video went on to mention that voting day is September 4.

    Holden Chow and his team believes that this video is misleading and has lodged a complaint with the Independent Commission Against Corruption.

    - Everything that TV Most said is true. Holden Chow's prospects just before the November 22, 2015 Tung Chung South district council election were very good indeed, and he went on to win. The Legislative Council elections will be held on September 4, 2016. It is you who over-reach if you think that Holden Chow's prospects for this Legislative Council election are very good, because TV Most never said it.

    https://www.facebook.com/chankawairicky/videos/1063924346976261/

    - CAP 554 Elections (Corrupt and Illegal Conduct) Ordinance

    Section: 26 Illegal conduct to publish false or misleading statements about a candidate

    (1) A person engages in illegal conduct at an election if the person publishes a materially false or misleading statement of fact about a particular candidate or particular candidates for the purpose of promoting or prejudicing the election of the candidate or candidates.

    (2) A candidate engages in illegal conduct at an election if the candidate publishes a materially false or misleading statement of fact about the candidate or candidates with whom the candidate is associated, or about another candidate or other candidates, for the purpose of-

    (a) promoting the election of the candidate or candidates with whom the candidate is associated; or
    (b) prejudicing the election of the other candidate or candidates.

    (3) For the purposes of this section, statements about a candidate or candidates include (but are not limited to) statements concerning the character, qualifications or previous conduct of the candidate or candidates.

    (4) In a prosecution for an offence of having engaged in illegal conduct under subsection (1) or (2), it is a defence to prove that the defendant believed on reasonable grounds that the statement was true at the time when it was made.

    - When Ta Kung Pao tried to report on the peculiarities of Edward Leung's finances and the inconsistencies in his depiction of family situation, the Journalists Association condemned the newspaper.
    When Sing Tao reported on the allegations of sexual harassment by Ricky Wong, the Journalists Association condemned the newspaper too.
    Therefore, when TV Most made up an intentionally misleading story about candidate Holden Chow, the Journalists Association will be consistent and say nothing.

    Why?

    Because freedom/democracy/human rights/universal values/rule of law/professional ethics.

    The following nominees have suspended their campaigns for the Legislative Council elections:

    - Tsui Chi Kin (independent), Hong Kong Island
    - Paul Zimmerman (independent), Hong Kong Island
    - Wu Sui Shan (Labour Party), Kowloon West
    - Sumly Chan Yuen Sum (Civic Party), District Council (Second) Functional Constituency
    - Kalvin Ho Kai Ming (ADPL), District Council (Second) Functional Constituency

    (SCMP) September 2, 2016.

    Commentators said it was unclear whether the last-minute pullouts would work out in the pan-democrats favour. Under electoral rules, verified candidates cannot abandon the race at this stage, but can stop campaigning.

    Professor Lau Siu-kai, former head of government think tank the Central Policy Unit, said time was limited for voters to fully understand their intentions and reconsider their choices. But the five could set the example for more underperforming pan-democrats, he said. In the best-case scenario, they could gain a few more seats if more withdrawals consolidated votes for stronger candidates.

    Chinese University political scientist Ivan Choy Chi-keung could not recall something like this ever happening in the past. This could boost the pan-democrats image and morale but not necessarily the results, he said.

    The chain of unexpected events was sparked by Suzanne Wu Sui-shan, the Labour Party chairwoman contesting in Kowloon East constituency, who said she wanted to set an example for her pan-democratic allies to focus on the whole picture.

    Zimmerman and fellow Hong Kong Island contender Chui Chi-kin, who beat DAB lawmaker Christopher Chung Shu-kun in last years district council polls, have stopped electioneering. I hope you will all consider casting your vote for democrats who are almost in, Zimmerman said in a statement, suggesting his supporters switch to Demosisto candidate Nathan Law Kwun-chung.

    The biggest surprise, however, was the pullout of the pair running for super seats, a functional constituency sector that provides a second vote for 3.5 million registered voters in the geographical constituencies.

    The Civic Partys Sumly Chan Yuen-sum, who funded his own campaign as the party initially opposed his electioneering, made the announcement five hours after last appearing in Central to canvass votes. [We] urge voters to utilise their wisdom and ensure that the pan-democrats retain three super seats, party chairman Alan Leong Kah-kit said. Also giving up campaigning for a super seat was Kalvin Ho Kai-ming, of the Association for Democracy and Peoples Livelihood.

    Internet comments:

    - Thus spake the US Consulate General ...

    - Thus spake Ken Chow Wing-kan: "An evil force far more powerful than the triad gangs or the China Liaison Office is involved ..." What else can that force be except the US Consulate General/CIA/NED?

    - Here is a question about English grammar: Did the five suspend their campaigns? Or were their campaigns suspended for them by the party honchos?

    - Deep behind is the assumption that Hong Kong voters are just pigs to be herded to feed in the troughs and fill in the ballots accordingly.

    - The Magnificent Five are doing this in order to help the non-establishment camp continue to hold more than half of the geographical constituencies/District Council (Second) Functional Constituency as well as veto power (=more than one-third of the full Legislative Council).

    - I salute the five! These courageous bailed out of the fight because they want to give the people more choice. Kudos to them!

    - Only the fools from the pro-establishment camp would stay on all the way. They don't have the courage to quit.

    - Absolutely no money was offered for them to quit. How do I know? Because we know pro-democracy people have integrity.

    - (Wikipedia) "Each list of candidates is subject to a deposit of $50,000 for a geographical constituency, and $25,000 for a functional constituency. Deposits are forfeited if the list fails to receive at least 3% of the valid votes cast in the constituency." Don't worry -- the party bosses will reimburse our five heroes for the forfeited deposits.

    - Everything that the five said about their original intention to come out to serve the people and fight for freedom and democracy means nothing when the Black Hand behind the curtain says NO!

    - Here are the two opposing summaries:
    (1) We salute you for giving up and valuing the overall good.
    (2) You said that you entered the election because the people need you and now you abandon them in the moment of greatest need.

    - The China Liaison Office is unable to get the DAB, FTU, BPA, Liberal Party, Heung Yee Kuk and others to coordinate their efforts. However, Jimmy Lai, Anson Chan and other pan-democratic honchos can get Civic Party, Democratic Party, ADPL and others to do their bidding. This shows that Hong Kong will function more smoothly and efficiently under pan-democratic rule.

    - There is another possible outcome than Roy Kwong (Democratic Party) eking out a victory over Holden Chow (DAB) for the fifth and final place. It is possible that the pan-democratic supporters of Sumly Chan and Kalvin Ho find Roy Kwong insufferable (and he is indeed just that) and stay home in droves. The result may be that the Starry Lee (DAB) list will gain two Legco seats!

    - Eh, who were the people who say that the universal values are for "anyone who wants to stand for election should be allowed to, and anyone who wants to vote can vote for whoever they want." You know, no 篩選 (screening). But these five people have just screened themselves out.

    - No, their names remain on the ballots and therefore you can still vote for them.

    - In fact, I recommend that we vote for Sumly Chan. It would be delicious payback and an exercise of people power if Sumly Chan ends up with more votes than Roy Kwong.

    - If Sumly Chan is actually elected, will he take up the position after he abandoned his effort and let his supporters down?

    - And what is wrong with this Sumly Chan guy? He is a District Councilor for the Lei Muk Shue East district. When he said that he wanted to run for Legislative Councilor, the Civic Party said no. But ultimately the Civic Party relented and let him run. But when the going gets tough, the Civic Party made him suspend his campaign.  STOP WASTING OUR TIME!

    - When Ken Tsang wanted to run in the Social Welfare sector of the Legislative Council, the Civic Party kicked him out. They would have done that to Sumly Chan but not the fact that he was untouchable in Lei Muk Shue East district.

    - Disposable diapers are always discarded after being used.

    - Here I am reminded of the words on the bandana of Johanne Liu, better known as Taiwan's Sunflower Queen/mama-san: "Democracy cannot be swapped/traded/bartered/exchanged."

    - The whole city is angry!
    On the evening of September 2, numerous candidates in the opposition camp abandoned their campaigns.
    They toyed with the voters, they toyed with the election.
    This is the darkest night in the history of democracy in Hong Kong
    We will not tolerate this!
    All those voters who don't like being toyed around should come out on September 4th
    to punish the pan-democrats with their votes.

    - (Bastille Post) September 2, 2016. For days, rumors swelled that the pan-democrats intend to abandon some of their candidates with lesser chances in order to secure the seats for other candidates with better chances. Finally, it has happened with five pan-democratic candidates declaring openly that they are abandoning their quests.

    According to pan-democratic insiders, the pan-democratic bosses were behind the scenes holding many negotiations. The main purpose is to trade interests: If you give up in this district, I will help you in that other district, etc. Even if the candidates don't agree, they can't ward off the pressure from the party bosses. The supporters may be disappointed and the candidates may find it hard to run for elections again, but that is another story sometime in the future.

    In this round of abandonment, Sumly Chan (Civic Party) has 5% support and Ho Kai-ming (ADPL) has 2% support in the race for the five District Council (Second) Functional Constituency seats. Together they have 7%. If 2% of that goes to James To (Democratic Party), 2% to Roy Kwong (Democratic Party) and 1% goes to Leung Yiu Chung (Neighbourhold and Worker's Service Centre), it may be enough to elect all three.

    According to an informed source, this deal is the biggest political deal in the history of Hong Kong democracy. It should increase the number of seats for the pan-democrats. But the legacy is that the voters are being denied their right to choose. The Civic Party once fielded a candidate in the Chief Executive election with the slogan "You are the boss only if you can choose." But this won't happen for their supporters this time in the District Council (Second) Functional Constituency.

    The second problem is that the whole affair was manipulated behind the curtain by the pan-democratic party bosses. This is completely in violation of the principles of openness and transparency. The pan-democrats always criticize the government of lacking openness and transparency, but that is exactly what they are doing now.

    The third problem is that this is a case of the larger parties bullying the smaller parties. This round of action was decided by the Civic Party, Democratic Party, Labour Party plus the pan-democratic big bosses. Those who stand to gain will be the larger parties. Those who stand to lose are the smaller parties who were not included in the deal (e.g. Youngspiration).

    After this episode, the pan-democrats may win their coveted Legco seats but they have lost the moral high ground. When they criticize the government for black-box operations and bartering favors/interests, the government will have plenty of ammunition to hit back.

    - (Ta Kung Pao) September 2, 2016.

    Outside Elizabeth House (Wanchai), there is a 315 square meter billboard for Sumly Chan (Civic Party), who is Audrey's choice for Super Seat. According to information, this billboard costs $400,000 in rental fees. According to the Buildings Ordinance, this large billboard requires an architectural plan to be approved by the Buildings Department. In response to our inquiry, the Buildings Department confirmed that the Civic Party billboard is an illegal structure that should be dismantled immediately. When we called candidate Sumly Chan for comment, we were forwarded to the call center.

    - If Sumly Chan knew what his chances were and never entered, the Civic Party would have saved a few hundred thousand dollars renting that billboard.

    - The nerve of them!

    The Civic Party is asking everybody to donate money to pay for the vast expenditure incurred by Sumly Chan in his Super Seat campaign.

    - Why bother? Just send the bill to the Democratic Party c/o Roy Kwong Chun Yu.

    - This is just a smoke screen. The bill is more than covered by Jimmy Lai. But the Civic Party has to go through the pretense of raising money.

    - (The Stand) For this election, Sumly Chan was reported to have used up his wife's entire retirement sayings, and Kwan Wing-yip considered taking out a mortgage loan. So how are they going to pay for all this?

    - Was the deal in the making a long ago already? Here are the economic incentives.

    In the District Council (Second) Functional Constituency, each candidate can spend up to a maximum amount of $6,936,000. If you are by yourself, that's all you can spend. But if you can get a couple of other people to run as well, they each can spend $6,936,000. Two days before the election, those two people say that they are suspending their campaign and asking everybody to vote for 'like-minded' people (namely, you because their messages had been crafted as a perfect fit with yours). That is to say, you will harvest the fruits of $6,936,000 x 3 = $20,808,000 in campaign spending.

    So did Sumly Chan and Kalvin Ho enter the District Council (Second) Functional Constituency election in order to build a base of supporters to be handed over to Roy Kwong?

    - It's not only about the money. It's also about air time. For voters, the primary source of information is the electronic forums on television and radio. At these forums, the candidates get equal time. The pro-establishment camp is targeting with precision (for example, three candidates for three of the District Council (Second) Functional Constituency seats). If the pan-democrats also field three candidates, then the battle will be for the fifth and last spot given the 55%/45% split among all voters.

    However, the pan-democrats fielded 6 candidates. So if each candidate gets 10 minutes of air time, the pro-establishment camp gets 30 minutes in total while the pro-democracy camp gets 60 minutes. That is twice as much time to make negative criticisms of the opposing side.

    - Sorry, the money guy has just decided that the five of you have just been 'screened' out of the Legco elections.

    - A trip down memory lane with these candidates talking about democracy ideals beliefs principles dedication trust honesty integrity commitment confidence blah blah blah
    https://www.facebook.com/434483659936746/videos/1240952462623191/
    https://www.facebook.com/1818980738333851/videos/1842906092607982/

    - A sixth candidate Clarice Cheung (independent) announced late in the night that she has suspended her campaign as well.

    - Because of the timing, Clarice Cheung was probably not invited to the party by the pan-democratic honchos. She just threw in the towel by following the lead of the Five Martyrs of the Democratic Revolution.

    - Clarice Cheung is a copy cat. Her case isn't even reported in the media.

    - And now we have a seventh pan-democratic candidate throwing in the towel.

    (The Stand News) Last night five pan-democratic candidates suspended their respective campaigns. In the District Council (Second) Functional Constituency, Sumly Chan (Civic Party) and Kalvin Ho Kai Ming (ADPL) did so.
     
    ID# Name (Party)
    801 James To Kun Shun (Democratic Party)
    802 Starry Lee (DAB)
    803 Kwong Chun Yu (Democratic Party)
    804 Kalvin Ho Kai Ming (ADPL)
    805 Sumly Chan Yuen Sum (Civic Party)
    806 Wong Kwok Hing (Federation of Trade Unions)
    807 Kwan Wing Yip (Neo Democrats)
    808 Leung Yiu Chung (Neighborhood & Worker's Service Centre)
    809 Holden Chow Ho Ding (DAB)

    Of the remaining 7, James To, Starry Lee, Wong Kwok Hing and Leung Yiu Chung are considered safe bets. This leaves the two pan-democratic candidates Kwong Chun Yu (Democratic Party) and Kwan Wing Yip (Neo Democrats) fighting the pro-establishment Holden Chow Ho Ding (DAB) for the fifth and final spot. Last night, Kwan Wing Yip said that he will continue his campaign.

    This morning at 11am, Kwan Wing Yip and the Neo Democrats announced that Kwan is suspending his campaign as well. At the press conference, Kwan said that his team came under a great deal of pressure. So his decision was a difficult one on the darkest day of his political career. It is also a blight on the Neo Democrats and all those who are fighting for democracy.

    Kwan said that some people spout democracy talk when they are actually destroying Hong Kong's core values. Other Neo Democrats present implied that the pressure came from the Democratic Party.

    Kwan apologized to the voters. He said that he entered the election in order to give voters more choices, but in the end he let them down.

    - Of all people, Kwan Wing Yip deserves the least respect. The Neo Democrats used to be part of the Democratic Party. They broke away in 2010 because the Democratic Party entered a deal to establish the District Council (Second) Functional Constituency. In the 2012 Legislative Council elections, they refused to enter a candidate for the District Council (Second) Functional Constituency as a matter of principle. In the 2015 District Council elections, they won 15 seats, enough to secure a nomination for the District Council (Second) Functional Constituency election in 2016. So they tossed their principle aside and fielded Kwan Wing Yip. Now Kwan and the Neo Democrats have just given up the campaign in order to preserve the seat for the Democratic Party candidate. Shameless!

    - The Neo Democrats said that they will now focus on preserving Gary Fan Kwok Wai's seat in New Territories East. They urged the other New Territories East candidate Andrew Cheng Kar Foo to consider suspending his campaign in order to make sure that the pan-democrats keep six seats.

    Ha ha ha. As soon as the Neo Democrats finished whining about the Democratic Party applying pressure on them, they turned around to apply pressure on an independent candidate.

    Definition of Bully: A person who uses strength or power to harm or intimidate those who are weaker.

    - Well, how are some words left on a Facebook going to intimidate Kwan Wing Yip? The only logical explanation is that certain dark secrets about Gary Fan known to the Democratic Party will be published tomorrow if Kwan Wing Yip does not quit.

    - It is a sad sight to see that on a day when 7 candidates were forced to quit, the pan-democrats failed to notice the terror of the Black Hand behind the scene and cheered their Seven Martyrs of the Democracy Movement in Hong Kong for their courage. This is truly pathetic.

    - CAP 619 Competition Ordinance

    Bid-rigging (圍標) means

    (a) an agreement

    (i) that is made between or among 2 or more undertakings whereby one or more of those undertakings agrees or undertakes not to submit a bid or tender in response to a call or request for bids or tenders, or agrees or undertakes to withdraw a bid or tender submitted in response to such a call or request; and

    (ii) that is not made known to the person calling for or requesting bids or tenders at or before the time when a bid or tender is submitted or withdrawn by a party to the agreement or by an entity controlled by any one or more of the parties to the agreement; or

    (b) a submission, in response to a call or request for bids or tenders, of bids or tenders that are arrived at by an agreement

    (i) that is made between or among 2 or more undertakings; and

    (ii) that is not made known to the person calling for or requesting bids or tenders at or before the time when a bid or tender is submitted or withdrawn by a party to the agreement or by an entity controlled by any one or more of the parties to the agreement;

    - The whole affair is a classical case of 'bid-rigging.' The process begins by fielding many puppet 'pro-democracy' candidates to dilute the message from the pro-establishment candidates. At the election forums, they take up the majority of speaking time. Two days before the election, the masterminds ordered the puppet candidates to quit in a high-profiled manner, leaving only the candidates that the bosses want to see elected.

    Will those puppet candidates have to sacrifice a lot, given that they have spent millions on advertising? The answer is clearly NO. The bosses will see to it that these puppets will make much more than their expenses, one way or the other. Nobody gets into business in order to lose money, especially these calculating political hacks.

    - A "Deep Throat" has published this chronology of events:

    August 31. Martin Lee and Albert Ho of the Democratic Party asked Jimmy Lai (Next Media) to urge the Civic Party to make Sumly Chan quit so that his votes can be passed on to Roy Kwong (Democratic Party).

    September 1 morning. Jimmy Lai met wit Albert Ho and Lee Wing Tat of the Democratic Party for lunch and promised to compensate all those who abandon their campaigns. The money will be funneled through Ho and the amount will be at least double what was spent so far.

    Audrey Eu met with Paul Zimmerman and Chui Chi-kin to persuade them to abandon their campaigns and pass on their votes to Cyd Ho (Labour Party).

    September 2 morning. Joseph Cheng held a box lunch in Tamar to discuss the strategy for campaign suspensions. Martin Lee, Alan Leong (Civic Party), Emily Lau (Democratic Party), Lee Cheuk Yan (Labour Party) and Gary Fan Kwok Wai (Neo Democrats) were spotted.

    Martin Lee said that anyone who refuses to quit will be a sinner to be persecuted with every means possible.

    Sumly Chan, Kalvin Ho Kai-ming, Kwan Wing Yip, Paul Zimmerman and Chui Chi-kin were forced to abandon their campaigns.

    September 2 afternoon. Jimmy Lai met with Lee Cheuk Yan and Lam Cheuk Ting for afternoon tea, and promised once more to compensate those who abandon their campaigns.

    September 2 evening. Sumly Chan, Kalvin Ho Kai-ming, Kwan Wing Yip, Paul Zimmerman and Chui Chi-kin announced that they are abandoning their campaigns.

    September 2 late night. Anson Chan and Martin Lee met to discuss strategies in the geographical constituencies. They want to save Hui Chi Fung (Democratic Party) and abandon Cyd Ho (Labour Party) in Hong Kong Island; save Lau Siu Lai and abandon Raymond Wong and Yau Wai-ching in Kowloon West; save Wong Yeung Tat and abandon Jeremy Tam in Kowloon East; save Lam Cheuk Ting and abandon Cheung Chiu Hung in New Territories East; save Kwok Ka-ki and Lee Cheuk Yan and abandon Frederick Fung Kin-kee in New Territories West.

    September 2 late night. Gary Fan called a meeting of Neo Democrats and demanded Kwan Wing Yip to quit, because the choice was either to betray the voters or the pan-democrats. He said that Jimmy Lai will compensate Kwan generously. Kwan tried to fight for his own case, but he was forced to accept with tears in his eyes.

    September 3. Kwan Wing Yip announced that he was abandoning his campaign and considered this to be darkest day in his political life. Jimmy Lai met with Leung Kwok Hung (League of Social Democrats) and Roy Kwong. Leung Kwok Hung agreed to meet with Chan Chi-chuen (People Power) to persuade Chan to abandon his campaign.

    Internet comments:

    - Mom, I am going to stand here, hold my breath and stop breathing until you buy me that Barbie doll!!! I mean it!!!

    - Hmm, you can hold your breath until you pass out. But once you pass out, your body will start breathing again. So this is a waste of time. But you can die if you try this standing on the ledge of the roof or sitting in a filled bathtub. The coroner will write down the cause of death as: Expired due to gross stupidity.

    - This kid needs to study more. For example, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan are located in Central Asia, and Central Asia is not the Middle East.

    - As another example, there is something known as "fiscal multiplier of infrastructure spending." For example, each dollar of infrastructure spending increases the GDP by two dollars. Without building the roads, railways, port terminals and airport, Hong Kong would not have a logistics industry at all.

    - Wow! I just checked the map of the One Belt One Road countries. The "Middle East" is a very big place, running from Italy to Russia to India to Singapore. I didn't know that before, but now I have learned something new from this 15-year-old.

    - There are good reasons why 15-year-olds are not allowed to vote. You have just seen them.

    (Hong Kong Research Association) 2,188 persons aged 18 or over were interviewed between August 29 and September 1, 2016.

    Q1. What is the issue that you are most concerned about?
    27.8%: Political system/governance
    24,2%: Land/housing
    13,3%: Economic development
    10.6%: Medical/healthcare
    6.1%: Education
    5.4%: Labor/employment
    1.9%: Environmental protection
    4.9%: Others
    5.8%: No opinion

    Q2. What is the main reason for deciding on whom to vote for?
    25.1%: Policy platform
    22.8%: Past job performance
    19.5%: Political party background
    18.4%: Political beliefs
    6.3: Candidate's image
    2.8%: Strategic voting
    2.1%: Others
    3.2%: No opinion

    Q3. How likely are you to vote?
    55.8%: Definitely
    21.3%: Most likely
    3.9%: Most likely not
    4.7%: Definitely not
    11.2%: Undecided
    1.1%: No opinion

    District Council (Second) Functional Constituency (5 seats)
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    801 James To Kun Shun (Democratic Party) 15.6%
    802 Starry Lee (DAB) 20.5%
    803 Kwong Chun Yu (Democratic Party) 4.9%
    804 Kalvin Ho Kai Ming (ADPL) 2.8%
    805 Sumly Chan Yuen Sum (Civic Party) 4.7%
    806 Wong Kwok Hing (Federation of Trade Unions) 6.1%
    807 Kwan Wing Yip (Neo Democrats) 3.0%
    808 Leung Yiu Chung (Neighborhood & Worker's Service Centre) 7.0%
    809 Holden Chow Ho Ding (DAB) 5.2%
      Undecided 21.4%
      No opinion 8.8%

    Hong Kong Island (6 seats)
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    1 Gary Wong Chi Him (independent) 1.1%
    2 Christopher Lau Gar Hung (People Power) 1.5%
    3 Regina Ip Lau Suk Yee (New People's Party) 15.7%
    4 Cyd Ho Sau Lan (Labour Party) 6.9%
    5 Cheung Kwok Kwan (DAB) 7.6%
    6 Chim Pui Chung (independent) 0.8%
    7 Cheng Kam Mun (Civic Passion) 3.4%
    8 Nathan Law Kwun Chung (Demosisto) 3.4%
    9 Shum Chee Chiu (independent) 0.6%
    10 Ricky Wong Wai Kay (independent) 12.3%
    11 Chui Chi Kin (independent) 0.6%
    12 Paulus Johannes Zimmerman (independent) 2.5%
    13 Hui Chi Fung (Democratic Party) 4.9%
    14 Tanya Chan (Civic Party) 9.8%
    15 Kwok Wai Keung (Federation of Trade Unions) 5.5%
      Undecided 16.7%
      No opinion 6.7%

    Kowloon West (6 seats)
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    1 Avery Ng Man Yuen (League of Social Democrats) 1.9%
    2 Jonathan Ho Chi Kwong (independent) 0.5%
    3 Claudia Mo Man Ching (Civic Party) 12.3%
    4 Leung Mei Fun (BPA) 9.2%
    5 Tam Kwok Kiu (ADPL) 2.9%
    6 Chu Siu Hung (independent) 0.8%
    7 Raymond Wong Yuk Man (Proletariat Political Institute) 5.5%
    8 Helena Wong Pik Wan (Democratic Party) 9.6%
    9 Lam Yi Lai (independent) 0.5%
    10 Ann Chiang Lai Wan (DAB) 11.9%
    11 Kwan San Wai (independent) 0.0%
    12 Lau Siu Lai (independent) 5.8%
    13 Yau Wai Ching (Youngspiration) 6.3%
    14 Augustine Lee Wing Hon (independent) 0.6%
    15 Tik Chi Yuen (independent) 3.9%
      Undecided 20.6%
      No opinion 7.7%

    Kowloon East (5 seats)
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    1 Wong Kwok Kin (Federation of Trade Unions) 10.3%
    2 Wu Sui Shan (Labour Party) 1.0%
    3 Patrict Ko Tat Pun (independent) 1.0%
    4 Tam Heung Man (The Frontier) 2.0%
    5 Paul Tse Wai Chun (independent) 7.0%
    6 Wilson Or Chong Shing (DAB) 10.9%
    7 Lui Wing Kei (independent) 0.4%
    8 Wu Chi Wai (Democratic Party) 12.4%
    9 Jeremy Tam Man Ho (Civic Party) 12.6%
    10 Wong Yeung Tat (Civic Passion) 4.9%
    11 Chan Chak To (Kowloon East Community) 1.8%
    12 Tam Tak Chi (People Power) 4.2%
      Undecided 20.7%
      No opinion 10.8%

    New Territories West (9 seats)
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    1 Wong Yun Tat ( Neighborhood & Worker's Service Centre) 2.2%
    2 Andrew Wan Siu Kin (Democratic Party) 5.9%
    3 Ko Chi Fai (independent) 0.0%
    4 Chow Wing Kan (Liberal) 1.2%
    5 Cheng Chung Tai (Civic Passion) 4.5%
    6 Kwong Koon Wan (independent) 0.0%
    7 Michael Tien Puk Sun (New People's Party) 11.3%
    8 Ho Kwan Yiu (independent) 3.8%
    9 Leung Che Cheung (DAB) 6.5%
    10 Kwok Ka Ki (Civic Party) 4.9%
    11 Wong Ho Ming (League of Social Democrats) 3.1%
    12 Lee Cheuk Yan (Confederation of Trade Unions) 4.1%
    13 Wong Chun Kit (Youngspiration) 2.7%
    14 Mak Mei Kuen (Federation of Trade Unions) 5.5%
    15 Frederick Fung Kin Kee (ADPL) 3.6%
    16 Chan Han Pan (DAB) 7.0%
    17 Clarice Cheung Wai Ching (independent) 0.0%
    18 Hendrick Lui Chi Hang (independent) 0.5%
    19 Tong Wing Chi (independent) 0.1%
    20 Eddie Chu Hoi Dick (independent) 2.9%
      Undecided 22.2%
      No opinion 8.0%

    New Territories East (9 seats)
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    1 Christine Fong Kwok Shan (independent) 3.7%
    2 Lam Cheuk Ting (Democratic Party) 4.2%
    3 Liu Tin Shing (independent) 0.5%
    4 Chin Wan Kan (Hong Kong Resurgence Order) 2.7%
    5 Leung Kwok Hung (League of Social Democrats) 3.3%
    6 Cheung Chiu Hung (Labour Party) 2.3%
    7 Alvin Yeung Ngok Kiu (Civic Party) 10.2%
    8 Raymond Mak Ka Chun (independent) 0.9%
    9 Andrew Cheng Kar Foo (independent) 3.0%
    10 Elizabeth Quat (DAB) 9.3%
    11 Hau Chi Keung (independent) 0.5%
    12 Dominic Lee Tsz King (Liberal Party) 4.1%
    13 Tang Ka Piu (Federation of Trade Unions) 4.0%
    14 Gary Fan Kwok Wai (Neo Democrats) 3.3%
    15 Estella Chan Yuk Ngor (independent) 0.1%
    16 Wong Sum Yu (independent) 0.0%
    17 Leticia Lee See Yin 1.1%
    18 Raymond Chan Chi Chuen (People Power) 1.3%
    19 Sixtus Leung Chung Hang (Youngspiration) 4.4%
    20 Ronald Leung Kam Shing (independent) 0.3%
    21 Yung Hoi Yan (New People's Party) 4.3%
    22 Chan Hak Kan (DAB) 8.6%
      Undecided 20.4%
      No opinion 7.5%

    (Hong Kong Research Association) 5,016 persons aged 18 or over were interviewed between August 20 and August 29, 2016.

    Q1. What is the issue that you are most concerned about?
    26.2%: Political system/governance
    23.1%: Land/housing
    12.9%: Economic development
    11.2%: Medical/healthcare
    6.3%: Labor/employment
    5.8%: Education
    2.2%: Environmental protection
    5.5%: Others
    6.8%: No opinion

    Q2. What is the main reason for deciding on whom to vote for?
    25.3%: Past job performance
    21.5%: Policy platform
    18.2%: Political party background
    17.5%: Political beliefs
    7.2%: Candidate's image
    2.3%: Strategic voting
    3.6%: Others
    4.5%: No opinion

    Q3. How likely are you to vote?
    58.2%: Definitely
    18.5%: Most likely
    4.2%: Most likely not
    3.8%: Definitely not
    13.7%: Undecided
    1.6%: No opinion

    District Council (Second) Functional Constituency (5 seats)
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    801 James To Kun Shun (Democratic Party) 17.5%
    802 Starry Lee (DAB) 20.4%
    803 Kwong Chun Yu (Democratic Party) 4.1%
    804 Kalvin Ho Kai Ming (ADPL) 2.7%
    805 Sumly Chan Yuen Sum (Civic Party) 3.9%
    806 Wong Kwok Hing (Federation of Trade Unions) 7.0%
    807 Kwan Wing Yip (Neo Democrats) 3.2%
    808 Leung Yiu Chung (Neighborhood & Worker's Service Centre) 8.6%
    809 Holden Chow Ho Ding (DAB) 4.4%
      Undecided 21.3%
      No opinion 6.9%

    Hong Kong Island (6 seats)
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    1 Gary Wong Chi Him (independent) 0.4%
    2 Christopher Lau Gar Hung (People Power) 2.5%
    3 Regina Ip Lau Suk Yee (New People's Party) 18.5%
    4 Cyd Ho Sau Lan (Labour Party) 6.2%
    5 Cheung Kwok Kwan (DAB) 8.0%
    6 Chim Pui Chung (independent) 0.6%
    7 Cheng Kam Mun (Civic Passion) 3.4%
    8 Nathan Law Kwun Chung (Demosisto) 1.6%
    9 Shum Chee Chiu (independent) 0.4%
    10 Ricky Wong Wai Kay (independent) 10.3%
    11 Chui Chi Kin (independent) 0.2%
    12 Paulus Johannes Zimmerman (independent) 1.6%
    13 Hui Chi Fung (Democratic Party) 5.4%
    14 Tanya Chan (Civic Party) 12.7%
    15 Kwok Wai Keung (Federation of Trade Unions) 5.1%
      Undecided 18.7%
      No opinion 4.4%

    Kowloon West (6 setas)
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    1 Avery Ng Man Yuen (League of Social Democrats) 3.5%
    2 Jonathan Ho Chi Kwong (independent) 0.1%
    3 Claudia Mo Man Ching (Civic Party) 13.8%
    4 Leung Mei Fun (BPA) 11.4%
    5 Tam Kwok Kiu (ADPL) 3.8%
    6 Chu Siu Hung (independent) 0.0%
    7 Raymond Wong Yuk Man (Proletariat Political Institute) 4.6%
    8 Helena Wong  Pik Wan (Democratic Party) 8.2%
    9 Lam Yi Lai (independent) 0.1%
    10 Ann Chiang Lai Wan (DAB) 12.1%
    11 Kwan San Wai (independent) 0.1%
    12 Lau Siu Lai (independent) 4.5%
    13 Yau Wai Ching (Youngspiration) 6.5%
    14 Augustine Lee Wing Hon (independent) 1.3%
    15 Tik Chi Yuen (independent) 4.0%
      Undecided 18.5%
      No opinion 7.6%

    Kowloon East
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    1 Wong Kwok Kin (Federation of Trade Unions) 11.2%
    2 Wu Sui Shan (Labour Party) 0.8%
    3 Patrict Ko Tat Pun (independent) 0.6%
    4 Tam Heung Man (The Frontier) 2.5%
    5 Paul Tse Wai Chun (independent) 7.1%
    6 Wilson Or Chong Shing (DAB) 10.9%
    7 Lui Wing Kei (independent) 0.2%
    8 Wu Chi Wai (Democratic Party) 12.2%
    9 Jeremy Tam Man Ho (Civic Party) 18.9%
    10 Wong Yeung Tat (Civic Passion) 4.4%
    11 Chan Chak To (Kowloon East Community) 1.1%
    12 Tam Tak Chi (People Power) 3.1%
      Undecided 20.5%
      No opinion 6.5%

    New Territories West
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    1 Wong Yun Tat ( Neighborhood & Worker's Service Centre) 2.6%
    2 Andrew Wan Siu Kin (Democratic Party) 6.2%
    3 Ko Chi Fai (independent) 0.1%
    4 Chow Wing Kan (Liberal) 0.7%
    5 Cheng Chung Tai (Civic Passion) 2.5%
    6 Kwong Koon Wan (independent) 0.1%
    7 Michael Tien Puk Sun (New People's Party) 12.4%
    8 Ho Kwan Yiu (independent) 3.4%
    9 Leung Che Cheung (DAB) 5.4%
    10 Kwok Ka Ki (Civic Party) 5.5%
    11 Wong Ho Ming (League of Social Democrats) 3.5%
    12 Lee Cheuk Yan (Confederation of Trade Unions) 7.0%
    13 Wong Chun Kit (Youngspiration) 5.0%
    14 Mak Mei Kuen (Federation of Trade Unions) 4.6%
    15 Frederick Fung Kin Kee (ADPL) 4.1%
    16 Chan Han Pan (DAB) 5.7%
    17 Clarice Cheung Wai Ching (independent) 0.3%
    18 Hendrick Lui Chi Hang (independent) 0.0%
    19 Tong Wing Chi (independent) 0.1%
    20 Eddie Chu Hoi Dick (independent) 1.5%
      Undecided 23.3%
      No opinion 6.1%

    New Territories East
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    1 Christine Fong Kwok Shan (independent) 4.3%
    2 Lam Cheuk Ting (Democratic Party) 5.0%
    3 Liu Tin Shing (independent) 0.5%
    4 Chin Wan Kan (Hong Kong Resurgence Order) 2.7%
    5 Leung Kwok Hung (League of Social Democrats) 3.0%
    6 Cheung Chiu Hung (Labour Party) 4.0%
    7 Alvin Yeung Ngok Kiu (Civic Party) 10.0%
    8 Raymond Mak Ka Chun (independent) 0.7%
    9 Andrew Cheng Kar Foo (independent) 4.6%
    10 Elizabeth Quat (DAB) 8.7%
    11 Hau Chi Keung (independent) 0.7%
    12 Dominic Lee Tsz King (Liberal Party) 6.0%
    13 Tang Ka Piu (Federation of Trade Unions) 2.4%
    14 Gary Fan Kwok Wai (Neo Democrats) 3.9%
    15 Estella Chan Yuk Ngor (independent) 0.1%
    16 Wong Sum Yu (independent) 0.0%
    17 Leticia Lee See Yin 0.8%
    18 Raymond Chan Chi Chuen (People Power) 2.2%
    19 Sixtus Leung Chung Hang (Youngspiration) 2.8%
    20 Ronald Leung Kam Shing (independent) 0.5%
    21 Yung Hoi Yan (New People's Party) 4.0%
    22 Chan Hak Kan (DAB) 6.4%
      Undecided 19.8%
      No opinion 7.0%

    (The Stand News) August 24, 2016.

    Cable TV sponsored an election forum last night for the Kowloon West district. Afterwards, the supporters of Raymond Wong Yuk Man (Proletariat Political Institute) and CK Ho (Hong Kong Localism Power) quarreled outside the venue. After Wong left in a car, the scene got chaotic with clashes. The police used pepper spray and police batons to maintain order.

    According to Passion Times (Civic Passion), abut 10 or so HK Peanut members led by former League of Social Democrats chairman Andrew as well other League of Social Democrats/People Power supporters harassed Raymond Wong. When the information got out, more than one hundred Civic Passion, Proletariat Political Institute and City-State supporters rushed over to help Wong.

    Meanwhile Andrew To said that they were surrounded and shouted at by almost 100 Civic Passion members. CK Ho's car was vandalized with many scratch marks. CK Ho's campaign manager Yeung Kai-cheung said: "There was no incident of surrounding Wong that Civic Passion described. As for what happens afterwards, you can watch the video for yourselves. In the end, the car of CK Ho's friend was scratched. Such are the accomplishments of the Valiant Ones. Civic Passion always provoke others first and then play victims afterwards."

    The Hong Kong Police said that one police was injured during a melee. He sustained injuries to the neck and eye and taken to Queen Elizabeth Hospital for treatment. In addition, a car was prevented from leaving at the scene. After issuing verbal warnings, the police applied pepper spray. Two police officers sustained injuries to the hand and chest, and taken to Queen Elizabeth Hospital for treatment.

    Videos:

    https://youtu.be/6gw4ur9ToSw
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGW8iwlSGi0
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AySMEXmtItw

    https://www.facebook.com/1640482902830291/videos/1762743997270847/

    https://www.facebook.com/passiontimes/videos/1185175438212288/
    https://www.facebook.com/passiontimes/videos/1185145024881996/

    Internet comments:

    - Being the crafty Supreme Leader, Raymond Wong was the first to leave the scene. As usual.

    - When they heard that there were only 10 LSD/PP people there, more than 100 Civic Passion rushed over to display their valor. But where were they when Zhang Dejiang came to town? What happened to all the talk about valiant conquering the People's Liberation Army?

    - Who are the League of Social Democrats and People Power anyway? At one time or the other, Raymond Wong was the Supreme Leader of the League of Social Democrats and People Power too. His discarded followers is a list of who's who in social activism: Edward Yum Liang-hsien, Andrew To Kwan-hang, Avery Ng Man-yuen, Raphael Wong Ho-ming, Leung Kwok-hung, Albert Chan Wai-yip, etc. His political career is a series of setting up political organizations and blowing them up when they go beyond his control. In practical terms, he must be seen as a tool for the Chinese Liaison Office to destroy the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong.

    - Apple Daily has even made a documentary of Raymond Wong and the various generations of favorite sons.

    - https://www.facebook.com/passiontimes/videos/1185145024881996/ The highly popular Cheng Chung-tai (Civic Passion) being welcomed by citizens at the Tsuen Wan MTR station.

    - https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=h9eAaYmezqw Civic Passion or triad thugs?

    - https://www.facebook.com/chankawairicky/videos/1057614217607274/ Another day, another non-contact boxing match. Wong Yeung Tat vs. Tam Tak Chi at a Kowloon East forum.

    - What valor? They clashed for several hours but not a single drop of blood could be found. Why bother?

    - Here is the League of Social Democrats on October 9, 2014. They are arguing with other citizens whether they can eat hot pot dinner and play mahjong in the middle of Nathan Road (Mong Kok) in the name of the Revolution. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFr9OWNVqOk After 30 minutes of discussion, nothing was settled.

    Meanwhile Wong Yeung Tat (Civic Passion) made an emergency appeal to Occupy Central participants not to cook with open stoves or drink alcohol in the middle of Nathan Road. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Vjeb3qgC8Y

    - The alternate model is to hire actors to play villagers to lay siege to a pro-establishment incumbent Legislative Councilor: https://www.facebook.com/434483659936746/videos/1231080153610422/

    - Or if you prefer something nonviolent and light-hearted, here is Alvin Cheng Kam-mun (Civic Passion) smugly accusing Christopher Lau (People Power) of characterizing the Hong Kong government as a democratic government. What Christopher Lau said (in English) is: "This is NOT a democratic government. This is NOT a democratic parliament. They don't have to listen to you. They don't have the election pressure." How can Cheng who claims to have studied in Queensland (Australia) not understand this very simple English? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-Ws_RgQj_w

    Later, Paul Zimmerman (independent) asked Alvin Cheng Kam-mun (Civic Passion) about the solution to land supply. Begin at 7:34 in  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mdJZMa-SJiA. Cheng bailed and let Bonix Chung handled it by saying that they advocate constitutional reform to monitor the government blah blah blah ... That is obviously not answering the question, so Zimmerman rephrased the question as: "What land do we use? ... Are you in support of the small house policy or not?" Chung continued to mumble about there being plenty of land still in government hands blah blah blah. Zimmerman pressed on: "One of your colleagues in New Territories East supports the small house policy. Is that correct?" Finally Alvin Cheng takes over the microphone: "Actually the problem goes back to the population policy because if we cannot estimate the number of people who will be in Hong Kong ... for example, 150 one-way visa holders per day right now ... we cannot formulate our land policy." Zimmerman asked about the 'brown fields' which pollute the land, and Cheung/Chung said that land use is not transparent and that is why it is important to have a constitutional reform in order to monitor the government. Zimmerman said that land use data can be found by accessing a government website ...

    - https://www.facebook.com/1818980738333851/videos/1839155459649712/ Video of Civic Passion volunteers covering up the banners of rival candidates.

    - (Headline Daily) August 24, 2016. CK Ho has filed a police report that a Raymond Wong supporter has threatened on Facebook to kill him and Edward Yum. The person threatened to kill, burn his body and use it as a Buddhist talisman.

    - Here is another adventure for Civic Passion. (Wen Wei Po) August 28, 2016.

    Last night a citizen found Civic Passion members Alvin Cheng Kam-mun, Bonix Chung and others taking down the banners for DAB candidates Alvin Cheng Kam-mun and Cheung Kwok-kwan in Wah Kwai Estate, Pok Fu Lam district, Hong Kong Island. So the citizen took out his camera to film.

    A female Civic Passion member spotted him and yelled, "Mister, do these banners belong to you? If so, will you please acknowledge?"

    Cheng Kam-mun also came up to this citizen in an intimidating manner: "Are they yours? Did you file an application?" The citizen asked them to identify themselves and explain why they are taking down other people's banners. Cheng said that they are not taking down those banners. Rather, these banners were "unsupervised" and "can fall down upon pedestrians if there is rain and wind." Therefore, Civic Passion is taking the action "in order to protect the citizens of Hong Kong." As such, they do not need any authorization.

    A large number of Civic Passion members rushed up to surround this citizen. Some of them blocked the camera, other used foul language to curse him and still others charged up, screamed and threatened to attack him. When Cheng realized that the Civic Passion people were out of control, he separated them from the citizen and left. Cheng has a number of court cases still pending and cannot afford to violate the terms of probation.

    (SCMP) August 21, 2016.

    Hundreds of people took to the streets on Sunday in a protest march against the disqualification of six pro-independence Legislative Council candidates, as marchers said they were there to defend Hong Kongs political rights and freedom of speech not to support independence.

    Organisers estimated that 1,300 protesters took part, while a police spokeswoman said the marchs turnout peaked at 760.

    The rally drew lukewarm response from localist groups. Among the six banned aspirants, only Alice Lai Yi-man, Nakade Hitsujiko and Yeung Ke-cheong showed up, while independent candidate James Chan Kwok-keung, Hong Kong National Partys Chan Ho-tin, and Hong Kong Indigenous Edward Leung Tin-kei did not attend.

    March organiser Jimmy Sham Tsz-kit, convenor of Civil Human Rights Front an alliance of pan-democratic groups had estimated that up to 2,000 people would gather in Causeway Bay when the march kicked off at 3pm.

    After the protest ended outside Chief Executive Leung Chun-yings office in Admiralty at 4.30pm, Sham said he was neither satisfied nor disappointed with the turnout. Many people came out to express their discontent, so how can we be happy when people are angry? he explained.

    One of the participants, Chily Chau, a second-year social work student at Baptist University, said: I have reservations about independence as a way out for Hong Kong... and I might not vote for a pro-independence candidate if I were given the choice. But Hongkongers should at least be allowed to vote in a fair election.

    Alan Wong, a 62-year-old retiree, said: Independence is next to impossible at this stage... but free-thinking voters should be making the decision if they support it, not the government.

    March organiser Jimmy Sham Tsz-kit, convenor of Civil Human Rights Front an alliance of pan-democratic groups had estimated that up to 2,000 people would gather in Causeway Bay when the march kicked off at 3pm.

    After the protest ended outside Chief Executive Leung Chun-yings office in Admiralty at 4.30pm, Sham said he was neither satisfied nor disappointed with the turnout. Many people came out to express their discontent, so how can we be happy when people are angry? he explained.

    One of the participants, Chily Chau, a second-year social work student at Baptist University, said: I have reservations about independence as a way out for Hong Kong... and I might not vote for a pro-independence candidate if I were given the choice. But Hongkongers should at least be allowed to vote in a fair election.

    Alan Wong, a 62-year-old retiree, said: Independence is next to impossible at this stage... but free-thinking voters should be making the decision if they support it, not the government.

    The snub by localists highlighted the gap between them and the pan-democrats. Some localists had questioned if the event was a pan-democratic tool. Both camps had clashed on whether marches were effective in fighting for democracy, and whether independence was a way out for Hong Kongs problems.

    Internet comments:

    - Public pressure eventually forced you to invite someone but then he brings a message that carries considerable embarrassment for you. Quiz: Which banner did Nakade Hitsujiko actually carry?


    "If the Americans aren't here yet, I will invite them.
    If the Americans arrive, I will guide their way."


    (Spoof)
    "If the American soldiers want ass, I will offer mine.
    If the American soldiers take out their dicks, I will suck them."

    (SCMP) August 25, 2016.

    Liberal Party aspirant Ken Chow Wing-kan, who is running for a Legislative Council seat in New Territories West, dropped a bombshell on Thursday night by announcing he would stop his electioneering for fear of people close to him paying a heavy price.

    Chows abrupt move has sparked speculation on whether the Yuen Long district councillor is being pressured by Beijings liaison office, which is allegedly coordinating the election campaign of the pro-establishment camp.

    In an interview with magazine E-Weekly last week, Chow admitted that he was earlier approached by a middleman to quit the race for a hefty sum of money double the amount of his election expenses. Chow claimed he had told the middleman that such deals were illegal and that he still believed he was free to contest in a democratic society like Hong Kong.

    During the New Territories West election forum organised by Cable TV on Thursday night, Chow dressed all in black was the only candidate who brought no banners or other publicity materials with him.

    In a dramatic twist, he told the crowd in his introductory remarks: I now announce a very heavy decision to all of you. As I do not want supporters around me caught in any high level troubles or paying a price, I will stop all my electioneering to gain voters support starting from tonight. This forum will be the last one I will attend.

    I bow and apologise to all my volunteers, family members, citizens and supporters I have let you down because I am not strong enough, an emotional Chow said. The Liberal aspirant gave up the chance to debate with opponents, but made a brief speech before the forum ended. The scariest factor was not death, he said, but the failure to protect the people around him.

    Chows remarks left all the other contenders shocked, with a number of pan-democratic candidates questioning Beijing-loyalist Junius Ho Kwan-yiu during the forum, as he was likely to benefit from the Liberal candidates departure.

    The Democrat Partys Andrew Wan Siu-kin said no political power should intervene in the citys election and urged Ho to join him in filing a claim to the police regarding the threats Chow had faced.

    But Ho dismissed it as a political smear campaign, saying he did not know what the accusation was and that he had a lot more meaningful things to do.

    Liberal Party leader Felix Chung Kwok-pan told the Post he was shocked by Chows announcement and that he needed more time to know the story first. Chow is the first candidate to quit the race over alleged threats. Under electoral rules, no verified candidate can withdraw from the election once the nomination period has ended. Liberal Party honorary chairman James Tien Pei-chun said he and other core members of the party did not know of Chows decision beforehand. We are trying to reach Ken, Tien said.

    (SCMP) August 26, 2016.

    A Liberal Party candidate who gave up his Legislative Council bid citing high-level threats should explain his case to the public because the rule of law and peoples right to stand for elections could be at stake, the partys leaders urged yesterday.

    The election watchdog said it was alarmed at Ken Chow Wing-kans abrupt departure from the race for a seat in the New Territories West constituency, stressing it would not tolerate any threats or violence in the polls and would deal with complaints strictly. It also warned candidates against spreading false information about other contenders.

    Chow, a long-time Yuen Long district councillor, yesterday remained tight-lipped after tearfully announcing his decision at an election forum on Thursday night, saying only that he would be leaving town and would return to speak about the threats the day after the September 4 elections, according to party leaders.

    His rival and pro-Beijing lawyer Junius Ho Kwan-yiu denied having any plans to intimidate Chow. But Ho admitted one of his supporters had proposed to him that he pursue Chow to hit his morale, an idea he claimed he had rejected.

    The incident has highlighted the power struggle among rural forces within the citys pro-establishment camp.

    Speaking to the press after filing a report to the Independent Commission Against Corruption, the Liberal Partys three honorary chairmen said they were shocked at Chows decision.

    James Tien Pei-chun, who spoke to Chow on the phone after the forum, said Chow appeared very scared but refused to tell him who had made threats against him, only revealing they involved the personal safety of his campaign team.

    I asked him what he meant by the tall wall and the higher-level troubles he had mentioned at the forum whether it is the Hong Kong government or [mainland officials] in Shenzhen but he wouldnt tell, Tien said.

    Tien urged Chow to come forward to explain the episode to the public as soon as possible.

    This is because the rule of law is important to Hong Kong, he said. This is not just your own problem, but one about peoples right to stand for election.

    At the Thursday forum on Cable TV, Chow, running for a seat in New Territories West, shocked his competition by announcing he would stop his electioneering for fear that people close to him would be caught in higher-level troubles and pay a heavy price.

    However, under the law, a candidate cannot officially quit an election.

    Chow passed to the media a voice clip in which Hos volunteer said he would bring 20 to 30 men to pursue Chow before and after the forum.

    Ho yesterday said the clip was part of an internal discussion among his campaign team in a WhatsApp group, and he had rejected the idea from his volunteer, who owns real estate and catering businesses.

    I have reasons to suspect [Chows] actions were intentional and orchestrated by himself to target me, Ho said, stressing he did not know why Chow went after him.

    Ivan Choy Chi-keung, a political scientist at Chinese University, said while Chows claims remained untested, they would, if proven, severely shake peoples confidence in the integrity of the LegCo elections, which has already been called into question over the disqualification of six candidates deemed to have been advocating Hong Kong independence from the rest of China.

    As to whether the incident would hurt Hos campaign, it depended on how it would play out over the next few days, Choy said.

    Regardless of Hos role, the incident has also shed light on the tension between different rural forces, according to Chu Hoi-dick, an activist running in the same constituency who is a vocal critic of the powerful rural body, the Heung Yee Kuk. Chu claimed that the liaison office had an interest in the kuks campaign.

    Opinion polls have placed Ho on the cusp of winning a seat.

    He is thought to be one of the major players scrambling for power within the kuk at a time when competing factions vie for influence as the kuks long-time kingpin Lau Wong-fat is ailing.

    The kuk is powerful because it has 26 members on the election committee that picks Hong Kongs leader and one in the legislature, and is linked to many development interests across vast areas of rural land.

    Ho, who steered an anti-Occupy campaign in 2014, is also seen to have close ties with pro-Beijing forces.

    Last month, just a few days after he declared his plan to run in the polls, he was appointed by the government as a New Territories Justice of Peace, a position that enables him to be an ex officio member of the kuk. In 2011, he angered Lau by unseating him from the chairmanship of the kuks Tuen Mun Rural Committee.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) August 26, 2016.

    Pro-Beijing Legislative Council election candidate Junius Ho Kwan-yiu has accused a rival candidate of conducting a conspiracy to smear him, after the election hopeful made a surprise announcement to drop out of the race on Thursday night.

    Hos statements came after recordings by one of his volunteers were revealed by his opponent Ken Chow Wing-kan of the Liberal Party. The tape made reference to deploying 20 to 30 people to pressure Chow during a televised election forum on Thursday, although the action did not occur.

    Chow said during the forum that he will halt his election campaign in order to avoid greater trouble for people around him. But Chow did not clarify as to what the threats entailed. Ho, in response, held a press conference on Friday questioning Chows actions.

    If Mr Chow felt such recordings put himself and his family in danger, why did he not report to the police in the first place? He gave the recordings to media and other parties he said. Under what circumstances did he get the recordings?

    Ho refused to reveal the identity of the volunteer in the recording. I have a responsibility to protect his privacy, not everyone can stand the medias questions, he said.

    Ho said the recordings were internal discussions by his volunteers on election strategies, but he ultimately rejected the plan after he learnt of it. He also denied the proposed pressuring action involved any criminal acts.

    Chow did not clearly say what he was accusing him of doing, Ho said. But he was targeting me  such accusations, if it was not a planned conspiracy, what was it? he said.

    Ho accused Chow of acting when he cried in front of cameras. If you really felt pressure, you wouldnt be so unclear he cant even tell the half of it wasting the time and energy of many people. Such bad acting made people sad and cry, he said.

    Chow previously accused Ho of lying to the indigenous people community, claiming that Ho was not an indigenous person himself. Ho was the former chairman of the Tuen Mun Rural Committee.

    Ho denied the claims, and accused Chow of failing to produce the document that can prove his claim. Ho said that he filed a complaint with the Electoral Affairs Commission on August 24. I didnt know my complaint would make him [Chow] so horrified maybe he couldnt stand the trial of the law.

    Chow told E Weekly magazine last week that a middleman offered him cash amounting to double his election spending in return for him to halt his campaign.

    For such a serious accusation, why did he not report it to the ICAC [anti-graft agency]? This is very different from common practice, and Chow was a district councillor for a long time, he said. It was only him accusing other people this is the most dishonourable, the accused should have a right of reply.

    Asked about whether there was a mole who leaked the recordings, Ho said: Every volunteer is a good friend, I wont say they are moles. Everyone who helps me is an angel. Ming Pao then reported that the volunteer in the recording was named Wong Si-chuang.

    Wong is the president of the Great Union Food & Drinks Co. Ltd. and the H.K.N.T. Estate Agents & Merchants Association, matching the description given by Ho about him on a radio programme on Friday, which stated he was in the catering and property business. Wong had led a group of people in 2014 promoting their opposition to the pro-democracy occupy protests. Wong confirmed to Ming Pao that it was him in the recording, and said he did not threaten Chow.

    In a statement, the Electoral Affairs Commission said that it does not tolerate any defrauding, threatening or violent acts in elections. It said that it is a criminal offence if violence or threats were used to cause anyone joining or not joining the election. It also said that it is a criminal offence to publish false statements about candidates themselves or other candidates in order to make themselves elected or block other candidates from being elected.

    (The Standard) September 7, 2016.

    The Liberal Party's Ken Chow who abruptly ended his campaign in the New Territories West constituency last month said today he was threatened and told to end his election campaign by "three people from Beijing". 

    He left Hong Kong last month after announcing his shock decision at an election forum. He had blamed threats by "high level forces" then but refused to elaborate then. 

    The District Councillor's decision sent shockwaves and led to concerns over the fairness of local elections, when even a candidate seen as a government ally could be told to quit. 

    He then went abroad and returned to Hong Kong on Monday, a day after the Legislative Council election. 

    Speaking at a news conference, Chow said that a longtime friend told him to go to a hotel in Shenzhen to discuss his campaign. There, he met three men he didn't know. He said they came from Beijing.

    Chow said he was told to stop attending election forums, end all campaign promotions, and stay away from Hong Kong until after the election. Chow said the men had detailed knowledge about his family and supporters and that scared him. 

    The next day, he announced end to his campaign and left Hong Kong. Chow also claimed he was followed while he was in Britain, but felt safe enough because there were surveillance cameras on the streets. 

    He said he never discussed any of this with anyone, as he didn't want his family to worry. He refused to comment on whether the matter had anything to do with pro-government lawmaker-elect Junius Ho, who took the last seat in New Territories West. 

    Chow had released an audio recording when he ended his campaign, of apparently a group discussing tactics against his campaign. Ho later admitted the voice belonged to his supporters but said that was an internal discussion about election strategies. 

    Chow said before the Shenzhen encounter, he was discouraged against running on three occasions and on another occasion offered huge amount of money. 

    Chow said he didnt report it to the anti-corruption agency as the man was just speaking hypothetically. Upon his return to Hong Kong on Monday, Chow did report to the The Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC). 
    The Liberal Party, the New People's Party and the Labour Party had already urged the ICAC to investigate.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) September 7, 2016.

    The outgoing Legislative Council president has questioned the reasoning behind alleged threats made to Liberal Party election dropout Ken Chow Wing-kan.

    Jasper Tsang Yok-sing commented on the incident after Chows explosive claims on Wednesday, when he revealed that he was forced by three people from Beijing to drop out of the Legislative Council race, as his candidacy could harm the chances of fellow pro-Beijing candidate Junius Ho Kwan-yiu from securing the final seat in New Territories West.

    I find it very very weird, Tsang said, according to Commercial Radio. If there was really someone who threatened Mr Chow from running in the election, threatened him to suspend his campaign, I would ask why: what is the logic behind persuading a candidate with almost zero per cent support?

    Chow was receiving very low levels of support in the polls before the election.

    But Chow claimed he was approached by middlemen on three occasions asking him to stop running, before he was asked to go to a hotel room in Shenzhen. It was there that he was introduced to the three people who, he said, held important information of people close to him.

    Chow then decided to suspend his campaign out of fear.

    I cant understand it if some people wanted another candidate to have a chance to win, they should choose to persuade someone with a similar [voter base] who is able to get a lot of votes, right? Tsang said. I find it weird if it was me, I would not choose to spend so much effort on someone who has almost no votes, asking him to drop out.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) September 7, 2016.

    In a new revelation, pro-Beijing Liberal Party election candidate Ken Chow Wing-kan said it was three people from Beijing who forced him to drop out of the Legislative Council race on August 25. Before that, he was urged on multiple occasions not to run, as his candidacy could harm the chances of a fellow pro-Beijing candidate securing the final seat in New Territories West.

    He said at a press conference on Wednesday that a day before he decided to make the surprise announcement to suspend his campaign, he was invited by a friend whom he had known for over a decade to meet in Shenzhen where the friend lived. The friend wanted to discuss important issues related to his campaign.

    But when he arrived at a hotel in Shenzhen, he was introduced to the three people, who asked him to halt his campaign. According to Chow, the trio were holding important information of people close to him.

    I dont know how they knew, including people very close to my family circle, important friends who support me, their backgrounds, income sources, habits they read them out one by one, I started to feel afraid, he said.

    You realise this information is beyond the reach of all private investigators. Then they said if you dont follow our orders, they will take action immediately, that those who support me will pay a heavy price.

    He said he was asked to do three things: stop attending all election debates; suspend all election campaigns; and leave Hong Kong as soon as possible until the final vote count was complete.

    So the second day, I bought a ticket in a hurry to go, he said. I am sorry I could not say anything back then.

    Chow flew to the UK, where he remained until his return on Monday: There is CCTV everywhere [in the UK] I feel much safer.

    However, Chow said he was being followed in Britain.

    He said that the three who threatened him were above the China Liaison Office in Hong Kong. But he refused to reveal their identities, concerned that he may get into bigger trouble.

    Asked as to why he did not report the case to the police, he said: You know this is outside their jurisdiction, no matter if its the Electoral Affairs Commission, the police, or the Independent Commission Against Corruption, they cannot handle things that happen outside of Hong Kong, and the people involved were not from Hong Kong.

    The Shenzhen meeting came after three meetings between him and two different groups of friends, who asked him to drop out.

    Chow said two friends from authorities stationed in Hong Kong suggesting Chinese ones invited him to meet at a restaurant in Sha Tin on July 13, saying that you were not blessed to take a seat in the New Territories West area.

    In response, Chow said he did not require blessings. The pair then said they may be able to help as there are a lot of positions in government, but Chow refused.

    On July 17, two days before he submitted his nomination to run, he met with a friend from Yuen Long and in the catering business, who he had known for more than 20 years. Chow described the person as someone who was working on many things for the country in private.

    The friend offered him a monetary amount equal to double his election spending: HK$5 million at a cafe in Gold Coast, Tuen Mun. The sum would be in return of him not running in the election. Chow also refused.

    On July 19, the day he submitted his nomination, Chow said the two friends who met him in Sha Tin asked him once again not to run.

    They said it will cause the pro-Beijing camp to lose altogether, including Leung Che-cheung and Junius Ho Kwan-yiu, he said.

    Chow said the two friends told him that Ho had secured 17,000 votes from the indigenous peoples community those from the rural politician Chan Keung. Ho could garner another 10,000 votes, according to their results in the 2012 Legislative Council election, so Ho would likely win a seat.

    I told them those 17,000 votes [from Chan] will not switch to Ho, he said, adding that Ho had irreconcilable differences with the indigenous people community.

    Many indigenous people told me if there was not another person from the community running in the election, they would support me, he added. But after [the July 19 meeting], the indigenous leaders suddenly told me sorry Ken, we are in not a convenient position to support you anymore.

    What happened before [the switch]? You can guess the reason, Chow said.

    On Monday, Ho won the last seat of nine-seat New Territories West constituency with only 5,000 votes more than the tenth-placed Lee Cheuk-yan of the Labour Party.

    Its a manipulated election, he said.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) September 8, 2016.

    The Liberal Partys Ken Chow Wing-kan has given further details about the three people from Beijing who threatened him in order to make him drop out of the Legislative Council election. Chow had hinted that the moves were intended to make him give way to pro-Beijing lawmaker-elect Junius Ho Kwan-yiu.

    Chow made explosive claims on Wednesday that he was invited to a hotel restaurant in Shenzhen to meet with a friend on August 24, the day before he suspended his campaign, but was instead introduced to the three, who he said had just flown in from Beijing.

    They were from a secret department that they could not disclose, he said on a RTHK programme on Thursday. They flew in especially to handle the matter of my election campaign. They asked me to suspend my campaign.

    The three were middle-aged men, Chow said, and they told him not to ask which department they were from.

    They spoke Cantonese, not with [a Hong Kong accent], it sounded like the Guangzhou accent, he said, adding that they looked like mainland officials based on how they spoke, acted, and the cigarettes they smoked.

    He was asked to stop going to election debates, suspend his campaign and leave Hong Kong. According to Chow, they held important information about people close to him and threatened to take action if he did not drop out. The information could only have been collected by government agencies, he said.

    I had no choice they needed me to make a decision that night, he said.

    Chow also criticised LegCo president Jasper Tsang for questioning his version of the story. Tsang has said that he did not understand why anyone would threaten Chow, since he had very low support in the polls.

    Is he trying to help some people whitewash this? he said. It is a matter of debate whether or not I had voter support.

    He said that he won 1,900 votes in the district council election, and he had a team of over 100 campaigning for him in Tin Shui Wai. He added that many people were ordered to attack him after he gave up his campaign.

    Chow has said there were three occasions on which he was urged not to run before the Shenzhen meeting.

    These included two meetings with two mainland people from authorities stationed in Hong Kong Chow declined to answer if the agency was the China Liaison Office.

    They suggested to him in the first meeting that he was not blessed to win and that they may be able to help him with a government position if he gave up the race. He refused.

    The second meeting with the two was in a sound-proofed room in their office to which he was not allowed to bring his phone. Chow also refused to stop his campaign on that occasion.

    Another meeting was with a long-term friend of his, who has ties with the rural leaders in Hong Kong and with people in Beijing. Chow refused a suggestion from the friend that a monetary amount equal to double his election spending HK$5 million would be given to him in return for not running in the election.

    (Oriental Daily) July 20, 2017.

    According to Labour Party member Chiu Yan-lai reported the case of Chow Wing-kan to the Independent Commission Against Corruption, the ICAC has notified him that the investigation will be terminated due to lack of sufficient evidence.

    Video

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=nEvjLFvP-4M Chow Wing-kan's statement (with English sub-titles)

    Internet comments:

    - On one hand, the person(s) who forced Chow Wing-kan to quit comes under CAP 554 Elections (Corrupt and Illegal Conduct) Ordinance

    Part: 2 Corrupt Conduct

    Section: 6 What penalties can be imposed for corrupt conduct at elections?

    (1) A person who engages in corrupt conduct at an election commits an offence and is-

    (a) if tried summarily, liable on conviction to a fine of $200000 and to imprisonment for 3 years; or
    (b) if tried on indictment, liable on conviction to a fine of $500000 and to imprisonment for 7 years.

    (2) A person may be convicted of an offence of having engaged in corrupt conduct at an election if the person is found to have engaged in the conduct before, during or after the election period.

    (3) A court that convicts a person of having engaged in corrupt conduct must order the person to pay to the court-

    (a) the amount or value of any valuable consideration received by the person or the person's agents in connection with the conduct; or
    (b) such part of the amount or value as that court specifies in the order.

    Section: 7 Corrupt conduct to bribe candidates or prospective candidates

    (1) A person engages in corrupt conduct at an election if the person corruptly-

    (a) offers an advantage to another person as an inducement for the other person-

    (i) to stand, or not to stand, as a candidate at the election; or
    (ii) if the other person has been nominated as a candidate at the election, to withdraw the nomination; or
    (iii) if the other person has been nominated as a candidate at the election, not to use the other person's best endeavours to promote the election of the other person; or

    (b) offers an advantage to another person as a reward-

    (i) for having stood, or not stood, as a candidate at the election; or
    (ii) if the other person was nominated as a candidate at the election, for having withdrawn the nomination; or
    (iii) if the other person was or has been nominated as a candidate at the election, for not having used the other person's best endeavours to promote the election of the other person; or

    (c) offers an advantage to another person as an inducement for the other person to get, or try to get, a third person-

    (i) to stand, or not to stand, as a candidate at the election; or
    (ii) if the third person has been nominated as a candidate at the election, to withdraw the nomination; or
    (iii) if the third person has been nominated as a candidate at the election, not to use the third person's best endeavours to promote the election of the third person; or

    (d) offers an advantage to another person as a reward for having got, or having tried to get, a third person-

    (i) to stand, or not to stand, as a candidate at the election; or
    (ii) if the third person was nominated as a candidate at the election, to withdraw the nomination; or
    (iii) if the third person was or has been nominated as a candidate at the election, not to use the third person's best endeavours to promote the election of the third person; or

    (e) solicits or accepts an advantage as an inducement-

    (i) to stand, or not to stand, as a candidate at the election; or
    (ii) if the person has been nominated as a candidate at the election, to withdraw the nomination; or
    (iii) if the person has been nominated as a candidate at the election, not to use the person's best endeavours to promote the election of the person; or

    (f) solicits or accepts an advantage as a reward-

    (i) for having stood, or not stood, as a candidate at the election; or
    (ii) if the person was nominated as a candidate at the election, for having withdrawn the nomination; or
    (iii) if the person was or has been nominated as a candidate at the election, for not having used the person's best endeavours to promote the election of the person; or

    (g) solicits or accepts an advantage as an inducement to get, or try to get, another person-

    (i) to stand, or not to stand, as a candidate at the election; or
    (ii) if the other person has been nominated as a candidate at the election, to withdraw the nomination; or
    (iii) if the other person has been nominated as a candidate at the election, not to use the other person's best endeavours to promote the election of the other person; or

    (h) solicits or accepts an advantage as a reward for having got, or having tried to get, another person-

    (i) to stand, or not to stand, as a candidate at the election; or
    (ii) if the other person was nominated as a candidate at the election, to withdraw the nomination; or
    (iii) if the other person was or has been nominated as a candidate at the election, not to use the other person's best endeavours to promote the election of the other person.

    (2) For the purposes of this section-

    (a) a person offers an advantage if the person confers, undertakes to confer or shows a willingness to confer, an advantage on another person; and
    (b) a person solicits an advantage if the person asks for, or shows a willingness to receive, an advantage, either for the person's own benefit or for the benefit of another person; and
    (c) a person accepts an advantage if the person receives or obtains an advantage, or agrees to receive or obtain an advantage, either for the person's own benefit or for the benefit of another person.

    (3) For the purposes of this section, a person is taken to have offered an advantage even though the offer was made by another person, but only if the other person was acting with the person's authority. That authority may be conferred expressly or by implication.

    Section: 8 Corrupt conduct to use or threaten to use force or duress against candidates or prospective candidates

    (1) A person engages in corrupt conduct at an election if the person-

    (a) uses force or duress, or threatens to use force or duress, against another person to induce the other person-

    (i) to stand, or not to stand, as a candidate at the election; or
    (ii) if the other person has been nominated as a candidate at the election, to withdraw the nomination; or

    (b) uses force or duress, or threatens to use force or duress, against another person to induce the other person to get a third person-

    (i) to stand, or not to stand, as a candidate at the election; or
    (ii) if the third person has been nominated as a candidate at the election, to withdraw the nomination; or

    (c) uses force or duress, or threatens to use force or duress, against another person because the other person or a third person-

    (i) stood, or did not stand, as a candidate at the election; or
    (ii) if the other person or the third person has been nominated as a candidate at the election, withdrew the nomination.

    (2) A person is taken to have engaged in corrupt conduct of a kind referred to in subsection (1) even though the conduct was engaged in by another person, but only if the other person was acting with the person's authority. That authority may be conferred expressly or by implication.

    Section: 9 Corrupt conduct to engage in certain deceptive behaviour in relation to candidates and prospective candidates

    (1) A person engages in corrupt conduct at an election if the person-

    (a) by a deception, induces another person-

    (i) to stand, or not to stand, as a candidate at the election; or
    (ii) if the other person has been nominated as a candidate at the election, to withdraw the nomination; or

    (b) by a deception, induces another person to get a third person-

    (i) to stand, or not to stand, as a candidate at the election; or
    (ii) if the third person has been nominated as a candidate at the election, to withdraw the nomination.

    (2) A person is taken to have engaged in corrupt conduct of a kind referred to in subsection (1) even though the conduct was engaged in by another person, but only if the other person was acting with the person's authority. That authority may be conferred expressly or by implication.

    On the other hand, if Chow Wing-kan or any other candidates accuse another candidate and no supporting evidence is provided, a different section of CAP 554 applies:

    Section: 22 What penalties can be imposed for illegal conduct at elections?

    (1) Any person who engages in illegal conduct at an election commits an offence and is-

    (a) if tried summarily, liable on conviction to a fine at level 5 and to imprisonment for 1 year; or
    (b) if tried on indictment, liable on conviction to a fine of $200000 and to imprisonment for 3 years.

    (2) A person may be convicted of an offence of having engaged in illegal conduct at an election if the person is found to have engaged in the conduct before, during or after the election period.

    Section: 26 Illegal conduct to publish false or misleading statements about a candidate

    (1) A person engages in illegal conduct at an election if the person publishes a materially false or misleading statement of fact about a particular candidate or particular candidates for the purpose of promoting or prejudicing the election of the candidate or candidates.

    (2) A candidate engages in illegal conduct at an election if the candidate publishes a materially false or misleading statement of fact about the candidate or candidates with whom the candidate is associated, or about another candidate or other candidates, for the purpose of-

    (a) promoting the election of the candidate or candidates with whom the candidate is associated; or
    (b) prejudicing the election of the other candidate or candidates.

    (3) For the purposes of this section, statements about a candidate or candidates include (but are not limited to) statements concerning the character, qualifications or previous conduct of the candidate or candidates.

    (4) In a prosecution for an offence of having engaged in illegal conduct under subsection (1) or (2), it is a defence to prove that the defendant believed on reasonable grounds that the statement was true at the time when it was made.

    - I have three conjectures on Chow Wing-kan:

    (1) He wanted to avoid losing badly. Various public opinion polls showed that his support rate is less than 1%. So this is quick exit without losing face.

    (2) He wanted to attack Junius Ho. Previously he had challenged Ho's claim to be an aboriginal, but that went nowhere due to lack of substantive evidence. Chow's abandonment of his campaign casts suspicions on Ho.

    (3) He must be thinking that by fabricating such a story, he would get the sympathy vote. Chen Shui Bian did it in Taiwan, so can Chow Wing-kan do it in Hong Kong. (Note: The election by-laws state that a nominee cannot drop out, so Chow's name will appear on the ballot even if he stops campaigning.)

    - If I have time on hand, I am sure that I can come up with (4), (5), etc. But how about (0)? Namely, Chow is telling the truth? How come nobody is interested in this possibility?

    - Here is (4): Chow Wing-kan is using his case to generate a sympathy vote for Liberal Party's Dominic Lee in New Territories East. As it stands, Chow has no chance in New Territories West but Lee may have a slight chance in New Territories East. If both Chow and Lee fails, the Liberal Party will have no representation in the geographical constituencies. So Chow sacrificed himself to save Lee.

    - Here is (5): Chow Wing-kan may say that he is not campaigning any more, but his name will remain on the ballot. If his tragic story gets played up, he will win a Legco seat without even being in Hong Kong for the final week! In the famous words of Raymond Wong, he could win lying down! So from no chance he becomes a sure win!

    - Chow has gone overseas and won't be back until September 5, the day after the election. What has his Liberal Party got to say about the case?

    (Hong Kong Free Press) August 26, 2016.

    A honorary president of the Liberal Party said the partys election candidate Ken Chow Wing-kan told her that the pressure which forced him to make a sudden decision to drop out of the race came from a higher level than his rival in the election.

    Honorary president Selina Chow Liang Shuk-yee said Ken Chow hardly mentioned any conflict with candidates in the election.  He said, I cannot talk about many things I cannot tell you, I cannot tell the media, but he added that the recording was only a lower level matter, an election matter. For that, I feel that his decision to drop out was not because of the recording, she said.

    Ken Chow, running in the New Territories West constituency, told E Weekly magazine last week that a middleman offered him cash amounting to double his election spending in return for halting his campaign. Chow refused the payment. Selina Chow said the topic of money did not come up at all during a discussion with Chow about the pressure.

    James Tien Pei-chun, also honorary president, said Ken Chow did not mention Junius Ho at all during a conversation with him. Tien said he asked Chow if the pressure was from the recording, some indigenous communities in Tuen Mun or Yuen Long, the Hong Kong government, or even Shenzhen suggesting influence from China, But he told me, Mr Tien, to protect my family and friends I cannot say anything. But Tien said he felt that Chow did not stop his election campaign due to the recording. Chow did not mention the China Liaison Office when speaking to him either, he said. When Tien asked Chow as to why he did not contact the police, Chow told him: If I am able to report it to the police, then I would be able to speak publicly [about the source of pressure], but you see I cant. Tien said he could not agree with such a statement but respected his choice.

    According to Tien, Chow is to leave Hong Kong and return on September 5, a day after the election, to provide answers to the public.

    The Liberal Party is in disarray. There are two honorary presidents making public statements that only adds more confusion. The party president Felix Chung Kwok-pan is nowhere to be found. None of this is going to help them in the New Territories East election.

    - (HKG Pao) James Tien and Selina Chow both said that Ken Chow Wing-kan told them that the recording has nothing to do with his decision. That seemed to have absolved Junius Ho of any culpability on this score. But Chow Wing-kan will have to face the Independence Commission Against Corruption when he returns on September 5.

    - The Liberal Party fielded only two lists this time, one in New Territories West and the other in New Territories East. The two lists were headed by young unknowns and not by their celebrities (such as James Tien or Selina Chow). So far we have Chow Wing-kan dropping out in New Territories West, leaving the party leaders clueless as to the actual reason. How can this not hurt the Liberal Party overall, and hence the New Territories East list?

    - If the Central Government wanted Chow to quit, they would not need to talk to him. Chow is a nobody. They would have hauled the Liberal Party head honchos down to the China Liaison Office and told them to make Chow drop the campaign in order to spend more time with his family. If Chow refuses, he will be expelled from the Liberal Party.

    - I can continue with writing the rest of the script: A few days later, Chow Wing-kan walks down the street and is physically assaulted by two South Asians who screamed: "The DAB paid us to do this!" Then all the reporters will rush over to a very surprised DAB chairwoman Starry Lee for comments.

    - This whole case makes zero sense. On one hand, the guy is so scared that he is stopping his campaign. On the other hand, the guy gets on television to tell the public that he was forced to stop his campaign. Is he afraid? Is he not afraid? I am very confused.

    - (HKG Pao) Junius Ho accused Chow Wing-pan of lousy acting because he couldn't squeeze a single tear out while supposedly crying. Ho said: "Either you don't tell anything or else you tell it all. If you were genuinely pressured, you would not be making a squeak. Now you tell half the story and waste the time and energy of so many people. I find this very regrettable."


    "I don't want to say"

    The next morning Chow Wing-pan answered questions from the press. He said, "Junius Ho can say whatever he wants." Does that mean that Junius Ho is credible? Chow said that the public can decide for themselves. Chow declined to say what his troubles were. Chow said that he plans to leave Hong Kong.

    - (HK01) August 25, 2016. Last week, Chow Wing-kan was interviewed by e-Weekly and said that he was contacted by someone who offered double his campaign budget to drop out. Chow said that he told the person that it is against the law to persuade someone to drop out of an election. Chow said: "I believe that some people don't want me in the election, and they didn't think that I would run. But Hong Kong is a democratic society. I believe that I am free to participate in elections."

    - So Chow Wing-kan has some specific knowledge. How about going to the Election Affairs Commission/Independent Commission Against Corruption/Hong Kong Police? If not for himself, how about doing this for freedom/democracy/human rights/universal values/universal suffrage/rule of law in Hong Kong?

    - After Chow Wing-kan read his statement and broke out in tears, a number of other candidates rushed and condemned the Chinese Communists. As an act of solidarity, they publicly appealed to all their supporters to cast their votes for Chow Wing-kan. And when Chow Wing-kan comes in with 55% of the votes, that will tell the Chinese Communists what the true feelings of the people are. It will be a great victory for freedom/democracy/human rights/universal values/universal suffrage/rule of law in Hong Kong.

    Of course, this never happened. Every other candidate rushed in to condemn the Chinese Communists. But they will never ever tell their supporters to vote for someone else. They all have to protect their personal interests. So they will say that they (and only they) are the best bet to stop the Chinese Communists.

    - (HK01) August 26, 2016. Yesterday Chow Wing-kan contacted <HK01> and said that a citizen recorded two conversations between two men in a Butterfly Estate (Tuen Mun District) restaurant.

    Conversation 1: ... Today we have two identities. First of all, we are citizens who spontaneously organized because we are upset with Chow Wing-kan, and also Cheng Chung Tai for his smearing tactics. The three student leaders were also too leniently sentenced. Lawyer Ho has demanded an appeal but the Department of Justice thinks that it is none of Ho's business. Therefore we are the voice for justice. Tonight we will assemble 20 to 30 persons to ambush Chow Wing-kan at the forum, so that he won't even want to participate in this forum. So this is what we will do tonight. We will figure out what to write on the placards. Le me see ... er, we won't do it. We can't do it. Let the office people help to produce the placards. Also, you and I will coordinate with XXX (name of volunteer worker).

    Conversation 2: After ambushing Chow Wing-kan, we will come back wearing Lawyer Ho's vests to support Lawyer Ho. We will cheer him. That's all. After the forum, we will ambush Chow Wing-kan. This is what is to to be done. Thanks.

    Nothing in there hasn't been happening many times already from both camps. There is nothing about threats to Chow's family. So these two recordings between unidentified persons don't mean anything.

    Example: Candidate Leung Che Cheung (DAB) is surrounded by paid actors and actresses playing villagers, while his smirking opponents Chu Hoi Dick (Land Justice League), Kwok Ka Ki (Civic Party), Wong Ho Ming (League of Social Democrats) and Lee Cheuk Yan (Labour Party) lurk in the background: https://www.facebook.com/434483659936746/videos/1231080153610422/ Sample Q&A: Leung asked, "How come you never come to my office for help until election time?" Answer from male 'villager': "Why would I come to you at any time other than an election?"

    - (The Stand News) August 26, 2016. Junius Ho told Commercial Radio that the voice on the recordings belongs to a volunteer of his. Ho said that the ambush did not involve any criminal activity. Based upon Ho's understanding, there was a discussion within the Whatsapp group. "I just heard it on the Internet last night." Around noon, the volunteer proposal about the action was discussed. But Ho said that this type of thing was unnecessary. "If it is right, I do it; if it is not right, I won't do it ... when the preliminary discussion reached me, I said not to do it ... I personally think that it was enough to lodge a complaint with the Electoral Affairs Commission."

    - (HKG Pao) Junius Ho asked just how Chow Wing-kan got those two recordings. Chow's explanation to the website HK01 was that a citizen recorded the two conversations over at the next table in a Butterfly Estate (Tuen Mun) restaurant. Junius Ho said that these were in fact Whatsapp voice messages. That was why Chow Wing-kan's 'citizen' did not have a complete recording with no breaks.

    - If recorded in an estate restaurant around lunch, the background noise should be very high. There is no background noise in the two recordings.

    - Ambush politicians? Why don't you Google the term "Legislative Council"+"ambush"? This is so commonplace in Hong Kong today. Why act surprised and shocked?

    - If the Chinese Communists want to assassinate their enemies, Chow Wing-kan would not even make the top 100 on the list. Before his announcement, nobody knows who he is. The enemy list should be topped by people like Lee Cheuk-yan (Labour Party) and Leung Kwok-hung (League of Social Democrats) who list the end of one-party rule and the overthrowing of the Chinese Communist Party in their respective party platforms.

    - "Any number of public opinion polls have shown that most of Chow Wing-kan's supporters are in the Tin Shui Wai district, which is also where Junius Ho gets his support. Therefore Ho stands to gain most with Chow's exit and is therefore the leading suspect behind this nefarious plot."

    Eh, the Hong Kong University Public Opinion Programme rollings polls are based upon average sample sizes of 1,000. Of these, about 300 are located in New Territories West. Chow Wing-kan's support level is around 1%. 1% out of 300 is 3. "Most of his supporters are from Tin Shui Wai." That means 2 out of 3 of those supporters are from Tin Shui Wai. Don't you think that your analysis is based upon unreliable data with too much sampling error?

    - HKU POP feels uncomfortable enough about publishing supporting levels even for New Territories West as a whole due to the small sample size of 300. They definitely do not publish it at the level of the sub-district Tin Shui Wai within New Territories West.

    - "Junius Ho is intimately tied with the triad gangs of New Territories, so the Chow Wing-kan affair is not surprising."

    Eh, it is against the law to publish false or misleading statements about a candidate under CAP 554 Elections (Corrupt and Illegal Conduct) Ordinance. I have made a screen capture of your comment above and forwarded it by email to the Hong Kong Police, Independent Commission Against Corruption and Election Affairs Commission. So get ready for the knock on the door at 6am.

    - (Bastille Post) Chow Wing-kan and Junius Ho are supported by different Rural Affairs factions. In the case of Chow, he emerged in 1994 by winning a Yuen Long district council seat. In 2004, he became the assistant to Heung Yee Kuk chairman and Liberal Party member Lau Wong Fat and became a Liberal Party member. Meanwhile, Junius Ho earned Lau Wong Fat's enmity when he fought to become the Tuen Mun District Council chairman. At this time, Chow Wing-kan's support is low whereas Junius Ho is fighting for the last Legco seat against Frederick Fung (ADPL) and Cheng Chung-tai (Civic Passion). So by dropping out, Chow hopes to hurt Junius Ho and his Rural Affairs faction and help the Liberal Party list in New Territories East.

    - Are you confused about who's who in the Chow Wing-kan story? Here is the all-inclusive relational diagram:

    1. Chow Wing-kan is a chess piece put into place by James Tien (Liberal Party), with no chance of winning a Legco seat in New Territories West but capable of being a time bomb to help fellow Liberal Party member Dominic Lee in New Territories East.

    2. James Tien (Liberal Party) did this in conjunction with Hau Chi-keung (New Progressive Alliance) in order to eliminate their common enemy, Junius Ho.

    3. James Tien is going for five things at the same time ("kill five birds with one stone): (1) set up the explosive Chow Wing-kan situation; (2) increase Dominic Lee's chances of winning; (3) giving votes to the New Progressive Alliance; (4) making Junius Ho crash; (5) taking revenge against the China Liaison Office for stripping him of his position on the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference Standing Committee.

    - (Ming Pao) August 31, 2016.

    Next Magazine interviewed Chow Wing-kan at the airport before he left. When asked whether he was scared of "triad gangs" or "the China Liaison Office," he said: "Far more powerful than what you say."

    Did the China Liaison Office apply pressure on him? Chow said: "I don't want to respond." Is he concerned about being 'disappeared'? Chow said: "Therefore right now I ... I am going back to mainland China."

    Can the Hong Kong Police help? Chow said: "If the forces are not based in Hong Kong, how can you enforce the law? How do you investigate?" Are "foreign forces" involved? Chow reiterated: "Beyond the scope of law enforcement."

    - Look at the HKRA poll of 5,016 persons:
    Rank Name (Party) %
    1 Michael Tien Puk Sun (New People's Party) 12.4%
    2 Lee Cheuk Yan (Confederation of Trade Unions) 7.0%
    3 Andrew Wan Siu Kin (Democratic Party) 6.2%
    4 Chan Han Pan (DAB) 5.7%
    5 Kwok Ka Ki (Civic Party) 5.5%
    6 Leung Che Cheung (DAB) 5.4%
    7 Wong Chun Kit (Youngspiration) 5.0%
    8 Mak Mei Kuen (Federation of Trade Unions) 4.6%
    9 Frederick Fung Kin Kee (ADPL) 4.1%
    10 Wong Ho Ming (League of Social Democrats) 3.5%
    11 Ho Kwan Yiu (independent) 3.4%
    12 Wong Yun Tat ( Neighborhood & Worker's Service Centre) 2.6%
    13 Cheng Chung Tai (Civic Passion) 2.5%
    14 Eddie Chu Hoi Dick (independent) 1.5%
    15 Chow Wing Kan (Liberal Party) 0.7%
    16 Clarice Cheung Wai Ching (independent) 0.3%
    17 Ko Chi Fai (independent) 0.1%
    18 Kwong Koon Wan (independent) 0.1%
    19 Tong Wing Chi (independent) 0.1%
    20 Hendrick Lui Chi Hang (independent) 0.00%

    - (SCMP) Legco candidate Ken Chow needs help in more ways than one. By Alex Lo. September 2, 2016.

    The Electoral Affairs Commission and the Independent Commission Against Corruption are jumping into the case of Ken Chow Wing-Kan. Thats all very well. I hope they get to the bottom of Chows allegations, which if proven true, pose a direct threat to our electoral system.

    But, to paraphrase an old saying, extraordinary allegations require extraordinary proof. So far, the Liberal Partys candidate for New Territories West in Sundays Legislative Council elections has offered little to substantiate his sensational claims. Instead, he has fled to Britain. Unfortunately, in the paranoid and fact-free politics of Hong Kong today, his allegations have taken on a life of their own.

    In a dramatic appearance, Chow dressed all in black announced at an election debate forum on television last week that he was quitting the race because of threats not only against him but those close to him who might be caught in higher-level troubles and pay a heavy price.

    He has provided various media outlets with a recording in which the assistant of an election rival apparently threatened to bring dozens of men to clash with him.

    That could be a criminal threat, but it would fall well within local jurisdiction. Later, however, Chow offered a different story, saying the unnamed source of the threats was outside Hong Kong jurisdiction and that it was more powerful than the triads or the central governments liaison office in Hong Kong.

    He also claimed someone offered him money twice as much as his HK$2.5 million election expenses to quit the race.

    A rational even if scared individual might consult with his party colleagues, the police or any law enforcement agency and regulators before going public. He apparently consulted no one, and even surprised his own campaign workers.

    To be credible, he might, for example, explain why such a powerful force would target a minor political player such as himself. Furthermore, the Liberal Party is generally considered a pro-establishment group.

    Campaigning is stressful even in normal circumstances. In todays highly divisive political climate, the pressure is especially high on election candidates. Anyone can crack under such intense stress.

    Chow has made sensational allegations about a powerful force, yet rules out the usual suspects. Instead, he conjures up a hidden conspiracy coming from outside Hong Kong. The ICAC should investigate. But in the meantime, his loved ones may consider seeking professional help for him.

    - Chow Wing-kan posted photos of himself in Europe. Chow said that he wanted to protect those around him. But he flees to Europe by himself. How is that going to protect those around him?

    - After Chow Wing-kan came back, he gave a series of self-contradictory radio interviews ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYDurVXUQ2o ).

    Q: Did these three persons identify themselves? Government personnel? Public service workers?

    A: Eh. No.

    Q: But they have to be introduced somehow. It can't just be: This is Mr. Chen, and this is Mr. Li. There needs to be some kind of introduction, such as the department.

    A: But this department is a secretive  ... hmm ... a somewhat secretive department ... it is not convenient to say.

    Q: I mean to say, Do you actually know yourself? Or do you feel inconvenient to say it?

    A: Eh, at the time, they did not say which department they came from.

    Are you totally flummoxed as well? They did not say which department they came from, but it is a secretive department which is inconvenient to identify at this time. Get it?

    - (The Stand) September 5, 2016. Next Magazine reports exclusively that Chow Wing-kan arrived in Hong Kong at 3pm this afternoon. Chow explained that he was threatened and told to leave Hong Kong until after the vote counting was over. "I have kept my promise. I returned after the dust has settled from the elections. He will not harass me anymore." Chow disclosed that while he was in England, he was photographed by someone who appeared to be a Chinese woman. Someone also took photos of him for publication in the media. He said that he does not know the photographer.

    - The Liberal Party has done this sort of thing before.

    (AFP/Reuters) May 28, 2004.

    An outspoken radio talkshow host told Hong Kong legislators yesterday that he quit his show because Chinese officials told him he would be in danger if he did not stop airing anti-Beijing comments. Allen Lee (李鵬飛), also a veteran politician, said he refused to give in to the threats.

    "A lot of people, including mainland officials, pressured me to keep quiet," Lee told a specially convened legislative panel meeting. "I refused to soften my views ... so I quit."

    Lee resigned from his Teacup in a Storm radio show soon after two other high-profile talkshow hosts stepped down saying they had received threats of violence because of their anti-Beijing views.

    The resignations sparked fears in the largely-autonomous former British colony, which was handed over to China in 1997, that Beijing had launched a crackdown on subversive media figures.

    Lee said a "retired Chinese official" and other people including a friend had tried to persuade him to tone down his comments. "This mainland friend wanted to see me but I refused ... because he wanted to speak to me about the matters about my show," Lee said. "I felt that there was no need to talk about it because ... there was nothing more to talk about."

    Lee, the former leader of the business-backed Liberal Party and a leading Cabinet member during British rule, is the only one of the three hosts to speak to legislators. The other two, Albert Cheng (鄭經翰) and Wong Yuk-man (黃毓民), refused, saying they feared for their safety.

    Lee said China's motive behind the intimidation was September's legislative elections, which democrats critical of China are tipped to win. "No one in this room would know how nervous they [China] are about this year's election," Lee said. "This nervousness is unprecedented."

    A pro-Beijing legislator, however, poured scorn on Lee's comments, saying there was no proof China was behind the threats. "We shouldn't make any conclusions until the police have finished their investigation," said Wong Yung-kan (黃容根) of the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment of Hong Kong party. He also scoffed at suggestions freedom of speech had been harmed. "No one has told any editors not to publish any stories, even on Teacup in a Storm they still criticize the government," Wong said.

    Pro-democracy legislator Margaret Ng (吳靄儀) said Lee's revelations were "frightening." "Freedom of speech means freedom from fear," she told reporters after the hearing. "If you have to be defiant and think that you must risk your life to speak out on perfectly normal political views, it is frightening."

    (Global Times) June 4, 2004.

    On May 27, Allen Lee showed up at the Legislative Council with a 3,000-word statement to detail why he quit his radio show. Lee said that he received a telephone call from a mysterious caller after 10pm on May 18. The person identified himself as "Chen" and is a former Central Government official. This person asked Lee about the wife and daughter: "Your wife is gentle and your daughter is pretty." As a result, Lee "felt threatened." He could not sleep that night, and after some thought, he announced the next day that he would quit the radio program.

    A few days later, the mysterious caller surfaced. He is Cheng Shousan, who used to be deputy director at the Hong Kong and Macao Affairs Office of the State Council. Cheng said that he and Lee served on the Preparatory Committee for the Handover for 18 months in 1996-1997. On May 18, he called Lee to say hello and hoped to meet. The reason why Cheng mentioned Lee's wife and daughter was that he once attended the Asia-Pacific Regional Young Designers Competition and sat next to Mr. and Mrs. Lee. He mentioned casually to Mrs. Lee that the female master of ceremony was pretty and spoke very good English. Mrs. Lee was delighted and told him that this was their daughter. When Cheng mentioned that to Lee on the telephone, he said that Lee remembered the occasion.

    As to the so-called threat, Cheng said that he is a retiree who is currently working on the compilation of a dictionary. As such, he has no power to issue any threats to Lee or freedom of press in Hong Kong.

    After Cheng surfaced, Lee said: "It does not matter whether his name if Chen or Cheng. He called me to threaten me!"

    - (SCMP) September 14, 2016.

    Liberal Party heavyweight James Tien Pei-chun has said Beijings liaison office told him to discourage party colleague Ken Chow Wing-kan from running in the Legislative Council elections, and called on the central government to investigate if the office had overstepped its role.

    Tien said he did not follow the instruction, and quoted the unnamed liaison office representatives as saying Chows bid could affect Junius Ho Kwan-yiu, who ended up winning the ninth and final seat in New Territories West.

    Tiens revelation on Wednesday morning came a week after Chow said he dropped out of the polls last month after three people from Beijing threatened him in Shenzhen. They allegedly told him to withdraw to improve the chances of other pro-Beijing candidates.

    Chow also said he was asked to quit the race three other times, two of them involving two friends working for a mainland organisation in Hong Kong.

    Asked if he was referring to the liaison office, Chow had said he did not want to name any organisation.

    But a source close to Chow told the Post on Wednesday that two junior officials from the liaison office were present at one of the three meetings.

    Tien, the partys honorary chairman and former leader who retired from Legco this year, did not say whether the liaison office approached Chow, but talked about his personal experience on a Commercial Radio programme.

    Officials from the liaison office talked to me in July, he said. They said I should ask Chow to quit because he could not win, but I said: How do you know?

    The official said Chows bid would affect Hos chance of winning ... But I refused the suggestion because Chow wanted to give it a try, and we also believed that he could win the [final seat].

    Tien said that, at the Liberal Partys standing committee meeting on Tuesday night, Chow revealed that the liaison office also tried to discourage his volunteers from helping him.

    The Liberal Partys Miriam Lau Kin-yee, a local deputy to the National Peoples Congress, and Selina Chow Liang Shuk-yee, a local deputy to the Chinese Peoples Political Consultative Conference, had written to Zhang Dejiang and Yu Zhengsheng, the state leaders in charge of the two national bodies respectively, urging them to look into Chows case.

    Tien said: Beijing needs to find out if the office has gone beyond its liaison role and become an executive department in Hong Kong ... The credibility of Hong Kong elections is at stake.

    - Negative reactions from high places:

    - None of the Liberal Party current or honorary chairpersons were present for Chow Wing Kan's press conference on September 5th. The only thing that they did was to suspend Chow's membership pending the ICAC investigation.

    Why the skepticism? Liberal Party honorary chairpersons James Tien and Selina Chow and others have run in New Territories for many years, and never had they been threatened before. Furthermore, they had the voter base which could make a difference to someone else, unlike Chow Wing Kan's negligible chances.

    - (Hong Kong Free Press) September 10, 2016. Speaking to RTHK, Liberal Party chairman Felix Chung Kwok-pan said that the party would invite Chow to speak with the disciplinary committee to hear and investigate his case before deciding on whether disciplinary action would be taken. Of course, we understand that he is under threat, but the point is he is representing the Liberal Party to run the campaign, he should [be] responsible to us too, he said. If he had told us earlier before he made the decision, certainly we would support him. But now, the thing is, he just left without any notice, this is something that might not be acceptable. When asked whether Chow may be asked to repay the money used in the campaign, Chung said that really depends on his financial situation. We dont want to push him too much because he is already under huge pressure right now. He said that about HK$1.5 million was spent on Chows campaign, and that it would be up to the party to decide on whether repayment was necessary.

    - Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference Standing Committee member Rita Fan said that she does not believe in Chow's allegations. Chow said that the three men came from an authoritative higher than the China Liaison Office. Rita Fan said that such an order has to come from someone who is either a Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference Standing Committee vice-chairman, or a State Council vice-chairman. She finds it incredible that such a person would bother with Chow Wing Kan and his tiny number of potential votes.

    - (SCMP) September 9, 2016. Chief executive CY Leung rejected another candidates claim that he had to pull out of the elections under a threat coming from Beijing. Leung said he regretted the allegations made by the Liberal Partys Ken Chow Wing-kan, dismissing them as surmise and innuendo.

    - (Headline Daily) Chow Wing-kan's story is full of holes. By Michael Chugani. September 13, 2016.

    Is Ken Chow Wing-kan telling a tall tale, telling the truth or embellishing the truth? The expression tall tale means a story that is difficult to believe. To embellish the truth means to make the truth more interesting by adding untrue details. The word exaggerate has a similar meaning. I do not know if Liberal Party member Chow Wing-kan is telling a tall tale, telling the truth, or exaggerating when he claimed three people from Beijing warned him at a meeting in Shenzhen to withdraw as a candidate in last weeks Legislative Council election. He said they spoke in Cantonese and knew every detail about his family and close friends, hinting they would attack them if he did not withdraw from the election.

    I cannot convince myself to believe Chow Wing-kan. His claim of being forced to withdraw from the election is full of holes. If a claim is full of holes, it means it has too many unbelievable or weak points. The words far-fetched and dubious have similar meanings. Chow Wing-kans story is full of holes because he refused to provide details of which hotel in Shenzhen he met the three men, what they looked like, and why he believed they were somehow connected to the central government. He said he was so scared he escaped to London.

    But if he was really so scared, why did he put his family and close friends in danger by announcing during a TV debate the day after meeting the three men that he had been threatened? A scared person would have kept his mouth shut, withdrawn from the election and escaped to London. When he returned to Hong Kong after the election he told the ICAC not to investigate because they could do nothing. It is easy to make a claim without proof and then ask the ICAC not to investigate. Chow Wing-kan had no chance of winning the election, so why would Beijing even care about him? I dont believe him but I believe Chu Hoi-dicks claim that bad people in the New Territories had threatened to kill him and his family after he won the election. His story is not full of holes because he provided details to the police.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) August 26, 2016.

    The incumbent pro-democracy camp IT sector lawmaker has slammed smearing reports by pro-Beijing media that claimed a teachers union transferred voters from the education sector to his sector in order to help secure his seat.

    Similar front page reports carried by the Headline Daily and The Standard both under the pro-Beijing Sing Tao News Corporation on Thursday claimed that some 1,500 members of the Hong Kong Professional Teachers Union (HKPTU), who worked in IT in tertiary education institutes, applied to be members of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) in order to become IT sector voters.

    But Ming Pao published a report on Friday stating that it found only 19 voters in the education sector made the alleged switch, out of the IT sectors 12,000-strong members.

    Let the data speak for itself. When the pro-establishment media could write their headline story based on lies, how far can the smearing go? said Charles Mok, the sitting IT sector lawmaker running for re-election in the functional constituency of the upcoming Legislative Council election.

    One new IT sector voter told Ming Pao that he switched jobs from an educational institute to a tech company, and that he obtained the new status from a related society unrelated to IEEE, or the pro-Beijing industry association iProA.

    Another new voter told the newspaper that he expected the election result of the education sector would not be very different from the past, and he heard that the pro-Beijing camp was doing something in the IT sector, therefore he wanted to make the switch and vote for the pan-democratic candidate. He said he has been a member of the Hong Kong Association for Computer Education for more than ten years.

    President of Baptist University Roland Chin also made the switch, but the newspaper said he was not reachable.

    The HKPTU has denied any discussion over transferring voters to other sectors and any involvement in vote-rigging activities. It said that the union in fact urged eligible members to apply as education sector voters in April, during the registration period. We recognise and respect press freedom, but we are deeply disappointed by false allegations, a statement read.

    Overall, including the 19, 42 people switched to the IT sector from other functional constituencies since the last election in 2012, according to Ming Pao.

    Eric Yeung Chuen-sing, Moks opponent in the election, told Ming Pao that he was surprised by the result. If it was only 40 people, it was nothing special, he said.

    In a statement, Mok demanded Headline Daily issue a public statement to clarify the false allegations.

    Internet comments:

    - On the question of who do you believe, here is IEEE:

    - Will the person who created this material stand up and apologize sincerely? If this person is actually an election candidate, then the right thing to do is to apologize and drop out; even if elected, to not assume the office so that a by-election will be held.

    - (Headline Daily) In December 2015, the IEEE had about 2700 members in its Hong Kong branch. By June 2016, the number of members had increased rapidly to 8,830.

    - Something is rotten in the state of Denmark ...

    - How to become an IT sector voter (from the Frontline Tech Wokers Concern Group's Facebook) in two easy steps:

    - "Ming Pao published a report on Friday stating that it found only 19 voters in the education sector made the alleged switch, out of the IT sectors 12,000-strong members. Let the data speak for itself. When the pro-establishment media could write their headline story based on lies, how far can the smearing go? said Charles Mok, the sitting IT sector lawmaker running for re-election in the functional constituency of the upcoming Legislative Council election."

    This is a misdirection play. Nobody is saying that the problem is only with voters in the education sector making the switch to the IT sector. The education sector is totally dominated by Professional Teachers Union member so that the election winner will surely be the person designated by the Professional Teachers Union. Some teachers don't even bother to register as voters. The call is for those people to register as IT sector voters so that they can dominate the IT sector as well. Someone figured out that an easy path to become an IT sector voter is to register as a member of the apolitical IEEE.

    Hong Kong University Public Opinion Programme five-day rolling poll (as of August 23, 2016).

    District Council (Second) Functional Constituency
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    801 James To Kun Shun (Democratic Party) 16%
    802 Starry Lee (DAB) 17%
    803 Kwong Chun Yu (Democratic Party) 5%
    804 Kalvin Ho Kai Ming (ADPL) <0.5%
    805 Sumly Chan Yuen Sum (Civic Party) 2%
    806 Wong Kwok Hing (Federation of Trade Unions) 6%
    807 Kwan Wing Yip (Neo Democrats) 1%
    808 Leung Yiu Chung (Neighborhood & Worker's Service Centre) 8%
    809 Holden Chow Ho Ding (DAB) 5%

    Hong Kong Island
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    1 Gary Wong Chi Him (independent) 1%
    2 Christopher Lau Gar Hung (People Power) 1%
    3 Regina Ip Lau Suk Yee (New People's Party) 21%
    4 Cyd Ho Sau Lan (Labour Party) 2%
    5 Cheung Kwok Kwan (DAB) 5%
    6 Chim Pui Chung (independent) 1%
    7 Cheng Kam Mun (Civic Passion) 1%
    8 Nathan Law Kwun Chung (Demosisto) 4%
    9 Shum Chee Chiu (independent) <0.5%
    10 Ricky Wong Wai Kay (independent) 10%
    11 Chui Chi Kin (independent) <0.5%
    12 Paulus Johannes Zimmerman (independent) 3%
    13 Hui Chi Fung (Democratic Party) 4%
    14 Tanya Chan (Civic Party) 10%
    15 Kwok Wai Keung (Federation of Trade Unions) 5%

    Kowloon West
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    1 Avery Ng Man Yuen (League of Social Democrats) 3%
    2 Jonathan Ho Chi Kwong (independent) <0.5%
    3 Claudia Mo Man Ching (Civic Party) 8%
    4 Leung Mei Fun (BPA) 14%
    5 Tam Kwok Kiu (ADPL) 3%
    6 Chu Siu Hung (independent) <0.5%
    7 Raymond Wong Yuk Man (Proletariat Political Institute) 5%
    8 Helena Wong  Pik Wan (Democratic Party) 8%
    9 Lam Yi Lai (independent) <0.5%
    10 Ann Chiang Lai Wan (DAB) 10%
    11 Kwan San Wai (independent) <0.5%
    12 Lau Siu Lai (independent) 7%
    13 Yau Wai Ching (Youngspiration) 3%
    14 Augustine Lee Wing Hon (independent) 1%
    15 Tik Chi Yuen (independent) 3%

    Kowloon East
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    1 Wong Kwok Kin (Federation of Trade Unions) 9%
    2 Wu Sui Shan (Labour Party) 10%
    3 Patrict Ko Tat Pun (independent) <0.5%
    4 Tam Heung Man (The Frontier) 1%
    5 Paul Tse Wai Chun (independent) 8%
    6 Wilson Or Chong Shing (DAB) 12%
    7 Lui Wing Kei (independent) <1%
    8 Wu Chi Wai (Democratic Party) 10%
    9 Jeremy Tam Man Ho (Civic Party) 11%
    10 Wong Yeung Tat (Civic Passion) 5%
    11 Chan Chak To (Kowloon East Community) 3%
    12 Tam Tak Chi (People Power) 4%

    New Territories West
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    1 Wong Yun Tat ( Neighborhood & Worker's Service Centre) 1%
    2 Andrew Wan Siu Kin (Democratic Party) 5%
    3 Ko Chi Fai (independent) <0.5%
    4 Chow Wing Kan (Liberal Party) 1%
    5 Cheng Chung Tai (Civic Passion) 5%
    6 Kwong Koon Wan (independent) <0.5%
    7 Michael Tien Puk Sun (New People's Party) 12%
    8 Ho Kwan Yiu (independent) 4%
    9 Leung Che Cheung (DAB) 7%
    10 Kwok Ka Ki (Civic Party) 6%
    11 Wong Ho Ming (League of Social Democrats) 3%
    12 Lee Cheuk Yan (Confederation of Trade Unions) 5%
    13 Wong Chun Kit (Youngspiration) 2%
    14 Mak Mei Kuen (Federation of Trade Unions) 5%
    15 Frederick Fung Kin Kee (ADPL) 2%
    16 Chan Han Pan (DAB) 5%
    17 Clarice Cheung Wai Ching (independent) <0.5%
    18 Hendrick Lui Chi Hang (independent) <0.5%
    19 Tong Wing Chi (independent) 1%
    20 Eddie Chu Hoi Dick (independent) 2%

    New Territories East
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    1 Christine Fong Kwok Shan (independent) 5%
    2 Lam Cheuk Ting (Democratic Party) 4%
    3 Liu Tin Shing (independent) <0.5%
    4 Chin Wan Kan (Hong Kong Resurgence Order) 4%
    5 Leung Kwok Hung (League of Social Democrats) 3%
    6 Cheung Chiu Hung (Labour Party) 3%
    7 Alvin Yeung Ngok Kiu (Civic Party) 12%
    8 Raymond Mak Ka Chun (independent) <0.5%
    9 Andrew Cheng Kar Foo (independent) 4%
    10 Elizabeth Quat (DAB) 7%
    11 Hau Chi Keung (independent) <0.5%
    12 Dominic Lee Tsz King (Liberal Party) 4%
    13 Tang Ka Piu (Federation of Trade Unions) 2%
    14 Gary Fan Kwok Wai (Neo Democrats) 3%
    15 Estella Chan Yuk Ngor (independent) <0.5%
    16 Wong Sum Yu (independent) <0.5%
    17 Leticia Lee See Yin <0.5%
    18 Raymond Chan Chi Chuen (People Power) 2%
    19 Sixtus Leung Chung Hang (Youngspiration) 5%
    20 Ronald Leung Kam Shing (independent) <0.5%
    21 Yung Hoi Yan (New People's Party) 3%
    22 Chan Hak Kan (DAB) 5%

    (HKG Pao) August 23, 2016.

    With respect to the rolling polls conducted by the Hong Kong University Public Opinion Programme, two political parties held a press conference to lodge complaints. The first political party People Power said that the rolling polls are based upon small samples with large sampling errors. Furthermore, the interviews read only the first candidate on the list. The second political party said that their incumbent legislator Chan Wai Yip was second on the list and therefore this presentation puts them into a disadvantage.

    In 2008 and 2012, the Hong Kong University Public Opinion Programme read out the first three names on a list, because many political parties put their better known members in second place. As a result, Chan Wai Yip estimated that he has to spend 80% of his time trying to tell people not to trust the polls instead of expounding on his own policy platform. Chan Wai Yip also said that his list had been 5% at one point, but is now less than 0.5%. He asked: "Is someone paying you to do this?" He said that if he loses, then the blame will be on the polling.

    On August 19, Hong Kong University Public Opinion Programme responded: "Due to limited resources, the rolling polls had a smaller sample at first. The sample sizes will be increased in the latter stages and the sampling errors will decrease in a corresponding manner." So HKU POP is admitting that their sample sizes are small and that the accuracy has room for improvement. No wonder the political parties are critical.

    (SCMP) August 22, 2016.

    Pollsters at the University of Hong Kong made a U-turn on Monday and changed the methodology of a rolling poll on the Legislative Council elections after political parties across the spectrum cast doubts on its reliability.

    Angry parties, including the Democrats, People Power and the Liberal Party, had pointed to the small sample size of the poll 100 to 300 people in each of the five geographical constituencies and the pollsters failure to mention aspirants placed second on a slate when questioning respondents.

    Several outgoing lawmakers are running second on tickets in an attempt to secure seats for their protgs. Under the proportional representation system these veterans have little chance of winning.

    In a statement last Friday, the HKU Public Opinion Programme said it would not consider altering its methodology as it had found no significant statistical difference between mentioning one and two candidates on the slate in a test when polling 469 people from August 11 to 15. But it backtracked and decided to mention two candidates on the slate to respondents from Monday night onwards.

    [HKU POP] made this decision after taking into account opinions from all walks of life and we believe [the change] is manageable, Frank Lee, the programmes research manager, told the Post.

    The pollsters had earlier said the number of slates in direct elections had increased drastically and they had no choice but to name only the first aspirant on each list, saying it was the best they could do. When asked if they could have done better from the beginning, Lee said: We will not look back.

    Dominic Lee Tsz-king, a Liberal Party candidate running in New Territories East who had criticised the polls methodology, said he welcomes the pollsters making amends. The level of support for Lees list, with veteran James Tien Pei-chun standing in second place, was 4.1 per cent when Tiens name was read to respondents. Without Tiens name read out it was 2.6 per cent, according to the test.

    People Powers Albert Chan Wai-yip, who is running second with the League of Social Democrats Raphael Wong Ho-ming in New Territories West, said the change had come too late as the damage had been done. The TV and radio have been running the results of the poll every hour and voters have already formed an impression on the candidates, he said.

    The parties earlier had expressed their worries over the poll, which they said might mislead voters into giving up on hopefuls who in fact had a chance of winning.

    The poll was commissioned by three media organisations and Power of Democracy.

    (HKG Pao) August 23, 2016.

    There is a discussion forum post which cites a HKU POP worker that the polling numbers for certain pro-establishment candidates are artificially inflated in order to boost votes for 'pro-democracy' candidates.

    The information is given in a table. For example, the original data showed that Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee had 9% support. But a new target is set to be 16% and her number was artificially adjusted up to 16%. Hong Kong University Public Opinion Programme has not yet responded to press inquiries.

    Here is a translation of the post:

    "Deep throat" revelation: Pan-democrats fix opinion polls to fool people

    Last night, I went drinking with a friend who works at a think tank. After four bottles, our heads were spinning and we began to talk about the Legislative Council elections ...

    He said confidently that the pro-establishment camp won't be able to get 15 seats in the geographical constituencies.

    I said that I don't believe it!

    He challenged me to a bet: How about two Lafite's?

    I never back off from a challenge!!! So I immediately took him on.

    "Dear friend, what do you know? Right now, the poll results on Cable TV have been fixed ... the Hong Kong University Public Opinion Programme research assistant Shiry told me that Power For Democracy has artificially raised the poll numbers for the pro-establishment candidates.

    For example, Mrs. Ip has a support level of 9%, less than Ricky Wong's 10%. But they inflated it to 16%. Leung Mei Fun has only 4.3% support, even less than Yau Wai Ching. But she is being boosted up to 7%. The same thing with Wong Kwok Kin."

    I asked: "What is the advantage?"

    "Fuck! I was right what I said that you know nothing! They do so in order to play up the pan-democrats as victims and get the sympathy vote. The pro-establishment camp appeared to be heavy favorites, but they may lose everything. I even got a photo of their document. Let me send this over to you. You are going to lose this one for sure."

    The fucking Power For Democracy has caused me to lose two Lafites. Today I am telling you about this dirty secret, so that the Electoral Affairs Commission can arrest these bastards."

    (i-cable tv) August 25, 2016.

    Cable TV News will no longer publish HKU POP poll numbers for the Legislative Council elections, effective immediately. We learned yesterday that the data from August 21 to September 1  will become the 5,000-person sample for Power for Democracy and published two days before the election.

    Power for Democracy advertised that this definite 5000 person sample will be useful for political parties to adjust their strategies in order to increase their chances for winning Legco seats.

    We do not believe that we as a media organization should co-sponsor an election tool along with a political organization. Therefore we have decided that we will no longer release polls numbers, effective immediately.

    (SCMP) August 25, 2016.

    Two television stations which are sponsoring a rolling poll on the Legislative Council elections have stopped broadcasting the results, after a co-sponsoring political group announced it will make use of the data for electioneering.

    As media organisations, Cable TV and Now TV said it would be inappropriate for them to continue working together with the political group.

    The poll, conducted by the University of Hong Kongs public opinion programme, has sparked controversy since it was launched late last month. Last week, it was criticised by several political parties, whose candidates were shown as lagging, for having a small sample size, with only 100 to 300 people in each of the five geographical constituencies.

    The pollsters cited budget constraints, adding it would raise the size closer to the election.

    In a statement yesterday, Cable TV said it found out only on Wednesday that co-sponsor Power for Democracy was planning to make use of some of the poll data to compile a large-scale survey, to be released on September 2, two days before polling day.

    Power for Democracy has ... [said] the survey with 5,000 [people] will be indicative and helpful for political parties to adjust their strategies and win more seats, the statement read. Cable TV considers it is not appropriate for itself, as a media organisation, to co-sponsor an opinion poll for electioneering, it added. It will stop showing the results today.

    Under the law, broadcasts must be politically neutral, with equal treatment given to candidates during the election period.

    On the first day the poll results were announced, the HKU pollsters stated in a press release the survey was co-sponsored by the two stations, online news portal HK01 and Power for Democracy.

    Cable TV news editor Lam Miu-yan had noted the groups participation, but said her station was not aware it planned to use the data for the 5,000-people survey. Now TV said it had never before co-sponsored a survey with a political body, and it was not informed of Power for Democracys participation during negotiations on the poll contract with HKU.

    Both stations said they have not decided on whether to withdraw sponsorships or not.

    Karie Pang Ka-lai, assistant director of HKUs public opinion programme, said her team did not expect the political group to come up with a different purpose for the data after the deal was made but stressed that the pollsters independence had not been compromised.

    Power for Democracy, meanwhile, said it was shocked and did not understand the broadcasters decision.

    (HKG Pao) August 23, 2016.

    There is a discussion forum post which cites a HKU POP worker that the polling numbers for certain pro-establishment candidates are artificially inflated in order to boost votes for 'pro-democracy' candidates.

    The information is given in a table. For example, the original data showed that Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee had 9% support. But a new target is set to be 16% and her number was artificially adjusted up to 16%. Hong Kong University Public Opinion Programme has not yet responded to press inquiries.

    Here is a translation of the post:

    "Deep throat" revelation: Pan-democrats fix opinion polls to fool people

    Last night, I went drinking with a friend who works at a think tank. After four bottles, our heads were spinning and we began to talk about the Legislative Council elections ...

    He said confidently that the pro-establishment camp won't be able to get 15 seats in the geographical constituencies.

    I said that I don't believe it!

    He challenged me to a bet: How about two Lafite's?

    I never back off from a challenge!!! So I immediately took him on.

    "Dear friend, what do you know? Right now, the poll results on Cable TV have been fixed ... the Hong Kong University Public Opinion Programme research assistant Shiry told me that Power For Democracy has artificially raised the poll numbers for the pro-establishment candidates.

    For example, Mrs. Ip has a support level of 9%, less than Ricky Wong's 10%. But they inflated it to 16%. Leung Mei Fun has only 4.3% support, even less than Yau Wai Ching. But she is being boosted up to 7%. The same thing with Wong Kwok Kin."

    I asked: "What is the advantage?"

    "Fuck! I was right what I said that you know nothing! They do so in order to play up the pan-democrats as victims and get the sympathy vote. The pro-establishment camp appeared to be heavy favorites, but they may lose everything. I even got a photo of their document. Let me send this over to you. You are going to lose this one for sure."

    The fucking Power For Democracy has caused me to lose two Lafites. Today I am telling you about this dirty secret, so that the Electoral Affairs Commission can arrest these bastards."

    (The Standard) June 6, 2016.

    Eighteen pro-democracy groups have formed an alliance to promote strategic voting in the September Legislative Council elections under the "ThunderGo" plan of University of Hong Kong law professor Benny Tai Yiu-tin.

    The alliance, Citizens United in Action, hopes to topple the pro- establishment camp as the majority in Legco. One of its works is to promote the interactive polling tool "Votsonar" to collect the voting preference of more than 100,000 voters.

    It aims to guide strategic voters to cast their ballots so that most legislators of their camp will be elected. The tool was launched last month on a free messaging app, Telegram, but by Saturday only about 2,000 people had joined.

    Angus Chiu Chi-fan, Civic Data HK spokesman responsible for Votsonar, said: "I believe the number of participants will keep increasing and approach 100,000.

    "And it's more like big data. The number of samples is much larger than random sampling of the HKU opinion polls, allowing higher accuracy."

    Tai said 15 percent of voters may want strategic voting to maximize the number of legislators in their camp. That means 200,000 out of 1.2 million non-pro-establishment voters, which would be enough to return 35 legislators to Legco.

    "That would make 30,000 to 40,000 voters in each district. With such a number of strategic voters, we can even get 25 seats in the geographical constituency, not mentioning 23 [pan- democrats]," he said.

    Votsonar will then provide "accurate information" for strategic voters to cast their ballots.

    Tai played down worries it may breach the Election Ordinance. "We won't tell voters to vote or not to vote for candidates A or B. What voters will receive is only the support rate of the candidates, so that they will consider whose chance of winning is higher, and make strategic decisions."

    (Wen Wei Po) August 23, 2016.

    In his live broadcast  yesterday, Sze Tat Chau criticized Votsonar for attempting to manipulate voter intentions and get votes for wastrels. He showed how he and his friends have voted together to become kingmakers. Thus, in New Territories West, Wong Ho Ming is now leading; in New Territories East, Chan Chi Chuen has surpassed Alvin Yeung, etc. "Unfortunately, we are not doing as well in Kowloon West because my friends have only started ... Do you want me and my friends to vote for CK Ho? ... Fine, let us vote him! Let's go, Votsonar!"

    The Facebook page Look7s also called for people to vote for CK Ho at Votsonar. "Let us all support CK Ho so that he becomes the top vote getter at Votsonar. We are doing everything that we can to help Benny Tai."

    Overnight, CK Ho went from dead last in Kowloon West to the top. Sze Tat Chau said happily: "I want to see how Evil Tai goes thunder down. I am dying from laughter." He added: "The so-called Project ThunderGo by Benny Tai has been laid waste in one instant by good friends. The pan-democrats' plan to built their empire on top of the voters' will is fragile. When Benny Tai wakes up this morning, he may have to call CK Ho to lend some votes to Claudia Mo and Helena Wong.!"


    Out of 913 persons, 484 (53%) voted for CK Ho.

    Q1. What is the issue that you are most concerned about?
    25.1%: Political system/governance
    20.8%: Land/housing
    15.1%: Economic development
    10.8%: Medical/healthcare
    7.1%: Labor/employment
    6.3%: Education
    2.3%: Environmental protection
    6.0%: Others
    6.5%: No opinion

    Q2. What is the main reason for deciding on whom to vote for?
    32.1%: Past job performance
    19.0%: Policy platform
    18.2%: Political party background
    16.3%: Political beliefs
    5.1%: Candidate's image
    1.9%: Strategic voting
    3.2%: Others
    4.1%: No opinion

    Q3. How likely are you to vote?
    53.5%: Definitely
    18.1%: Most likely
    3.5%: Most likely not
    1.1%: Definitely not
    4.8%: Undecided
    19.0%: No opinion

    District Council (Second) Functional Constituency
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    801 James To Kun Shun (Democratic Party) 18.6%
    802 Starry Lee (DAB) 20.0%
    803 Kwong Chun Yu (Democratic Party) 3.7%
    804 Kalvin Ho Kai Ming (ADPL) 2.3%
    805 Sumly Chan Yuen Sum (Civic Party) 3.6%
    806 Wong Kwok Hing (Federation of Trade Unions) 6.9%
    807 Kwan Wing Yip (Neo Democrats) 2.5%
    808 Leung Yiu Chung (Neighborhood & Worker's Service Centre) 8.2%
    809 Holden Chow Ho Ding (DAB) 3.9%
      Undecided 22.4%
      No opinion 7.9%

    Hong Kong Island
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    1 Gary Wong Chi Him (independent) 0.3%
    2 Christopher Lau Gar Hung (People Power) 1.8%
    3 Regina Ip Lau Suk Yee (New People's Party) 18.2%
    4 Cyd Ho Sau Lan (Labour Party) 6.0%
    5 Cheung Kwok Kwan (DAB) 8.2%
    6 Chim Pui Chung (independent) 1.7%
    7 Cheng Kam Mun (Civic Passion) 2.3%
    8 Nathan Law Kwun Chung (Demosisto) 1.4%
    9 Shum Chee Chiu (independent) 0.3%
    10 Ricky Wong Wai Kay (independent) 11.1%
    11 Chui Chi Kin (independent) 0.3%
    12 Paulus Johannes Zimmerman (independent) 2.0%
    13 Hui Chi Fung (Democratic Party) 5.1%
    14 Tanya Chan (Civic Party) 15.4%
    15 Kwok Wai Keung (Federation of Trade Unions) 4.2%
      Undecided 17.9%
      No opinion 3.8%

    Kowloon West
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    1 Avery Ng Man Yuen (League of Social Democrats) 3.7%
    2 Jonathan Ho Chi Kwong (independent) 0.4%
    3 Claudia Mo Man Ching (Civic Party) 14.2%
    4 Leung Mei Fun (BPA) 10.5%
    5 Tam Kwok Kiu (ADPL) 4.1%
    6 Chu Siu Hung (independent) 0.1%
    7 Raymond Wong Yuk Man (Proletariat Political Institute) 5.8%
    8 Helena Wong  Pik Wan (Democratic Party) 8.0%
    9 Lam Yi Lai (independent) 0.2%
    10 Ann Chiang Lai Wan (DAB) 13.1%
    11 Kwan San Wai (independent) 0.3%
    12 Lau Siu Lai (independent) 2.5%
    13 Yau Wai Ching (Youngspiration) 6.0%
    14 Augustine Lee Wing Hon (independent) 0.9%
    15 Tik Chi Yuen (independent) 5.0%
      Undecided 18.1%
      No opinion 7.1%

    Kowloon East
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    1 Wong Kwok Kin (Federation of Trade Unions) 12.4%
    2 Wu Sui Shan (Labour Party) 1.1%
    3 Patrict Ko Tat Pun (independent) 0.3%
    4 Tam Heung Man (The Frontier) 1.1%
    5 Paul Tse Wai Chun (independent) 7.0%
    6 Wilson Or Chong Shing (DAB) 11.5%
    7 Lui Wing Kei (independent) 0.2%
    8 Wu Chi Wai (Democratic Party) 13.5%
    9 Jeremy Tam Man Ho (Civic Party) 17.1%
    10 Wong Yeung Tat (Civic Passion) 4.5%
    11 Chan Chak To (Kowloon East Community) 1.4%
    12 Tam Tak Chi (People Power) 2.5%
      Undecided 21.4%
      No opinion 6.0%

    New Territories Wst
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    1 Wong Yun Tat ( Neighborhood & Worker's Service Centre) 2.1%
    2 Andrew Wan Siu Kin (Democratic Party) 5.9%
    3 Ko Chi Fai (independent) 0.3%
    4 Chow Wing Kan (Liberal) 0.9%
    5 Cheng Chung Tai (Civic Passion) 2.9%
    6 Kwong Koon Wan (independent) 0.1%
    7 Michael Tien Puk Sun (New People's Party) 12.0%
    8 Ho Kwan Yiu (independent) 4.3%
    9 Leung Che Cheung (DAB) 5.4%
    10 Kwok Ka Ki (Civic Party) 5.7%
    11 Wong Ho Ming (League of Social Democrats) 3.3%
    12 Lee Cheuk Yan (Confederation of Trade Unions) 5.2%
    13 Wong Chun Kit (Youngspiration) 5.0%
    14 Mak Mei Kuen (Federation of Trade Unions) 4.7%
    15 Frederick Fung Kin Kee (ADPL) 4.4%
    16 Chan Han Pan (DAB) 6.3%
    17 Clarice Cheung Wai Ching (independent) 0.4%
    18 Hendrick Lui Chi Hang (independent) 0.0%
    19 Tong Wing Chi (independent) 0.2%
    20 Eddie Chu Hoi Dick (independent) 1.8%
      Undecided 22.7%
      No opinion 6.4%

    New Territories East
    ID# Name (Party)

    %
    1 Christine Fong Kwok Shan (independent) 4.6%
    2 Lam Cheuk Ting (Democratic Party) 4.0%
    3 Liu Tin Shing (independent) 0.2%
    4 Chin Wan Kan (Hong Kong Resurgence Order) 2.5%
    5 Leung Kwok Hung (League of Social Democrats) 3.6%
    6 Cheung Chiu Hung (Labour Party) 3.3%
    7 Alvin Yeung Ngok Kiu (Civic Party) 12.5%
    8 Raymond Mak Ka Chun (independent) 0.9%
    9 Andrew Cheng Kar Foo (independent) 3.9%
    10 Elizabeth Quat (DAB) 10.0%
    11 Hau Chi Keung (independent) 0.5%
    12 Dominic Lee Tsz King (Liberal Party) 6.0%
    13 Tang Ka Piu (Federation of Trade Unions) 2.5%
    14 Gary Fan Kwok Wai (Neo Democrats) 3.7%
    15 Estella Chan Yuk Ngor (independent) 0.1%
    16 Wong Sum Yu (independent) 0.1%
    17 Leticia Lee See Yin 0.5%
    18 Raymond Chan Chi Chuen (People Power) 2.2%
    19 Sixtus Leung Chung Hang (Youngspiration) 3.1%
    20 Ronald Leung Kam Shing (independent) 0.3%
    21 Yung Hoi Yan (New People's Party) 4.4%
    22 Chan Hak Kan (DAB) 5.5%
      Undecided 19.9%
      No opinion 5.7%

    (Gizmodo) August 18, 2016

    Heres a case where film marketers being incurably Western causes a big problem: Arrival released 12 posters depicting alien monoliths appearing across the world. One of them photoshopped a building from Shanghai into a Hong Kong skyline. Oops.

    Bigger oops was not thinking about the tense history between Hong Kong and China, of which Shanghai is the largest city. (Full disclosure: io9 identified the poster as being of Shanghai when we published it.)

    Hong Kong was a British colony until 1997, when the Handover transferred its sovereignty to China. Theres been a fair amount of tension between Hong Kong and mainland China, especially in recent years. The political unrest culminated recently in the proliferation of groups calling for independence from China. And then Arrival stepped right into that debate.

    The tower in the righthand corner is the distinctive Oriental Pearl Tower, a TV tower in Shanghai. The rest of the poster is of Victoria Harbour, a name that pretty clearly gives it away as being in Hong Kong and not Shanghai.

    This has caused a pretty predictable backlash. If you want to see marketing gone horribly, horribly wrong, go scroll through the 2,700and risingcomments on the image on Facebook. Youll find its been taken over by people proclaiming #HongKongIsNotChina. Commenter Cherry Ben took it even further than just the hashtag with, Lets boycott this piece of shit. Putting the fucking tower in Vic. Harbour doesnt mean it represents China you fucking idiot. #Hongkongisnotchina

    Mostly, though, the comments are exactly what youd expect. Some polite requests that the marketers do some research and respect other nations before doing things like this. Others making fun of them for making a stupid mistake. Some general dislike of the design of the tower. A fair bit of mocking the Why are they here? tagline, which seems especially ironic given this mistake. But mostly, comment after comment with just the hashtag.

    Although the best response has to come from Horace Chin Wan-kan, a leader of the Hong Kong Autonomy Movement and who is running Hong Kongs Legislative Council election. Heres his response, as reported by Variety:

    The movie adaptation of the sci-fi novel Arrival, which obtained the Nebula Award, [has] decent director Denis Villeneuve and actors Amy Adams [and] Jeremy Renner. However, everything is ruined by this improper poster.

    The use of decent there is an especially strong burn.

    Let this be a lesson to marketers and moviemakers everywhere: sometimes your ignorance just makes you look dumb. Sometimes its a political nightmare.

    (SCMP) Hong Kong Taken Out of the Picture. By Alex Lo. August 22, 2016.

    Another day, another localist controversy. This time its over a Hollywood sci-fi movie. Paramount Pictures has apparently produced a geographically and hence politically incorrect poster for its upcoming movie about aliens called Arrival.

    The offending picture includes Shanghais iconic Oriental Pearl Radio and Television Tower as part of the cityscape of Hong Kong while an alien spacecraft hovers over it.

    The inaccuracy has caused a storm of protests among localists and their sympathisers. The social media page with the hashtag #hongkongisnotchina has attracted a massive following.

    Unlike our localists, Hollywood has long thought of Hong Kong as part of China. In any case, Tinseltown has had a long history of getting Hong Kong wrong, so what else is new? I am no film historian but arguably, it all started with Love is a Many-Splendored Thing. When Dr Han Suyin heard news that her lover, the journalist Mark Elliot played by William Holden, had been killed while covering the Korean war, she ran in tears from Wan Chai to what was supposed to be the Peak where they had a romantic encounter. The marathon run would have exhausted anyone. In fact, it was quite unrealistic, unless Dr Han had superpower.

    And that reminds me of Michael Bays fantasy sci-fi movie franchise Transformers. The last one, Age of Extinction, was shot mostly on the mainland but Hong Kong also experienced some major destruction in the movie. Sadly for our localists, Government House and the government headquarters in Admiralty were left intact.

    In the last part where the main characters had to rush from Beijing to Hong Kong to confront the evil alien robots Decepticons, their drive was so short it could have been taken from Wan Chai to Causeway Bay. If you didnt know better, you might think our nations capital is right next door where Shenzhen is.

    Because of the furore, Paramount Pictures and international distributor Sony Pictures have quietly replaced the poster. Well, you guess it, Hong Kong is gone, but they keep the tower where it is, in Shanghai, and features the spacecraft hovering over the citys famous Huangpu River.

    This incident pretty much sums up what would happen if our localists and secessionists have their way. Outsiders and other countries will just drop Hong Kong out of the picture and go straight to the mainland.

    Internet comments:

    - Here is a very funny spoof video on the movie poster producers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Isq5AQBsg00

    - (The Stand News) Some Hong Kong Internet users found the response unacceptable and continued to leave comments with the hashtags #HongKongIsNotChina and #BoycottArrivalMovie. They demanded that the movie companies apologize to the people of Hong Kong. "If you want to earn RMB, you should go to China and not come to Hong Kong!"

    - Boycott this movie? These Hong Kong Localists don't buy movie tickets anyway. They can just go to mainland Chinese BT websites to download for free.

    P.S. For that purpose, they suddenly know how to read simplified Chinese characters and listen to putonghua soundtracks. At all other times, they will avert their eyes and claim to be a completely different human race from the Chinese.

    - Don't worry. When the movie Arrival arrives, the DAB/FTU and the Heung Yee Kuk will mobilize their people to buy movie tickets.

    - Here is the ultimate scorecard: (the-numbers-com) As of February 5, 2017, the Hong Kong box office receipts for Arrival was US$1,063,431. For China, it was US$15,270,000. Who should the movie companies try to placate?

    (Harbour Times) August 3, 2016.

    Baggio Sixtus Leung Chung-hang (梁頌恆), inspiration of Youngspiration, has the thumbs up to run in the New Territories East.

    Hong Kong Indigenous Edward Leung Tin-kei (梁天琦), a massive vote winner in the February by-election has been denied to the voters in New Territories East by the Electoral Affairs Commission via the Registration and Electoral Office and Returning Officer Cora Ho Lai-sheung (何麗嫦).

    Now Baggio Leung will square off against the philosopher-king of localism, Horace Chin Wan-kan (陳云根), aka Chin Wan (陳雲) of the Civic Passion-Hong Kong Resurgence Order-Proletariat Political Institute alliance headliners.  

    It wasnt meant to be this way. Baggio Leung originally planned to run on Hong Kong Island, but decided to join Kenny Wong Chun-kits (黃俊傑) bid in New Territories West as the third-ranked candidate in Wongs list. Presumably Baggion Leungs name recognition would help Mr Wongs ticket to attract votes.

    According to Baggio Leung, the two signature localist groups came up with a joint election list a week before the nomination period ended. Their plan B saw them propose a list headed by Baggio Leung followed by former Hong Kong Indigenous member Li Tung-sing (李東昇).

    The original idea was to secure [Edward Leung] Tin-keis candidacy by increasing the political costs of banning both lists for the Electoral Affairs Commission, while lowering the effectiveness of disqualifying him alone, he explains. In other words, it was meant to show to the election watchdog the futility of banning Edward Leung from the election.

    Planning for all contingencies, the final result is the Youngspiration and Hong Kong Indigenous Plan B. Edward Leung will move to help coordinate election efforts in New Territories East, New Territories West, and Kowloon West where Youngspiration is running.

    Commenting on the coalition, Baggio Leung says there are many similarities among the two groups, particularly on some general concepts concerning Hong Kong nationalism and self-determination. When we joined the All-IN-6 campaign during the New Territories East Legco by-election in February, we were not only backing [Leung] Tin-kei [whose candidate number was Six] but also his platform, he notes.

    Baggio Leung hopes that voters wont be voting for him out of sympathy, but out of a sense of crisis in face of an executive branch exceeding its authority to bar candidates from running through the mechanism of the EAC. Meanwhile, he stresses some subtle differences that differentiate his camp from the rival localist bloc represented by Chin.

    Id describe Chins advocacy of a de facto referendum, a universal constitutional reform and a permanent continuation of the Basic Law as a variation of One Country, Two Systems, which are essentially different from our nationality-centred ideology, Baggio Leung explains. Localist supporters will make their own choice.

    (HKG Pao) August 11, 2016.

    Youngspiration has three lists in the Legislative Council elections. Some people think that their candidates do not have good speaking skills. Youngspiration spokesperson Wong Chu-kit said on a Hong Kong Indigenous radio program that he has been spending at least one hour a day on speaking techniques. He joked that his trainer told him to use more foul language "which would be more relaxed and locally flavored."

    Edward Leung Tin-kei thinks that he has good speaking skills which were acquired by experience as an online radio host. He said that he will become the commander-in-chief for the three Youngspiration lists, and he will hold mock debates with their candidates "so that they can internalize the political beliefs of Hong Kong Indigenous." He encourages the Youngspiration candidates to appear at more election forums.

    (RTHK) August 16, 2016.

    Yau Wai-ching: Today I offer everybody one word. The fifty-second sign in the Book of Change was "mountain." That means that our beliefs will be as unmovable as a mountain. All along, we have the fighting spirit to pave the road for Hong Kong's future. You add this together you will get "relentless." In the past, the people of Hong Kong has been too charitable towards the Hong Kong Communist Government. From now on, we will be  relentless. When it comes to the government, we will be relentless. This is how we will take back what is ours. Thank you. I am candidate number 13, Yau Wai-ching.

    Augustine Lee Wing-hon: I want to post a question to Yau Wai-ching. She just brought up the word "relentless." I would like to know the definition of "relentless." Do you think that the Legislative Council is not chaotic enough? Do you want to get in and make sure that there is bloodshed before you are satisfied? What is being 'relentless'? When you spoke, you voice was quivering. When you said "relentless", your voice was quivering. So how are you going to be "relentless"?

    Yau Wai-ching: You should make the effort to go home and consult a dictionary.

    Augustine Lee Wing-hon: Are you supposed to have answered my question?

    Yau Wai-ching: I don't want to waste my time.

    Augustine Lee Wing-hon: You said it. You said that you will be relentless. How relentless?  What is being relentless?

    Yau Wai-ching: Be relentless against the Hong Kong Communists.

    Augustine Lee Wing-hon: I am 100% Hongkonger. I have the right to ask you in what way will you be relentless.

    Yau Wai-ching: That is to say, you don't plan to be relentless against the Hong Kong Communist government. When you enter the Legislative Council, you only want to perform public service for the Hong Kong Government.

    Augustine Lee Wing-hon: I am asking you. Don't ask me a question back. Do not use this type of political ruse. How relentless will you be? Will you throwing bricks?

    Yau Wai-ching: How am I going to throw bricks inside the Legislative Council?

    Augustine Lee Wing-hon: Will you?

    Yau Wai-ching: I want to say, How am I going to throw bricks inside the Legislative Council? There is not a single brick inside the Legislative Council.

    Lam Yi-lai: Then why don't you throw bricks in the Mong Kok streets? I have never seen you show up in Mong Kok. What are you saying about Localism? What are you saying about Hong Kong independence? You are lying to the young people to get their votes?

    Yau Wai-ching: I have not shown up in Mong Kok? I reside in Mong Kok.

    Lam Yi-lai: And you want to enter the Legislative Council? Is Hong Kong not chaotic enough? Huh?

    Yau Wai-ching: You should not make things up, Lam Yi-lai. I reside in Mong Kok. How can I not show up in Mong Kok?

    Lam Yi-lai: You were in Occupy Mong Kok? I have never seen you before.

    Yau Wai-ching: At the time, I was an unknown. When I walked down the street, you wouldn't recognize me.

    Lam Yi-lai: All of Hong Kong knows you. Throwing bricks, localists, Hong Kong independence. I want to ask you, how are you going to bring about Hong Kong independence.

    More at RTHK.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) August 19, 2016.

    A recently founded yet influential Taiwanese party has denied a report that it will come to Hong Kong to rally support for a localist party. A candidate of the Hong Kong party has apologized for misinformation given to a news site.

    Local Press, an online news site close to localist groups, quoted Youngspiration candidate Kenny Wong Chun-kit as saying that Taiwans New Power Party (NPP) including their lawmaker Hung Tzu-yun will come to Hong Kong at the end of next week for an election rally.

    But the NPP soon denied the report, saying that none of its five lawmakers had such plans. Our party is concerned about Hong Kongs development in democracy, we support full universal suffrage, it said. We welcome Hong Kongs civil society joining the election. But we have never discussed the development and support of individual parties.

    In January, Huang Kuo-chang, then NPP candidate for Taiwans legislature, was denied a visa to Hong Kong for the second time.

    Local Press apologised to the NPP in a statement, saying that it only cited Wong, but failed to confirm the news with NPP.

    Around the same time, Wong told Stand News that there was a mistake in the Local Press report, as Youngspiration was still in talks with NPP and it was not confirmed. Five hours later, Wong backtracked and apologised to Local Press for providing misinformation in a statement: It was due to my failure to express the information in a good manner.

    Wong said he had discussed with the NPP plans to visit Hong Kong, but he caused a misunderstanding as he told Local Press before they were confirmed.

    Wong, a candidate running in the New Territories West constituency in the upcoming election, said he was willing to accept a disciplinary hearing from his party. But some pointed out that Youngspiration has no such mechanism.

    But many localist supporters were not satisfied with Wongs apology, saying that he should not have blamed Local Press in his response to Stand News.

    Another Youngspiration candidate, Sixtus Baggio Leung Chun-hang, was supported by Edward Leung Tin-kei as a substitute candidate in the New Territories East constituency, after Leungs candidacy was rejected by an election official.

    Localist supporters voiced their discontent towards Wong during a localist online programme which over 2,600 people viewed, saying that Wong harmed the reputation of Local Press and Leung.

    In a statement, a government spokesman said that the Government does not welcome activists who pursue the notion of Taiwan independence to come to Hong Kong to campaign for Hong Kong political organisations.

    (HKG Pao) August 20, 2016.

    Due to the reaction to the New Power Party story, Wong Chun-kit has resigned as the spokesperson for Youngspiration. Hong Kong Indigneous spokesperson Ray Wong said on online radio that he would not support Wong blindly just because they have an alliance with Youngspiration. "Wong was wrong this time. When he is wrong, he should admit it and rectify it. I don't want him to die; I only want him to start again."

    Wong went on to say that Hong Kong Indigenous got into an alliance with Youngspiration after Edward Leung's nomination was invalidated. At first, "it was normal." "But the more we worked together, the more problems surfaced. The big problem is that none of the Youngspiration were prepared to get into politics."

    Wong said that he can only hope that Youngspiration will do something better for everybody to see before the election. He hinted that he won't even support Youngspiration. "It is your freedom to cast your vote as you wish. This is your choice. You shouldn't vote for someone else's sake." So who should the localists vote for? Ray Wong said that the main mission is to grab the traditional pan-democrats' votes for the localists. Any further opinions on Youngspiration will be given after the elections.

    (HKG Pao) August 21, 2016.

    There appears to be a wave of departures at Youngspiration after the alliance was formed with Hong Kong Indigenous.

    First of all, Kowloon City District Councilor Kwong Po-yin resigned. It is rumored that she has gone over to rival organization East Kowloon Community Concern Group to take charge of medical/healthcare policies. She will also attend as a volunteer for the East Kowloon Community Concern Group at election forums.

    Now, Lai Yiu-chun who was a Youngspiration candidate for District Council has also departed for the East Kowloon Community Concern Group. Lai said that they parted on amicable terms. He said that he had resigned from Youngspiration because he had gotten a job. He is joining the East Kowloon Communityt Concern Group because he thought that they didn't have enough volunteers. Lai wrote on Facebook that he will be sleeping at the Concern Group's headquarters to make sure that he can give the maximum number of hours.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) August 21, 2016.

    A womens rights group is accusing a Legislative Council candidate of making sexist comments during a televised debate on Sunday.

    During the debate Grace Lam Yi-lai asked her opponent Yau Wai-ching if she and a localist ally used 100 Viagra pills together. The Kowloon West candidate also referred to Yau as a universal adaptor plug.

    Lam accused Yau, from the Youngspiration political party, of using Viagra with Ray Wong Toi-yeung of fellow localist group Hong Kong Indigenous. Police discovered Viagra pills and HK$530,000 in cash in an apartment where Wong was arrested following violent clashes in Mong Kok this February.

    What do [the pills] have to do with me? responded Yau when Lam pressed her again on the matter. Later in the debate, Lam later suggestively called Yau a universal adaptor plug.

    In a statement on Stand News on Thursday, the Association Concerning Sexual Violence Against Women (ACSVAW) said that Lams comments were unacceptable, whether for the subject [of the attack] or for an observer.

    Lam was not interested in discussing Yaus political views sex life and the female (and male) body should not be an obstacle to becoming a politician, read the statement.

    The ACSVAW compared Lams comments to a Twitter post made by United States Presidential candidate Donald Trump last May, in which he claimed that fellow candidate Hillary Clinton was unable to satisfy her husband. It also pointed to the criticisms made by Taiwans Kuomintang political party against incumbent President Tsai Ing-wen for being an unmarried woman, and therefore a failure.

    The issue of Viagra pills was initially raised by Simon Ho Chi-kwong, a candidate from Hong Kong Localism Power, during the televised debate hosted by RTHK. Ho asked Yau why her Youngspiration party accepted an endorsement from Hong Kong Indigenous, for whom Ray Wong is a spokesperson. Hong Kong Indigenous Edward Leung Tin-kei has been disqualified from the election next month.

    Ho is known for sharply criticising other localist candidates for their unrealistic views. He alleged during the debate that the HK$530,000 found in the apartment where Wong was residing was laundered money.

    Neither Lam nor Yau have publicly commented on the debate controversy.

    Lam has run in various elections in Hong Kong since the 1990s. Among her various policy proposals, she is most well-known for advocating the criminalisation of adultery.

    Yau, who ran unsuccessfully for a District Council seat last November, advocates self-determination for Hongkongers. Her Youngspiration party has proposed a number of policies with the aim of strengthening the citys identity, including tests for new immigrants and Hong Kong history classes.

    Separately, local paper Sing Tao Daily invited fashion designer William Tang Tat-chi to be a guest columnist last week to rate the appearances of six female candidates in the Kowloon West constituency.

    Tang praised the appearance of Priscilla Leung Mei-fun of the pro-Beijing Business and Professionals Alliance for Hong Kong as refreshing, and said that Claudia Mo Man-ching of the pro-democracy Civic Party has an international look. However, he also claimed that Yau Wai-ching, in a chequered shirt and jeans, looked like a wet market woman.

    Internet comments:

    - You are kidding yourselves if you think that "ideas are everything" whereas "debating skills are worthless" and "ability is unimportant." I am fine with saying that debating skills aren't everything. I am even fine with someone drafting your policy platform for you. But when you show up at an election forum without even memorizing your own policy platform, then this is unforgivable because you are ill-prepared for the election. If elected, you won't be prepared for your job either. Some candidates never look at their written notes but they can readily expound on their ideas. That is because they have thoroughly understood and internalized those ideas and their faith and confidence are unshakeable.

    - I just turned on the television and there was Yau Wai-ching being asked at an election forum about the item on "developing natural gas in Hong Kong" on her policy platform. Now I don't know enough about whether there is natural gas lying underneath the ground in Hong Kong. But I do know that you have no idea what this item is doing in your policy platform and therefore the Democratic Party candidate is ripping you to shreds.

    Later someone went to ask Youngspiration's Kowloon East candidate Baggio Leung the same question. Leung said that there is a gas field 350 kilometers outside Hong Kong, and those resources can be used by Hong Kong by 'political means' or 'commercial means' to become self-sufficient in energy. Of course, Leung does not explain what 'political means' or 'commercial means' imply. He only said that this is pointless without an Exclusive Economic Zone for Hong Kong.

    - (Wikipedia: Exclusive Economic Zone)

    An exclusive economic zone (EEZ) is a sea zone prescribed by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea over which a state has special rights regarding the exploration and use of marine resources, including energy production from water and wind. It stretches from the baseline out to 200 nautical miles (nmi) from its coast.

    Generally, a state's exclusive economic zone is an area beyond and adjacent to the territorial sea, extending seaward to a distance of no more than 200 nautical miles (370 km) out from its coastal baseline. The exception to this rule occurs when exclusive economic zones would overlap; that is, state coastal baselines are less than 400 nautical miles (740 km) apart. When an overlap occurs, it is up to the states to delineate the actual maritime boundary. Generally, any point within an overlapping area defaults to the nearest state.

    Baggio Leung knows that there are no natural gas fields near Hong Kong. So he posits it somewhere 350 kilometers outside, right within the known limit of 370 kilometer for an Exclusive Economic Zone.

    So why does he have to talk about 'political means'? Here is a map of Hong Kong. The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region is in red and the rest of China is in yellow. Oh, no! There are Chinese islands to the south of Hong Kong (namely, the Wanshan (Ladrones) Archipelago of the Zhuahai municipality)! That means Hong Kong's Exclusive Economic Zone is circumscribed on all sides by China! If there is a natural gas field 350 kilometers out there, it belongs to China!

    Oh, and there is the more fundamental problem in that Exclusive Economic Zones are owned by states. Hong Kong is not a state. It is not a member of the United Nations and can never be a state unless UN Security Council permanent member China votes AYE.

    So it may be that Baggio Leung fully understands the situation. But he has no solution and he cannot admit that he has no solution.

    - 'Political means' means reaching a deal politically. For example, China can swap the gas fields for Hong Kong's Lantau Island (including the Hong Kong International Airport and Disneyland). 'Commercial means' means reaching a financial deal, with Hong Kong leasing the gas fields from China for a fee.

    - Wait, in view of the controversy over natural gas fields in Hong Kong, Youngspiration has just released their map of the territorial sea for Hong Kong after independence.

    - If other nations don't agree, Hong Kong can pay the Permanent Court of Arbitration to rule in its favor. The going price was USD $30 million last time.

    - Does the Republic of Hong Kong intend to use force to liberate the Chinese islands to its south?  Once they do so, the path is clear for a southward expansion of territorial sea.

    - Taiwan will lay out their welcoming mat for Hong Kong to explore for oil and gas outside Kaohsiung harbor.

    - If this is the map for Hong Kong, what if Macau also becomes independent? Being so close to Hong Kong, its map would be almost identical. So this is bizarre beyond belief? Does Youngspiration seriously believe this?

    - This post was made less to explain anything than to feature Yau Wai Ching's kawaii.

    - This map has the three projects of Husky Energy-CNOOC (Liwan 3-1, Liuhua 34-2 and Liuhua 29-1) coming under Hong Kong possession after independence. These natural gas fields are up and running, so Hong Kong will have immediate access to natural gas.

    Husky Energy is a Canadian company and CNOOC (China National Offshore Oil Corporation) is a Chinese state-owned company. What is Hong Kong going to do in order to nationalize these assets? Send in their marines to take over the platforms, pipelines and terminals?

    Right now, CNOOC is sending natural gas from Liwan 3-1, Lihua 34-2 and Liuhua 29-1 to the Gaolan Terminal in Zhuhai city. Seizing the platforms, pipelines and terminals will only stop supplies to Zhuhai. It won't bring any natural gas to Hong Kong because there is no pipeline. I cannot imagine that China (or even Canada) will sit idly by to watch Hong Kong lay down a new pipeline.

    - (Baike.Baidu) There are several tens of thousands of Chinese citizens who live on the Wanshan Archipelago. What to do about them after Hong Kong independence? Ship them back to China, of course.

    - Some of those families have been living there for several hundred years already, long before Hong Kong became a British colony under the 1842 Treaty of Nanking.

    - Tough shit to them for encroaching on the Sacred Land of the Hong Kong Nation.

    - The Wanshan Archipelgao will be a perfect place for the Hong Kong nation to build a submarine base. We can buy a nuclear-powered submarine armed with weapons of mass destruction to serve as a deterrent against foreign invasion.

    - And this brings us to the issue of "innocent passage." Innocent passage is a concept in the law of the sea that allows for a vessel to pass through the territorial waters of another state, subject to certain restrictions. The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea defines innocent passage as this:

    Passage is innocent so long as it is not prejudicial to the peace, good order or security of the coastal State. Such passage shall take place in conformity with this Convention and with other rules of international law.

    If Hong Kong imports from overseas, the cargo ships may or may not be allowed to pass. At a minimum, China may insist on inspecting the ships for arms.

    - Here is my full script for what happens next.

    (0) China dissolves into many different nations the same way that Yugoslavia and USSR did.

    (1) The newly independent Hong Kong Nation will be allies with the Guangdong Nation and the Taiwan Nation. The Guangdong Nation also includes the Cantonese-speaking former Guangxi province. Since this powerful Guangdong Nation encircles Hong Kong, we must regard them as hostile.

    (2) Since Shenzhen is different from the rest of the Guangdong Nation due to the large number of immigrants from other places in China, we should adopt the Free City of Dantzig model to form the Free City of Shenzhen. All those don't fit into the Guangdong Nation or the Hong Kong Nation will be shipped off to Shenzhen. Under the rule of the Guangdong Nation and Hong Kong Nation, Shenzhen will undergo de-sinofication gradually. Fifty years later, a referendum will be held to see Shenzhen will become independent or join either the Guangdong Nation or the Hong Kong Nation.

    (3) Hong Kong's territory will be expanded to include the Yantian District and Dapeng Peninsula of Shenzhen. The Daya Nuclear Power Station will be taken over by Hong Kong. The Dapeng Peninsula will be the military harbor for Hong Kong.

    (4) The Hong Kong Nation will join the Trans-Pacific Pact in order to trade with other civilized nations. Hong Kong will go back to its own transshipment industry to serve as the window to and from the Guangdong Nation and the rest of the mainland Chinese nations.

    (5) The Hong Kong Nation will join ASEAN alongside the Guangdong Nation and the Taiwan Nation. The Hong Kong Nation will compete with Singapore to become the financial center of South East Asia. Basic supplies will come from the South Asian nations.

    (6) The South Sea will belong to ASEAN and the member nations will develop the resources jointly. The Wanshan Archipelago will be divided between the Hong Kong Nation and the Macau Nation. Some islands belong to Hong Kong will be leased to the United States to serve as naval bases. Sovereignty over the other islands will be suspended and the fishing regulations will be jointly determined by the ASEAN nations.

    (7) The Hong Kong Nation will join the British Commonwealth. If possible, the Hong Kong Nation should also join the European Union.

    (8) The Hong Kong Nation will maintain good relations with Japan, but Japan has to apologize for invading Hong Kong. The Japanese leaders will be invited for the grand opening ceremony of the The Battle To Defend Hong Kong Memorial Museum.

    (9) After the dissolution of the People's Republic of China, the Hong Kong Nation can cooperate with other mainland Chinese nations provided that they adopt the system of universal values. But we don't need or encourage any confederation.

    (10) If the people of Macau are willing, the Hong Kong Nation will take over Macau too. The two free ports can become the window to the mainland Chinese nations. Macau can also help Hong Kong enter the Portuguese-speaking world and even Latin America.

    - The whole edifice is premised on "If and when China collapses ...", then all sorts of happy things will happen. But if China does not collapse, then what?

    - The Trans-Pacific Pact? It is already dead on the arrival of President Donald Trump. Hong Kong for transshipment? Hey, Shenzhen handles more volume than Hong Kong already. Who needs Hong Kong?

    - Do you think that the Chinese Communists will readily hand over the Wanshan Archipelago to the Hong Kong Nation? Do you know the significance of the Wanshan Archipelago campaign in the history of the People's Liberation Army?

    - Baggio Leung says that he will use "commercial means" to acquire the gas fields. This means buying the Wanshan Archipelago from the Chinese. Okay, let us that ask for the standard going rate of HKD 10,000 per square feet. Fair enough?

    According to Wikipedia, the 104 islands of the Wanshan Archipelago have a total area of 33 square miles. One square mile is 2,7878,000 square feet. So the total cost will only be HKD 27,898,000,000. That's very affordable with each of the 7 million Hong Kong citizens paying around HKD 4,000 per capita.

    Will the Chinese sell? Of course, they never refuse a business deal. If you dangle a bundle of money in front of them, they will jump through hoops to reach it. Right? After all, you would and therefore so will they ... they can't have different priorities, can they?

    - Actually the gas that you use to cook in your home can also be obtained by "commercial means" or "political means." If you prefer "commercial means", you sign a contract with TownGas and they will turn on the gas inside your home. If you prefer "political means," you can either build your own pipe to surreptitiously tap into the TownGas system or you rob/steal liquefied petroleum (propane/butane) gas canisters from somebody else. So Youngspiration is merely extrapolating from the personal level to the national level.

    - Maybe Youngspiration is farting out of their mouths. Literally. The gas that makes up a fart includes nitrogen, oxygen, carbon dioxide, hydrogen and methane. Methane is the primary component of conventional natural gas, commonly used for cooking and heating. So if all Hongkongers can dutifully collect all their farts with gas containers, Hong Kong can indeed be energy-independent.

    - At least Yau Wai-ching did not talk about mining diamonds in Hong Kong. (Explanation: There is a place known as Diamond Hill in Kowloon! Since Hong Kong has a whole hill of diamonds, Hongkongers don't ever have to work again -- they will just hire Filipinos to dig out the diamonds for export).

    - Apart from her own policy platform, Yau Wai-ching could not answer a question on the amount of Old Age Allowance ("fruit money") currently being handed out.

    - Yau Wai Ching was asked whether she still receives allowance money from her mom. She refused to answer.

    - At the forums, Yau Wing-ching always says: "Blah blah blah ... I am Yau Wai Ching from Youngspiration. Please support me. I am Candidate #13, Yau Wai Ching. Please vote for me." In response to most questions, she says: "This sort of question? You should go ask XXX instead of me. I am Yau Wai Ching from Youngspiration. Please support me. I am Candidate #13, Yau Wai Ching. Please vote for me."

    - (Ming Pao) August 23, 2016. Cable TV has a special segment <Say Say With You> to spring sudden questions on candidates. Yesterday, they showed how various Kowloon West candidates answered a question about the rules of procedure at the Legislative Council. Kwan San Wai, Chiang Lai Wan and Wong Yuk Man answered readily, but Yau Wai Ching (Youngspiration) said that she needed to think about it. Then the video showed a man approach Yau and whispered to her for a while. Aftewards, Yau answered the question on camera. Some people think that this was unfair to Yau because the audience could not hear what the man told her. Other people think that Yau needs to do her homework if she wants to become a Legislative Councilor.

    Facebook video: https://www.facebook.com/silentmajorityhk/videos/1120972534658518/

    - What can you do about an actress who refuses to memorize the script? You have a human flesh prompter standing by all the time.

    -  And who is the guy who read her the script at the last moment? Since he is obviously more informed, shouldn't he be running for election instead?

    - Yau Wai Ching even told people to vote for her on September 3. Voting day is actually September 4. She is a total airhead with nothing between the ears.

    - No. Yau Wai Ching is selling kawaii which means that her intelligence and knowledge are irrelevant. If elected, her job will not to explore any issues or ponder any legislation. She will show up at the Legco session and demand head counts. If there is no quorum, everybody can go home. If there is quorum, she'll stand on her chair, yell, get ejected and go home.

    Here is Yau Wai Ching's kawaii in her best form.

    - Even the Yellow Ribbon newspaper Ming Pao is going after Yau Wai-ching. I thought that the attacks were coming only from Civic Passion/Proletariat Political Institute/Hong Kong Resurgence Order.

    - When the Civic Passion/Proletariat Political Institute/Hong Kong Resurgence Order candidates were quizzed about the countries that joined One Belt One Road, none of them could name anything. One of them characterized Singapore as a Third World country.

    - They don't have to know which countries have joined One Belt One Road. They only need to know that it must be stopped at the border. The Road can run all the way from London to Shenzhen, but it must not cross into Hong Kong at all costs. That is all they need to know. But if you must know, then I'll tell you that it has something to do with infiltration/brainwashing.

    - Why must they stop One Belt One Road? Because it will make China even stronger, and we can't have that. We need China to collapse and break into numerous small nations fighting with each other. This is the only realistic way of achieving Hong Kong independence.

    - Nonsense is not limited to Yau Wai Ching. Here is Wong Chun Kit citing statistics:
    https://www.facebook.com/434483659936746/videos/1231064570278647/

    According to a public opinion poll, 17% of the people of Hong Kong support independence. Hong Kong's population is 7.4 million. 17% of 7.4 million is 1.25 million.

    According to another opinion poll, 30% of Hong Kong University students support independence. Hong Kong University has 27,933 students. 30% of 27,933 is 8,380.

    How do you answer to us?

    With due respect, are you telling me that ...?

    If 17% of the people want something, then the other 83% must concur.

    If 30% of the Hong Kong University students want something, then the other 70% must concur.

    How do you answer to the majority? How do you justify imposing something that the majority does not want?

    - You can impose on the majority something that they don't want if you have a dictatorship.

    - Alternately, you say that all pigs are equal but some pigs are more equal than others. The minority which want independence are more equal than the majority of pigs. Therefore the minority position rules.

    If 14% of the people in that same poll actually want China to take over Hong Kong completely under One Country One System, then the other 86% must do so.

    - (Wen Wei Po) August 31, 2016.

    At a radio forum yesterday, Helena Wong Pik-wan (Democratic Party) asked Yau Wai-ching (Youngspiration): "Yau Wai-ching, are you thinking about getting the young people of Hong Kong to extract natural gas in the South Sea? Is that your policy, Yau Wai-ching? I ask you how Hong Kong can get a Special Economic Zone? Where can natural gas be found and extracted?" Yau Wai-ching declined to respond.

    Ho Chi-kwong (Hong Kong Localism Power) was next up. Ho said that previously Raymond Wong wanted to get more votes so that the number two on his list (Ma Yu-sheng) can also be elected. Wong told people not to vote for the "asshole." So Ho asked Yau Wai-ching: "He said not to vote for the 'asshole.' Are you the 'asshole'? He also told you to join a beauty pageant instead of a Legislative Council election." Once again, Yau Wai-ching declined to respond. Ho added: "Does your failure to respond mean that you think Raymond Wong is right?"

    Augustine Lee Wing-hon (independent) asked Yau Wai-ching whether she was present in Mong Kok on the night of the Lunar New Year's Day riot; if so, did she also throw bricks? Yau Wai-ching only said that she was present. Kwan San-wai accused Yau Wai-ching of condoning violence: "If you throw bricks because the vendors were not allowed to set up stalls, what do you need the police for in Hong Kong? If you can get everything by throwing bricks, why do you need the rule-of-law in Hong Kong?"

    - For the archives: 10-1/2 minutes of tirade from Raymond Wong Yuk-man against Youngspiration/Hong Kong Indigenous.
     https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4EOiqNJ_lQ

    On the morning of the election, Raymond Wong said: "I am not afraid of losing. Sorry. If I lose to Yau Wai Ching, I retire. A twenty-something-year old young girl. She knows fucking nothing. If I lose to her, I retire. Right or not?"

    Raymond Wong told Yau Wai Ching: "Do you think that you are running for Miss Hong Kong? ... I can beat you lying down!" In the end, it was Professor Wong who was down on the ground out for the count. The problem was that Wong thought that running for Miss Hong Kong was easy. The truth is that you need a Cambridge University law degree to become Miss Hong Kong (cf. Louisa Mak) but you can be an airhead and still be elected Legislative Councilor!

    (SCMP) August 10, 2016.

    The campaign for Hong Kong independence has extended to secondary schools, with students from at least 14 schools setting up localist concern groups, prompting the Education Bureau to warn such causes would be banned on campus.

    The rhetoric that seemed to be growing among undergraduate unions across the city seemed to have had an effect on younger students as a 60-member group called Studentlocalism mounted a call to action on its Facebook page earlier this week.

    The group, which was founded in April with a stated mission to get the city prepared when the time came for self-determination, appeared to be gearing up for the opening of the school year.

    In the coming days, Studentlocalism will continue to increase [the number of] its street booths to promote independence, the group wrote on Facebook.

    We have also started contacting different secondary student unions which support independence to foster more cooperation.

    The group called on supporters to run for the student unions in their respective schools when the new term begins in September in a bid to bring the independence voice to campuses. It did not respond to questions from the Post.

    As of yesterday, pupils from 14 secondary schools had echoed Studentlocalisms call to set up their own concern groups in their schools, including Wah Yan College on Hong Kong Island and Ying Wa College.

    Mak Tak-cheung, vice-principal of Ying Wa College, said students would need to talk to teachers if they wanted to set up booths for promotional purposes at school. We will listen to their plan and decide ... if its appropriate or if it goes against the school and the Education Bureaus policies, Mak said.

    Ting Wing-hing, principal of Po Leung Kuk Centenary Li Shiu Chung Memorial College, which has one concern group, said he would learn more from the students in September. I want the school to be a place for pupils to learn about knowledge, skills and moral character ... [It should not be] a political battleground, he said.

    A spokesman for the Education Bureau told the Post that no pro-independence advocacy or activities should appear in schools ... and any organisation which serves to promote independence must be banned.

    (SCMP) August 13, 2016.

    Eight years ago, Parco Wong Lok-hang, then age nine, was proud of his Chinese identity during the Beijing Olympics. Now Wong has not only lost his interest in cheering for the national team, but has co-founded a localism group in his school, Ying Wa College, to promote the idea of Hong Kongs independence from China.

    He expects independence to produce a Hong Kong government that will be fully democratic and responsive to peoples needs. He also believes the city can survive on foreign imports and trade without the backing of China.

    We have enough money to build our own desalination facility and our food can be imported from abroad,Wong insists, when asked about the citys heavy dependence on the mainland for basic needs such as drinking water and food.

    Wongs group was set up in his school in Sham Shui Po on August 8, and is one of at least 16 localist outfits run by secondary school students. They reflect the expansion of the highly controversial movement for Hong Kong independence from universities and youth activist groups to even younger recruits.

    These groups emerged after a 60-member group called Studentlocalism mounted a call to action on its Facebook page earlier this month.

    Ying Wa College vice-principal Mak Tak-cheung has previously said he will talk to students such as Wong and see if their plans go against Education Bureau policies, while a bureau spokesman said any school organisation which serves to promote independence must be banned.

    But Wong, whose group has only three members so far, said he would proceed with his plans, such as planning forums and distributing pamphlets to discuss independence when he starts as a Form Five student next month.

    If we cannot make a political stance by giving out pamphlets, we will share the materials online, he says.

    Like many young people in the city, Wong studied Chinese history from Form One to Form Three, but it saddens him to learn about political troubles during Mao Zedongs era.

    Wongs political awakening came in September 2014 when he joined fellow students in boycotting classes and gathering outside government headquarters in Admiralty to say no to Beijings stringent framework for universal suffrage for the chief executive election.

    I was angry when police fired tear gas at protesters on September 28, he says, referring to a key incident that triggered the 79-day Occupy protests which paralysed parts of the city.

    I realised that under Chinese rule, it was unlikely or impossible to have democracy, he says.

    In the past, the [British] colonial government was more responsive to the peoples housing and economic needs. Now the chief executive ... often does things that seem to incite peoples animosity.

    A Form Five student who founded a localism concern group at Salesian English School shares a similar story that he was proud of Chinese athletes in 2008, but the Occupy protests in 2014 encouraged his belief in Hong Kongs independence.

    Earlier this month, electoral officials invalidated the candidacy of six localists for the Legislative Council elections on September 4 because of their pro-independence stance. The student, who only identifies himself as Tom, says the disqualifications only reinforced his belief that without independence, we will never see universal suffrage in Hong Kong.

    Studentlocalism has urged supporters to run for positions in student unions in their respective schools as a way to promote independence.

    Tom says he is actively considering challenging a group of students for union positions because he does not know if they back independence.

    (SCMP) August 20, 2016.

    A pro-independence group led by secondary school students announced plans yesterday to establish localist factions in more than 200 schools to discuss the contentious idea of separating Hong Kong from China.

    They also suggested compulsory military service for the citys youth after independence, openly defying recent moves by the government to curb the trend of separatist talk in schools.

    On a radio programme yesterday, Studentlocalism convenor Tony Chung Hon-lam said his group would start to promote localism in schools through such groups, and by distributing leaflets. The leaflets would be about opposing the use of Putonghua to teach Chinese, protecting traditional Chinese characters, or even Hong Kong independence, he said.

    Chung said he expected schools and authorities would try to clamp down on their activities. If they try to stop us from distributing leaflets, we could do that just outside the school where they cant stop us from doing anything, he said.

    On how Hong Kong would handle defence if it became independent, Chung said the city would need a conscript army. Hong Kongs youngsters are relatively weak. So if all adults could be drafted into the army for a year or two, it would be good for their health, in addition to being able to protect our country.

    Internet comments:

    - Here are the respective slogans adopted by the Concern Groups at the 17 schools:


    1. Recover Hong Kong, become independent and strong
    2. Recover Hong Kong, only through independence
    3. When tyranny becomes reality, revolution is the only method
    4. When tyranny becomes reality, revolution is an obligation
    5. ---
    6. Student uprising, Hong Kong independence
    7. Respect words, practice force, defend our homeland
    8. We would rather be flying dust then still dirt
    9. Defending public justice is the mission for students
    10. Facing off colonial tyranny, the people of Hong Kong will never be alone
    11. We would rather be broken jade than intact tiles
    12. Respect words, practice force, Hong Kong independent
    13. To quote Martin Luther King: A genuinely harmonious society will not see the disappearance of all controversies.
    14. Resist the Communists at the campus, Hong Kong independence
    15. When tyranny becomes reality, revolution is an obligation
    16. This is a revolution of our times
    17. Hong Kong Independent

    -  (NOW TV) Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference representative Henry Tang said that "談港獨是吃飽飯無事忙" (=talking about Hong Kong independence is for those who have nothing better to do after the meal).

    - (HKG Pao) By Chris Wat Wing-yin. August 20, 2016.

    As a parent, I wished that the Secretary for Education could make a firm statement such as: "Hong Kong independence is a complicated issue. Most teachers don't know enough to teach it, and they shouldn't be teaching it either. If the students genuine want to discuss Hong Kong independence, the Department of Education can hired a specialist to visit each school and speak to the students. When the speech is done, the discussion is over and there is no need to have any Concern Group because there is nothing there to be concerned about."

    At the same time, the principals and teachers should tell the students clearly that the discussion of Hong Kong independence is not a freedom of speech issue, because it is illegal. Thus, when the school holds a discussion on drug abuse, they will state that it is illegal and bad and they will find former users, doctors and police officers to tell you why drugs are bad for you. The school won't let you form a concern group so that you can investigate how to prepare drugs, how to take drugs without being addicted, which drugs gives you the best high ... The school is a place to educate the children about the right ideas, not for them to try to break the law.

    - (Speakout HK @ YouTube)

    0:01 Professional Teachers Union president Fung Wai-wah : Not let him (the student) speak.

    0:03 Professional Teachers Union vice-president Cheung Yui-fai: The campus can become a place for them to hold rational discussions (including Hong Kong independence).

    0:11 Studentlocalism convenor Tony Chung Hon-lam: Actually we are not talking about discussions (about Hong Kong independence). We are promoting the idea (of Hong Kong independence). At the schools, more and more people are supporting the fight.

    [The students are clearly talking about pushing Hong Kong independence, not holding 'rational discussions'.]

    0:33 Studentlocalism convenor Tony Chung Hon-lam: We are going to take a look at the situation inside the schools. If the school authorities are not applying great pressure to stop us, we hope to organize discussion forums. We will invite Localists to come down to the schools to tell us what Hong Kong independence is about and how to achieve Hong Kong independence.

    1:00 Host: That is to say, a certain organization tells you that independence cannot succeed. Would you want to invite them to share their opinions?

    1:10 Studentlocalism convenor Tony Chung Hon-lam: You can express your views, because there are actually many people who say that Hong Kong cannot achieve independence. Actually I would like to know what is the basis of your argument?

    [So is this "discussion" or "advocacy"?]

    - (HKG Pao) As for financial resources, Tony Chung said that he would like to register his organization and open a bank account to solicit donations. But he is concerned that his registration will be rejected like the Hong Kong National Party.

    - (HKG Pao) Tony Chung said that he does not exclude the use of violence or bloodshed to overthrow the existing the regime. Using Occupy Central as the example, he said that the principles of peace, reason and non-violence created many taboos such that "many things that should be done were not done." He condemned the pan-democrats for stopping the demonstrators from occupying the Legislative Council building in November 2014. He said that if they had occupied the Legislative Council building, they would have created the public opinion to oppose the Copyright (Amendment) Bill.

    - This is wrong on many counts. First and foremost, the assault on the Legislative Council was based upon a rumor that the Copyright (Amendment) Bill would be discussed the next morning. Repeat -- it was a baseless rumor decided to incite people to riot. So how are you going to create public opinion to support a non-existent issue?

    - After all this time, Tony Chung still doesn't realize what the government's strategy was during Occupy Central. The government let the demonstrators sit for 79 days until the welcome was worn out and public opinion swung completely. Occupying the Legislative Council building would have merely accelerated the process by a few days. The government does not mind the occupation of the Legislative Council building, or the Government Headquarters, or the China Liaison Office, because the government won't stop functioning as a result. Conversely, you can take over the building but you have no ability to hold it for an extended period of time. So what is the point other than make you feel good?

    - (HKG Pao) Tony Chung described some visions of the independent Hong Kong. He said that Hong Kong can build large-scale desalination plants in order to become self-sufficient and even sell the surplus to China.

    As for food, he said that the agricultural and livestock industries had been restricted by the government through licensing. Therefore he wants to revive the agricultural and livestock industries so that Hong Kong can become self-sufficient in food.

    As for energy, he said that Hong Kong can depend on wind and coal burning to generate electricity.

    As for national defense, he said that he hopes that Hong Kong can be a neutral like Switzerland. The first and foremost thing is not to have a hostile relationship with China because it will be hard to deal with the large Chinese army.

    - More pearls of wisdom from Tony Chung:

    "China will not abandon their business deals just for the sake of integrity of its national territory." In other words, China can't live without being propped up by Hong Kong's economic prowess.
    Also, young Hongkongers can't afford to buy apartments because the Chinese are bidding prices up. Therefore, housing prices will have to be kept low after independence to prevent speculations.

    - So these are his ideas about how Hong Kong can be independent of China. Well, the Book of Rites have this saying (Quora):

    From ancient times, those who want to promote great virtue to the world, first they need to govern their states; in order to govern their state, they need to first manage their family; in order to manage their family, they need to first improve themselves; in order to improve oneself, they need to regulate in their mind; in order to regulate their mind, one needs to maintain sincere intention; in order to maintain sincere intention, one need to exhaust one's knowledge, in order to exhausted one's knowledge, one needs to study the essence of the physical world. Study the physical world, learn everything you can learn, being sincere with your intention and regulate your mind, with your mind at the right place, you'll be able to improve yourself. after you improve yourself, you can manage your family, after your family is managed, you can govern your state, and then you'll bring justice and virtue to the World.

    Tony Chung has plenty of ideas about how to govern Hong Kong. But how does he deal with his own life first?

    (Ta Kung Pao) On radio, Studentlocalism convenor Tony Chung Hon-lam said that his parents do not support his ideas. The programme host asked him repeatedly whether he can become 'independent' by living away from home for a couple of weeks. Chung said that it will be "tough" because he doesn't have any economic resources himself. He said that he can get by with living in a sub-divided room and eating cup noodles, etc.

    If Tony Chung cannot even manage his own life, how does he expect to lead the new Hong Kong nation into a glorious future?

    - This is Tony Chung's idea of valiant warriors of the Hong Kong revolution:

    Where are you going to get that gun? The US Consulate General?  The National Endowment for Democracy?

    - Usually, the guns are supplied for free. But the bullets are very expensive to buy. This is the same pricing logic as the Sony PlayStations and the Microsoft XBoxes -- you clean them up at the backend.

    - I hate the double-talking style in Hong Kong. Why say something like "The possibility of violence and bloodshed cannot be excluded"? The negative of a negative is not a positive. Why not come and say directly: "Hong Kong will become an independent nation as of August 20th, 12:00 noon. If not, then there will be violence and bloodshed." Why don't we just get with it quickly?

    - The reason why they don't want independence immediately is that there is a lot of money to be made between now and then. But if they take action tomorrow, the fantasy will burst and there is only time left to run for political asylum at the US Consulate General.

    - Here is a more direct statement:

    "Wherever there is oppression, there will be resistance; a single spark can start a prairie fire!"
    As an aside, does anyone remember who said this?

    Joint declaration from Studentlocalism and various Concern Groups:
    We are sternly warning the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region government, the Department of Education and their lackeys that they must not attempt to suppress the voices of Hong Kong independence by expulsion or other means. Or else our organization will retaliate decisively.

    - What is that 'decisive retaliation'? Use your weapon (=keyboard) to pound a few more Facebook posts?

    - If you want to quote Chairman Mao, you should remember that his most important philosophical essay is On Contradiction. Applied to Hong Kong, it means that the debate over the constitutional reform bill was an internal contradiction among the people and can be tolerated. But Hong Kong independence is an irreconcilable conflict.

    - Indeed, these anti-Chinese Hong Kong localist children are very familiar with Chairman Mao's sayings:

    - Everybody knows that the big factor is the People's Liberation Army with 2.3 million soldiers. How does Tony Chung propose to deal with this?

    - Institute a system of compulsory military service in order to build up an army
    - Maintain a neutral international position
    - Avoid hostilities with neighboring countries
    - Run signature campaigns to let the various foreign consulates learn about StudentLocalism's views on Hong Kong independence.

    This is totally based upon wishful thinking. Firstly, a city of 7 million will never be able to build up an army strong enough to resist an established army of 2.3 million. Don't even waste your time thinking about this. Look for other solutions such as getting protection by the American nuclear umbrella/THAAD.

    - Before they think about how or why the Central Government would consent to have Hong Kong become independent, they leap-frog into deciding what they will do after Hong Kong becomes independent. I think that they need to solve the 'how and why' first.

    - If I can offer an analogy, Tony Chung is like an otaku who idolizes Chrissie Chau. But instead of trying to figure out how to meet her in person for the first time, he only talks about the blissful life with Chrissie after they marry.

    - The 'how and why' is summarized as "Valiant Resistance."

    - (SCMP) Legislative Council candidate Chan Chak-to claimed that he believed achieving independence would not necessarily result in war, saying: There is no need to use guns. The most important [thing] is the peoples support.

    - When you don't have a gun, you are going to say: "There is no need to use guns." When you have a big Magnum 45, you are going to use it.

    - The people's support? In your favorite poll where 17% support Hong Kong independence, the majority preferred to stay with One Country Two Systems. This means that you don't have the people's support. What kind of democracy is it for a small minority to impose its will on the vast majority? How different are you from the minority Communists?

    More importantly, you cannot dictate whether that 'neighboring country' will take a hostile position or not. It is up to them; it is not only up to you. Have you ever explored what the position of the 'neighboring country' will be? You can try and ask. But at present, you are just a Secondary School Form 4 student and they are clearly not going to take you seriously enough to give you an answer. You can ask the China hands what they think. Most likely they will tell you that the Chinese gerontocrats aren't going to survive if they let Hong Kong become independent. The 1.4 billion Chinese citizens will never forgive them. So they will in fact keep Hong Kong at all costs, including imposing martial law and destroying its economy.

    - Right now, they can't even bear giving up the Spratly Islands. Why are the chances of them giving up Hong Kong?

    - You have a serious case of schizophrenia. Whenever June 4th comes around, you say that the Commies murdered several thousand students at Tiananmen Square and therefore they are cruel, ruthless and implacable. For the rest of the year, you say that the Commies will peacefully let Hong Kong become independent and conduct business as usual.

    As for the belief that Hong Kong is too important economically to China and that the Chinese will always be willing to do business, I think you need to study some Economics first, including macroeconomics and international trade. At Form 4, Tony Chung has not begun studying serious Economics yet. Oh, he needs to study up on political science and Chinese history too.

    - Anyway I copied down Tony Chung's key visions for the independent Hong Kong:

    - Compulsory military service to build an army
    - Desalination plants for water
    - Revive agricultural/livestock industries
    - Revive the manufacturing industry

    With due respect, this is not very appealing to me.

    - If this is what you plan, the treasury will run out of money very quickly.

    - Let me respond to Tony Chung's arguments:

    Desalination: The cost is $12 per square meter, which is $3 more than imported Dongjiang water. If you use desalination to completely replace Dongjiang water, the extra cost is $1.8 billion per year. That is not too much.
    The six desalination plants will cost $60 billion to build. That is not too much.
    But the six desalination plants will need 60 hectares of land. Where do you find 60 hectares of land? Some environmental protectionist dickheads are going to file so many judicial reviews to make sure that you won't be able to go ahead for at least 30 years.
    Of course, you can just make up a new constitution to say that judicial reviews are not allowed in matters of national security (as you see it).

    Agriculture: Hong Kong itself provides about 2% of the consumed vegetables from 4,000 farmers. If you want to reach 50%, you need at least 100,000 farmers. How do you make 96,000 people decide to become farmers of their own free will, when the work is long and hard and the pay is lousy? Besides, where are you going to find the farmland?

    Energy: Wind power? CLP/Hong Kong Electric have a combined total of 10,000 MW. We don't have the land to build onshore wind farms, so we will have to go offshore. The London Array takes up 100 square kilometers and generates only 630 MW. So we are going to need 1,587 square kilometers of land for our wind farms. And the rest of the world will complain because it sits right in the middle of major shipping lanes. It will surely become one of the wonders of the world as seen from outer space. The cost of the London Array is about $22 billion. If we want to use the same technology, it will cost Hong Kong about $330 billion. Sure we can afford it. But a few billion here and a few billion there, we will have nothing left soon. P.S. God forbid that a super-typhoon should come around and blow everything away.

    Military: Let me use Singapore for comparison. Singapore has about 48,000 soldiers and spends HKD 60 billion a year on national defense. Who the hell is going to agree with conscripting 40,000 persons and spending HKD 60 billion?  Right now nobody in Hong Kong spends an hour or a dollar on Hong Kong defense. And even if Hong Kong builds such an army, will the western nations sell arms to Hong Kong? Taiwan is extorted to buy out-of-date military junk from the United States. Will Hong Kong have to do the same? And if the People's Republic of China does attack Hong Kong, then what? The Guangdong Military District has 280,000 soldiers already. That would be 7:1. Don't forget that their soldiers are already trained and armed, whereas ours will have only just begun elementary training (do the push-ups, jog around the track, march in sync, etc). If and when war breaks out, the battleground will be Hong Kong and rockets will be dropping on top of your house.

    International relations: When Hong Kong becomes independent, it is not going to be 'neutral'. It will only be isolated. You cannot join the United Nations like Switzerland because China is a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council and it can veto any motion against even the unanimous opinion of the rest of the world. If you go for independence against the wishes of China, do you think that they will let you join the United Nations? As the UN goes, so go the other organizations such as World Bank, WTO, WHO, UNICEF, IOC, FIFA, etc. There won't be any more "Hong Kong Is Not China" chants at FIFA World Cup qualifying matches, because Hong Kong won't be a FIFA member.

    As for "decreased hostile relationships with the neighboring country", this is most asinine! China is on the other side of the very small Shenzhen River. How can you not have hostile relationship with China given what happened?

    Actually, do we really need to discuss the subject of Hong Kong independence?

    - There is all the talk about how Hong Kong without its tourism, retail, finance and logistic industries can keep the value of its currency. The wishful thinking is that Hong Kong has always been able to withstand the hedge-fund vultures and will again. But this time, what if the Hong Kong dollar is attacked by the People's Bank of China backed by the USD$3 trillion in foreign reserves?

    - (Local Press) According to Tony Chung, the trade between Hong Kong and China will not stop just because Hong Kong is no longer part of China. There is no reason to reject a business proposal when it involves a lot of money.

    - Dear Tony, did you know that Hong Kong accounts for just over 2% of China's GDP.

    Let us suppose that your parents give you an allowance of $200 per week. Now they give you an ultimatum: Either you take a 2% cut down to $196 per week with no curfew, or else you can keep getting $200 with an 8pm curfew. Which deal will you take?

    Dear Tony, I don't think you have any idea what the true standing of Hong Kong is within the People's Republic of China.

    - These two pro-independence guys could become Tony Chung's military advisors: "Let us buy an aircraft carrier. When China makes any noise, we'll drive the aircraft carrier over and intimidate them. That would be really cool."

    - Handing out leaflets in school? Please refer to the case of Tsang Tak-sing:

    St Paul's College Form Six student Tsang Tak-sing was arrested on 28 September 1967 after distributing anti-government and Communism promotion leaflets, which condemned "the education system aiming at enslavement", "The Colonial Government prohibits us from becoming patriotic, by quelling with fascist forces", around the entrance of his school. He was reported by the schoolmaster R. G. Wells, arrested, tried and convicted for two years for distributing inflammatory leaflets that promoted public order crime, thus depriving him of his chance of a university education due to his past criminal record.

    Who are the tyrants? The Chinese Communists or the British colonialists?

    - (Sky Post) YP 28171. By Chris Wat Wing-yin. August 19, 2016.

    I received an email from a reader. His name is YP 28271. This is not a car license number. This is the ID for a prisoner in jail. YP stands for "Young Prisoner". He wrote: "I asked the honorable judges how 49 years ago, 300 YP's who want to fight back for their ideals were sentenced to jail and left with permanent criminal records." Forty-nine years, there were demonstrators against the British colonial government. 16-year-old YP 28271 was not involved in any demonstrations. He was randomly checked by the police in the street and found to be carrying patriotic banners in his book bag. He was sentenced to one year in jail. There were more than 300 other youngsters like YP 28271. All of them found their careers destroyed by their criminal records.

    - Recently Joshua Wong has come out with the naked truth. He said that his group Scholarism held a monopoly in 2012. They owned the market as the sole player. Today, the market is much more competitive with groups such as Hong Kong Indigenous, Youngspiration, StudentLocalism, etc. This means intense competition for donations.

    Sometimes a new brand comes into the market with a deliberate intention to cause brand confusion. On the left, we have the River Child version 1.0 (Joshua Wong) now scheduled for retirement. On the right, we have the River Child version 2.0 (Tony Chung).

    - (Stand News https://thestandnews.com/society/%E6%88%91%E5%9C%B0%E5%91%A2%E7%8F%AD%E4%B8%AD%E5%AD%B8%E7%94%9F-05-%E7%8D%A8%E6%B4%BE%E5%AD%B8%E7%94%9F%E9%A0%98%E8%A2%96-%E6%88%91%E5%93%8B%E7%A9%B6%E7%AB%9F%E6%9C%89%E7%84%A1%E5%B9%AB%E5%88%B0%E9%A6%99%E6%B8%AF/ ) September 22, 2017.

    Today, only Tony Chung is left out of the four conveners of Studentlocalism. It is now September 2017 and school has just started. Form 5 student Tony Chung has to be at school until 6pm twice a week. By the time he gets home, it is already 7pm. He has to do his homework. He wants to run for election at the Student Association. He has to write a policy platform. As the sole Studentlocalism convener left, he has to meet with other members. He also has to take care of external affairs, just as meeting with other organizations to support the resistance.

    Not to forget that he has to host an online program once a week.

    The name of that program is "Studentlocalism." The program began last July. At first, each segment has three to four hosts who cross-talk with each other. In recent months, Tony Chung is the only person in the live broadcast studio."

    "Even the Channel i people can see that I am just filling in the time. Previously, with so many people present, they can afford not to be so good without being spotted."

    To a certain extent, this is not Tony Chung's fault. The personnel moves within Studentlocalism occurred because three of the conveners resigned for various personal reasons: one said that his family had business in mainland China; one said that he failed to see any future for localism and wanted to halt and take measure ... even Tony Chung resigned himself in April, but continued because there was nobody left to take over.

    "In the long run, I don't think that I am good at handling external affairs. If some other member thinks that he can do better, he should take over."

    ...

    Like so many others of his generation, Tony Chung's enlightenment began with the 2012 anti-National Education affair. After Hong Kong Priority's Billy Chiu charged into the PLA barracks in 2013, he began to pay attention to Localist issues. In his eyes, "Democratic Return" and "Hong Kong independence" can co-exist. "I accept any and all means to attaining Hong Kong democracy. We can either have a democratic return of Hong Kong to China with the democratization of China, or Hong Kong independence ... both paths should be pursued to see which one works."

    The turning point was the New Territories East by-election. Under the influence of his peers, Tony Chung began to see that the only solution was for Hong Kong to leave China. "Many people say that the Hong Kong government must take back the right to approve immigration from China. But even if we get that right back, Hong Kong will still be under the thumb of the Chinese Communist Party."

    "No matter how democratic Hong Kong is and no matter if we have genuine universal suffrage with civil nomination, the Chinese Communists can take away everything that they gave you if you make them angry ... as long as you don't leave China, any democracy that you have can be gone in a flash."

    Tony Chung and three other persons founded Studentlocalism with the platform of (1) support all narratives and actions that will shake off Chinese Communist colonial rule of Hong Kong, including Hong Kong independence; (2) the establishment of a new constitution by the people; (3) firmly defend the localist interests of the people of Hong Kong.

    These seemed to be ambitious goals. In retrospect, Tony Chung thinks that founding the party seemed to be rather childish. "The four of us know each other well. We share the same ideas ... I was easy to come up with a new student organization."

    He did not expect what would happen next."

    "I did not think that I would get on television. There was news coverage, as well as condemnations, attacks and smears from fellow travelers ... I never thought that the localist circle/political circle would be so horrid."

    In the summer of 2016, Studentlocalism manned street booths. They went to Tai Koo Shing, Ho Man Tin, Tai Wai and Tuen Mun. They handed out leaflets on Hong Kong independence. They recruited new members. Their membership went from a dozen or so to sixty.

    Tony Chung can never forget those days. He said that two types of persons approach them: First of all, there are the Blue Ribbon old men who come up to challenge them. Secondly, there were middle-aged pan-democrats who were curious why young students would think about Hong Kong independence.

    But everything changed after the Leung Chung-hang/Yau Wai-ching oaths of office in October 2016.

    "Previously, at least people scolded us. But now, everybody ignored us as if we didn't exist." Tony Chung began to re-think whether they should continue to man the street booths which were resource-intensive. "The Localists -- including Studentlocalism, Hong Kong Indigenous, Civic Passion -- have street booths going for two years already. Basically those who could support us are already supporting us. There is no need to wait two years."

    "What have the street booths done of us since Studentlocalism was founded in April last year to now? Basically, nothing."

    Another reason for shrinking the street booths is the loss of manpower. Many secondary school students who joined when the going was good have now faded away after the Leung-Yau oath affair.

    To Tony Chung, many young people joined Studentlocalism without understanding the ideas. "They only know that Hong Kong must leave China. But as soon as they get probed at the street booths, 'What is Hong Kong going to do without China?', they don't have answers. The secondary students are unclear about the narratives, and therefore they get disheartened easily."

    "To put it bluntly, it was cool and awesome at one time. But now that things have gone bad, they stop coming!"

    Studentlocalism's secondary school concern groups were once a favorite topic in the local media. Today they are defunct for all purposes. ""Basically there is nothing left except Facebook." Tony Chung said that the secondary school concern groups did not die because the schools suppressed them, but because the members were increasing disheartened.

    Tony Chung said that several days after Studentlocalism announced their secondary school concern groups, another localist organization announced the same project.

    "I don't know why two identical projects emerged. Some concern groups listened to us, others listened to them. It was very confusing. This was unworkable because the two groups did not communicate. So we chose to give up."

    During the past year, there were plenty of infighting with the localist camps. "Some Studentlocalism members thought that it was pointless to continue. They were not helping Hong Kong but they were being attacked by their own kind. So they just walked away."

    Tony Chung had his personal telephone number published by localists. Once upon a time, Tony Chung said that it was a joke to be criticized by Ta Kung Pao/Wen Wei Po. But now he has found the truth: "My most vicious critics are not Ta Kung Pao/Wen Wei Po and not the government. They are my own people ... this is most disheartening."

    Over the past year, Tony Chung has been repeatedly ask by the media: How do you get to Hong Kong independence? By what route? This is the biggest question that mainstream society has for the pro-independence faction.

    Tony Chung has spoken to other pro-independence activists. Some said "armed revolution," some said "national self-determination" and some said "referendum on independence." But nobody know how to carry out the next step to whatever that they advocate.

    "They know themselves that this is really infeasible. This is merely a propaganda trick ... all the organizations are like that."

    Tony Chung admits that this is the dilemma of Studentlocalism as well. "We are also thinking about how to carry on."

    In truth, Tony Chung has declined to answer the media on the "How to attain Hong Kong independence" question. In his eyes, it is more important to promote his ideas. "If more and more people believe this, and more and more people think about how to do this, a way will naturally emerge."

    "We and the Hong Kong National Party promoted Hong Kong independence in secondary schools and universities. This caused the Hong Kong government and the school administrations to react strongly ... Actually, did we help Hong Kong when we came out with our plan? Are we making it harder to promote Hong Kong independence?" Tony Chung said: "成事不足，敗事有餘 " (We didn't achieve anything and we end up destroying other things).

    However, he emphasized that he has no regrets.

    "If we don't do this, the same result would occur five or ten years later when freedom of speech becomes restricted in Hong Kong."

    Tony Chung is in Form 5 Secondary School. He does not expect to qualify for university. "When a 17-year-old girl has to go into exile in Taiwan over the Mong Kok Lunar New Year incident ... I have to think whether I will be next? Will we able to graduate in one and a half year's time? Will we be arrested? Will we have to go into exile in Taiwan like her?"

    This is still one and a half years away from the Diploma of Secondary Education examination. Tony Chung has thought about retreating from the front line and studying. "I have participated in many actions that might have resulted in arrests. Even if I stop now, it is useless. The Hong Kong government and the Hong Kong Police can still arrest me for those prior actions and send me to jail."

    Like many other Localist leaders, Tony Chung does not know how to plan for his own future. Who knows what will happen in ten years' time?

    "Ten years later, there is a good chance that Article 23 will be enacted, or else the National Security law will be directly incorporated into Annex 3 of the Basic Law ..." Tony Chung said that he has been recorded by the media over the past year as saying "overthrowing the government" and "Hong Kong independence." He firmly believes that he will be pursued by the authorities and thus lose his freedom.

    https://www.facebook.com/nextmagazinefansclub/videos/631169137047033/ 

    [The scene location is supposed to be the Tai Koo MTR station. Edward Leung is the man wearing the dark purple t-shirt. The man wearing the grey t-shirt may be a Ta Kung Pao reporter, according to Leung.]

    -5:55 Purple: Scare them?

    -5:53 Grey: Are you scared? Have you defecated on yourself?

    -5:50 Purple: How many blows did you catch?

    -5:50 Grey: Huh?

    -5:49 Purple: How many blows did you catch?

    -5:42 Grey: See you next time.

    -5:38 Purple: How many blows did you catch? Why don't you admit it? How many blows landed on you?

    -5:35 Grey: Take a look at your face first. Fuck your mother!

    -5:31 Purple: Come over here!

    -5:29 Grey: Your mother's stinking cunt!

    -5:27 Purple: Two against one.

    -5:26 Grey: You go back to your hometown. I only work for a living. Calm down first! Your mother!  You haven't even got a fully grown set of hair.  You calm down first!

    -5:10 Purple: You come over.

    -5:10 Grey: Your mother's stinking cunt. If I make the call, it will be fucking bigger than you. Your mother's stinking cunt! You go home! Fuck your mother!

    -4:51 Purple: You come over.

    -4:48 Grey: Your mother's stinking cunt! You keep talking about democracy all the time! You go and suck dick! Fuck your mother! If you want, you can fight. Fuck your mother! ... I am not going to fucking play with you. There will be another opportunity, brother! You leave! Why don't you fucking think about what you are fucking doing!

    -4:09 Grey: Film your mother's stinking cunt! Wow! Leung Tin-kei is assaulting people! Leung Tin-kei is assaulting people. He is not talking about democracy. Wow! Please help me! Wow! Assault! Leung Tin-kei is assaulting people! Wow! Leung Tin-kei is assaulting people! Wow! That Leung Tin-kei for Hong Kong independence. Aiya! Aiya! He is assaulting people! Aiya!

    -3:32 Purple: You are a paparazzo for Ta Kung Pao, right? Paparazzo, right? You are several decades old. You are doing such things. Worse than being a dog. How can you fucking face your parents? They raise you until you are this old. You are worse than a dog. I ask your mother.

    -3:12 Grey: I am an orphan. I have no parents.

    -3:06 Purple: No parents? Worse than being a dog. Are the Communists your mother? ... Ta Kung, right? Ta Kung, right? Hey. Hey.

    [tussling]

    -2:06 Grey: Fuck your mother!

    -0:56 Grey: Please don't hit people, alright or not?

    -0:54 Purple: I only want to hit you.

    -0:54 Grey: Hit me?  You don't have the guts!

    -0:50 Purple: How many blows did you catch?

    -0:48 Grey: Forget it. We're not talking about this.

    -0:48 Purple: But I want to talk about this. What the fuck are you afraid of?

    -0:33 Grey: Calm down first, alright?

    -0:18 Purple: Leaving? Hey! Ta Kung Pao! Come back! Fuck your mother!

    Backup: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9E1BqBbCgy0

    (DotDot News) August 15, 2016.

    The reporter Mr. Lo and another reporter located Edward Leung at past 8pm last night in Causeway Bay and asked him to respond to certain facts, including some bad things. When Leung heard it, he refused to answer and left. He said as he walked away: "I have nothing to say." The reporter recorded the entire process. Leung was very upset and kept using foul language to tell the reporter to scram.

    More than 3 hours later, the reporter had gone home, ate out with his family and got ready to go home. At Tai Koo MTR Station, he encountered Leung again. The reporter lowered his head and tried to walk past. Leung came up, stood and glared at the reporter.

    The reporter said: "Mr. Leung, what do you want?" Leung said that the reporter was a dog! The reporter asked Leung to be more polite. Leung rushed up and hit the reporter with his shoulder/elbow, causing bleeding on the left side of the reporter's face. Leung threw two more punches at the reporter, causing the reporter to bite his own tongue and bleed all over his mouth. The reporter and Leung tussled with each other. Passersby and MTR employees interceded and pulled them apart. During this time, Leung struggled free and tried to continue the fight. He asked the reporter: "How many times did I hit you?" "You don't want to be a human, you want to be a Chinese dog!" The two cursed each other out with foul language.

    Leung picked his mobile phone to film the reporter who had backed away. He asked the reporter not to leave. The reporter yelled that Leung was assaulting people. He scolded Leung for not daring to answer that he was advocating Hong Kong independence. "Do you have shit on your body?" With the intercession of many people, the two left separately. At the time, neither party called the police.

    Passersby were present and they filmed most of what happened. Lo said that he is not afraid of a confrontation with Leung, even at a press conference. He is willing to tell the truth, "because this pro-Hong Kong independence person has gone too far. He is completely irrational."

    Afterwards, the reporter found out that after the earlier encounter in Causeway Bay, Leung went on his Internet show and said that a reporter asked him questions. Leung said that he wanted to hit the reporter at the time, but could not because there was a camera. However, he has followed the reporter. Thus, the fight at Tai Koo was not an accidental encounter, but one in which Leung followed the reporter to exact revenge! As soon as Leung finished the Internet show, he went out to attack the reporter!

    Early morning on August 14, Next Media posted a video of this incident. This was just the second half of the incident and was provided by a passerby. The video drew two extreme kinds of reaction. On one hand, certain media professionals called Ta Kung Pao and express their anger and shock. On the other hand, other people were delighted by a reporter having the courage to scold pro-Hong Kong independence people. At the same time, radical extremist uploaded information about the reporter and his family onto the Internet and called on people to harass, threaten and curse them. This made the reporter and his family very scared.

    Video: https://goo.gl/jPpJxO Another view of the fight

    Video: https://www.facebook.com/DotDotNews/videos/1402297503118906/ Interview with the reporter Mr. Lo on his injuries and the threats on his family. He said: "I only wanted to report this news story."


    Ta Kung Pao reporter Mr. Lo

    (Wen Wei Po) August 15, 2016.

    The Police Public Relations Bureau said that they received a call at 1150pm about a dispute over at the Tai Koo MTR Station. When police officers arrived at the scene, they could not find the individuals that were involved. Later a 42-year-old man named Lo came down to the Chai Wan Police Station to provide the relevant information. Lo claimed to have been assaulted by a man the night before at the Tai Koo MTR Station. The police have reviewed the relevant closed-circuit television recordings, and determined that Edward Leung attacked the reporter first. The police is treating this as a case of fighting in public.

    (SCMP) January 13, 2017.

    Hong Kong localist leader Edward Leung Tin-kei was bound over for HK$1,000 in Eastern Court on Friday after the prosecution decided to offer evidence on one count of fighting in a public place against him and a pro-Beijing newspaper journalist.

    Magistrate Chu Chung-keung dismissed the charge against Leung and Ta Kung Pao reporter Lo Wing-yin, who is also to comply with a bind-over order over the next 12 months.

    In August, Leung, leader of Hong Kong Indigenous, was seen in a heated verbal exchange with the reporter inside Tai Koo MTR station. The exchange involved foul language and violence. The court heard on Friday that Leung and Lo had both sustained minor injuries in the brawl. Lo later reported the incident at Chai Wan police station and claimed he had been assaulted, resulting in Leungs arrest on December 16. The journalist was arrested four days later.

    On Friday, after confirming with prosecutors that they did not wish to pursue the charge, Chu asked the pair whether each accepted the conditions of binding over. Yes, Leung said. Lo followed with the same answer. Each man is prohibited from engaging in acts of violence over the coming 12 months. The two left the court separately without saying anything.

    Internet comments:

    - What a shame that this video began only in Round #2! A Round #1 had taken place before, with Leung's shirt being ripped in the back.

    - (Apple Daily) From the reader who provided the video to Next Media: "At the time, I was listening to music and I couldn't hear what they were arguing about. Then they started to fight until they fell down on the ground. His glasses even fell off. The shirt was then ripped. They kept swearing and fighting. Several passersby went up to stop them. Two MTR employees also came to stop them. For a while, Edward Leung and the other guy could not stay calm. They continued to shout and want to fight. Leung took out his mobile phone to try to film the man. When the man saw the phone, he yelled and pretended that he was badly hurt. Then he seized Leung's phone and threw it on the ground. They tussled for a while. Finally they left on their own based upon the repeated admonishments of the MTR employees."  She added: "If I remember correctly, Edward Leung hit out first."

    According to the reader, she was somewhat scared at first. Then she saw a woman next to her filming, so she realized that she should also film as well.

    - My personal view is that Leung Tin-kei challenged this person who may be a paparazzo and lost badly. If this is his idea of valiant resistance, how is he and his ilk going to defeat the People's Liberation Army? The part that bothered me was the MTR employee who kept stroking Leung's back to calm him down. I am curious if this dog trick also works on humans.

    - In Round #2, the other guy just spun Leung around like a monkey. It was no match.

    - It was more like training a dog to do turns. Next lesson would be to jump hoops. Then the dog gets to eat the dog biscuits.

    - This is the famous kung fu move known as 「餓狗搶屎」("Hungry dog fights for feces to eat").

    - The MTR employees in the yellow uniforms should tell the guy wearing the grey t-shirt that he can't walk his dog inside the subway system under the MTR by-law.

    - Assume the position!

    Edward Leung: "The only thing left to do is Revolution." Arf arf!

    - The other guy was lucky. If the MTR station had bricks on the floor, Leung would have picked it up and smashed his face in.

    - Edward Leung's excuse is that he is currently out on bail while awaiting trial for incitement and participation in the Mong Kok riot. His bail may be revoked if there is another criminal charge during this period. Therefore he has to act with restraint.

    - If so, then why does Leung keep asking the other guy to count the number of blows received? Leung must know that he threw some punches which landed.

    - Why didn't the MTR employees summon the police? If the police came, this is going to be a straightforward case of two parties engaging in disorderly conduct in public. And it will depend on whether the two parties will file complaints. In the case of Edward Leung, he would find it awkward to seek the help of the Hong Kong Evil Police to file charges in a court of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China. Meanwhile, the other party has made it clear that he is only working to make a living and so he is willing to fight all the way in court with his employer picking up the tab.

    - The Police Public Relations Board confirmed that someone called at 11:48pm about a fight at the Tai Koo MTR station. When police officers arrived at the scene, they did not find anyone.

    - I am accustomed to thinking that Hongkongers are peaceful, reasonable and non-violent and only mainlanders are violence-prone. I am still correct here, because Edward Leung was born in Wuhan, China.

    - Eh, but you don't know where that other guy comes from. He may work for Ta Kung Pao, but he could be authentically born and raised in Hong Kong.

    - The point is not for Edward Leung to defeat the People's Liberation Army as in Donnie Yen vs Mike Tyson in Ip Man 3. The point is for Edward Leung to be elected to the Legislative Council, where it is a good bet that he can physically defeat the pro-establishment gerontocrats there. Valiant resistance must be used wisely and strategically.

    - Since the other party appears to be from a newspaper, the reaction of the Journalists Association would be interesting.

    On one hand, if this reporter were from Apple Daily/Next Magazine, they would be rushing out to declare that freedom of press is being strangled in this city and that the attacker must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

    On the other hand, if this reporter were from Ta Kung Pao, they would be rushing to say that they didn't see or hear anything (I See Nothing).

    - It is said that these paparazzi have been following Edward Leung around for more than a month? Well, what is wrong with that? They are merely satisfying the citizens' right to know. Apple Daily/Next Magazine paparazzi do this sort of thing all the time.

    - What do the paparazzi want to find out? For example, people have been saying that Edward Leung is renting a service apartment in Tai Koo at more than $30,000 per month. Shouldn't those who donated to Hong Kong Indigenous in the belief that they are contributing to Hong Kong independence know where their money is really going to?

    - Could it be that they followed Leung around for a month without getting any reportable news? Out of desperation, they decided to create news by provoking a fight.

    - If so, the video would be much more professional and it would not be posted over at the Next Media website first.

    - Here is the Apple Daily-style report on the incident: "當時大公報記者正進行正常採訪 唯有人拒絕回應及襲擊記者 嚴重妨礙新聞自由及損害香港核心價值". (At the time, the Ta Kung Pao reporter was conducting normal news gathering. But someone refused to comment and then attacked the reporter, thus seriously interfering with freedom of press and damaging a core value of Hong Kong.)

    - Is this case that the so-called reporter used obscene language to provoke Leung into a fight? But Leung is the person who normalizes obscene language:

    Facebook https://www.facebook.com/chankawairicky/videos/1040560225979340/ Edward Leung gets on a chair to raise middle finger and scream obscenities ("You eat shit" and "Fuck your mother") at the Electoral Affairs Commission briefing of the candidates. If he can use it against other people, he should be able to accept it when used against himself. Of course, he can try to out-shout the other party.

    - Is it wrong for reporters to use obscene language to quarrel with their subjects? Here is Apple Daily reporter Gary Ma:

    Born in a Time of Chaos Facebook
    https://www.facebook.com/1640482902830291/videos/1692551290956785/
    https://www.facebook.com/1640482902830291/videos/1692549944290253/

    - Obviously, Edward Leung cannot count on the Hong Kong Evil Police to bring justice. Therefore his alternative is to take matters into his own hand by calling for a general demonstration to blockade the Ta Kung Pao offices/plants in Hong Kong until they apologize and promise never to follow Hong Kong Indigenous people around.

    - Here is the prelude to the current episode.

    (Apple Daily) August 8, 2016.

    Hong Kong Indigenous' Edward Leung posted a video/photos on his Facebook that a car has been following him for a month. In the video, Edward Leung and Ray Wong approached the tailing car and opened the car door to demand the two men inside identify themselves. The two men replied "Grandpa's" and "Newspaper." They also said, "We don't want to know about you." They did not say which organization they belong to.

    Leung published the vehicle registration data which showed the owner is DCH which registered the car on June 30, 2016. DCH provides car rental service.

    - Duh, this is one of those BEEN THERE DONE THAT stories. Previously Lam Wing-kee also said that he was being followed by unknown vehicles. The police investigated and found that the car was rented by Next Media.

    - When Secretary of Education Eddie Ng was tailed by Next Media reporters, he called the police (see #419). Everybody made fun of him. When Lam Wing-kee was tailed by Next Media reporters, everybody said that White Terror is upon us and nobody is safe from cross-border law enforcement. Lam summoned the police and is now living under police protection in a safe house. Will Hong Kong Indigenous call the police and ask for round-the-clock protection plus a safe house too?

    - "Grandpa" is a derogatory term. No mainland Public Security Bureau agent is going to say that he works for "Grandpa." This is like being followed by foreigners and when you stop them and ask them who they are, they say "We're coons." When the two men gave that "Grandpa" response, they were making a joke that Leung and Wong don't appreciate at all.

    - YouTube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CNXMWGmTSq8

    - This is a poorly staged homemade movie. Imagine that you are the two special agents. You have been following the guy around for one month. Now you are parked on the street watching your guy. Your guy comes at you with another man. What do you do? You should lock the car doors, roll up the windows and drive off. Right? Wrong!

    In the video, a man comes to the right side of the car. What does the driver do? He didn't lock the car door, which allows the man to yank the car door open and talk to him. Another man comes to the left side of the car while using a mobile phone to film. What does the passenger do? He rolls down the window so that the cameraman can record the conversation. This makes no sense at all, least of all for a couple of men who are either spies or reporters.

    - So is the Tai Koo MTR fight another episode in this homemade movie?

    - Next Media said that the video for the Tai Koo MTR fight was provided by a 'reader'. It is more likely that the video was made by a Next Media paparazzo tailing the Ta Kung Pao paparazzo tailing Edward Leung.

    - The conspiracy theory is that Jimmy Lai (Next Media) needed to boost the Legislative Council prospects for the traditional pan-democrats. Therefore he sent this guy to provoke Edward Leung into a fight in front of a camera. If it turns out that Edward Leung has neither the EQ/temperament nor the physical fighting skills, his votes will flow to the traditional pan-democrats.

    - (Hong Kong Free Press) August 10, 2016.

    Edward Leung Tin-kei, member of the localist party Hong Kong Indigenous, was banned from posting on Facebook for 24 hours on Tuesday after his video of two men allegedly following him was reported.

    The video uploaded by Leung on August 7 showed him approaching a black car which he claimed followed him for a month. When Leung asked the two men inside the car where they came from, they replied grandpa a slang term used for the Chinese Communist Party.

    I dont want to know about you. Someone wants to know about you I dont want to know, said one of the men in the car.

    Leung was informed on Tuesday night that his original video was removed for not complying with Facebooks community standards. Shortly after, he uploaded it again and was banned from posting for 24 hours after the new post also got reported, said Ming Pao.

    A few hours later, lawmaker Charles Mok of the Information Technology functional constituency left a comment on Leungs Facebook page, saying that he had asked Facebook about the incident. The original video of Leung allegedly being followed has since been restored.

    For every post being deleted, just post ten more posts, said one commenter on Leungs Facebook page. According to Hong Kong Indigenous Facebook page, many users re-uploaded the video on their personal accounts since Tuesday.

    - From the Hong Kong Indigenous talk show:

    "I was followed by the Ta Kung Pao reporter down the street with a camera. He kept provoking me. I really wanted to fucking hit him. But he was recording me with this camera. I couldn't very well send a punch over. There wasn't anything that I can do. I can only remember his face and then fucking follow him in return. What else can I do?"

    "He wants to find the dirt on you. So he follows you with his camera in hand. He keeps saying this and that about your family members. The number of family members, where they are, he knows everything about them. He tells it to you. He keeps provoking you and asking you for a comment."

    - On the Internet, the 'reporter' who provoked Edward Leung is supposed to be a former entertainment paparazzo for Next Media. Given the cutbacks at Next Media, these paparazzi are scattered into other outlets in the media industry, where their training and experience are being put to good use. If you want to place the blame, it is Jimmy Lai introducing yellow journalism in Hong Kong.

    - (Apple Daily) According to information, the reporter is named Lo and his nickname is Golden Hair. He worked at <East Week> once, and then he became the Entertainment Tracking Managers at <FACE> for 11 years. Three months ago, he was dismissed after Next Media shut down <FACE>. Thereafter he and some colleagues went over to work at Ta Kung Pao. He has been there for more than 2 months.

    - (Wen Wei Po) August 18, 2016.

    Although the eyewitness who provided the video to Next Media said that Edward Leung struck first, the pro-independence supporters quickly went aft er the reporter. They posted his name, telephone number, personal photos, work history, etc on the Internet together with some truly awful comments. Even the MTR employee who tried to intercede had his personal information ferreted out and published as well.

    Although Edward Leung said that the dispute arose because he was upset at the reporter harassing his family members, the pro-independence supporters went after the family members of this reporter. The blogger Lo Lok wrote: "It is usefully to go after the reporter Lo directly, because his boss will merely consider that to be an accomplishment. The focus should to fucking harass all those around him, be they friends or family members. We must post their photos, addresses and telephone numbers; we will call their companies to complain. It would be even better if they have children because we can bully them at school. We will greet them after school so that the children will suffer psychological trauma that will follow them forever. We want to make this Lo person an untouchable. This is the only way to hurt a little bit. So, brothers, let us try our best to ferret out information and post altered photos. Resistance must not have any bottom lines."

    At the Golden Forum discussion forum, someone posted the information about the family members and friends of this reporter, including the online accounts of the friends. The photos of his wife and daughter were also posted. Someone pointed out the name of the kindergarten which his daughter attended. Someone said that he wanted to organized a gang to rape the daughter. User "Cheung Siu-wai" wrote about the rape gang: "One person will be the lookout, one person will drive the car, one person will distract the woman (=the reporter's wife)."

    The "Hong Kong National Independent Movement" Facebook published 40 photos of the daily life of the reporter, including many of his family members and friends. The page explained in a contrarian manner: "The sins of the reporter should not affect his friends and relatives, so we should send information to them." The hashtags "#Sharing is a virtue" and "#Please share if you agree." were added.

    - (Wen Wei Po) August 15, 2016. Snippets of Internet comments.

    It is usefully to go after the reporter Lo directly, because his boss will merely consider that to be an accomplishment. The focus should to fucking harass all those around him, be they friends or family members. We must post their photos, addresses and telephone numbers; we will call their companies to complain. It would be even better if they have children because we can bully them at school. We will greet them after school so that the children will suffer psychological trauma that will follow them forever. We want to make this Lo person an untouchable. This is the only way to hurt a little bit. So, brothers, let us try our best to ferret out information and post altered photos. Resistance must not have any bottom lines.

    Get people to go and rape Lo XX's daughter. One person will be the lookout, one person will drive the car, one person will distract the woman (=the reporter's wife).

    It is a good method to pick her up after school. Different people can do it to different paparazzi.

    Right, we need to scare the people. We must do our best.

    Anyone who offends Tin-kei will see their entire families killed!

    They should be prepared to see these consequences.

    There is nothing that this family has to worry about. They will all attain eternal happiness together.

    We must go after these Hong Kong traitors. None of them is innocent.

    The Chinese take revenge against everybody around them. The principal will have to watch his family being decimated one at a time before his turn to die.

    I hope that his daughter will become an orphan.

    Disaster must be wrought upon his family.

    His wife deserves it too, because she chose such a husband.

    - (Ta Kung Pao) August 15, 2016.

    Who is behind the sudden emergence of Hong Kong independence forces? Why do their resources increased suddenly after meeting with members of the US Consulate General? Behind the radical talk and action, is this a con game or a self-enrichment scheme?

    These are the truths that the public wants to know after the Mong Kok riot. But the Hong Kong independence forces do not disclose how they are being financed, and they do everything possible to prevent the efforts by the public and the media to find out.

    But paper cannot wrap up a fire. There are no impenetrable walls in the world. After the extensive investigation by the Ta Kung Pao reporters, Hong Kong Indigenous people such as Edward Leung and Ray Wong are definitely not as "clean" as they tell the outside world.

    Edward Leung claims to be a DOUBLE NO youth (No job, no school), but he lives a life of luxury. He claims to reside in Yuen Long, but he actually stays at a luxury apartment in Hong Kong Island East. He bought an expensive car and he has servants. He lives like a wealthy man. A person who publicly urges young people to carry out a revolution is actually a privileged class member living off subsidies. A person who advocates resistance without bottom lines is enjoying the advantages of the system from his luxurious apartment. These investigations undoubtedly reveal the extreme hypocrisy behind the Hong Kong independence forces and the supreme irony for their political ideas.

    Edward Leung lies all the time, but the facts are undeniable. These truths should be a wake-up call for the supporters of Hong Kong independence and radical localism.

    When Edward Leung and others promulgate Hong Kong independence, they are looking after their own interests under the guise of these slogans. If young people listen to them and join riots, they will become the tools for Leung and others to earn their lives of luxury. If the rioters are punished by the law, Leung and others won't be harmed one little bit. It should be clear who is selling whom out.

    But it should be pointed that the truths uncovered by the reporters is just a small portion. More needs to be uncovered. It requires a large sum of money to live such a lifestyle. Where does the money come from? What is the purpose of the people who are providing money to keep these people? This is something that every decent citizen should think about.

    It is the duty of every journalist to seek out the truth. Those who insult or even assault journalists should be condemned for trampling upon freedom of press. Last night's ugly show at Tai Koo by Edward Leung showed us how vicious and hypocritical the pro-Hong Kong independence elements are. Previously Edward Leung refused to respond to the questions from the reporters. Afterwards he worked with others to follow the reporter after work and launched a violent attack while the reporter was dining outside with his family. The reporter was injured and was forced to defend himself.

    Why did Edward Leung publicly attack the reporter? Is he afraid that the reporter may reveal the truth and expose his life of luxury? Or is there something more sinister behind?

    By attacking the reporter, Edward Leung showed his true self. The Hong Kong independence forces are groups of violent extremists. Those are lawless, they have no bottom lines, and they will do anything. As long as they are allowed to roam free, there will never be calm in society. Who will be the next victim of the pro-Hong Kong independence people? Citizens have no choice but to oppose them if we want to maintain Hong Kong's prosperity and stability.

    - (Ta Kung Pao) August 15, 2016.

    Previously, Ta Kung Pao reported that Hong Kong Indigenous is not registered either as a social group or a corporation. Donations to Hong Kong Indigenous are taken by the private corporation Channel i (HK) Limited owned by Ray Wong and Edward Leung. How the money comes and goes is not transparent.

    Our further investigation found that the DOUBLE NO (No school, no job) young man Edward Leung is living a life of luxury. Leung does not live with his parents. Instead he rents a service apartment that costs at least $24,000 per month at Kornhill Apartments, Hong Kong Island East. Channel i shareholder/director Ray Wong drives a silver Audi purchased by Channel i for almost $300,000. So are the living expenses of Wong and Leung being paid by Channel i or some other funder is unknown. On Saturday night, our investigative reporter asked the DOUBLE NO young man Edward Leung these questions, but he responded with "None of your business" and a stream of obscene invectives.

    According to the company registry, Channel i was established in October 2015, with founders Ray Wong and Edward Leung being shareholders and directors. The registered capital was only $1. However, the company purchased a $293,000 Audi under its own name for the use of Ray Wong. During our investigation period, we observed that no other Hong Kong Indigenous member uses this vehicle. If Ray Wong does not take Edward Leung home, the latter would take a taxi instead.

    Ray Wong is unemployed while Edward Leung admits to being a DOUBLE NO young man. Yet, they drive a Audi and Leung lives in a luxury service apartment. According to the the company registry data, Leung reported an address in an apartment Fu Ho Building, Kau Yuk Road, Yuen Long. We found that this 282-sq ft unit is inhabited only by Leung's retired father. Meanwhile Leung himself actually lives at Kornhill Apartments, 2 Kornhill Road, Hong Kong Island.

    Kornhill Apartments is located at the Middle Levels, Hong Kong Island East. Apartments range from 400 to 1,000 square feet in area, and are rented out as service apartments with access to the swimming pool and gym. When we inquired about conditions, we were told that Kornhill Apartments does not have a hotel license so that they can only be rented out on a monthly basis. A renter must pay a one month deposit. We observed that Leung has been there for at least one-and-a-half months. Based upon the minimum rent of $24,000 for a 400 sqft bedroom without kitchen, he has paid at least $72,000 already. Did Leung pay this out of his own pocket, or is somebody else paying for it?

    Leung usually dines outside with his girlfriend. He seldom patronizes tea restaurants. Usually he goes with friends to restaurants that cost $150 per person.

    Also Ta Kung Pao observed that Leung is a cigarette smoker, and he goes into the street to smoke. Our reporter estimates that he smokes at least one pack a day. Given that his cigarette brand costs $60 per pack, he spends at $1,800 on cigarettes.

    Apart from his girlfriend, Leung also has a pretty camerawoman following him around to record his activities.

    - In Taiwan, university graduates are looking at an average salary of NT$22,000 (about HK$5,500). In Hong Kong, a fifth-year university student with no job spends $24,000 in rent, $9,000 in food (two meals a day), $1,800 in cigarettes, free chauffeur service, etc. So how can young people in Hong Kong complain that they were born in a time of chaos in which the people cannot make a living?

    - Kornhill Apartments: $18,888 for the first month; $24,000 per month afterwards

    - The Facebook of the Journalists Association is being flooded.  On one hand, a journalist has been assaulted and therefore the Hong Kong Journalists Association should come out immediately to defend Freedom of Press in Hong Kong. On the other hand, a journalist for a pro-China newspaper was filmed assaulting a citizen and therefore the Hong Kong Journalists Association should come out immediately to denounce this flagrant violation of professional code of conduct. What is to be done given the pressures from both sides? In an act of exceptional valor, the Journalists Association officers have gone into hiding and not answering their phones.

    - Finally, the Hong Kong Journalists Association has issued a statement. As expected, it listed both sides of the argument in a wishy-washy way. "Our Association workers reached out to Mr. Leung and the newspaper at which the reporter named Lo works to learn what happen. We have not received any replies yet. Therefore, we cannot comment on this dispute."

    - (Wen Wei Po) August 17, 2016.

    Yesterday at the Hong Kong National Independence Movement Facebook, they posted the photos of the daughter of a relative of reporter Lo and said that they will personally congratulate the little girl for studying well. They also wished her a good Ghost Festival.

    When the Journalists Association finally spoke out, the statement was a condemnation of both Edward Leung and reporter Lo. They said that insulting and assaulting reporters as well as citizens are unacceptable behaviors, and that it is the duty of reporters only to gather news on public figures. This roused the ire of the pro-independence keyboard warriors:

    Here is one conversation:

    Fong Hok-nang: How about standing a fund to pay paparazzi to dig up the personal lives of the Journalists Association executive committee members? I offer $10,000. I hope that other funders will add more.
    P.S. I welcome young wastrels to join in and work together on an  uncompensated basis.
    PPS. I don't have time to manage this project, so someone else has to take charge.
    Charles Low: I am poor. I offer $1,000.
    Andrew Tsai: I offer $100.
    Fong Hok-nang: There has to be at least $100,000 to $200,000. We need to fire 10 to twenty people to follow them around all the time.
    Yuk Bong-cheung: Will $100,000 be enough?
    Fong Hok-nang: Huh? Not enough? Will it cost several tens of thousands of dollars to hire several people to follow them around day and night for one week?
    Yuk Bong-cheng: Insurance, medical expenses, family compensation.

    So far this post has more than 100 LIKES and several dozen comments. One commentator asked "Why go after the Journalists Association Executive Committee?" and received a response of "Because" alongside the Journalists Association's statement on the incident. Our reporter inquired but has not received any response from the Journalists Association.

    At another front, even though Apple Daily filed a report under the title "Leftist newspapers manufacturing news on Edward Leung," the pro-independence keyboard warriors think that Apple Daily was working in cahoots with Ta Kung Pao. So they posted information about the family lives of two Apple Daily reporters. User "Fanny Sun" reminded the two reporters to "pay attention to their children." According to information, another Ming Pao reporter who is a friend of reporter Lo also had his telephone number and photos of his children posted.

    - Did Wen Wei Po ask the Journalists Association about the threat by the pro-Hong Kong independence fans to burn Ta Kung Pao down to the ground?

    - (Wen Wei Po) August 15, 2016.

    Normally, the pan-democrats are willing to comment on everything and anything. But about this incident, they are forwarding their mobile phones to the message boxes and not responding to the messages left there.

    Among those who picked up the phone, Sin Chung-kai (Democratic Party legislator) said that he has not heard of this incident and he has no idea what happened. Given that it is not clear who is right or wrong and the matter is being investigated by the police, then the police should be allowed to investigate without his comment.

    Gary Fan Kwok-wai (Neo Democrats legislator) said that after viewing the various videos on the Internet, he "personally believes in the Edward Leung's explanation." Fan said that although political figures should have higher EQ than ordinary people, they have feelings and therefore Leung retaliated when the reporter mentioned Leung's family members.

    Kenneth Kwok (Civic Party) said that there are numerous fights in the subway every day and there are many other "serious matters" that society should be concerned about, such as the personnel moves at the ICAC and the Electoral Affairs Commission banning political dissidents from entering the elections. Since the police and the MTR are investigating, comments by others are inappropriate until the investigations are completed. As for the disclosure of personal information about the reporter, his family and friends, Kwok said that he has to learn more about this before commenting.

    - (HKG Pao) August 15, 2016.

    Chris Wat Wing-yin: "If this is a tip from a reader, then how come it only occurs at Next Magazine? The incident took place at some time after 11pm. The police said that they were called at 1150pm. However, the Next Magazine Facebook had posted the video at 1:06am already. Isn't that very quick? Any normal tipster would need some time to find the right channel to offer the video.

    Also, most citizens would be scared to approach a street fight. Why is this tipster able to stand up close and make a professional-quality video? Isn't she somewhat too professional?

    In truth, this is the typical "news gathering" method for Next Magazine reporters. Edward Leung has admitted that he tailed the Ta Kung Pao reporter and attacked him after work. Thus, Leung had all the time in the world to call the Next Magazine reporter to come along for the ambush.

    - (Apple Daily) August 16, 2016.

    Ray Wong responded to our inquiry and said that the Audi vehicle in the report belongs to the company Channel i (HK) Limited owned by Ray Wong and Edward Leung. The vehicle was purchased from the used car market for about $30,000 last month. It was intended to be used for the election campaign. Wong said that they don't have any financial backers, and they have relied on the subscription fees to the Channel i program to support operations. "We are a very poor political party. I don't understand why they say that we have financial backers who let us spend extravagantly."

    - When the purchase price of the vehicle is a lot lower than its open market value, there is something suspicious about the seller. PERIOD. Why don't you see what kind of car you can buy for $30,000 on the open market?

    - At least Ray Wong didn't come out to say that the Kornhill Apartments unit is being rented for only $1 per month.

    - The vehicle was intended to support the election. Edward Leung is not a candidate anymore. So what happens to the vehicle and the rest of the money?

    - When Edward Leung's nomination was invalidated, they lost their raison d'tre. In order to continue siphoning in more money, they said that they are going to support the Youngspiration candidates. Send more money more frequently.

    - (Ta Kung Pao) In July, Hong Kong Indigenous said their fund-raising goal was $200,000. They said that they would not want to exaggerate the amount of money needed. Yet, Edward Leung filed expenses that included $550,000 for advertising in the February 2016 New Territories East Legislative Council by-election.

    - And still no explanation from Ray Wong about the $530,000 crisp new bills and the 100 Viagra pills that he was found with when he was arrested for incitement and participation in the Mong Kok riot.

    - And finally we have the news report that Edward Leung was so upset about that he assaulted the reporter who asked him for comments.

    (Ta Kung Pao) August 16, 2016.


    Top: Address of former restaurant owned and operated by Edward Leung's father
    Bottom: Address of former Xinhua Bookstore

    Hong Kong Indigenous spokesperson Edward Leung Tin-kei told the media that "his father is anti-Communist, his mother fears the Communists and his maternal grandfather was a Nationalist Party (KMT) member. When the People's Republic was founded in 1949, his ancestral home was confiscated and his maternal grandfather was exiled to Xinjiang. Thus he used a series of bitter family experiences to burnish his radical localist image. Our reporter visited Leung's place of birth in Wuhan city, Hubei province to discover his past.

    We found out that his mother "who is scared of the Communists" and his father "who opposes the Communists" ran a restaurant in the Jiang'an district, Wuhan City in the year 2000 and earned RMB. The so-called confiscated ancestral home has been returned to the family. Leung said that his "family members have immigrated overseas and have no need to go back to China" when in fact the family members are living in Beijing, Zhuhai and Wuhan. When our reporter asked Leung for confirmation, he cursed with obscene language and angrily said: "This is none of your business!"

    According to what our reporter found in Wuhan, Leung Tin-kei was born on June 2, 1991 at Number 15, Xian'an Fang, Jiang'an district, Wuhan city, Hubei province, People's Republic of China. His given name was Liang Han-zhang. The Huang family on his mother's side were in the local cotton business before the founding of the People's Republic of China and they were wealthy. His grandfather Mr. Huang studied in Hong Kong in his youth, and also studied business management at the Shanghai Academy of Finance.

    In 1953, Mr. Huang graduated from university and was assigned by the state to work at the Bureau of Mineral Affairs of the Xinjiang Metal Company for seven years.

    The ancestral home of the Huang family at Xian'an Fang was once confiscated by the sate, but it was returned to the Huang family in 1979 before Edward Leung was born.

    Today, Number 15 Xian'an Road is unoccupied. Leung's parents met each other here. According to Leung's father, he met Ms. Huang here when he was traveling and then they got married.

    According to information, Leung's mother worked as an accountant at the Xinhua Bookstore on Huangxing Road, Jiang'an Disrict, Wuhan City. The location is now the office of the Xinhua Travel Agency.

    Our reporter located an former employee Ms. Zeng of the old Xinhua Bookstore. She said that Ms. Huang married a Hong Kong man named Liang at the Wuhan Civil Affairs Bureau in the summer of 1990. At the time, everybody thought that this was a big deal. The girls were all envious! Shortly afterwards, Ms. Huang resigned from her job. In 1992, she immigrated to Hong Kong and they did not keep up the contact. But Ms. Zeng said that Ms. Huang's husband ran a restaurant in Jiang'an District in 2000. Another colleague had even seen Ms. Huang in the Jiang'an District.

    Our reporter checked the local business registry. A man with the same name as Edward Leung's father registered the Fu Lin Men Food and Beverage (Wuhan) Limited Company in the capacity of legal representative. The registration was canceled in 2006. The address is presently occupied by a Hubei-cuisine restaurant.

    Mr. Leung told our reporter that he invested in a restaurant in Wuhan more than a decade ago, but gave up after losing money. He recollected that he was unfortunate to run into SARS and the avian flu crisis, and nobody ate out during that time. "It all began when I was dining with senior government officials in Wuhan. I saw that the restaurants were filled with people. So I decided to invest more than 1 million. But unfortunately I ran into SARS. Then it was all over."

    Although Mr. Leung lost money with this investment, he was not "anti-Communist" as his son. "I don't like the system in mainland China, but that doesn't mean that I don't like China," Mr. Leung said.

    Edward Leung's background as a new immigrant to similar is others like him. He still has many relatives in mainland China. According to information, Edward Leung's mother has two sisters. The elder one immigrated to the United States, but has moved back to live in her Wuhan hometown. The younger one runs a cultural company in Beijing.

    As for his National Party member maternal grandfather, he is living in Zhuhai now. Other relatives of Edward Leung's mother also live and run businesses in mainland China. So it is an exaggeration for Edward Leung to say that all his family members have immigrated overseas.

    Edward Leung was born in the Huang family ancestral home at Number 15, Xian'an Fang, Jiang'an district. In 1993, it was listed as a Class 1 protected historical building. Our reporter checked the land registry and found out that Leung's maternal grandfather sold the building for RMB 1,000,000 in year 2000.

    - This is a classical news report, with nothing wrong or sleazy. The starting point is that a public figure has weaved a certain story around himself. The investigative reporter went out to verify that account and found numerous discrepancies. The principal was upset because he was caught in his lies. And now he has to face his family members who want to know why he has lied about them for his own political purposes.

    - This Ta Kung Pao news report did not name the relatives of Edward Leung nor their addresses. That is a shame. They should be identified so that mainland Internet users can form lynch robs to kill the men and rape the women. That's what the pro-Hong Kong independence Internet users want to do to the family of the Ta Kung Pao reporter, so it must be okay up on the mainland too.

    - This is the rule of law. If only Hongkongers can do it but not mainlanders, that would be rule of man and we all know that would be bad.

    - Squeezing a bit out of the toothpaste tube every day. This is exactly what Apple Daily/Next Magazine does all the time. Mr. Lo, nicknamed Golden Hair, learned his trade well after 11 years at <FACE> as the manager of the paparazzi squad for the entertainment industry.

    - The Valiant Frontier Facebook wrote: "It is wrong to harass the person's family because they are innocent. But if someone does that, we will applaud loudly and offer our strong support." In like manner, we write: "It is wrong to harass the extended family of Edward Leung. But if someone does that, we will applaud loudly and offer our strong support."

    - The usual tactic from the Chinese Communists is to hang out a bait. If Edward Leung denies any part of this news report, his relatives on mainland China will be interviewed by Phoenix TV/CCTV to wonder why Edward Leung is saying these untruthful things about them.

    - A recent American example: When did Melania Trump come to the United States, got a green card and became a citizen?

    Melania Trump "seemed to confirm" that she came to the United States on an H-1B visa in 1996, and an agent for a modeling agency told the The Washington Post that his agency sponsored Trump for an H-1B visa in 1996. She became a permanent resident of the United States in 2001 and a citizen in 2006.

    In August 2016, it was reported that Trump's account of her immigration status may have contained inconsistencies. Controversial photographs of Trump were re-published in the New York Post in the first week of August 2016. These photographs were originally taken in the United States during a photo shoot which puts her inside the United States in 1995, as does a biography published in February by Slovenian journalists. The photos themselves were published by the French men's magazine, Max, in January 1996. This causes a discrepancy in her timeline of being a legal resident of the United States: her purported immigration timeline has her entering the country in 1996 on a short-term travel visa, which would not have authorized her to work as a model. However, the photographer who took the pictures republished by the New York Post stated that Trump was not paid for her work.

    This was only a big issue because her husband takes a hostile stance against illegal immigrants, including wanting to make Mexico pay to build a great wall along its borders with the United States.

    - (Ta Kung Pao) August 17, 2016.

    Edward Leung's father lives in a small unit in Yuen Long. According to the Land Registry, he purchased the unit for $278,000 in the 1990's and sold it for $800,000 in 2009 for a profit of $520,000. The new owner is believed to be his own brother. This is a decrepit unit, with old windows and doors. The window panes are rusting, and one corner of the kitchen window has fallen off. According to neighbors, Leung's father is very frugal. When he goes out at noon, he usually only buys some biscuits or bread for lunch.

    Leung's father runs an antique shop in Yuen Long. The shop has an area of about 6 feet wide and 20 feet long. The shop is filled with cardboard paper, magazines, etc with barely any 'antiques' in sight. The dust-covered windows have a faded sign saying "Business move sales". Neighbors said that Leung's father is frugal and runs only an electric fan even during the hottest days of the summer. According to information, the shop has been losing money consistently and Leung's father wants to rent it out for between $7,000 to $10,000 per month.

    Neighbors said that they wanted Leung's father to tell his son to stop. But the father is proud of his son and supports his campaign to run for the Legislative Council. He reported told the neighbors: "He is not committing murder or arson. What is wrong with that?" "The Legislative Council pays $160,000 per month. It is better to become a legislator than a policeman!"

    - (Kinliu) By Chris Wat Wing-yin. August 17, 2016.

    ... Frankly, I don't approve of paparazzi methods. I don't think that any reporter really wants to be a paparazzo. Ta Kung Pao has not been the home for paparazzi before. But given the number of crooks who are pretending to be freedom fighters today, even Ta Kung Pao has to use the Apple Daily method to shine the light on these people.

    Many of the Journalists Association folks came out of Apple Daly. They knew exactly who introduced the paparazzi when and where. When the entertainment celebrities complain, they got the standard response: "When you eat salted fish, you must be prepared to put up with the thirst (due to the high salt content)."

    Therefore I recommend the same to Edward Leung: "When you eat salted fish, you must be prepared to put with the thirst." If you want to become rich and famous, then you must be prepared to deal with the ambushes, criticisms, incessant filming, being followed around, etc. If your EQ is so low that you explode at the slightest provocation, then you are not thick-skinned enough yet. No wonder you won't become a Legislative Councilor.

    - After going into hiding for days, Hong Kong Indigenous spokesperson Edward Leung Tin-kei finally emerged by posting a 6-minute video of himself campaigning with a megaphone at Tai Po Plaza. The video showed Leung standing in the middle of the road to broadcast his ideas. It did not matter whether the traffic light was red or green, Leung just stood there and made cars and people walk around him. Indeed, Edward Leung knows no fear (nor traffic regulations) as a true valiant warrior for the people of Hong Kong.

    - Transport Department, The Road Users' Code

    Rules and advice for all road users

    Avoid any behaviour likely to put into danger any person or to cause damage to public or private property or to obstruct other road users.

    Do not obstruct other road users or make their passage dangerous by throwing, depositing or leaving any object or substance on the pavement or the roadway. If you are unable to avoid creating an obstruction in that way then take the necessary steps to remove it as soon as possible and, if it cannot be removed immediately, then warn other road users.

    You should make allowances for and/or help children, disabled or elderly people and others who may have difficulty in getting around such as people with injuries or coping with children or luggage.

    - (SCMP) December 17, 2016.

    Hong Kong localist leader Edward Leung Tin-kei was arrested on Friday over his involvement in an earlier fight with a pro-Beijing newspaper journalist.

    In August, the Hong Kong Indigenous leader was seen in a heated verbal exchange with the Ta Kung Pao reporter involving foul language and some violence inside Tai Koo MTR station. The journalist later reported the incident at Chai Wan police station, claiming he had been assaulted.

    On Saturday police said they had arrested a 25-year-old with the surname Leung in the Chai Wan area at around 4pm on Friday for fighting in a public place, but he had since been temporarily released.

    Police said the case was still under investigation and they would not rule out arresting others involved in the incident.

    A source close to the investigation said officers had spoken to the reporter by phone on Friday. We called him to arrange a home arrest for fighting in public, but he was making excuses, saying he was not available, the source said. We are still trying to make arrangements.

    - Edward Leung is a spy from the Liaison Office. His job was to morph Localism into a completely unacceptable Independence movement. Localism was never to split HK from China. It was to give control of HK back to people who live in HK. The fight was staged to give Edward Leung street cred.

    - (SCMP) December 23, 2016.

    A Hong Kong localist leader accused of fighting a reporter at an MTR station in August is seeking a more effective way to handle the court case while the other party indicated on Friday he intends to plead not guilty.

    Edward Leung Tin-kei, 25, of Hong Kong Indigenous, and Lo Wing-yin, 42, were charged with one joint count of fighting in a public place, an offence punishable by a HK$5,000 fine and 12 months imprisonment.

    Prosecutors alleged the pair took part in an unlawful fight at Tai Koo MTR station on August 13.

    A duty lawyer for Lo said he was ready to plead not guilty.

    But Leungs counsel, Noel Lau, claimed his team had yet to receive all documents. He asked for more time to see if the case could be handled in a more effective way. It is understood that may include settling through a bind-over order.

    Magistrate Jason Wan Siu-ming adjourned the case to January 13.

    In the meantime, both defendants were freed on HK$1,000 cash bail on condition they report to police regularly and reside in their reported addresses.

    Among events that take place once every four years, I like the FIFA World Cup more because I really don't want to watch the Chinese team.

    At the Rio Olympics opening ceremony, the order of countries is #44 China and #92 Hong Kong. So in front of a global television audience of more than 1 billion, Hong Kong is indeed an independent sovereign country!

    - Eh, the placard in front of the Hong Kong delegation reads: "Hong Kong China." It does not read "Hong Kong."

    - That should really upset those who like to chant "Hong Kong Is Not China" and boo their own national anthem at soccer games.

    - At least, this was not the ignominy of being called "Chinese Hong Kong" as in "Chinese Taipei." This CNN news title is titled: "Anger in Taiwan over 'Chinese Taipei' Olympics moniker". Well, either you accept that your place is at the back of the bus, or else you sit in front and deal with the consequences (reference: Rosa Parks). In this case, Taiwan could have smuggled in their own placard of "Republic of Taiwan" and show it as they parade into the stadium. The consequence is that they will be immediately expelled from the Olympic movement.

    - (Wikipedia) Hong Kong At the Olympics

    The National Olympic Committee (NOC) for Hong Kong was founded in 1950 as the Amateur Sports Federation and Olympic Committee of Hong Kong. It was recognised by the IOC in 1951, and subsequently, Hong Kong was represented separately from Great Britain (for any gold medal ceremony, the colonial flag of Hong Kong was raised and the British national anthem was played) at all future Olympic Games.

    After the sovereignty of Hong Kong was transferred to the People's Republic of China in 1997, the NOC for the special administrative region has been designated Hong Kong, China. Hong Kong is represented separately at the Olympics by its own choice (for any gold medal ceremony the Hong Kong SAR flag is raised and the PRC national anthem is played). As permitted under its constitution as agreed upon handover from the United Kingdom (specifically, Article 151, Chapter 7 of The Basic Law), it "may, on its own, ... maintain and develop relations and conclude and implement agreements with foreign states and regions and relevant international organizations in the appropriate fields, including the economic, trade, financial and monetary, shipping, communications, tourism, cultural and sports fields."

    - If and when the United Kingdom reclaims sovereignty over Hong Kong, we will finally get our national anthem back! Here is Lee Lai-shan with the first and only Hong Kong Olympic gold medal ever at the 1996 Atlanta Games to the tune of God Save The Queen!

    - Well, brother, you have a long wait ahead of you ...

    Facebook: Oppose "689" CY Leung ruling Hong Kong with lies, Down with 689

    I turned on the television set to watch the Rio Olympics opening ceremony
    Then I saw that this dickhead Natalis Chan is the host
    So I turned off the television set.
    Please press LIKE if you support this boycott

    (Yahoo! Sports) August 7, 2016.

    US teenager Ginny Thrasher got hooked on shooting when deer hunting with her grandfather and on Saturday that passion saw her past China's champion sharpshooters to claim the first gold medal of the Rio 2016 Games. The 19-year-old edged past Athens 2004 champion Du Li in the final shot in the women's 10m air rifle. London 2012 titleholder Yi Siling took bronze.

           

    - People say that they cry when they see their national flags raise at the Olympics. But all Hong Kong localists should be very delighted to see the United States beat the two Chinawomen to win the first Olympic gold medal at the Rio Games.

    - Long Live the United States!!! P.S. When are they going to send the marines in to liberate Hong Kong from the grip of the Chicoms?

    - Kengo Ip's Facebook

    Sports is not politics?
    Japan took its first gold in swimming. Vietnam beat Brazil and China to win the men's 10m air rifle gold.
    The hostility between China and Japan is mighty. Vietnam is tangling with China over South Seas. They are showing us Chinese off at the Olympics. How can you as a Chinese person not be angry?
    When will China's first gold come? Hahaha, I think that that the Chinese coaches are more worried than you are.

    Comment: Kengo Ip, if I don't pour acid on you the next time at the Book Fair, may I be run over and killed by a car in the street!

    - Question: Why won't the Hong Kong Police investigate this case and arrest the Facebook commentator? After all, they arrested the people who threatened the Returning Officer of the Registration and Electoral Office.

    - An anonymous third-party sends some screen captures to the Hong Kong Police Public Relations Bureau and demand an investigation. There is no complainant and there is no direct evidence. What do you expect the police to do? P.S. The police ask people to send in actionable information.

    - What happened to the crew who said that the people who threatened the Returning Officer were merely exercising their freedom of speech? Where have they disappeared to now?

    - Whenever there are ties that lead to a shared medal, the national flags are supposed to be place in parallel.  In the women's 100m backstroke, China's Fu Yuanhui was tied with the Canadian swimmer for the bronze medal. It really warmed my heart to see that the Rio organizers placed Canada's flag on top of the Chinese flag. Long live Canada! When they will send their army over to liberate Hong Kong from the Chicoms?

    - Don't be silly! According to the Olympic rules, the flags are supposed to be in parallel when there are ties. In the event that there isn't enough room for parallel placement, the flags are supposed to be arranged vertically by alphabetical order of the winners' names. Here we have Fu Yuanhui (China) and Kylie Masse (Canada). Of course, the Brazilians have no idea that the Chinese woman's family name is Fu and the Canadian's family name is Masse. Instead, they thought that the Chinese woman's family name is Yuanhui! So Kylie Masse goes ahead of Fu Yuanhui. Get it?

    But if you want to feel good, go ahead by all means ... please remember that masturbation is bad for your physical and mental health ...

    - The rules actually say that the tied countries should be arranged vertically by country name in alphabetical order (because this could be a team event with multiple athletes who have different names). So Canada goes ahead of China.

    At first, RTHK's website listed the Olympic medal counts by country by the total number of medals won. This meant that China was ranked number 2 on the list. A massive complaint campaign to RTHK by localists led to a new table in which countries are ranked by the number of gold medals first, silver medals next and bronze medals next. This meant that China was knocked down to number 11 on the list. This has been yet another great victory for The People of Hong Kong!

    - That table above was for results after the first day. Here is the table right now (August 11, 2016) from Google. Why don't you find another way to complain to Google so as to knock China out of the top 10?

    - You have a heart of glass. The only thing is whether you know it or not.

    Top Left: Olympic Games news -- the Chinese won the 100m women's backstroke
    Top Right: The Chinese won the 200m men's free style, 200m women's individual medley
    Bottom Left: The Chinese won the 200m women's free style, women's gymnastics team event ...
    Bottom Right: I can't stand this ... I want to see them lose their gold medals ...

    (Wall Street Journal Blog) August 8, 2016.

    For Chinas proud Olympians, the stars havent quite aligned in Rio.

    Several Chinese flags used by organizers at the 2016 Olympics in Brazil featured wrongly angled stars, a subtle but significant slip that has irked Chinese officials as well as legions of viewers back home.

    Olympic organizers pledged to rectify the mistake, which came to light on Saturday during the games first medal ceremony, where two Chinese shooters celebrated podium finishes beneath a pair of flags with wonky stars.

    Chinas national flag features five golden stars backed by a field of red, with one large star flanked on the right by an arc of four smaller stars, each tilted to point a tip directly toward the center of the larger star. The small stars on Chinese flags in Rio, however, are laid uprightan error that first appeared on a flag waved by the Chinese delegation during Fridays opening ceremony, but seemingly went unnoticed at the time.

    At a medal ceremony the next day, where the flags hung motionless and were easier to scrutinize, the mistake was obvious. Chinese officials lodged protests, while viewers at home voiced complaints on social media. Some attentive web users have discovered that the five-star red flag used at this Olympics appear problematic, state broadcaster China Central Television said on its official Weibo microblog. The national flag is the symbol of a nation! No problems are permissible!

    CCTVs comments drew more than 93,000 likes from Weibo users, some of whom criticized the Olympic organizers for perceived sloppiness. This Olympics are the worst Ive ever seen, a user wrote. Others talked about who was to blame. If the flags were made in China, then things would be a little awkward, one Weibo user said. Another user responded, Even if they were made in China, they were based on Brazilian-supplied designs!

    It wasnt clear who produced the erroneous flags, though CCTV said last week that all the national flags that will be hoisted during the [opening] ceremony are made in China, as part of a report asserting that Chinese-made products will be an integral part of the Olympics.

    Chinese diplomats, for their part, have filed an official complaint to the Rio Olympic Committee and suggested that a non-Chinese contractor was responsible for the mistake.

    In a verified Weibo post dated Monday, the Chinese consulate in Rio de Janeiro said the committee has apologized and ordered the contractorwhich the consulate didnt nameto resolve the problem.

    A Chinese state-run newspaper, however, quoted the Rio Olympic Committee as saying that all flags used at the games had been approved by the respective national Olympic committees. The Chinese flag was approved by the Chinese Olympic Committee, Peoples Daily said, citing comments from the Rio committee.

    Neither the Rio nor Chinese Olympic committees immediately responded to requests for comment.

    The Chinese flag was designed in 1949, just months before the founding of the Peoples Republic. Its red field is meant to represent the Communist revolution, while the five stars symbolize the unity of the Chinese people under the Communist Party. The large star represents the party, while the small stars symbolize the four social classes as defined by Mao Zedong: the working class, the peasantry, the urban petty bourgeoisie, and national bourgeoisie.

    Chinas uproar over stars askew wasnt the only flag-related furor over the opening Olympic weekend. During Fridays opening ceremony, Australian broadcaster Seven Network accidentally displayed the flag of Chile instead of Chinas when representing the Middle Kingdom on a list of participating nations, drawing derision from Chinese viewers down under.

    An unnamed Seven Network spokesperson told Chinas government-run Xinhua News Agency that the network apologized unreservedly for the human error that resulted in the flag switcheroo. Efforts to reach Seven Network for comment werent immediately successful, while a receptionist who answered a call after working hours said the broadcaster doesnt take queries outside the business day.

    (Silent Majority for HK) August 12, 2016.

    For the longest time, the 'pro-democracy' people of Hong Kong have argued that national education is unnecessary in Hong Kong. As an example, they showcased the United States of America, because over there "patriotism comes from inside the heart" and national education, respect for the national flag, sing the national anthem, standing at attention during the national anthem, etc were unimportant. So now we have the case of gymnast Gabby Douglas who failed to place her hand over her heart during the playing of the national anthem during the Olympic medal ceremony. Eventually Gabby Douglas had to issue a public apology.

    What if Gabby Douglas did what Joshua Wong and company did during the playing of the national anthem?

    (New York Times) August 12, 2016.

    The playing of the United States national anthem at Olympic medal ceremonies is bringing tears to the eyes of American athletes here. Elsewhere, the song is having a very different effect.

    It is driving me crazy, said Jason DeBord, a 45-year-old living in Ann Arbor, Mich. I hit the mute button, or I make dinner, or I just sit there and brace myself.

    DeBord has nothing against displays of patriotism, nor is he simply eager to return to the action. What irritates him is the version of The Star-Spangled Banner being used at the Olympics. Put bluntly, it has been butchered.

    O.K., that might overstate the problem. Maybe it would be more accurate to say the song has been altered in ways that rob it of its oomph, its power and its optimistic essence.

    Specifically, DeBord said, this Banner segues several times to minor chords, which in the Western canon are considered melancholic, in places where major chords, which are heartier and more upbeat, are the norm. The effect, DeBord said, is a rendering of the anthem that is darker and sadder.

    It has a totally different emotional feel, he said. It is supposed to have an ascending chord structure. Instead, it sort of has a descending chord structure.

    In short, this is a defeatist Star-Spangled Banner, and it is broadcast, around the globe, at a moment of ecstatic, international triumph. Continue reading the main story

    DeBord, who spent 16 years on Broadway as a conductor and pianist, is on the faculty at the University of Michigans department of musical theater. He is the first to admit that few people are likely to notice, let alone be bothered by, the elements of the song that annoy him. But when he posted his feelings on his Facebook page, he quickly found that he had company. Lots of perturbed company.

    Glad its not just me, one commenter wrote.

    Another person posted: Sounds like a music school project gone awry. Just awful.

    Im not on Twitter, someone else added, but there must be a way to tell them!!!

    Asked for the particulars of his beef with this Banner, DeBord offered to head to the piano in his home and provide a live tutorial, over the phone. He quickly plowed through the beginning of the song O say, can you see, by the dawns early light but stopped when he got to What so proudly we hailed.

    At proudly, he noted, the Olympic version of the anthem goes to one of those sad, dark minor chords where majors have long been the norm. He played the standard version and then the Olympic version standard, Olympic, over and over. Once he pointed out the difference, it was obvious. The Olympic version was conciliatory, maybe even retreating. The standard version was chest-thumping and on the offense.

    It happens again on rockets red glare, he said, hands on the piano, and then again on land of the free.

    There is no official or definitive version of The Star-Spangled Banner, and that is no accident. The 1931 bill signed into law by President Herbert Hoover that adopted the song as the nations anthem is a model of terseness. It is mum about both lyrics and arrangement, which, said Mark Clague, an associate professor of musicology at the University of Michigan, is one reason the anthem has continued to evolve over the years.

    When Francis Scott Key wrote it, hed just seen a decisive victory in Baltimore in the War of 1812, which was like a second war of independence, he said in an interview. He writes the song in celebration, and its played for years with a celebratory feel, up-tempo and light. Only later does it become the song we know, slower and more majestic.

    Clague, who is working on a book about The Star-Spangled Banner, did indeed notice the new Olympic take on the song. What struck him most was the way it handled the climactic land of the free, which is typically wrung for maximum emotion.

    Here it goes to a minor chord, he said, so rather than having that firm, confident expression of the word free, you get an unstable, questioning chord. Where you should be feeling victory, you have a question mark.

    Clague sounds less bothered by this take on the anthem. Maybe it is because he knows thousands of versions have been created over the years and he regards the tune as a variety of clay that everyone is free to mold. He also surmises that the arranger was adapting the song for the moment.

    When we play the anthem in the U.S., its often all about creating a sense of unity in the country, he said. The Olympics is a very different context. Were really celebrating brotherhood, international cooperation, rather than martial qualities that anthems are often called upon to express. Three flags are being raised, not one. So I think that what has happened here is theyve softened the song, de-emphasizing the militant aspect and emphasizing the songs lyrical side, to bring out the community-of-nations idea.

    The United States Olympic Committee said it was not responsible for submitting the anthem to Olympic organizers. The group that is running the Rio Games said it would look into the origin of the United States anthem being played here.

    This version may not be making its Olympic debut. According to DeBord and Clague, the version heard here in Rio was also used at the 2014 Winter Games in Sochi, Russia, and the 2012 Summer Games in London. Those were in the key of C major and were 70 seconds long.

    During a medal ceremony, Shazam, the song identification app, tagged the track as The London Philharmonic Orchestra & Philip Sheppard.

    If this rendition originated in London, where did London get it?

    As it happens, a 2012 YouTube video shows the ambitious effort undertaken in the lead-up to the London Games to record new arrangements of more than 200 national anthems.

    That project was led by Sheppard, a British composer, cellist and professor at the Royal Academy of Music whose website states that he has scored more than 30 films and worked with David Bowie, Jeff Buckley, the Weeknd and many other recording artists. In the video, he is seen conducting the London Philharmonic Orchestra at Abbey Road, the studio made famous by the Beatles.

    Sheppard could not be reached Wednesday.

    The anthems serve a particular purpose at the Olympics, he tells an off-screen interviewer in the video. That is namely to get the flag up the pole during the gold medal ceremonies.

    He is making the practical point that the songs cannot go on and on. So one of his biggest challenges, he said, was ensuring that each anthem lasted 60 to 90 seconds. This meant dramatic cuts for some anthems like Uruguays, which usually lasts for six and a half minutes and looping repetition for others, like Ugandas, which is only nine bars long.

    All the countries had to sign off on the new arrangements, Sheppard says. At one moment in the video, he sounds a little nervous about whether Britain will give a thumbs-up.

    The video ends, inexplicably, with the full, 70-second rendering of The Star-Spangled Banner as the camera shows an American flag. There is no commentary.

    Is it possible that Sheppard went with minor chords as a way to shave time off the tune? The standard land of the free, for instance, when milked properly, takes its time.

    DeBord doubts it. But for him, the need for edits could never justify such maddening results.

    You dont need to compromise a piece of music, he said, to make it work for time.

    (The Australian) August 9, 2016.

    The comments of Mack Horton, Australias first gold medallist at the Rio Olympics, about his key rival, Chinas Sun Yang, have now inflamed diplomatic tensions between Australia and China, led by the Chinese government agency Xinhua and the Global Times.

    Hortons outspoken remarks, referring to Yang as a drug cheat, have sparked escalating Chinese-led criticism of Horton, Australian swimming, Hortons family and now the entire Australian community.

    An editorial in the Global Times was scathing of Australia, saying: In many serious essays written by Westerners, Australia is mentioned as a country at the fringes of civilisation. In some cases, they refer to the countrys early history as Britains offshore prison. This suggests that no one should be surprised at uncivilised acts emanating from the country.

    Yang, who is set to dominate the 200m freestyle final later today, accused Horton who beat him in the 400m freestyle on the opening night of competition of cheap tricks and called for some respect.

    The Chinese Swimming Association has demanded Horton apologise, putting it at odds with the position of the Australian Olympic Committee, which has publicly announced that Horton was free to express his opinion.

    This morning Australian Chef de mission Kitty Chiller refused to step back and fully supported Hortons stance. Mack obviously has very strong views about the need for clean sport, as every single one of us does, she said. He has every right to express his views and his displeasure in that sense. We have no intention of making an apology.

    Chiller said Horton was not affected by the trolling on social media or Chinas official demands for an apology. Mack is in a pretty good place, she said. Hes got probably his best event coming up in a few days and I know he, like all the swimmers, is focused on hia own event, his own lane, she said. I would hazard a guess that it wouldnt affect him at all.

    But the China swim manager Xu Qi said Hortons malicious words were inappropriate and great hurt had been done to the relationships between China and Australia. We have been noticing what has been said in the past two days by Horton, who launched a malicious personal attack, Xu Qi told Chinas state media Xinhua. We think his inappropriate words greatly hurt the feelings between Chinese and Australian swimmers. We strongly demand an apology from this swimmer. It is proof of a lack of good manners and upbringing.

    Australias synchronised diver Maddison Keeney, who won a bronze medal with Annabelle Smith, backed Horton. Im all for clean sport. Everyone should have an equal playing field, Keeney said.

    (The Australian) August 9, 2016.

    If Mack Horton had his way, the sporting world would see his increasingly rancorous rivalry with Sun Yang as an aquatic pantomime: a duel between evil and good, the Chinese drug cheat against an Aussie kid taught to play fair.

    For a competitor like Horton, the notion that he represents all who are clean in sport, while Sun represents all who have doped, is blood in the water. It is the thought that will fuel his mind, when his body is entirely spent, at the end of those torturous 30 laps.

    To a competitor like Sun Yang, it may also be a grossly unfair.

    Sun Yang served a three-month suspension after testing positive in May 2014 to a banned anti-anginal drug, Trimetazidine, at Chinas national swimming championships in Qingdao. Trimetazidine had been added four months earlier to the World Anti-Doping Agencys list of prohibited substances.

    In Hortons view, this means Sun is forever, irredeemably, a cheat. I used the word drug cheat because he tested positive, Horton told reporters after touching out Sun in the 400m freestyle to win his first Olympic gold medal. I just have a problem with him testing positive and still competing.

    The truth is more complicated.

    The reason Sun was suspended for three months, rather than the mandatory two-year penalty for taking a prohibited substance in force at the time, is that he was found not to have intentionally doped.

    In the first instance, his case was decided by the Chinese Swimming Federation. After reviewing the evidence against Sun, WADA chose not to appeal. Its only quibble was the amount of time taken by Chinas anti-doping authority to report Suns positive test.

    National anti-doping authorities are supposed to report positive tests within 20 days. It was not until November 2014, six months after the national championships, that media outlets first learned that one of Chinas most celebrated swimmers had failed a drug test and had been stripped of his national titles. By that stage, Sun had already served his short ban.

    The Chinese Swimming Federation and WADA accepted Suns explanation that he took Trimetazidine for a genuine medical condition and not to gain an unfair advantage. Suns condition is angina pectoris, which loosely translates into strange feeling in the chest. The condition can be caused by coronary disease and other serious heart problems which interrupt the flow of blood. Sun occasionally feels it as a squeezing sensation in his chest. Famously, he felt it moments before his 1500m final at last years FINA world championships in Kazan.

    I didnt feel good in my heart, the world record holder told reporters after his last minute withdrawal from his pet event. Today I felt really uncomfortable at the pool during my warm-up and I had to give up the idea of competing. I feel really sorry about that. It is the first time I have felt uncomfortable in competition.

    Sun told the Chinese Swimming Federation he took Trimetazidine, then listed as a banned stimulant, in the lead-up to competition without realising it was banned. The doctor who provided it to him was suspended.

    The problem for Sun is that Trimetazidine is used by athletes to cheat. A 2014 Polish study found that the drug, by improving heart function, was used by athletes to improve physical efficiency, especially in the case of endurance sports.

    Trimetazidine is still banned in and out of competition by WADA. Only a month ago, a positive test for the drug ended the Rio dreams of Russias quadruple sculls crew. The culprit was Sergei Fedorovtsev, an Athens gold medallist who returned a positive test for the drug during an Olympic qualifying event in Lucerne.

    Like Maria Sharapovas failure to declare her use of Meldonium before and after it was added to WADAs banned list, Sun failed to declare his use to Trimetazidine when he submitted a doping control form in Qingdao. Even assuming his medical condition is genuine, he did not have a therapeutic use exemption to take the drug.

    Horton is entitled to be suspicious of Sun. This is a natural consequence of the history of doping in Chinese swimming and the conflict of interest in the World Anti-Doping Code, which entrusts national sports federations to act as judge in cases involving their own athletes.

    Horton should also understand Suns case well enough to acknowledge that he has never been found guilty of deliberately taking a banned substance. There are certainly cheats aplenty at these Games. It may be however, that Sun isnt one of them.

    (Brisbane Times) August 9, 2016.

    French swimmer Camille Lacourt has taken a swipe at controversial Chinese swimmer Sun Yang, declaring: "he pisses purple".

    The swimming world has erupted after Australian Mack Horton called Sun a drug cheat on the opening day of the Rio Olympics, with the veteran French backstroker expressing his dismay over FINA's decision to allow him to compete.

    Lacourt, who finished fifth in the 100 metre backstroke final not long after Sun claimed gold in the 200 metre freestyle, likened the sport to athletics with a belief there are a number of athletes in each race who are taking performance enhancing drugs.

    "Sun Yang, he pisses purple," Lacourt told French radio station RMCsport. "When I see the 200m podium I want to be sick. I prefer to remember the crowd that cheered when we went out. I am very sad when I see my sport getting like this. I have the impression I am looking at athletics, with two or three doped in each final. I hope that [swimming's world governing body] FINA is going to react and stop this massacre, because it is getting sad."

    Sun, who served a three month ban for doping after testing positive to trimetazidine back in 2014, has felt the brunt of criticism after Horton's choice words at the start of the games.

    The atmosphere was inflamed further when, after reeling in South Africa's Chad le Clos to win Olympic gold on Monday night, Sun embraced FINA executive director Cornel Marculescu. Sun said Marculescu was like a "grandfather" to him. After the race Sun was asked about his friendship with Marculescu, the FINA boss, and replied that he had been a figure of support since the controversy in Rio erupted.  "Marcu is a very good friend of [the] Chinese swim team and he actually watched me like a grandfather. So I was very happy to see him see me win the gold. I hope this friendship will last."

    (SCMP) Sun Yang may not be a nice guy, but neither is he a drug cheat. By Alex Lo. August 11, 2016.

    The paradoxical thing about international sports like the Olympics is that it brings out the nationalists in many people. I have naturalised Canadian friends who are proud of their adopted country, but once they turn to the TV sports channels, they inevitably become Aussies, Italians, Poles and Chinese again.

    For sure, international athletes are trained by state-sponsored bodies and represent their countries when they compete. But it also means we dont see them as individuals, with their greatness and pettiness, strengths and weaknesses that are all their own.

    Take the feud between Chinas superstar swimmer Sun Yang, and his Australian and French rivals Mack Horton and Camille Lacourt.

    Horton accused him of being a drug cheat, while Lacourt said Sun made him sick because he pisses purple, that is, testing positive for drug back in 2014.

    The Chinese team has demanded an official apology but the Australians counter there is nothing to be sorry for. Netizens from those countries have been trading insults; accusations of racism fly.

    The public statements of Horton and Lacourt are disgraceful and ungracious, and unworthy of great sportsmen. Swimmers are among the most tested of Olympic athletes, and no positive results have turned up against Sun so far. They were referring to something back in 2014, but even that case was problematic.

    Even so, Sun has fully earned the animosity of not only his foreign rivals but even his own team by his well-known arrogance, bad poolside manners and domineering behaviour.

    In additional to Horton, national coaches from Brazil, Canada and South Africa have complained about his disruptive antics against other athletes during training sessions, with one complaining he acted like he owns the pools. His detractors are legion. None of it makes him guilty of doping, though, unless he tests positive.

    A few months after the World Anti-Doping Agency added trimetazidine to its list of banned substances, Sun tested positive for the drug in 2014. He said it was used to treat his heart condition. By January last year, the agency downgraded the drug from being a stimulant to a metabolic modulator. It was not a case of cut-and-dried doping.

    We expect great athletes to be great people who bring glory to their countries. The reality is that most suffer from the same character flaws as the rest of us.

    (Agence France Presse) August 9, 2016.

    IOC spokesman Mark Adams said the organisation encouraged free speech and had no plans to take action. However he said competitors had a right to compete "in tranquillity" and appealed to athletes to show respect to one another.

    "Clearly we want to encourage freedom of speech," he said. "But on the other hand of course the Olympics is about respecting others and respecting the right of others to compete," he added. "There is a line somewhere there, and each case is different of course, where people should be free to compete in tranquillity. So, yes, we would encourage people to respect their fellow competitors."

    Adams said the IOC had no plans to take action over the Horton-Sun spat. "People say many things after competition and they're entitled to say those things," he said. "At the moment we've had no complaints from anyone and no need to take it any further as far as we see."

    (News.com.au) August 10, 2016.

    Amanda Abates slip of the tongue comes off the back of an international feud after Aussie swimmer Mack Horton labelled Yang a drug cheat when he won gold in the 400 metre freestyle final on Saturday.

    Some big names of swimming are lining up to support Aussie gold medallist Mack Horton, with mounting backlash from China for calling one of its cheats, sorry, one of its stars a drug cheat, Abate said.

    Her co-host was quick to step in. Slip of the tongue with Sun Yang? he said, adding that it happens.

    I definitely didnt mean that, but look everyone, it is a talking point, Abate added. She took to Twitter soon after the awkward slip up.

    A number of social media users went straight in for the attack with Abate pleading with people not to troll her.


    - Chinese swimmer Fu Yuanhui is the new social media darling (see Shanghaiist). With respect to the Sun Yang flap, Fu said on video interview: "When I saw that, I was very upset. This was a smear. How can Horton say that about Brother Yang. But it is pointless for me to say anything here. I cannot say anything. If I made a rebuttal, wouldn't that make me the same as them? ... At the time, I also thought it would be delightful if I can also defeat the Australians. But I have nothing to do with those backstroke swimmers. We cannot transfer our anger at others. Nevertheless I still think that they went too far. How can they say that? Brother Yang works very hard. He is an excellent athlete. He did not cheat. Not all athletes take drugs. Many people think that if you excel, you must be taking drugs. But that is not true."

    - (Bastille Post) The insane level of popularity of Fu Yuanhui in mainland China showed that there has been a major shift in individual values. Thirty years ago, if a Chinese athlete behaved like Fu Yuanhui today, she would be criticized viciously for disgraceful conduct. At the 1988 Seoul Olympics, Li Ning fell down from the ring apparatus and lost the gold medal. He returned to China surreptitiously because he felt so guilty about letting everybody down. Today as the economy develops, social values have changed. While mainlanders still have the competitive spirit, they also value happiness and self-expression. In the case of Fu Yuanhui, nobody minds that she only tied for a bronze medal. Instead, they love her because she exudes a happy spirit. But even as the social attitudes in China become better, why are things getting worse in Hong Kong? Why is everything here embroiled in bitterness?

    - The Commies are masters at manipulative propaganda. As you remember, police interrogators come in as a pair, one good cop partnered with one bad cop. Sun Yang is the big bad bully, while Fu Yuanhui is the cutie-pie sweetheart. In truth, both are just as ugly and evil. Once you open the candy wrappings, poison is inside. Beware!

    (SCMP) August 12, 2016.

    Hong Kongs Geoffrey Cheah won his heat at the Rio Olympics and then felt the need to unburden himself of issues that have been troubling him also taking a swipe at China for allowing their star swimmer Sun Yang to continue competing after a doping suspension.

    Cheah, whose fathers cancer has affected his build-up to the Rio Games, won an Asian Games bronze in 2014 but never stood on the podium. He only received his medal after South Korean Park Tae-hwan was caught cheating.

    I feel pretty sad that it feels like people dont respect the doping rules, said Cheah, who clocked 22.46 seconds in his 50m freestyle heat but was unable to reach the next round. They feel like theyre above the rules.

    I know its two years ago but Im someone who gets the short end of the stick. I didnt get my chance to stand on the podium at the Asian Games, added Cheah as he unleashed years of pent-up frustration.

    Also, I dont see how its acceptable that [Chinas] Sun Yang can serve a three-month secret suspension and show up at the Asian Games and Olympics as if everything is fine. You cant even train during suspensions.

    - With a time of 22.46, Geoffrey Cheah finished in 32nd place. Only the top 16 advanced to the semi-finals. If you eliminate the suspected drug cheats (#1 Ukraine, #6 Russia, #20 China, #28 Russia, #30 China), Cheah is still far from qualifying. His personal best is 22.39. The world record is 20.91.

    - In Hongkongese, there is a saying about people who shift the blame: "If you are unable to defecate, you blame the ground for being too hard; if you are unable to urinate, you blame the wind for being too strong." In any case, it is always someone else's fault and never your own. Thus Geoffrey Cheah got his ass whipped because the 31 swimmers in front of him are drug cheats. (P.S. I know that they tested clean, but you know how FINA/WADA works!)

    - Geoffrey Cheah showed us the reason why Fu Yuanhui has become the most popular athlete at the Rio Olympics!

    - Geoffrey Cheah has good "sour grapes" company in Hope Solo.

    Hope Solo has had an interesting Olympics to put it mildly. Before the Games had even started she had alienated many people in the host country by posing with anti-mosquito gear, a reference to the problems Brazil is experiencing with the Zika virus.

    That led to the USA goalkeeper being taunted with cries of Zika at every goalkick by Brazilian fans during the World Cup. She then made two errors as the US drew with Colombia in their final group game of the tournament.

    On Friday, she really stepped things up. As the US faced a penalty that would see them crash out of the tournament to Sweden in shoot-out, Solo claimed she needed to change her gloves. That forced Lisa Dahlkvist to wait a few minutes to take her spot-kick, an uncomfortably long time at such a crucial moment. The Swede scored anyway and the defending champions were out.

    Solo did not take kindly to the defeat. I thought we played a courageous game. I thought we had many opportunities on goal, she said. I think we showed a lot of heart. We came back from a goal down, Im very proud of this team. And I also think we played a bunch of cowards. The best team did not win today, I strongly, firmly believe that.

    Solo was asked to clarify her comments and said her issue with the Swedes stemmed from their style of play. They didnt want to open play. They didnt want to pass the ball. They didnt want to play great soccer. It was a combative game, a physical game ... And they tried to counter with longballs.

    The goalkeeper was also dismissive of Swedens chances going ahead. I dont think theyre going to make it far in the tournament. I think it was very cowardly. But they won, they moving on and were going home.

    She told Sports Illustrateds Grant Wahl that she was proud of her team-mates. Tonight Sweden found a way to beat us. Nevertheless, I am so proud of the way we played tonight, our fight, our heart, and the skill we showed. Things dont always go the way you want them to. Such is life, and such is sport.

    There was widespread criticism of Solo on social media following her comments. She later admitted on Twitter that losing sucks. Im really bad at it.

    The Sweden coach, Pia Sundhage, led the US to gold and the 2008 and 2012 Olympics and was dismissive of Solos outburst. I dont give a crap, she told reporters after the game. Im going to Rio, shes going home.

    - The biggest cowards in history were the Viet Cong who defeated the Americans with their cowardly tactics:

    (Urban Dictionary) Viet-Cong

    The Viet-Cong were cowardly soldiers fighting America, Australia, South Korea and Canada among other white nations. The Viet-Cong fought on behalf of international communism and were financed and equipped by the giant commie powers of USSR and China. They fought in a cowardly manner in that while we all wore military uniforms but they pretended to be ordinary citizens of the RVN during the day, but they would go out at night or whenever they had a chance to try to kill us using cowardly methods such as concealed land mines on trails we would be likely to use, and setting grenades to go off with trip wires, and concealing sharpened punji sticks covered with their own shit to cause foot injuries in the feet of the GI's. For a time, before we blocked them, they used little kids to drop grenades into the gas tanks of GI vehicles. The grenade had the pin pulled with the triggering lever held down only by a rubber band.

    Despite all their backing and their treacherous butchery, the Viet-Cong were so thoroughly dominated by our forces that they had to sign off in 1973 on the Paris Peace Treaty as the only way to get us out of there. After that they proved their treachery once again so that as soon as all of us GI's were gone in reliance on the 1973 treaty, also signed by "North Vietnam", they re-invaded the south in 1975 with massive military power provided to them again by international communist assholes. Too bad for them all that communism was subsequently shown to be a demonic failure as a governmental system.

    (Sydney Morning Herald) April 7, 2007.

    Below a list of Australian Drug scandals. Sort your own business out before you give lectures to others!

    1 Dean Capobianco

    Australian track champion Dean Capobianco tested positive to steroids in 1996. His excuse? I ate too much contaminated red meat.

    2 Ian Thorpe

    His belly was chunky, he didn't want to swim anymore, so then Ian Thorpe retired. The five-time Olympic gold medallist gave up the chlorine life and was happily retired until he read L'Equipe this week. The newspaper revealed that Thorpe had returned a drugs test that showed an elevated level of testosterone and a hormone that may be used to mask testosterone. Drug testing officials, however, believe he will be found to have no case to answer.

    3 Nathan Baggaley

    A sip of steroid-laden juice from the family fridge caused Olympic kayaker Nathan Baggaley to be suspended from his sport for 15 months in 2005. Baggaley's defence to testing positive to drugs was that his brother, a country rugby union player recovering from a cracked rib, had mixed the drugs with juice and put it in the fridge. The excuse didn't wash with the judge. Recently, Baggaley got into more trouble after police allegedly found a drug-making pill press and a quantity of ecstasy at his Gold Coast home.

    4 Carol Gaudie

    Canberra netballer Carol Gaudie claimed she was a victim of drink-spiking. Gaudie tested positive to testosterone in 2002 but blamed an unknown person who may have spiked her drink in an attempted date rape at a night club in Kingston the night before the test. In the end Gaudie was banned for two years for the positive testosterone test.

    5 Shane Warne

    Warne's mum blamed herself for the positive drug test that nearly ended her son's career. Brigitte Warne said she gave the Australia's leg-spinner a diuretic tablet on the eve of his return from injury to the Australian one-day team in 2003. The chairman of the World Anti-Doping Agency, Dick Pound, was unimpressed with Warne's explanation that his mum had given him a banned tablet. "Poisoned by his mother? It is good, very good. It ranks up there with the one 'I got it from the toilet seat'," Pound said.

    6 Ben Tune

    In March 2001, Tune tested positive to the banned substance probenecid which is a drug used to increase the effects of antibiotics. However, for Tune, and not to his or his doctor's knowledge, probenecid is on the list of banned substances because it can mask the presence of steroids in the system. When the positive test was announced a year later, the Australian Rugby Union successfully avoided a ban and the International Rugby Board later ruled that Tune was free to play for the Wallabies.

    7 Wendell Sailor

    Cocaine ended Sailor's rugby career. He was banned for two years after he returned a positive test this time last year and that's meant more time for dancing. Sailor's recently starred on Dancing With The Stars television series. While he has been cha-cha-ing away, he has made it clear he wants to play again but this time back in the code of rugby league.

    8 Samantha Riley

    It was a headache tablet that caused a lot of headaches for swimmer Samantha Riley. In 1995 Riley's coach Scott Volkers gave her the pill which contained the banned substance dextropropoxyphene. Riley tested positive after taking the tablet during the 1995 world shortcourse championships and said the incident had a "huge impact" on her performances at the Atlanta Olympics. The then breaststroke world record-holder failed to win gold.

    9 Mark Bosnich

    Apparently a woman spiked his champagne with cocaine and that's why goalkeeper Mark Bosnich tested positive to the drug in 2002. The woman denied deliberately spiking Bosnich's drink, but said she might have put cocaine in his glass by accident while they were sharing a bottle of champagne in a London nightclub. This explanation did not get Bosnich off the hook and he was subsequently suspended from football for nine months.

    10 Ben Cousins

    The West Coast Eagles star has been troubled by a drug addiction for some time and is in rehab in the US. Cousins is recovering from his suspected $3000-a-week drugs habit in a luxury rehab centre in California. The 28-year-old and the AFL are said to be forking out $180,000 for the 60-day program.

    And please check out the doping incidences of Russia and China versus Australia, United States and United Kingdom.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) August 11, 2016.

    Facebook commentators are speculating if the Hong Kong German Consulate Generals word of the week was a reference to the Chinese swimmer Sun Yang and his now famous phrase in 1500 metres, I am the king I am the new world.

    Sun said the words when asked if he would beat rival Mack Horton at their next event, following Hortons controversial remark that he had no time or respect for drug cheats. Sun tested positive in 2014 for using a banned stimulant, which he said was prescribed for heart palpitations.

    Following Hortons remark, Chinese people took to Weibo to demand an apology from the Australian swimmer. The Chinese swim team also condemned Hortons words, saying: we think his inappropriate words greatly hurt the feelings between Chinese and Australian swimmers. It is proof of a lack of good manners and upbringing. We strongly demand an apology from this swimmer.

    The consulates word of the week was the verb sich entschuldigen, to apologise, and the accompanying sentence was he must apologise to the king! The post received 15,000 likes and 412 shares by 5:20pm. One commenter asked in the comments section To the 1500m king? Another said to the King, to the new world.

    (RT) August 11, 2016.

    A Canadian sports commentator is facing a tsunami of outrage over his nasty and humiliating comments in which he said a young Chinese athlete died like a pig during an Olympic event.

    Byron MacDonalds analysis of 14-year-old Ai Yanhans fourth place finish at the womens 4x200m freestyle relay has outraged viewers of CBCs live Olympic coverage on Wednesday.

    Many called for the 66-year-old former swimmer to be fired for his disgusting public insult directed at the Chinese competitor.

    After Yanhan and her teammates missed out on a podium spot to Team Canada, MacDonald remarked that the teenager had dropped the ball before following up with a bizarre and needless barb.

    That little 14-year-old from China dropped the ball, baby. Too excited, went out like a stink and died like a pig, MacDonald said.

    An apology from the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation on Twitter and MacDonalds co-commentator has not quelled disgust across social media.

    A CBC statement later released to the National Post read: To be clear, Byrons comments were related to the swimmers performance, not to her as an individual. That said, they were inappropriate and an unfortunate choice of words and Byron is very sorry for what he said.

    YouTube: Olympic Commentator Says Chinese Swimmer DIED LIKE A PIG

    (Hong Kong Free Press) August 11, 2016.

    Localist groups are working together to live broadcast an Olympics badminton match between Hong Kong and China. It is not yet known what form of live broadcast, streaming or otherwise, will be used for the mixed doubles preliminaries match.

    ProgressUST of the University of Science and Technology, Hong Kong Indigenous, and the Channel i Hong Kong programme Self-determination hosted by Simon Sin will hold the live broadcast on Mong Koks Soy Street.

    In an announcement, Hong Kong Indigenous said: There are no live broadcasts of the Hong Kong teams competitions. Although everybody is happy when the country next door loses gold medals, only the Hong Kong team can represent Hongkongers.

    Sin, the events master of ceremonies and a Hong Kong independence supporter, said: I am thinking if at that time the viewers shout Down with China, Support the Hong Kong team, I am a Hongkonger, HK IS NOT CHINA, the scene would be very dramatic We need to let the international community, Chinese people, and everybody know that Hong Kong does not have a reason to support the Chinese team, he said.

    Chris Ng, a lawyer from the Progressive Lawyers Group, said if the groups were to stream the match, its legality would depend on the source and its license. However, he also said that the groups will need a license to broadcast in public places, although recent public broadcasting events like the 100Most awards were allowed to continue even though the organisers had not applied for one. It is not known if the localists case would be treated similarly.

    The Group A match will be between Chau Hoi-wah and Reginald Lee Chun-hei from Hong Kong, and Zhang Nan and Zhao Yunlei from China. The Hong Kong pair will also face Germany and Indonesia.

    - (Ta Kung Pao) August 12, 2016.

    According to Ming Pao, ProgressUST convener Lam Hin-hei said that this event is intended to separate Hongkongers from the Chinese. She said that it would be even better if this became a pro-Hong Kong independence rally.

    According to Ming Pao, Simon Sin said that they chose the badminton match between Hong Kong and China so that the people will realize that Hong Kong and China are in opposition to each other. He said that there is no reason for Hongkongers to support the Chinese team. He wants to show public opinion to the media.

    - According to the Badminton World Federation, the mixed doubles world rankings as of August 11, 2016 are:

    #1. Zhang/Zhao (China)
    #6. Xu/Ma (China)
    #8. Liu/Bao (China)
    #9. Lu/Huang (China)
    #16. Lee/Chau (Hong Kong)
    #21. Zheng/Chen (China)

    This match will be #1 versus #16. Why did they choose this one to broadcast live? So that they can throw bricks after the Hongkongers lose?

    (SCMP) August 12, 2016.

    A localist rally in Mong Kok got off to a quiet start on Friday evening, with about 50 participants sitting down at a road junction and more standing around to watch a live broadcast of an Olympic badminton match between Hong Kong and mainland China.

    Around 100 police officers were deployed to prevent any trouble, given concerns that the localists call for supporters to cheer on the home team against the national squad could inflame anti-mainland sentiment and incite violence.

    Three localist groups organised the gathering for 7pm at the junction of Nathan Road and Soy Street, a bustling shopping area, to watch the encounter.

    The same site was rocked by rioting in February involving one of the groups that organised the live broadcast. That organisation advocates Hong Kong independence and has had a member disqualified from the coming Legislative Council elections due to his political stance.

    Sources with knowledge of the police operation told the Post more than 100 officers would be deployed at the Mong Kok site, most of them from the Police Tactical Unit. Some plainclothes officers were also to be present.

    Police assessments of the event showed the risk of trouble was not high, but another source said officers at the site would carry out stop-and-search operations if necessary. Outside Mong Kok, hundreds of officers are ready to be deployed in the event of any problem, he said, adding that about 170 from the Kowloon West emergency unit could also be mobilised if necessary.

    Despite the police presence, Lydia Lam Hin-hei, one of the organisers and convenor of University of Science and Technology student group ProgressUST, said the purpose of the broadcast was only to unite Hong Kong people in supporting the local team. Our purpose is not to incite conflict between Hong Kong and China, Lam said.

    The organisers said they had not applied for a letter of no objection from police for the gathering because it was a leisure activity. But the police sources said it was possible officers would look into whether the organisers could face arrest for unlawful assembly.

    Lams group and the other two co-organisers Hong Kong Indigenous, which took part in the Mong Kok riot in February, and Hong Kong independence advocate Simon Sin Wai-yin said the outdoor screening of the match was to let the international community, Chinese people and the public know there is no reason for Hongkongers to support the Chinese team. Lam said she expected about 100 people to attend the screening.

    The mixed doubles game between Chinas Zhang Nan and Zhao Yunlei and Hong Kongs Chau Hoi-wah and Reginald Lee Chun-hei started at 7pm, but TVBs live programming for the days Olympic events was originally not scheduled to start until 9pm.

    The organisers believed the local government had displayed a lack of support for the local team and that TVB, which secured the exclusive broadcast rights for the Olympics, had prioritised games involving the national team. Under pressure, the television station on Thursday night decided to broadcast the game.

    A TVB spokesman said on Friday the station had, due to great interest in the Hong Kong team, brought forward its broadcast schedule for the nightly Olympic events on its J5 channel to include more live coverage of games in which Hong Kong athletes are taking part. Co-organiser of the Mong Kok screening Simonson Sin said organisers would broadcast using the J5 channel. He said their lawyer believed this might not constitute an infringement of broadcasting rights because local restaurants often broadcast TVB programmes to the public. TVB has not made any comment on the broadcasting rights issue.

    As the Mong Kok screening began at 7pm, around 50 people sat down at the venue to show their support for the local badminton pair, cheering as they appeared on the court and when they won points.

    Alex Wan Chun-hang, a 27-year-old property management worker, said he was attending the event to show his discontent over TVBs selective broadcasting of the Olympics. I really like the Hong Kong team, Wan said. Its really a pity we cant see many of their games live. Wan said he supported one of the organisers, Hong Kong Indigenous, and that Hongkongers should protect their own culture and values.

    Mother Kat Hau and her husband brought along their seven-year-old son. Kat, who works in education and is a supporter of Hong Kong Indigenous, said she did not fear the night would end with trouble. We just finished dinner, so we thought we would come here to soak up the atmosphere, Kat said.

    The cheering fans were given blue pom-poms on sticks to wave in support of their Olympic pair. The majority of attendees were young or middle-aged, but there were also about a dozen elderly residents.

    Chiu Chor-chun, 60, said she came to support students and young people in their pursuit of localism. We need to support our own team and our own people, Chiu said. I have been supporting the young people since they started to ask for genuine universal suffrage two years ago. But Chiu said she did not support Hong Kong independence, saying it was not possible to realise such a status for the city.

    Tang Man-lai, 66, said he attended the event because he had thought TVB would not broadcast the match live. He said he came solely to watch the sports game and support the local team.

    Convenor of political party Youngspiration, Sixtus Baggio Leung Chun-hang, also joined the crowd to support the Hong Kong team. I just passed by, he said. He said he did not believe the night would descend into chaos. Its just Hongkongers supporting Hongkongers, he added.

    At times the crowd chanted: We are Hong Kong.

    - You read through the entire SCMP report and you won't find out who won. This is further evidence that politics trumps sports. But in case you are actually interested in the match outcome, here it is. It was over in under 40 minutes.

    Resistance Live Media video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WMfuJE5_w9s
    SocREC video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CyoHWc044lU

    (Wen Wei Po) August 13, 2016.

    The location was in the middle of bustling Mong Kok. Many citizens stopped to watch a few moments and left. Many said: 「搞乜鬼，阻住晒！」(What are they up to? Obstructing people!) Several dozen Hong Kong Indigenous and ProgressUST members and supporters sat on the ground and cheered whenever the Hong Kong team scored points. They also chanted: "Go Hong Kong!" and "We are Hong Kong!" Some pro-independence people also waved placards for Hong Kong independence. The Hong Kong team lost by 2-0 and the event was over in less than one hour. Lydia Lam said that the attendance was "more than expected." She said that she will hold more such events in the future to increase awareness of Hong Kong identity.

    South China Football Club chairman Wallace Cheung said that these organizations are hijacking the sporting events and their spirit to support Hong Kong and oppose the Chinese team. He said that it is perfectly okay to support the Hong Kong team, but this should not be simultaneously linked to opposing the Chinese national team. This is clearly politics hijacking sports, as was the case when Hong Kong and China played each other in the FIFA World Cup qualifying rounds.

    Cheung said that the Olympics are held in order for persons of different races and skin colors to come in and compete fairly in order to spread friendship, care and peace. It is not intended to spread hatred, war and killing. Cheung said that the fondness of the people of Hong Kong for their own team is being hijacked by the "false localists" as if Hongkongers are saying that they are not Chinese and thus increase conflicts between Hongkongers and mainlanders.


    Apple Daily: Many localist organizations organized a live broadcast in the Mong Kok street of the mixed doubles Hong Kong-China badminton match. 150 Hongkongers were drawn to the scene to cheer for the Hong Kong athletes. Although the Hong Kong team lost of China, the atmosphere was warm and excited. After the match, the citizens chanted slogans such as "We are Hong Kong" (in English) and "Hong Kong is awesome" aloud.

    - Where do they get their 150 from? They included all the reporters and photographers. Of course.

    - I watched the videos carefully. There were about 60 persons seated on the ground. Those outside the group are mostly reporters and photographers, because they are looking at the audience and not at the screen. Even if you count the number of standing spectators, there can't be more than 100 persons.

    - Ten times as many people were out at Morse Park (Wong Tai Sin) trying to capture Pokemon GO virtual creatures.

    - Oops, they forgot to count the 300 policemen.

    - And what was that about the 'many' localist organizations. There were two persons (Lydia Lam Hin-hei and Simon Sin) representing three groups (Hong Kong Indigenous, ProgressUST and the third 'group' goes by the name "Simon Sin").

    - Excuse me, my English skills not so good. Please explain me meaning of "We are Hong Kong"?

    - (SCMP) Lydia Lam Hin-hei, co-organiser and convenor of the University of Science and Technology student group ProgressUST, denied accusations that they tried to incite conflict. Irrespective of whether we held this event or not, there have to be identity conflicts, she said. Many people really feel they are Hongkongers instead of Chinese and want to support the Hong Kong team.

    - "Many people really feel that they are Hongkongers instead of Chinese." True enough. But it is also true that some people think that they are Chinese instead of Hongkonger, or Chinese Hongkonger, of Hongkonger Chinese, or Hongkonger of Chinese descent, etc.

    "Many people want to support the Hong Kong team." True enough. But it is also true that some people support the Chinese team, others support the American, Australian, British, French teams etc and still others only support the best athletes and not any specific team.

    Using 'and' is questionable. One can feel like a Chinese Hongkonger or a Hongkong Chinese or a Chinese and still support the Hong Kong team. One can support the Hong Kong team without giving a damn about artificially created identities.

    Besides Hongkongers have scorned at the lack of individual freedom in China because of the social pressure for all Chinese to support the Chinese (whether in sports or anything else). Why do Hongkongers want to do exactly the same thing to themselves? Please allow some room for people who feel that they are Hongkongers instead of Chinese to appreciate the best athletes wherever their countries of origin.

    - And like The Man Who Loves Women, some Hongkongers loves many teams at different times and places.

    - Given that the match was a 30-minute blowout, should TVB have broadcast it live?  And did it please the street audience to see the Hong Kong team being blown away by the Chinese? Do they think that TVB should broadcast all the events in which Hong Kong athletes participate? Do they think that the people of Hong Kong must see Geoffrey Cheah finish in 32nd place in the preliminary round of the 50m freestyle swim instead of Almaz Ayana (Ethiopia) breaking the longstanding 10,000m track record set by the Chinese athlete Wang Junxia in 1993?

    - Cable TV sports commentator Lee Tak-nang:

    Somebody has called for an assembly in the street to watch the mixed doubles badminton game. I found it regrettable and disappointing.
    Just ask yourselves: Are you really there to support the Hong Kong athletes?

    Athletes are very simple people. They need to concentrate on both their training and competition.
    When they know that their participation is being tied to political goals, it will only be disruptive. There cannot be any positive meanings.

    At this moment, Hong Kong has freedom of speech. I know that I cannot stop any such activity.
    But I want you to think about the innocent athletes who have worked for so many years to get this possibly once-in-a-lifetime chance to compete.

    How could you use the athletes as your political tools? Can your conscience live with it?

    Please think this over. If you want to pillory, criticize and vent, come at me. Please leave the athletes alone.

    - (SCMP) August 13, 2016.

    Olympian Chau Hoi-wah did not share the sentiments of her supporters back home. We are friends of China and all the players and others around the world, Chau said. I dont think people should politicise sport.

    Asked if she felt the rally organisers were using her for political gain, Choi said: No, theres nothing we can do about it. People are free to do what they want.

    Women's Volleyball at the 2016 Summer Olympics

    Results

    Preliminary round: Pool B

    August 6: Netherlands defeated China 3-2 (25-23, 21-25, 18,24, 25-22, 15-13)

    August 8: China defeated Italy 3-0 (25-21, 25-21, 25-16)

    August 10: China defeated Puerto Rico 3-0 (25-20, 25-17, 25-18)

    August 12: Serbia defeated China 3-0 (25-19, 25-19, 25-22)

    August 14: United States defeated China 3-1 (22-25, 25-17, 25-19, 25-19)

    - China lost the match against the Netherlands because they couldn't handle the booing from the Brazilian fans. As soon as the booing came, they committed many unforced errors. China just could not handle the pressure. They are just a bunch of jungle monkeys.

    - This is embarrassing as China simply could not handle the traditional volleyball powers (Netherlands, United States) or even the upstart Serbia. They only managed to beat the minions Puerto Rico and Italy, and squeezed through to the Knockout Stage as the fourth and last qualifier with a losing record of 2-3.

    - As the fourth and last qualifier in Pool B, China will meet the top qualifier Brazil in the Knockout Stage. Brazil is also the host country and the stadium will be filled with an enthusiastic partisan crowd. China will be booed and booed, just as in Hong Kong. So we can expect the cowardly Chinese to make a quick exit in the next match.

    Quarter-finals

    August 16: China defeated Brazil 3-2 (15-25, 25-23, 25-22, 22-25, 15-13)

    - In the middle of this game, China lost its composure once more and made many unforced service errors. But it was Brazil that gave the match away with unforced service errors in the end. The Chinese were lucky, because they really don't deserve to win. Brazil was robbed in front of a home crowd.

    - In the next match, China will meet the Netherlands who defeated them handily on the first day. So the Chinese will make an exit, albeit later than expected.

    Semi-finals

    August 18: China defeated the Netherlands 3-1 (27-25, 23-25, 29-27, 25-23)

    - Although the scores seemed close, China always looked to be in control. The Dutch never looked like they could string together a series of consecutive points to win a set.

    - Unfortunately, the United States was upset by Serbia in the other semi-final. It would have pleased me greatly to see the United States wipe out China in the final.

    - The Americans lost? I am not so sure yet, because Team America can always file an appeal to the International Olympics Committee to disqualify the Chinese and let the Americans play for the gold medal instead (see Women's 4x100m relay).

    - Hey, track and field is a contact sport (see Liu Xiang versus Dayron Robles) -- except when Americans are touched.

    - In the gold medal match, China will meet Serbia which had defeated China 3-0 in the preliminary round. In that earlier match, China could find no answer to the taller Serbian players. It was babies versus giants. This is an insurmountable physical deficit. So China will get a silver medal, which exceeds expectations for a team of cowards who couldn't handle the pressure.

    Gold medal match

    August 20: China defeated Serbia 3-1 (19-25, 25-17, 25-22, 25-23)

    - China settled down after losing the first set, and cruised through the next three sets. The Chinese changed formations/tactics to handle the taller Serbian players.

    - If you can't defeat China in the field, you can always insult them with the incorrect flag. How else can you explain that this happened again?

    - "He who laughs last, laughs longest," so goes the idiom. Chinese coach Lang Ping said that her team persisted through the matches that begun at 9am or 10pm. She said, "Those who persist get the last laugh."

    - Lang Ping is a naturalized American citizen who once coached the US National Team to defeat China in the 2008 Olympics. Therefore China is hiring an American to coach them. Any glory belongs to America.

    - Lang Ping may have coached the US National Team once upon a time but she was and still is a Chinese citizen. It was the Americans who hired a Chinese coach to help them in 2008, so the glory of that 2008 silver medal belongs to China.

    - Lang Ping gave up a USD 2 million coaching job to take over the Chinese National Team for 500 RMB. Meanwhile the team members on the Hong Kong 'national' team all want to play in the Chinese Premier League for the big bucks. So do you know the true meaning of patriotism?

    - Wake up, Lang Ping may have spent many years coaching in the United States. But she still holds her Chinese citizenship and passport.

    Badminton: Men's Singles

    Gold medal: Chen Long (China)

    Silver medal: Lee Chong Wei (Malaysia)

    Bronze medal: Viktor Axelsen (Denmark)

    Fourth place: Lin Dan (China)

    - The most interesting part is that all four of them speak Chinese!

    Here is Viktor Axelsen being interviewed on CCTV5 in putonghua after losing to Chen Long in the semi-final. He has been learning putonghua for a couple of years. He started to learn in order to communicate directly with the Chinese players and to understand Chinese strategies. He is popular in China and has a weibo account.

    Here is Lee Chong Wei speaking perfect putonghua on CCTV. He was also interviewed speaking perfect Cantonese on TVB. And then there is the part that really upsets Hong Kong localists:

    When the Chinese national anthem was played, Lee Chong Wei sang along. Quelle horreur!

    (EJ Insight) Why Olympics will no longer serve to promote patriotism in HK. By SC Yeung. August 9, 2016.

    The Olympic Games used to be an effective tool for the authorities to promote patriotism in Hong Kong.

    There was a time not too long ago when Hong Kong people felt mighty proud when Chinas national anthem was played as the countrys flag was raised during the medal awarding ceremonies.

    When Chinese athletes visited the territory after their rich harvest of gold medals in Sydney Olympics in 2000, they were welcomed as conquering heroes in the city.

    But in the current Rio Olympics, Hong Kong people dont seem to display that kind of national fervor anymore.

    Instead, many even sniffed at Chinas delegation for not winning medals on the first day of the games, and accused local media of showing bias in favor of the Chinese athletes in their coverage.

    On social media, Hong Kong netizens say they prefer to watch the games on foreign cable channels because they could not stand the local coverage which displays blind loyalty to the Chinese team.

    For example, Television Broadcasts, the exclusive Olympics broadcaster in Hong Kong, chose to broadcast a womens volleyball match involving Chinas team but failed to air a womens table tennis game in which a Hong Kong athlete was playing.

    Many Hong Kong netizens accused TVB of trying to promote patriotism by focusing on Chinese athletes while failing to cover events where Hong Kong athletes were competing.

    On the first day of the games last Friday, Chinese shooter Du Li, a gold medal hopeful, was defeated by her US rival.

    Many were bewildered when local media came up with this headline: China lost its first gold medal on the first day of the games.

    Thats ridiculous. It implies that China was supposed to win the gold medal but didnt. The simple, undeniable fact is that the honor didnt belong to any player until the competition ended.

    Local netizens made fun of the headline by posting a crime report, saying that Du lost her gold medal in Brazil and urged the police to investigate the case.

    On Monday, Hong Kong netizens tried to balance the local medias heavily biased coverage by posting news stories on gold medal winners from Taiwan, Vietnam and Kosovo.

    There is also the mystery about the flawed version of the Chinese flag that was raised during the medal ceremonies in the first few days of the games.

    The blunder drew the ire of Chinese people, who immediately assailed the games organizers for committing what appeared, based on their virulent reactions, to be an unpardonable sin.

    CCTV anchor Cui Yongyan was among the first to point out the mistake, saying that the Chinese flag cannot have such an error.

    When the error was still not corrected the following day, Cui wrote on his Weibo account: The first gold medal ceremony was moving, the national anthem was pleasing to hear, but the flag still had a small defect, the same as before. I dont want to keep obsessively, compulsively bringing this up, but this is the national flag. Its something you have to pay particular attention to This is a concept that even primary school students should be able to understand.

    The reaction from Hong Kong was comparatively moderate. Its probably because Hong Kong people did not allow patriotism to get the better of them.

    After all, if there was anyone to blame its the officials in the Chinese delegation who should have checked all the preparations and paraphernalia to be used before the games.

    Then theres the rivalry between Chinese swimmer Sun Yang and his Australian rival Mack Horton.

    Horton made an issue of Sun testing positive for a performance-enhancing drug in 2014 and splashing water in his lane during a training session.

    Sun, after losing to Horton in the 400 meter freestyle event, proclaimed that he is still the king of the 1,500 meter freestyle event.

    Meanwhile, Chinese state media quickly came to Suns defense, calling Australia uncivilized and Britains offshore prison.

    So much for the Olympics being a showcase of sportsmanship and world camaraderie.

    All this trash talk is not doing any good to Chinas image as a rising world power.

    And such an attitude certainly doesnt provide a good example for Hong Kong youngsters, or promote patriotism in the city.

    Chinas performance in Rio wont serve to remove the anti-mainland sentiment that has grown in the city.

    Beijing itself has fostered that negative sentiment by pushing the national education curriculum, by refusing to allow genuine universal suffrage in the 2017 chief executive election, and by implementing various measures that undermine the citys core values.

    Many Hong Kong people simply dont care how Chinese athletes perform as a whole in the Olympics.

    In fact, their interest in the games have gained a wider perspective. They appreciate the participation of refugees in the games and the victory of North Korea and Kosovo in some of the events.

    Before the Olympics kicked off in Brazil last Friday, Home Affairs Secretary Lau Kong-Wah said the government would invite some of Chinas gold medalists to the city to share their joy with the Hong Kong public, as well as to receive prizes from local sponsors.

    About 16 years ago, such a gesture would have been well received by the public.

    But now, many Hong Kong people suspect that the Chinese athletes would only be used by the administration to support the pro-establishment candidates in the Legislative Council election next month.

    If at all, the Olympic Games are helping Hong Kong people understand and appreciate the wonders and diversity of the world, but the government seems to want to limit our vision to China.

    Okay, you get the idea that nobody in Hong Kong cares about the Chinese Olympians. But then I read this:

    (Oriental Daily) August 22, 2016.

    The Chinese Olympics gold medalists will visit Hong Kong August 27-29. Performance tickets went on public sale this morning. There are 5,700 tickets for the three shows. Each ticket costs HKD 20 and each citizen is limited to purchasing 2 tickets per person. At the Hong Kong City Hall, there were 800 people queuing up at 9am. At the Hong Kong Cultural Centre, there were 500 queuing up at 9am. By noon, all tickets were sold out at these two venues as well as at the Sha Tin City Hall. By 1pm, Tuen Mun City Hall had sold out as well.

    Mr. Lee was first in line outside the Hong Kong Cultural Centre. He said that he began at 11am the previous day. He said that that he wants the tickets for his parents who love table tennis. He said, "It is worthwhile. Nothing else matters when your parents are happy."

    - You can talk all you want, but the body is the most honest.

    - I don't understand why the American team was not invited to come here. After all, they won the highest number of medals. I really want to see Ryan Lochte and company. And I want the US Women's 4x100m relay team to run a solo race in Hong Kong too.

    - Well, you can try to invite the American team. They will probably ask for $100 million in appearance fees, and that would be what you call a White Elephant Image project.

    - Or they could have invited the Japan team instead. I love that Ai Fukuhara chick!

    - Why? Because she speaks putonghua with a cute Northeastern accent that was acquired from her apprenticeship with the Liaoning provincial table tennis team.

    - (EJ Insight) August 23, 2016.

    The LCSD began selling 5,700 tickets for the events, offering them at HK$20 each, with counters put up at the Hong Kong City Hall, Sha Tin Town Hall, Tuen Mun Town Hall and the Hong Kong Cultural Centre in Tsim Sha Tsui.

    The tickets were sold out within hours after the counters opened at 10am Monday. Many people began queuing up Sunday night itself, with some mainlanders also making special trips to Hong Kong to snap up the tickets, the Hong Kong Economic Journal reported. Some scalpers sought to make a quick buck, putting the tickets on sale on the Taobao online platform as much as 1,000 yuan (HK$1,165).  

    Expressing concern over such activities, the LCSD is said be collecting evidence and forwarding it to the related departments for follow-up action. The department pointed out that people who failed to obtain the tickets can still watch the demonstration events live on TV.

    The final list of participating gold medalists will be known after the Chinese Olympic Committee takes a decision. According to Sing Tao Daily, swimmer Fu Yuanhui, who won the hearts of many people with her candid remarks following her Olympic success, is among the confirmed participants in the Hong Kong events.

    - Who is coming to see the Chinese gold medalists? Of course, there are the Chinese patriots. But most Hongkongers are pragmatic. They like the Chinese women's volleyball team because of its indomitable spirit irrespective of their national origins. Conversely, if that team sucks, nothing can make the Hongkongers come out to watch them.

    - But we have to wonder where the valiant warriors will be. The invasion of the gold medal locusts was clearly arranged by the Central Propaganda Department to brainwash the people of Hong Kong. Shouldn't the valiant warriors guard the gates, keeping Chinese citizens out and arresting Hong Kong residents for being traitors? But then you have to look at the numbers. When a Chinese tourist comes around with luggage in tow, the ten valiant warriors will surround and harass. Even when Hong Kong students hold a debate competition, the ten valiant warriors show up to heckle because the Chief Secretary is a guest of honor. But now we have a Communist propaganda show with 5700 attendees who queued up all day and all night to pay $20 to buy tickets. Will they tolerate the efforts of the ten valiant warriors to stop the show?

     (SCMP) August 10, 2016.

    More than 60 per cent of the University of Hong Kongs students would vote for the citys independence in a recent poll, up from 37 per cent just two years ago.

    That was according to Undergrad, the universitys student magazine, which interviewed 385 students from June to July on their political views.

    The poll also discovered that while 43 per cent of the students still believe in Beijings one country, two systems policy is the most suitable political framework for the city, the figure has decreased by 25 percentage points compared to two years ago.

    Now, 41 per cent say independence is the best system for Hong Kong, compared to only 15 per cent in 2014 however, when asked if a vote on Hong Kongs independence was held tomorrow, 61 per cent said they would vote in favour, even if Beijing would not recognise the result. Sixty-five per cent said they would vote for independence if Beijing did recognise the decision.

    When asked if they would support an armed revolution to achieve Hong Kongs independence, 31 per cent said yes while 50 per cent said no. This question was asked for the first time this year.

    The revelations came amid a political storm triggered by election officials disqualification of Hong Kong Indigenous leader Edward Leung Tin-kei, an HKU student, and five other localists from the Legislative Councils September poll because of their pro-independence stance.

    Asked which political figure could represent them, Leung came first with only 9.9 per cent, while radical lawmaker Wong Yuk-man and Civic Partys Alvin Yeung Ngok-kiu came second and third with 3.6 per cent and 2.6 per cent respectively however, 71.7 per cent said no political figure could represent them.

    Asked which political group could represent them, Leungs Hong Kong Indigenous came first with 19.2 per cent, while the Civic Party came second with 12.5 per cent 44.7 per cent said no group could represent them.

    Forty-eight per cent of the respondents identified themselves as supporters of the localists, while 25 per cent said they are pan-democrat supporters - a drop from 61 per cent in 2014. The localists were not an option in the poll two years ago.

    In January last year, Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying hit out directly at university student leaders at the start of his annual policy address, attacking them for advocating independence in Undergrad. He also criticised a book published by Undergrad in September 2014 entitled Hong Kong Nationalism.

    The opinion poll results were published in the latest issue of the magazine, which also contained several articles arguing for the citys independence.

    Asked if it is necessary to participate in political activities and express opinion in a peaceful, rational and non-violent manner, 48 per cent said no, while 41 said yes. It was a sharp contrast to the results in 2014, when 76 per cent supported the peaceful, rational and non-violent principle, and only 21 said the otherwise.

    Internet comments:

    - Undergrad said that 385 students were interviewed. Fine, but there is no description of methodology. Here are some methodological questions:

    - Is a sample size of 385 adequate? If 31% out of 385 said that they support an armed revolution to achieve Hong Kong's independence, then the 95% confidence interval is plus/minus 5% (that is, between 26% and 36%). However you look it it, this is a big number.

    - Who are these 385 students? Were they randomly selected from the undergraduate population such that their responses can be said to be representative? Or were they selected from a non-random sample? For example, did the pro-independence Undergrad editors just tell their friends to fill out this survey questionnaire?

    - What was the response rate? Did they send out 20,000 emails and got only these 385 back? If so, there could be a self-selection bias caused by the content of the survey (see, for example, Hong Kong By The Numbers).

    - Undergrad said that the 385 students had been 'invited' to participate. So this is not going to be a random sample.

    - (Oriental Daily) August 9, 2016.

    According to Hong Kong University Student Union's publication Undergrad, 385 HKU students were interviewed June-July. 60% of the interviewees support Hong Kong independence, which is 24% higher than 2 years ago. 41% think that the best Hong Kong political system is Hong Kong becoming an independent nation. 31% said that they support armed revolution to achieve Hong Kong independence. 34% believe that Hong Kong will become independent.

    When asked which methods of resistance should be used, the students ranked from high to low: labor strike; occupying major government buildings; blocking major roads; class strike; tossing petrol bombs; attacking major Chinese Communist political figures in Hong Kong; throwing rocks/garbage; self-immolation; hunger strike. The methods best suited for Hong Kong are labor strike; occupying major government buildings; assembly/demonstration, etc.

    - Why is class strike ranked not so highly? When they tried it early this year Hong Kong University Student Strike, they got fewer than 300 student strikers. If they call for yet another class strike, there will be even fewer people because the last one was known to be a dismal failure already. The problem is that a class strike costs the students in terms of lost time and money. If you miss too many classes, you will have to repeat the courses and pay for the extra tuition/room/board.

    - Why is labor strike ranked so highly? Because it doesn't cost the students anything if the whole city goes on strike indefinitely. The students don't work and most of them don't have to support their families.

    - So it is peculiar that they rank occupying major government buildings/roads so highly. It is easy to occupy government buildings/roads. You mobilize 200 people and you can charge in to take over any building or road. That is easy as pie. The problem is how long you intend to stay. If you stay for a long time, it means that you cannot attend class and therefore it will cost you just like the class strike.

    So they must be assuming, as in Occupy Central, that they will lead the charge and get the media limelight. Then they go back to class while other riffraffs will run the tent cities.

    - Attacking major Chinese Communist political figures in Hong Kong? How is this going to achieve Hong Kong independence? The major Chinese Communist political figures (such as China Liaison Office director Zhang Xiaoming) are just small fries in the Chinese Communist hierarchy, which reflects Hong Kong's lack of importance in their eyes. Throwing paper airplanes at them would be a joke. Throwing petrol bombs to kill them would put the Chinese Communists into an anti-terrorism mode with no concession ever to be given (as was the case with 9/11 in the United States). Article 18 of the Basic Law will be invoked to impose martial law in Hong Kong.

    - When 9/11 happened, President George Bush said that he had just hit the trifecta (war, national emergency and recession) because he can now do all the things that were not possible before: start wars in Afghanistan and Iraq; run huge budget deficits to spend the Clinton surplus; cut taxes on the rich; etc.

    - Self-immolations and hunger strikes aren't going to happen either, because they will be very very costly to the students. So this leaves throwing petrol bombs, rocks and garbage as the only concrete action let. And how is that going to bring in Hong Kong independence?

    - (SCMP) Lesson for Hong Kongs politicians: this is how you do a hunger strike. By Londen Lhatoo. August 12, 2016.

    We have hunger strikes here in Hong Kong too, but, by contrast, theyre feeble publicity attempts by veteran and budding politicians who are prone to separation anxiety when theyre kept away from food for too long.

    Our so-called hunger strikes can be farcical exercises in futility, with the concept of marathon fasting morphing conveniently into a relay system, in which participants working in shifts pass on the starving baton to reinforcements while they take a break to tank up.

    Remember student leader Joshua Wong Chi-fungs indefinite hunger strike during the Occupy protests of 2014? It lasted all of four days, and he gave up citing strong doctors advice and extreme physical discomfort. Government officials sat it out, smug in the knowledge that it would never get to the stage where they would be forced to the negotiating table.

    Democratic Party heavyweight Albert Ho Chun-yan, no pun intended, also staged an indefinite hunger strike for universal suffrage in 2014. It lasted all of 100 hours as a bout of diarrhoea combined with a mild headache prompted him to throw in the towel and pick up a plate.

    This is not an attack on the heroes of the pan-democratic camp. At least they try to go hungry in the name of democracy on occasion. Their pro-establishment rivals should try it, too for health reasons if not for politics. The amount of fasting involved in the cases of Wong and Ho was probably good for them in terms of detoxification.

    My Muslim friends do it all the time as part of their faith. They tell me it rejuvenates your body and helps you think clearly.

    - What is this armed revolution that they like to talk about? Why don't we concretely draw out a scenario with a call-to-arms?

    - Of course, you start with physical training. Here is the Civic Passion video:
    https://www.facebook.com/chankawairicky/videos/1045853305450032/

    And here is the Hong Kong garrison of the People's Liberation Army in hellish training:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Qk4Iu2ij10

    - Armed revolution is not some activist trying to jump on stage and seize the microphone to chant slogans (=sing karaoke); it is not someone throwing an egg at someone else. Armed revolution is Syria. Are you ready for it?

    - Hong Kong independence should start with Hong Kong University independence whereby all university decisions should be made by university people without any of those outside Council members. This begins by Hong Kong University giving up the subsidies from the University Grants Committee and let students pay with their own money.

    - But this isn't the same. The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region government subsidizes the universities through the University Grants Committee to the tune of $200,000+ per student per year. By contrast, the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region government is subsidizing the central government each year (for example, by buying Dongjiang River water).

    - But this isn't the whole truth. The central government also subsidizes the Hong Kong Special Administration Region in many ways. For example, the People's Liberation Army garrison is paid for by the central government. Places such as Taiwan or Singapore spend 2%-3% of GDP on military expenditure. Hong Kong spends nothing itself.

    - The title of this edition of Undergrad is 帝國瓦解 香港解殖 (The dissolution of the Empire, the decolonization of Hong Kong).

    If you know that the odds of you holding a successful armed revolution is nil, then you need to go to Plan B where everything is going to be handed to you on a plate. Instead of having to vanquish the 2 million People's Liberation Army in the battlefield, the Chinese Communist regime will collapse on its own. What used to be known as the People's Republic of China will dissolve into many small nations (Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan, Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia,Tibet, Tianjin, Hainan Island, etc). So we are all going to sit around and twiddle our thumbs, waiting for this to happen. In the interregnum, we will write more essays for Undergrad and ask for more donations more frequently from the general public.

    - (Wen Wei Po) August 12, 2016.

    The Hong Kong National Party has published a booklet to dispel certain popular misunderstandings about the feasibility of Hong Kong independence. For example, Hong Kong can import food from other countries and obtain water through desalination plants.

    A big question is: How do you become independent without an army? Is it all over when the People's Liberation Army marches in? Previously the problem with the pro-Hong Kong independence advocates is that they still want to avoid war. In truth, the complex urban terrain of Hong Kong with the large number of residential buildings and foreign-owned commercial buildings are very suitable for making ambushes and guerilla warfare.

    "Hong Kong can counter-attack by increasing the costs for China. We must hit back at Chinese interests in Hong Kong. We must not hesitate to sacrifice 100 of our own in order to kill 1000 of them. In any case, Hongkongers have nowhere left to go unless they immigrate overseas. Instead of letting the future generations become Chinese minions, we should seize the chance and fight the final scorched-earth battle."

    "A battle is not necessarily two armies facing off each other. It can be an endless number of ambushes. It may be that the family gets together to have dinner at home and then goes downstairs together to set fires to cars in the streets. They can force the People's Liberation of Army to abandon an entire district and use carpet bombing to kill everybody and destroy every building. That is one way to weaken the enemy. Everybody should let their creativity run free. There are many ways to conduct war."

    - "Force the People's Liberation Army to use carpet bombing to kill everybody and destroy every building in the district ..." I hope that includes you and your entire family.

    - "Sacrifice 100 of our own in order to kill 1000 of them ..." There are only 2,000,000 PLA soldiers. So if 200,000 Hongkongers sacrifice themselves at a 1-for-10 kill-ratio, the entire PLA will be wiped out and victory will be ours. But they will probably drop a nuclear bomb long before then to send Hong Kong back into the stone age and uninhabitable for several hundred thousand more years to come. That's unfortunate, but it was worth a try.

    - And you will be reporting on what happened from exile in the United States ...

    - "The family gets to have dinner at home and then goes downstairs together to set fires to cars in the street ..." Afterwards, the neighbors set up a watch group to look after their properties. When you try to do the same the next day, your entire family will be nabbed by an angry mob and hung from the lampposts.

    - Actually I don't mind as long as you set your own family car on fire.

    - They don't need carpet bombing. All they need is one low-tech barrel bomb dropped from a helicopter onto Sai Yeung Choi Street Street, Mong Kok district.

    - (SCMP) August 10, 2016.

    On Tuesday, HKUs Public Opinion Programme also released their latest poll on Hong Kong peoples view on Taiwans independence.

    Only 43.9 per cent object Taiwans independence, a new low since the survey started in 1993. Just over 28 per cent support Taiwans independence, down from 35 per cent five months ago a net rating of minus 15.3 percentage points, a new low since 1994.

    - These respondents are just the spectators who bring along their beer and peanuts. If Taiwan declares independence, they will just watch the show (Chinese missiles hitting Tsoying Naval Base and Chihhang Air Base in Taiwan; Taiwan missiles hitting Chinese missiles hitting Taipei 101; Taiwanese cruise missiles busting the Three Gorges Dam to drown millions of Chinese; Chinese nuclear bomb laying waste to Tainan; etc) and they have no personal stake in the outcome.

    - Taiwan has also promised to hit Hong Kong's IFC and ICC with cruise missiles. I am going to move my chair to the empty space in the West Kowloon Cultural District because this is the best seat in the house when the Taiwanese missiles hit Hong Kong.

    - (Wen Wei Po) March 30, 2017.

    In the latest issue of Undergrad, the lead article said that it is time for the Hong Kong independence movement to step back and store up its reserves. The time is to make preparations and sow radical ideas in order to wait for the China Meltdown to arrive after the Next Great Economic Depression. When that time comes, the forces of revolution will triumph over the forces of oppression.

    The essay said that "violent resistance cannot be avoided." But the cost of going to jail for ten years "too high". Thus, they want "violent resistance without any legal consequences"!

    Another Undergrad essay said that although the language of the people of Hong Kong have originated from Guangzhou, it has evolved into a unique language. It proposed a detailed goals and rules for The New Literature Movement in which the language of Hong Kong will be properly known as the Hong Kong Language and no longer referred to as the Guangdong dialect. "We must clearly separate Hong Kong Literature from Chinese Literature."

    (Hong Kong Free Press) August 8, 2016.

    Pro-independence Legislative Council election candidate Chan Chak-to, one of the few members of the camp who was allowed to run, has defended his stance once again at an election forum for the Kowloon East geographical constituency.

    The election forum hosted by Commercial Radio on Monday started off with a question from the hosts asking about candidates stances on independence. Chan said: I support Hong Kong independence its the only way out.

    He said he was very worried that returning officers may take action against him, but he denied that he made a false declaration in pledging to uphold the Basic Law. Is it violating the Basic Law to discuss independence or to advocate independence? Can a common citizen violate the Basic Law? It should not be possible.

    Chan advocates independence after 2047, when the Basic Laws promise of unchanged capitalism and way of life expires, the Kowloon East Community group candidate said.

    Is it a problem to talk about independence after 2047? I dont see any [problems], he said. Before 2047, we should have a wide discussion to let Hong Kong people understand[Chans time was up before he could finish his sentence].

    Chan, who recently started speaking out about his stance, was confirmed as a candidate after five were rejected for supporting independence or a return to the UK, in view of which returning officers considered them unable to genuinely uphold the Basic Law.

    Pro-Beijing camp candidate Patrick Ko Tat-pun, of the Voice of Loving Hong Kong, claimed that Chan was breaking Hong Kong law.

    After this programme ends, I can consider reporting you to the police station, Ko said, saying that Chan broke his pledge, and that inciting independence was a violation of the Basic Law.

    Chan was then questioned by the Federation of Trade Unions Wong Kwok-kin in a brief encounter.

    Wong: You speak Chinas Cantonese language, you use Chinese characters, you have Chinese blood, your ancestors roots are in China how would you achieve independence?

    Chan: I am a Hongkonger I dont know why you want to link me with China in any way.

    Wong: But you speak Mainland Chinas Cantonese language of the Guangdong Province, Mr. Chan.

    Chan: China uses Mandarin now they are now different from us.

    Wong: Guangdong Province uses Cantonese.

    Chan: Then what about Guangdong independence? Are you supporting Guangdong independence?

    Wong: Dont stray from the topic when we are talking about Hong Kong independence do you know where your roots are?

    Chan: My roots are in Hong Kong. I was born in Hong Kong The Communist Party is the one forgetting about its roots. Why did the Cultural Revolution happen? It happened in order to eradicate the Chinese culture of the past.

    Wong: Dont try to blame others

    Chan: Yes, I am using Hong Kongs culture

    Wong: What culture does Hong Kong have? The culture of Hong Kong is based on Chinese culture.

    Chan: So you think Hong Kong has no culture?

    Wong: Dont stray from the topic I know you are pro-independence and Ill just stop here.

    Previously, Chan said he will send a blank election mailout to voters in his constituency as he expected any pro-independence wording to be censored.

    - (Oriental Daily) August 8, 2016.

    This morning, Chan Chak-to attended a Kowloon East radio forum and said that a public opinion poll showed that 17% of Hong Kong citizens support independence. He said that the 19 years of One Country Two Systems have seen freedom, democracy and rule of law being ruined in Hong Kong. "Hong Kong independence is actually the most reasonable option."

    In the afternoon, Ko Tat-bun (Voice of Loving Hong Kong) went to the Wong Tai Sin Police Station and reported that Chan Chak-to signed a pledge to uphold the Basic Law and support the Hong Kong Special Administration Region of the People's Republic of China but his speeches for Hong Kong independence run contrary to that pledge. He asked the police to follow up on whether Chan made a false statement to the Returning Officer of the Registration and Electoral Office. Ko also said that he will complain to the Registration and Electoral Office to demand Chan to retract his speech, withdraw or cancel his candidacy.

    - (Wen Wei Po) August 9, 2016.

    At the Kowloon East radio forum, Paul Tse Wai-chun said that Chan Chak-to was evasive in his position on Hong Kong independence. He quoted Chan's essay from last year in which Chan said that Hong Kong independence can only be realized if they can destroy Hong Kong's economy. He asked Chan whether he still feels the same way. Chan said that he never wrote any such and accused Tse of smearing him. Chan said that Hong Kong independence is possible because Hong Kong is powerful enough to cause the Chinese Communist regime to fall.

    Wilson Or (DAB) said that One Country Two Systems is the best option for HOng Kong. He said that Hong Kong independence will destroy Hong Kong's economy and smash the "rice bowls" of the citizens. He said that the same public opinion poll showed that 70% of the citizens are opposed to Hong Kong independence. He said that this shows that the citizens know that it is their duty to maintain national unity. He asked why Chan wants to advocate Hong Kong independence against the wishes of the citizens.

    Chan agreed that Hong Kong independence does not have a broad base of support. He said that he only wanted to bring up the issue for public discussion. Chan asked Or a hypothetical question: "If more than 50% of the people support Hong Kong independence, will you also support it?"

    - (Wen Wei Po) August 9, 2016.

    At the radio forum yesterday, Chan Chak-to said that he is counting on the Registration and Electoral Office to disqualify him as a candidate. "As Chan Chak-to looks more likely to win, the odds of disqualification grow bigger." On August 5, he rebutted those who accused him of taking up Hong Kong independence "suddenly." Chan said that citizens used to think that all pro-Hong Kong independence advocates are nutcases. But then Edward Leung Tin-kei showed up and "everybody suddenly discovered that all those who advocate independence are normal. Edward Leung has set everyone on fire and independence is now unstoppable."

    Senior Counsel Ronny Tong Ka-wah said that said the Legislative Council Ordinance Article 42(B) Section 4 empowers the Returning Officer to void a nomination as late as the the day before the voting.

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    (Tai Kung Pao) July 31, 2016.

    After Chan Ho-tin was ruled ineligible for the Legco elections, a number of radical localists began a concerted effort to locate the particulars of the New Territories West Returning Officer at the Electoral and Registration Office of the Electoral Affairs Commission. They posted a photo of the Returning Officer Alan Law Ying-ki and sought his home address and details of family members. They warned Law's family to "watch where they step when they go outside."

    Some of them mistook the New Territories East Returning Officer Cora Ho Lai-sheung to be the New Territories West Returning Officer who invalidated Chan Ho-tin. They asked: "Does anyone know where Cora Ho and her family lives? Does she have children? Where do they attend school? Are her parents all dead already? Where do they live (if still living)?"

    (SCMP) August 6, 2016.

    The fallout from the disqualification of a localist leader seeking to run in next months Legislative Councils elections took a worrying turn on Saturday when the returning officer responsible received a threatening letter with a razor blade enclosed.

    Police also arrested a second suspect a Chinese University student over online threats made against returning officers.

    Police did not name the election officer targeted in the letter with the blade, only confirming that a woman had reported receiving the threat at her Sha Tin office on Sheung Wo Che Road. The address is that of Cora Ho Lai-sheung, the returning officer who invalidated Hong Kong Indigenous member Edward Leung Tin-keis candidacy for the polls on September 4.

    The letter contained words that constitute a threat, police said, without providing further details. The case is classified as one of criminal intimidation after a preliminary inquiry. No arrest has been made.

    Leungs candidacy was rejected even after he had agreed to drop his advocacy of independence for the city and signed an additional declaration reinforcing his acceptance of Hong Kongs status as an alienable part of China. He was one of six localist aspirants who were disqualified recently.

    Saturdays threatening letter comes after angry netizens launched a tirade of abuse via social media against Ho and fellow returning officer Alan Lo Ying-ki, who disqualified the Hong Kong National Partys Chan Ho-tin, for their decisions.

    Los picture and contact details were posted on Facebook by one user who then called on people to condemn him. Others encouraged people to seek out and publish Los home address and further information on his family.

    The government quickly condemned the online attacks, insisting returning officers were only doing their duty and acting within their powers.

    Following the arrest of a 22-year-old man on Wednesday, police detained a 19-year-old student on Saturday.

    The suspect, surnamed Cheng and a member of Chinese Universitys student union, had his home in Yuen Long raided and his mobile phone and his computer seized on Saturday morning by police.

    Cheng was arrested on suspicion of accessing his computer with criminal or dishonest intent, and allegedly posting numerous threats to harm returning officers personal safety on social media, senior inspector Jethro Chiu Kin-yip said.

    The suspect threatened to use violence against the returning officers, Chiu said, declining to name the victims. Police respect freedom of speech, but the virtual world is not a lawless world. Most laws used in the real world are also applicable to the virtual world.

    The student was released on bail and is to report back to police early next month.

    The disqualification of pro-independence candidates by Legco returning officers has sparked criticism and doubts over the officials role, with lawyers claiming the administration had given the civil servants power to exercise political screening of candidates.

    (Wen Wei Po) August 7, 2016.

    On August 3, Facebook user Pat Siu Chit wrote: "Right now if petrol bombs are not thrown, or government officials are not assassinated, or evil policemen are not killed or nobody else dies, then the government isn't going to pay any fucking attention to you ... Really, my friend tells me that."

    On August 4, Pat Siu Chit wrote: "Bomb, assassinate, kill, death, Registration and Electoral Office Returning Office. My friend says so, ok?" On the same day, he wrote: "Put to death, Law XXX (=New Territories West retuning office Alan Law); blow away, Ho XX (=New Territories East returning office Cora Ho). Fucking catch me, Evil Police, $10,000 per person!" Then he wrote: "I want to publish the home addresses of these two bastards. If you have it, please send me a message."

    On August 5, Pat Siu Chit wrote: "I am using a computer dishonestly to kill the entire families of Law and Ho, because they harmed all of the people of Hong Kong!" Yesterday he forwarded a news story about the police arresting a 19-year-old for threatening a returning officer and he commented: "Hey, there are so many warriors! Not need to be fucking afraid, because I am still here! Let's fucking make this even bigger!" He added hashtags of "#Burn Law and Ho to death", "#Kill the Evil Police", "#Kill you and then set you on fire."

    Then he went on to insult the police: "Is it fucking nice to become a police canine? ... I am formally challenging you! Watch it!" His hashtags included "#Set police station on fire," "#assassination", "#police living quarters," "#disaster falls on family," "#you won't die easy", etc.

    A comment from another Facebook user: "If I see Returning Officers Law and Ho in the street, I would feel that those two are threatening my life and property. Therefore out of self-defense, I will fucking waste them. Is that alright? ... In Hong Kong, self-defense is not a crime."

    (Wen Wei Po) August 7, 2016.

    The arrested Chinese University of Hong Kong student is a 19-year-old named Cheng. He will be a third-year student majoring in risk management. On August 2, he posted at the CUHK Student Union Facebook under "Hong Kong Communists naked interference in election, they have brought it upon themselves for a reckoning." He said that he will find a way "to hire assassins to send the three Retuning Officers to see the Lord of Hell." He said that he is unafraid and if they want to arrst him, he won't wear a helmet.

    On the same day, the same person forwarded a Civic Passion member's post: "This woman shall be cursed forever ... her destruction will be the minimum punishment. She should be sent to jail ... When the people can make her unable to sleep or eat well, to want to jump off the boat, to want to quit, then opposing the government is working ... we must proceed to harass the front line public servants. That person also said to "get into deepweb to hire an assassin to send her to see the Lord of Hell."

    The same person also forwarded Hong Kong Indigenous spokesperson Edward Leung's post and wrote: "I have always felt that certain people should be directly put to death without trial. Those dickheads at the Registration and Electoral Office are good examples.

    (SCMP) August 9, 2016.

    A returning officer who disqualified localist hopefuls for the Legislative Council elections was sent powder in the mail which contained Aids, anthrax and semen on Tuesday morning four days after she had received a razor blade via the same means.

    Investigators later suspected that the substance in the letter sent to Sha Tin district officer Cora Ho Lai-sheungs office on Sheung Wo Che Road was just flour.

    Internet comments:

    - Civic Passion member Joe Ho's Facebook

    New Territories West Returning Officer Alan Law Ying-ki really deserves to have his whole family dead. Don't tell me that you are just doing your job. You have the right to say no!
    You can have a way out, or else it can be a disaster.
    Otherwise I will curse you out day and night. When you step into the street, your feet will be run over by a car and you will be crippled for life; your parents will be hit by strokes, they will remain conscious but all four limbs will be immobile; your children will get cancer and have to undergo chemotherapy/radiation therapy until they waste away down to 35 pounds in body weight.
    Do my curses work? I cursed someone to the effect that he won't live past this year, and now he is fucking dead! All of England knows that!
    You don't believe me? You can look it up yourself. The obituaries were published in Hnog Kong too.
    Watch your step!

    - Wanted poster for Returning Officer Cora Ho Lai-sheung, including katana, gun, bullets and a Union Jack flag.

    - What is the big deal about receiving a death threat letter with a razor blade? It has happened many times before.

    (Associated Press/Agence France Presse) August 23, 2006.

    An outspoken Hong Kong legislator was mailed a death threat containing a razor blade, it was revealed yesterday, days after a vicious attack on another pro-democracy lawmaker.

    Leung Kwok-hung (梁國雄), a radical Marxist nicknamed "Long Hair" for his waist-length tresses, was sent the letter, peppered with swear words and criticizing his political activities, his assistant Foo Wai-lok said.

    The letter, postmarked July 18 but only opened on Monday, warned Leung that if he did not commit suicide within three days, he would be tracked down in the Legislative Council. "We have received a lot of threatening letters like this in the past, but we have never been threatened with a razor blade," Foo said. Leung is currently away in Europe.

    Two weeks ago Audrey Eu (余若薇), a leader of the pro-democracy Civic Party, also received a mailed death threat along with a razor blade.

    (New York Times) August 13, 2014.

    Chan Kin-man, a prominent Hong Kong democracy activist, receives many anonymous threats. He has gotten a razor blade in the mail and messages like: Hunt and Kill Traitors! Sophisticated hacking attempts occur daily, often from email addresses belonging to friends or students. Some threats are unprintable, about what the sender would like to do to Mr. Chans mother.

    This guy sent it to me twice, said Mr. Chan, sitting in his office at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, where he is a sociology professor, pulling out a letter from a folder. He also likes my mother. Big fan of my mom.

    He laughs, wryly.

    Therefore the two Returning Officers Law and Ho should just shut the fuck up.

    - In the United States, you can threaten anyone ("I'm gonna kill you ...") with the sole exception of the President of the United States.

    (Wikipedia) Threatening the President of the United States is a class E felony under United States Code Title 18, Section 871. It consists of knowingly and willfully mailing or otherwise making "any threat to take the life of, to kidnap, or to inflict bodily harm upon the President of the United States".

    A literal reading of this law is that while you must not threaten the President himself/herself, you can threaten to kill his family. Such speech is guaranteed under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.

    - In the United States of America, the President is elected by universal suffrage with civil nomination. Therefore he is entitled to special protection because he/she represents The People. In Hong Kong, the Chief Executive is not elected by universal suffrage with civil nomination. Therefore Basic Law Article 27 on freedom of speech allows the people to threaten to kill him, his family and anybody else. That is what the Law says. If the court rules differently, I will apply for legal aid to file yet another judicial review.

    - Sending letters with razor blades is a universal value.

    (CNN) November 24, 2010.

    The FBI and University of California at Los Angeles police are investigating a new round of threats from anti-animal research activists who claimed to have sent AIDS-tainted razor blades and a threatening message to a research professor, a university spokesman said Tuesday.

    The university said law enforcement officials confirmed that UCLA neuroscientist David Jentsch received a package at his home containing razor blades and a threatening note.

    In a phone interview with CNN, Jentsch said the activists have been "using various tactics to get at me."

    "They started with incinerating my car," he said. "They have participated in monthly demonstrations outside of my house. Usually the threats are general, this one was very specific. "They said they were going to cut my throat, and they named one of my students.

    "I'm not afraid. I'm angry. It's so ridiculous in our society that people do this just because they don't like what you do," he added.

    Jentsch provided an account of the threat.

    "About a week ago I was going through my mail in my kitchen and I opened a letter and razor blades spilled out on the floor. It was the first sign something was nefarious," he said. "The letter inside contained quite specific and heinous acts of violence to kill me."

    He said the letter was signed by the Justice Department, which he described as a group "loosely aligned with the Animal Liberation Front."

    "The major reason [no one has been arrested] is because the Animal Liberation Front has no official membership. Their spokesman calls from underground and claims to not know any of its members," Jentsch said.

    Jerry Vlasak, an animal rights activist, said he does not know who targeted Jentsch but he says he understands why the researcher was targeted.

    "He does not have the right to go home to feel at ease. Try to look at it from the perspective of the innocent beings that he is doing this to," Vlasak said.

    - (Headline Daily) Here is a photo of the Chinese University of Hong Kong Risk Management student named Cheng. He had this photo taken and published with his name and department to show that he is unafraid.

    What exactly have they been teaching him at Risk Management? Why would anyone hire him to manage their risks?

    - (Headline Daily) August 4, 2016.

    On July 30, the Internet user nicknamed "Fat Choi" posted: "Either throwing bricks or throwing rocks or throwing bombs, I am psychologically prepared ..." Then he used foul language to curse out Alan Law Ying-ki. Yesterday morning at 730pm, the police went to an apartment in Yau Tung Estate, Sau Kei Wan district and arrested a man named Choi. They took away two mobile phones and one tablet. They found a telecommunications company employee card on Choi, but the suspect declined to say whether he works there. On the Internet, Choi claimed to be a 'young wastrel' and is studying at a non-existent university.

    - (Wen Wei Po) August 8, 2016.

    Here are the pan-democrats having their say on the act of sending threatening letters with razor blade enclosed.

    Lam Cheuk-ting (Democratic Party) said: "I am working at the street booth. I am very busy." After many requests for a response, Lam finally said: "Everything should be in accordance with the law. I will not comment on individual incidents."

    Kwok Wing-kin (Labour Party) said that any criminal threat is wrong. But he said that the burden of proof for criminal threat is very stringent, so the police are using "dishonest use of computer" to charge people instead because it is easy to convict. So if the police thinks that this was a criminal threat, they should investigate it as such. However, since the case has proceeded to the judiciary, Kwok won't comment further.

    Andrew Cheng Kar-foo (former Democratic Party member) said that any threatening behavior is not good, because expression of opinions should be made through legal means and it is wrong to push the law. At the same time, he hopes that the government can understand why young people think this way and get to the root of the problem (namely, why are some people not allowed to run in the election?). Cheng said that the Returning Officers are public servants, so citizens should be holding their supervisors responsible instead.

    Alvin Yeung Ngok-kiu (Civic Party) said that some people are upset with the Returning Officers deciding themselves that certain persons cannot enter the elections. He said that some citizens are more upset than others. Therefore the government should solve the problem at the root instead of forbidding citizens from expressing their opinions.

    Leung Yiu-chung (Neighbourhood Workers Service Centre) said that the whole affair is a case of political oppression of opinions. However, citizens should look after their own personal safety because it is not worthwhile to ruin their futures.

    - The short summary: It's alright to mail those threatening letters with razor blades enclosed. Why? Because FREEDOM/DEMOCRACY/HUMAN RIGHTS/UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE/RULE OF LAW.


    Defend Democracy, Take Back Sovereignty
    Details of Assembly
    Location: Tamar Park
    Date: August 5
    Time: 20:00-22:00

    (Hong Kong Free Press) August 4, 2016.

    In a speech to supporters, the convener of the pro-independence Hong Kong National Party Chan Ho-tin asked followers planning to attend the partys rally on Friday to dress well in order to change the image of independence advocates. Chan emphasised that the rally itself will be absolutely peaceful.

    Come dressed like office ladies and businessmen in Central, that will be good, he said during a Facebook live session on Thursday. The image of independence advocates should not be a group of thugs or losers. We are people who do big things, we are people with a good image a lot of us are professionals.

    Chan called the rally after five hopefuls, including himself, who advocated independence or a return to the UK were banned from running in the upcoming Legislative Council election, creating questions of whether the election regulatory body has lost its neutrality in doing so.

    The rally, with the theme Defend Democracy, Retake Sovereignty, will be hosted at Tamar Park in Admiralty between 8pm and 10pm on Friday. Speakers include the five rejected candidates, localist commentators, and a video clip from Billy Fung Jing-en, the former president of the University of Hong Kongs student union, who is out of town.

    Many anticipated more radical action than a peaceful rally, but Chan said during the live session that with rumours that 2,000 police officers will be present, along with the forces improving strategies and equipment, such radical action may not achieve anything.

    We need to assess the number of people we have, he said. Luckily there may be thousands. But will it be tens of thousands? I have reservations.

    Chan said hypothetically, if the movement can bring more than 100,000 people out on the streets, he would not stop people from taking action, but this was not the case in reality. We have to be realistic about our numbers I would say we dont have the numbers to take big actions, he added.

    The partys big announcement at the rally is about long term plans, not about spontaneous radical actions that will soon be controlled by police forces, said Chan.

    We are talking about taking back [the governance of] Hong Kong. We are not purely opposition groups that create scattered resistance on the streets and then start a riot, Chan said. What will happen after you overthrow the government in a riot? You still cannot govern it. We have a lot to prepare for at this moment we dont have enough strength.

    Its like baking a cake, Chan added. You have to think about sifting the flour, beating the eggs, pouring the milk, stirring the cream, making them look good baking is only the final step.

    Chan has applied for a letter of no objection from the police, although it has yet to be approved. He said it will be an absolutely peaceful, rational, non-violent rally, adding that his party is preparing a stage and equipment.

    Some urged Chan to switch the venue to Mong Kok, but he pointed out that Edward Leung Tin-kei and Ray Wong Toi-yeung of Hong Kong Indigenous were barred from the area due to a court order after charges for rioting in February.

    You have to realise that [the clashes in Mong Kok] happened due to many factors it wasnt organised by us. If we force it to happen again, wed cause a lot of people to be arrested, he said.

    (Wen Wei Po) August 5, 2016.

    Chan Ho-tin (Hong Kong National Party) announced on Facebook live broadcast that the five persons whose nominations were invalidated (namely, Edward Leung (Hong Kong Indigenous), Nakade Hitsujiko (City-State), Chan Kwok-keung, Alice Lai (Conservative Party)) are invited to attend the rally tonight. He said that this was just a rally for pro-independence elements and therefore he did not expect to see too many people there and not much being done.

    However, he mentioned at least 6 times that if tens of thousands of people show up, then "he won't tell people to go home," "we won't stop just like that," "anything is possible", "people should improvise", etc. He said that he wants to form the pro-independence elements into a formidable force that can "take over Hong Kong."

    Meanwhile other Facebook pages are calling people to take concrete action. One Facebook user named Cheung Sam wrote: "When the Hong Kong Communists ousted Chan Ho-tin and Edward Leung, we become aware that there will be a unprecedented situation when the Revolutionary Army of Hong Kong fights the Hong Kong Communists. It will be N times more violent than the February 8th Mong Kok riot. Don't be afraid. I told you previously that February 8th represented our minimal level of force. But today is August 2. Just wait and see."

    Cheung Sam also posted reminders how to join the Hidden Army, by disguising identities on the Internet, communicating among the various teams, not making unnecessary sacrifices and protecting oneself carefully.

    (Wen Wei Po) August 5, 2016.

    A Facebook page titled "I am a fifty-cent ganger I am a mole" has been published a number of posts urging violence.

    After Edward Leung's nomination was invalidated, the Facebook user wrote: "The next step, all the localist supporters and members should do everything possible to stop the elections, no matter how lowly and bloody. All voting stations, candidates, voters and workers can be your targets. Nobody other than the police will try to stop you. You don't need to carry any moral baggage."

    The page also presented ways of disarming the police. "Simply put, petrol bombs work with certainty." "What good are demonstrations? If you can set road blocks as you march and then you go home before you reach the destination."

    As for Ko Tat-bun (Voice of Loving Hong Kong) being slapped during the Election Affairs Commission briefing, the Facebook user wrote: "Good slap. This is a good start. The next time, he should be beaten up so badly so that he has to be hospitalized/stored in a coffin." Apart from Ko Tat-bun, the page also targets Joshua Wong Chi-fung (Demosisto). "It is essential that we destroy Joshua Wong by whatever means possible."

    Previously Edward Leung had said that pro-independence supporters are low-class Hongkongers. This Facebook page wrote: "On Independence day, we must eradicate all those who oppose Hong Kong independence or otherwise suggest that independence must fail. If we don't do this, Hong Kong will fall again within ten years." A user added: "We don't have to wait for independence before we eradicate them. By the way, we should eradicate the leftist retards, Hong Kong pigs, and Hong Kong traitors too."

    The Facebook page said that, after independence, the people of Hong Kong will be classified into 'residents' or 'citizens.' Only citizens will be allowed to join the government or given guns.

    (SCMP)  August 5, 2016.

    Hong Kong independence advocates banned from next months Legislative Council elections vowed at a defiant rally on Friday night that they would press on with their cause and campaign for wider public support.

    The gathering, dubbed the first pro-independence rally in Hong Kong, went peacefully at Tamar Park outside the government headquarters in Admiralty.

    About 2,500 people, mostly the young and some middle-aged, took part, monitored by about 500 police officers on the ground with another 500 on stand-by at police stations.

    Five of the six disqualified pro-independence candidates attended the rally. Taking centre stage from among them was high-profile Hong Kong Indigenous member Edward Leung Tin-kei.

    Referring to the stage backdrop reading Hong Kong Independence in Chinese characters, Leung said: This is the first time that these four characters ... have appeared in Tamar Park and so many Hongkongers came out. This is a historic moment.

    He said he could not utter those words himself because he would launch a legal challenge against his disqualification.

    The University of Hong Kong philosophy student called on the crowd to continue the cause, speaking of revolution.

    We need to usurp power and reclaim the power we deserve. Hong Kongs sovereignty doesnt belong to [President] Xi Jinping, the Communist Party, the Chinese or local governments the sovereignty always belongs to the people, Leung said.

    You might associate it with bloodshed, jail or suppression ... But revolution is a change from the bottom up. Would you ask Beijing and the Hong Kong government to change from top down and give us democracy? Impossible.

    The independence movement would take time to win hearts and minds, Leung said, citing the 1911 Chinese Revolution which took 16 years to materialise. Leung noted that a recent public opinion poll found 17 per cent supported their cause. We need to win more support and one day we will be the mainstream, he said.

    Leungs candidacy was invalidated even after he signed an additional declaration agreeing to drop his independence stance, with a returning officer telling him that she did not trust he had genuinely changed his stance. Leung is challenging the decision.

    Chan Ho-tin, convenor of the Hong Kong National Party and another disqualified candidate, said his ultimate aim was to have his camp govern the city, but he stopped short of saying how they would achieve that goal.

    The 25-year-old engineering graduate from Polytechnic University said he envisioned a quiet revolution with people infiltrating the government and police force.

    A woman attending the rally said she hoped Hong Kong could become independent so there would be no more Chinese Communist Party interference in the city affairs. She supported the use of violence to enforce change because otherwise the Communist Party will not listen.

    Also in the crowd was a public hospital nurse, who said he was motivated to attend by the disqualification of Leung.

    Some candidates are deprived of the right to run and their supporters are deprived of the right to choose, he said.

    At the end of the rally, Chan called on people to support him by voting for him in the September elections in their own ways.

    Asked by reporters whether he meant voters should write down his name on ballot paper, Chan said it was up to the voters to decide.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) August 6, 2016.

    At what is dubbed the first ever pro-independence rally on Friday, the convenor of the Hong Kong National Party called for supporters to infiltrate different sectors for the sake of the movement.

    The rally at Tamar Park, near government headquarters in Admiralty, ran its course peacefully. It was attended by over 10,000   according to Chan Ho-tins estimation. Thousands chanted Hong Kong Independence at the event. Ho said it exceeded his expectations.

    I hope you can infiltrate all the government departments, the police force we need to learn their ways, we need intelligence this is very practical, he said. You can see that the pro-Beijing camp has their own doctors and lawyers same for the pan-democratic camp. We dont have them yet, but they are coming soon itll be our world.

    Only if we study well, can we build Hong Kong and govern it in the future, Chan added.

    We absolutely support and encourage the promotion of Hong Kong independence in secondary schools and universities, he said. Chan said he hoped that independence advocates can lead all of the university student unions. Well give whatever support we can.

    The rally was attended by five former candidates in the Legislative Council election, including Chan himself, who were disqualified by returning officers who doubted that they would genuinely uphold the Basic Law.

    Edward Leung Tin-kei of localist group Hong Kong Indigenous, who received more than 66,000 votes in a February by-election but was barred from running in the upcoming one, spoke of a revolution started by independence advocates.

    We have to take back power, take back the rights we should have. The sovereignty of this society does not belong to Xi Jinping, the central government, the communist party, or the Hong Kong government, but to Hong Kong people, he said.

    You may say revolution will cause bloodshed, will fail, will have sacrifices if the government does not crush your revolution, that means your revolution is useless and not a threat to the government. You should be happy we are creating a threat.

    What is a revolution? It is bottom-up change. A top-down change is only a reform do you still expect the Hong Kong government to reform from the top down, to give us democracy? Its impossible.

    Chan also called for independence supporters to vote for him, even though his candidacy was rejected. Do not vote with tears for those who do not support Hong Kong independence, he said. Originally I would appear on a ballot on September 4 but it doesnt matter use your own way to vote for me.

    But he did not directly answer how voters should vote for him, only saying that people can submit empty or invalid ballots. He added that he would not encourage people to break the law and mutilate ballot papers. Chan said he will continue his election campaign and continue to urge people to vote for him.

    The police said 2,500 attended the rally at its peak.

    Videos:

    SocREC Part 1 and Part 2. Complete version of the Hong Kong National Party rally in Tamar Park

    Internet comments:

    - Since all five candidates from Civic Passion/Proletariat Political Institute/City-State got their nominations validated, they see no reason to show up at a pro-independence rally for the invalidated nominees. Since the pro-independence elements won't welcome the traditional pan-democrats (Democratic Party, Civic Party, Labour Party, League of Social Democrats, People Power, etc), the latter won't show up either. So the only people who show up will be the valiant ones.

    But will this be July 1st 2016 Demonstration March redux with just a few people showing up outside the China Liaison Office?

    - If there are more reporters than demonstrators, then can always be some melodrama to draw media headlines. How about Chan Ho-tin lead the way to set fire to his ID card and passport, which are issued by the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China? This will be Day One of the Hong Kong Republic which has its own ID cards and passports!

    - On Day Two, Chan Ho-tin will announced that the temporary government is imposing a poll tax on every living thing in Hong Kong ...

    - Yes, taxes are payable in Hong Kong Special Administrative Region to be converted by the temporary government into Hong Kong Republican joss paper money.

    - The elections will be held and campaigns have to be run. Even if Edward Leung is out, he has a surrogate Baggio Leung (Youngspiration) still running. So the sniping continues.

    - (Wen Wei Po) August 5, 2016.

    Civic Passion/Proletariat Political Institute/City-State went all out against Hong Kong Indigenous' Plan B in Youngspiration. Wong Yeung-tat's wife wrote on Facebook: "Hong Kong Indigneous transferred their money and other assets to Youngspiration in violation of political ethics. This is the same thing that Scholarism tried when they wanted to transfer their assets to Demosisto ... Of course, you should vote for Civic Passion/Proletariat Political Institute/City-State. Before you vote you should the kind of persons the candidates are."

    Hong Kong Indigenous clarified on Facebook: "Recently a photo on the Internet suggests that Hong Kong Indigenous is transferring its assets over to Youngspiration. This has generated queries from some of our supporters." They said that they intended to raise money publicly only after Edward Leung's nomination is validated. Therefore they have not raised any money for the Legislative Council to date. They intend to raise money soon for their Plan B. They said the only channel for receiving donations is their Internet radio station Channel-I, and that money is earmarked for meeting daily expenses for the organization.

    The general trend is that Civic Passion supporters said that Edward Leung was a nobody, but Civic Passion/Proletariat Political Institute/City-State supported him during the New Territories East Legco elections and allowed him to gain 60,000 votes. But now Civic Passion/Proletariat Political Institute/City-State wants to field their own candidates in all five districts, with Wan Chin running against Edward Leung in New Territories Esat. Now that Edward Leung is out, Civic Passion/Proletariat Political Institute/City-State wants Leung's political inheritance for themselves.

    - At this time, both Wan China and Baggio Leung have poor support rates, far behind Edward Leung. So whatever Hong Kong Indigenous does, it seems like a loser of a cause for both of them.

    - Why kind of Plan B is this anyway? At the Election Affairs Commission briefing, Edward Leung jumps on a chair, raises his middle finger and yells: "Barnabas Fung, you eat shit! Fuck your mother!" Then he leaves huffing and puffing. Meanwhile the Youngspiration candidates are busy smiling and taking selfies to post on Facebook.

    - Why do you want Civic Passion/Proletariat Political Institute/City-State to withdraw from the election to show solidarity with Chan Ho-tin (National Party) and Edward Leung (Hong Kong Indigenous)? Just so they can clear the path for Hong Kong Indigenous' Plan B Youngpsiration to take more selfie photos?

    - (Apple Daily) August 5, 2016.

    Yesterday on Facebook, Chan Ho-tin repeated that he wanted to hold a 'peaceful assembly' to hand out pro-Hong Kong independent leaflets plus 1,000 books which were supposed to be campaign literature for Hong Kong independence. Chan said that he told the police that 1,000 will attend and he heard that there will be 2,000 police present, "two policemen for each participant." He also said that the police will be filming people on the Admiralty pedestrian overpass.

    Chan said that this "assembly of peace, reason and non-violence" may not go well with localists who advocate violence. Nevertheless, this is necessary for a pro-independence political leader to go through the transition. He said that the pro-independence localists are still stuck in social activism whereas they should be getting ready to take over the government.

    - (The Stand News) August 5, 2016.


    Hong Kong National Party rally, more than 10,000 persons claimed to have attended.
    Edward Leung: Take back Hong Kong sovereignty, the revolution will necessarily be bloody, do not speak to the government about ethics/morality

    - Chan Ho-tin said that he wants the independence movement to get ready to govern. But he promptly goes on to claim an attendance of 10,000+. How is anyone going to trust you to govern? When you cite a GDP figure for the past quarter, how can they trust you? When you present your budget? The number of days of remaining food/water?

    - You don't understand. Chan Ho-tin only wants to be the next President; he is not interested in governing. As Donald Trump is showing us, presidents don't have to talk responsibly.

    - If not Chan Ho-tin, then who will govern for the Hong Kong National Party? As Donald Trump said, he does not have to concerned about the details because he will leave those to the experts that he will hire. And his experts will be better than any previous ones.

    In this case, though, the existing government cannot be trusted to govern anymore. So foreign experts will be brought in. For example, the Hong Kong Police cannot be expected to continue to police, much less than defend the nation. The Hong Kong National Party can import Israeli mercenary soldiers to do the police/military work. At USD 50,000 per month for 10,000 Israelis, they will do a good job. They may not speak Cantonese, but they will let their Uzis do the talking. (Note: They have to be paid in USD because nobody will accept payment in HKD after independence).

    - (Cable TV) August 5, 2016.

    The participants took up more than half of Tamar Park. Some people said that they do not support independence, but they came because they were protesting the decision by the Returning Officers of the Registration and Electoral Office to invalidate the nominations of six candidates. One participant brought her six-year-old and four-year-old sons because she wants them to learn how to protect their homeland.

    - Previously during BREXIT, a number of voters voted to LEAVE not because they really want to leave the European Union but because they were casting a protest vote against business as usual. When LEAVE won over REMAIN, they are the ones who wanted another vote taken.

    - (HKG Pao) August 5, 2016.

    Unlike other events, the dais at this even was not elevated and there was no designated press area. Therefore, the camera crews set up in front of the stage and thus block the views of the audience. Chan Ho-tin went up to the press and told them the almost 20 cameras surrounded the stage in a crescent shape and blocked the views of the audience. He asked the camera crews to move aside. They refused. So Chan said publicly: "Will the camera crews move aside after filming? There are many Hong Kong citizens behind you."

    Some of the participants began to hurl obscenities at the press. "Fuck your mother!" "Reporters, I fuck your mother!" "I didn't come here to look at your backsides!"

    Do not expect the Journalists Association to make any comments about the any interference to news gathering or threats to journalists. That's because this was a "pro-democracy" rally and everything about "Democracy" is necessarily good.

    - Important announcements by Chan Ho-tin:

    (1) Fully support and assist the promulgation of information on independence within the various universities and secondary schools
    (2) Fully support the infiltration of pro-independence elements into the student unions of the various universities
    (3) Actively infiltrate the organizations (such as government, police) of the other side in order to obtain intelligence
    (4) The students should study hard so that they can government Hong Kong in the future
    (5) Actively promulgate Hong Kong independence in various sectors of society. In the future, we should participate in and enhance the alliance of various forces
    (6) With respect to the election, we must not vote for the pro-unification factions with tears in our eyes
    (7) Use your way to case your vote for Chan Ho-tin (you know what I mean)

    - Apple Daily Facebook: Hong Kong Indigenous spokesperson Edward Leung Tin-kei: "China is a hooligan country. Why are you talking about ethics/morality with them for? The meaning of the assembly today is that the resistance will begin this very moment."

    - Well, at every single rally, you say that "Resistance is beginning this very moment." Every time that you say this, it means that it didn't happen when you said it the last time(s). When will it ever really happen? What is your definition of resistance? Some people think that it is the French Resistance. Others think that it is Civil Disobedience. Your definition so far seems to be about holding rallies to announce that resistance is beginning this very moment (P.S. Donate more money more frequently (cash or Paypal only))

    - Civic Passion members Wong Yeung-tat and Cheng Kam-mun put aside their squabbles with Hong Kong Indigenous and Hong Kong National Party to make an appearance at Tamar Park. At least they didn't push aside Chan Ho-tin, seize the microphone and ask for donations.

    Meanwhile People Power legislator Raymond Chan Chi-chuen was not seen. This is probably because he is busy with raising campaign money. He wants $1,000,000 coming from 10,000 donors at $100 per person.

    - (Ming Pao) August 6, 2016. Many of the attendees were cautious. Whenever reporters snap photos, they put on surgical masks or use the pamphlets to cover up their faces. Some of them told the photojournalists not to take close-ups and used obscene language to curse.

    Secondary School sixth-year student Chan said Hong Kong under Communist Party rule has become rule-of-man with a bleak future. Therefore Hong Kong should become independent. He has no concrete plans, but he thinks conditions are ripe for Hong Kong to become independent. For example, Hong Kong can build desalination plants to get water and import food from overseas. He said that the key is to obtain international public opinion support which will increase the political costs for Chinese Communist oppression. As for a bloody outcome, he said that independence is not a sure thing but he is willing to give up his life for Hong Kong independence.

    Secondary School fifth-year student Tong said that the Hong Kong government is destroying Hong Kong core values. She thinks that the only way out is to leave the Chinese Communists and become independent. She said that she does not know how to deal with Chinese Communist suppression. But she thinks that "Sports Hong Kong" and "Youth Army" are good ideas. "No matter how violent it gets, I will take part if it is worthwhile."

    - No matter how violent? First of all, you can study history to see what the tolerance of the Communists is. How much violence are they willing to deal with to maintain integrity of territory?

    (July 6, 2009)  The Urumqi Mass Incident - Part 1  A mass incident occurred in Urumqi (Xinjiang) on July 5, 2009.  This page covers the media reports on July 5-7, 2009.

    (July 8, 2009)  The Urumqi Mass Incident - Part 2  This page covers the media reports on July 8-10, 2009

    (July 11, 2009)  The Urumqi Mass Incident - Part 3  This page covers the media reports between July 11 and September 1, 2009.

    (September 2, 2009)  The Urumqi Mass Incident - Part 4  This page covers the media reports on September 2, 2009 and later.

    You have to go way beyond this to move them.

    - Look at all the separatist movements in China.

    Taiwan is physically separated from mainland China by the Taiwan Straits. The population is 23 million. It has a standing army of 290,000 (see Wikipedia) with 2,800,000 reserve personnel. The public opinion polls say that as much as 60% of the population wants independence/nationhood. Taiwan has a treaty with United States/Japan to defend it against Chinese invasion. Taiwan has elected three pro-independence presidents (Lee Teng-hui, Chen Shui-bian, Tsai Ying-wen) before. But there is still no Taiwan independence.

    Tibet is to the far west of China. It has a population of more than 3 million plus another 100,000+ in exile. The Dalai Lama is an internationally famous political leader and a Nobel Peace Prize winner. There have been many uprisings in Tibet, the latest being in 2008. More than 100 Tibetans have killed themselves by self-immolations, about which the Dalai Lama is neutral. But there is still no Tibet independence.

    Xinjaing is to far northwest of China. It has a population of more than 21 million. There is leadership in the World Uyghur Congress, which describes itself as a nonviolent and peaceful movement. There have been many uprisings, most of which are small local terrorist attacks (possibly from extremiist groups such as ISIS and ETIM) with the largest being Urumqi in 2009. But there is still no Xinjiang independence.

    Hong Kong is contiguous with mainland China. The population is 7 million, of which one-third are Han people born in mainland China. It has no standing army. It has no unified leadership/government for independence in Hong Kong or in exile. There are no defense treaties with the United States, Japan, United Kingdom, Australia, Taiwan, Philippines, Vietnam, etc. No foreign navy will sail into Victoria Harbor to provide protection due to the threat from land-based cruise missiles and heavy artillery guns from across the border. There have not been any large-scale uprisings/terrorist attacks with many casualties. There have not been any self-immolations, except for the one in the movie Ten Years. Nobody has died from a hunger strike, because Hongkongers will only do relay hunger strikes (four hours of hunger strike per shift).

    Compared to the situations in Taiwan, Tibet and Xinjiang, Hong Kong is clearly a long way from being close to independence.

    - Locke Chan's Facebook

    I was present at the assembly last night. I am not trying to pouring cold water but my sense was that this group of young Hong Kong independence politicians are not ready even in terms of speaking or working the crowd. Even the Edward Leung that others have praised so highly was just so-so. I came because I was angry and upset. But this assembly has left me disappointed (and therefore I left early).

    When people see several thousand persons present, they see good prospects for Hong Kong independence. But I wonder how many of those attendees actually support Hong Kong independence? Or did they come because they were angry like me? Or because they support those whose nominations were invalidated? More importantly, how long will the "good visions" last? As I recall, the 500,000 persons on July 1, 2003 gave us the same "good visions"! 500,000 persons! We felt good, but what happens afterwards? Have things become better or worse in Hong Kong more than a decade later?

    I think Hong Kong independence is one path, but we cannot count on these young people. I want to see leaders who are more capable and charismatic to lead the way to Hong Kong independence. More effort should be put to establish organizational and popular foundations. There needs to be more and larger discussions of Hong Kong independence. Otherwise the so-called Hong Kong independence will remain just a "good vision." It will only be temporary respite or an act of resistance by young people. It won't get anywhere, it won't happen.

    If you disagree, you can unfriend me. Thanks.

    Q1. Which is the issue that you are most concerned about?
    27.0%: Political system and governance
    21.9%: Land/housing
    13.6%: Economic development
    9.3%: Healthcare/hygiene
    7.4%: Education
    5.7%: Labor and employments
    1.9%: Environment/conservation
    5.4%: Others
    8.0%: No opinion

    Q2. What is the main reason for how you decide to vote?
    30.%: Past job performance
    18.0%: Political beliefs
    16.8%: Political party affiliation
    16.7%: Political platform
    5.9%: Image of the candidate
    1.8%: Coordination/strategy
    4.1%: Others
    5.4%: No opinion

    Q3. How likely are you to vote?
    54.5%: Definitely yes
    19.2%: Most likely
    3.9%: Most unlikely
    1.0%: Definitely not
    5.2%: Undecided
    16.2%: No opinion

    Note: Candidate lists may not match final nominations.

    District Council (second) functional constituency:
    20.6%: James To Kun-sun (Democratic Party)
    17.2%: Starry Lee Wai-king (DAB)
    7.8%: Leung Yiu-chung (Neighbourhood and Street Worker's Centre)
    6.0%: Wong Kwok-hing (Federation of Trade Unions)
    5.5%: Holden Chow Ho-ding (DAB)
    5.2%: Sumly Chan Yeun-sum (Civic Party)
    4.1%: Roy Kwong Chun-yu (Democratic Party)
    2.3%: Paul Zimmerman (independent)
    2.0%: Kwan Wing-yip (Neo Democrats)
    1.7%: Ho Kai-ming
    1.4%: Chan Kwok-keung
    26.3%: Undecided/no opinon

    Hong Kong Island:
    15.1%: Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee (New People's Party)
    12.5%: Tanya Chan (Civic Party)
    11.3% Ricky Wong Wai-kay (independent)
    10.2%: Cheung Kwok-kwan (DAB)
    6.3%: Cyd Ho Sau-lan (Labour Party)
    4.8%: Hui Chi-fung (Democratic Party)
    4.5%: Kwok Wai-keung (Federation of Trade Unions)
    2.1%: Cheng Kam-mun (Civic Passion)
    2.0%: Chim Pui-chung (independent)
    2.0%: Nathan Law Kwun-chung (Demosisto)
    0.9%: Baggio Leung (Youngspiration)
    0.4%: Gary Wong Chi-him (Path of Democracy)
    0.3%: Lau Kar-hung (People Power/League of Social Democrats)
    27.6%: Undecided/no opinion

    Kowloon East:
    14.0%: Wu Chi-wai (Democratic Party)
    13.0%: Wilson Or Chong-shing (DAB)
    11.9%: Jeremy Tam Man-ho (Civic Party)
    8.6%: Wong Kwok-kin (Federation of Trade Unions)
    6.5%: Paul Tse Wai-chun (independent)
    6.2%: Wong Yeung-tat (Civic Passion)
    3.2%: Tam Tak-chi (People Power)
    2.5%: Oscar Lai Man-lok (Demosisto)
    2.3%: Shi Tak-loy (independent)
    1.5%: Wu Wai-shan (Labour Party)
    1.0%: Chan Chak-to (Kowloon East Community)
    29.5%: Undecided/no opinion

    Kowloon West:
    14.2%: Claudia Mo Man-ching (Civic Party)
    12.1%: Ann Chiang Lai-wan (DAB)
    9.3%: Raymond Wong Yuk-man (Proletariat Political Institute)
    7.8%: Helena Wong Pik-wan (Democratic Party)
    7.0%: Leung Mei-fun (BPA)
    6.7%: Yau Wai-ching (Youngspiration)
    6.0%: Tik Chi-yuen (Third Way)
    5.7%: Tam Kwok-kiu (ADPL)
    2.8%: Mak Ka-chun (independent)
    1.9%: Lau Siu-lai (Democracy Groundwork)
    0.3%: Avery Ng Man-yuen (League of Social Democrats)
    26.2%: Undecided/no opinion

    New Territories East:
    12.0%: Alvin Yeung Ngok-kiu (Civic Party)
    7.8%: Lee Tsz-king (Liberal Party)
    6.8%: Edward Leung Tin-kei (Hong Kong Indigenous)
    6.5%: Elizabeth Quat (DAB)
    6.4%: Chan Hak-kan (DAB)
    5.8%: Gary Fan Kwok-wai (Neo Democrats)
    5.0%: Christine Fong Kwok-shan (independent)
    4.8%: Cheung Chiu-hung (Labour Party)
    4.4%: Leung Kwok-hung (League of Social Democrats)
    4.2%: Lam Cheuk-ting (Democratic Party)
    3.9%: Chan Chi-chuen (People Power)
    3.7%: Tang Ka-piu (Federation of Trade Unions)
    3.5%: Eunice Yung Hoi-yan (New People's Party)
    1.5%: Hau Chi-keung (independent)
    0.8%: Wan Chin (City-State)
    0.6%: Liu Tin-shing (independent)
    22.3%: Undecided/no opinion

    New Territories West:
    13.2%: Michael Tien Puk-sun (New People's Party)
    9.8%: Kwok Ka-ki (Civic Party)
    8.6%: Lee Cheuk-yan (Labour Party)
    7.5%: Chan Han-pan (DAB)
    7.1%: Alice Mak Mei-kuen (Federation of Trade Unions)
    6.5%: Leung Che-cheung (DAB)
    6.2%: Raphael Wong Ho-ming (People Power/League of Social Democrats)
    5.9%: Frederick Fung Kin-kee (ADPL)
    5.7%: Andrew Wan Siu-kin (Democratic Party)
    4.8%: Junius Ho (independent)
    4.2%: Wong Yun-tat (Neighbourhood and Worker's Service Centre)
    4.0%: Cheng Chung-tai (Civic Passion)
    1.6%: Chu Hoi-dick (Land Justice)
    1.6%: Chow Wing-kan (Liberal Party)
    0.6%: Edwin Cheng (independent)
    0.4%: Wong Chun-kit (Youngspiration)
    12.4%: Undecided/no opinion

    Note: Candidate lists may not match final nominations.

    Hong Kong Island:
    Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee (New People's Party)
    Judy Chan Kapui (New People's Party)
    Tanya Chan (Civic Party)
    Ricky Wong Wai-kay (independent)
    Cheung Kwok-kwan (DAB)
    Kwok Wai-keung (Federation of Trade Unions)

    Kowloon East:
    Jeremy Tam Man-ho (Civic Party)
    Wu Chi-wai (Democratic Party)
    Wong Kwok-kin (Federation of Trade Unions)
    Wilson Or Chong-shing (DAB)
    Paul Tse Wai-chun (independent)

    Kowloon West:
    Leung Mei-fun (BPA)
    Cho Wui-hung (BPA)
    Claudia Mo Mang-ching (Civic Party)
    Helena Wong Pik-wan (Democratic Party)
    Raymond Wong Yuk-man (Proletariat Political Institute)
    Ann Chiang Lai-wan (DAB)

    New Territories East:
    Lam Cheuk-ting (Democratic Party)
    Alvin Yeung Ngok-kiu (Civic Party)
    Cheung Chiu-hung (Labour Party)
    Leung Kwok-hung (League of Social Democrats)
    Gary Fan Kwok-wai (Neo Democrats)
    Elizabeth Quat (DAB)
    Chan Hak-kan (DAB)
    Andrew Cheng Ka-foo (independent)
    Christine Fong Kwok-shan (independent)

    New Territories West:
    Michael Tien Puk-sun (New People's Party)
    Wong Wai-shun (New People's Party)
    Chan Han-pan (DAB)
    Leung Che-cheung (DAB)
    Kwok Ka-ki (Civic Party)
    Alice Mak Mei-kuen (Federation of Trade Unions)
    Lee Cheuk-yan (Labour Party)
    Frederick Fung Kin-kee (ADPL)
    Cheng Chung-tai (Civic Passion)

    District Council (second) functional constituency:
    James To Kun-sun (Democratic Party)
    Leung Yiu-chung (Neighbourhood and Worker's Service Centre)
    Starry Lee Wai-king (DAB)
    Hung Lin-cham (DAB)
    Wong Kwok-hing (Federation of Trade Unions)

    Totals: 17 pro-establishment; 16 pro-democracy; 2 independents

    (Oriental Daily) August 3, 2016.

    The Registration and Electoral Office has disqualified six pro-Hong Kong independence persons from running in the Legislative Council elections. Afterwards, there was a big-character poster on the Chinese University of Hong Kong Democracy Wall to the effect: "Registration Electoral Office, I fuck your mother" together with the photo and other information on Returning Officer Cora Ho Lai-sheung (including her name, position, office telephone number and address).

    The Chinese University of Hong Kong said that they respect the freedom of speech of students, but they do not tolerate obscenities and personal attacks. They called on students to show respect to others when they express their opinions.

    Chinese University of Hong Kong Student Union vice-president Poon Chi-kin said that the union does not restrict students on the usage of language in expressing their opinions. Poon said that the relevant statement had been ripped off by persons unknown and that the Student Union strongly condemns this destruction of property. Poon also said that he can understand why fellow students are angry because the Hong Kong Communist government has been oppressing the Hong Kong race recently.

    Internet comments:

    - CUHK Secrets #CU3781


    As soon as I saw the photos of the big-character wall poster about the Registration and Electoral  Office, I immediately rush over to sign. But the only left was the name "Electoral and Registration Office" plus the information on the Returning Officer. So I can only use a hand-written version (of "I fuck your mother").

    - Well, at least this CUHK student did not write: "Registration and Electoral Office fucked you mother").

    - CUHK Secrets $CU3761

    Does anyone know that one of the committee members of the Electoral and Registration Office is our vice-chancellor Professor Fanny M.C. Cheung?

    - (Sing Tao) August 4, 2016. The CUHK student representatives published an open letter to demand that vice-chancellor Fanny Cheung resign from the Registration and Electoral Office immediately. They said that Cheung is a social scientist and the head of the CUHK Institute of Asia-Pacific Studies must know that an open election is an indicator of a civilized society. Because the Returning Officers invalidated the nominations of six persons, they said that this was political oppression. This is particularly so in the case of Edward Leung in which the Returning Officer refused to believe that he genuine reversed his position. Therefore, if Cheung genuine wants people to believe that there are universal values in life, she must make the right choice to resign from the Registration and Electoral Office. Otherwise she will be a part of the political oppression and become a sinner whom the CUHK Student Union will be ashamed of.

    - I completely support the CUHK SU resolution. By the way, when the HKU Council voted not to appoint Johannes Chan as vice-chancellor for academic affairs, why didn't the HKU SU demand that all council members (including their own Student Union president) resign from the council effectively immediately? Please explain because I am confused.

    - If the 'pro-democracy' council members all resign, this will leave the council filled with only 'pro-establishment' members.

    - (Oriental Daily) August 4, 2016.

    As much as the Electoral and Registration Office deserves to draw criticisms, do university students have no opinions beyond posting obscenities? It is time to bring back foul-mouthed singer "The Prince of Temple Street" Wan Kwong's famous song Why Use Obscene Language?

    - Imagine that in 1978-1979, they only put up posters with "Deng Xiaoping fuck your mother" during the Democracy Wall Movement in China.

    On December 5, the most famous posters of the Democracy Wall, "The Fifth Modernization: Democracy and Others" written by Wei Jingsheng, was posted on Democracy Wall. This long article strongly criticized the undemocratic practice of Mao and Deng. It also emphasized that (1) the history of Germany, Russia and China proved that anti-democracy was the cause of the poor living conditions of the people; and (2) the political system of Yugoslavia would be a good model for bringing economic wellbeing to the people.

    Wei Jingsheng thought that Yugoslavia would be a good model for China. What do the current HKU/CUHK students think is a good model for Hong Kong? Note: "Fuck your mother" is not a model.

    - (Headline Daily) By Chris Wat Wing-yin. August 4, 2016.

    When I was a student, the University Democracy Wall was a solemn place. Despite occasional dregs, those who dared to post on Democracy Wall usually have strong opinions and visions. Young intellectuals-to-be such as ourselves can only admire and respect those long essays on the Democracy Wall.

    Earlier generations of Democracy Walls were even more magnificent. They started revolutions and formed public opinions. Nobody posted "The food in the canteen is so awful" and other low-level complaints. We are all intellectuals and we realized the the Democracy Wall is there to disseminate knowledge. Therefore we knew enough to keep the minor complaints to the proper channels and settle personal grudges elsewhere.

    Therefore, I have always thought that the quality of a university can be seen as soon as you stand before its Democracy Wall.

    A few days ago, at my alma mater Chinese University of Hong Kong's Democracy Wall, there were these words: "Electoral and Registration Office, I fuck your mother." Next to it was an A4-sized paper with a color photograph of Returning Officer Cora Ho Lai-sheung along with her office telephone number and address.

    An obscene phrase and a threat. Such is the substance of the Democracy Wall at a university today. Such is the quality of university students nowadays.

    The Democracy Wall has its regulations: there shouldn't be any foul language, any personal attacks, any obscene contents and any libelous statements against others. When you want to say something, you include their student/staff ID, your department and your class year. This is the spirit of responsibility of the big-character poster.

    What kind of view is conveyed by an obscene phrase? It means that you don't know how to reason and you only know how to curse and threaten. When the taxpayers give each university student $250,000 in subsidies per year, they are actually feeding hooligans instead of bringing up intellectuals.

    Of course, foul language is not exclusive to the Chinese University of Hong Kong. Earlier, the Hong Kong University Democracy Wall carried a big-character poster from what seems to be a medical students: "We will take back our medical sector. Arthur Li fuck your mother!" Last year the Baptist University Student Union removed "articles cannot contain foul language and obscene contents" from its Democracy Wall regulations because this will lead to a freer speech.

    The collapse of order begins at the Democracy Walls at the various universities. As a CUHK alumnus, I am hereby lodging a formal complaint with CUHK vice-chancellor Joseph Sung. If the university continues to ignore such talk and actions, the angry alumni will boycott donations, boycott all activities connected to the university, refuse to hire CUHK graduates ... etc. If you don't dare to teach them, society will do it for you.

    - Reprise: Democracy Wall, inside the Hong Kong University campus

    The intention was to say, "Arthur Li, Fuck your mother!" Instead, the writer missed the comma. So it is coming out as "Arthur Li fucks/is fucking/fucked your mother!"

    - I once thought that illiteracy was limited only to the Demosisto punks who didn't have good enough DSE marks to enter university. Now I know that illiteracy is rampant among Hong Kong University students as well.

    - Arthur Li comes from a wealthy family. So I can completely understand why you want Arthur Li to be your daddy.

    - There were two other banners on the same Democracy Wall, and both were problematic as well. The one above says: "我們的杏林﹐我們會奪回來" which "We'll take back our medical sector." This makes zero sense, because they really wanted to say "我們的翰林﹐我們會奪回來" which means "We'll take back our academic world." So this was either a typographic error or else the writer doesn't even know the difference between the two terms).

    The other banner said: "Hong Kong University takes the side of the evildoers, we voice our support for Billy Fung Jing-en, Mathieson is shameful." Unfortunately this can also be taken to read: "Hong Kong University takes the side of the evildoers, vocal support for Billy Fung Jing-en/Peter Mathieson is shameful."

    - Here is the HKU student Tsz Hou Li who posted those words:

    He said: "Those who know me all know that I don't use a lot of obscene language. But in this case, I have nothing to add."

    Tsz Hou Li wants Arthur Li to fuck all your mothers. Arthur Li is 70 years old; if he has to fuck the mothers of the several tens of thousands of students, teachers and staff members at Hong Kong University, he will surely die from exhaustion. This is very clear and Tsz Hou Li does not need to add anything more.

    - (Oriental Daily) According to the rules for the HKU Democracy Wall, obscene language and/or personal attacks are now allowed and the HKU Students Union has the right to remove any offensive items. However, these posters have been there for four days already in apparent violation of the rules. HKU SU president Althea has not responded to our inquiry about the posters. The HKU administration said that the Students Union is in charge of the Democracy Wall and they respect the autonomy of the Students Unions in dealing with such matters in a responsible and tolerant manner.

    - Of course, the HKU administration is clearly being sarcastic here. Allowing the posters to stand for four days is neither responsible nor tolerant.

    - The fascinating thing is that they are completely oblivious to the negative impression created by the illiteracy and infantilism as exhibited in these posters. Or perhaps the Student Union officers know, but they want to hang out Tsz Hou Li out to dry.

    - (Oriental Daily) August 4, 2016.

    Following the obscene insults against HKU Council chairman Arthur Li over at the Hong Kong University Democracy Wall, the Chinese University of Hong Kong Democracy Wall followed suit with an obscene insult against the Returning Officer of the Registration and Electoral Office. These two best-known universities of Hong Kong are competing not for academic accomplishments; they are competing to become the most boorish and uncouth university in Hong Kong.

    When a forest is huge, there are all sorts of birds. If a certain member of an institution for higher education prefers to be uncivilized, then it is a waste of time to talk to him about the principles of democracy. For example,  it is useless to tell him about Lu Xun's "Insults and threats are surely not combat." In truth, even insults come in different levels of quality. Low-quality insults center solely around the reproductive organs. High-quality insults do not even have to contain any obscenities. Here are some examples of high-quality insults:

    "As soon as you step outdoors, the birds disappear from the mountains and the people disappear from the streets."

    "After hanging around with you for some time, I want to be around dogs instead."

    "I wanted to bite you, but I am Muslim."

    "I look at your class ranking, and I can tell how many people are in your class."

    "No wonder your mother said that she was better off giving birth to a piece of BBQ pork than to you. On closer look, your mother was right. You are really not as good as a piece of BBQ pork."

    I really wish that when university students use obscenities, they should watch what that does to their image. They may receive a reply such as: "Please do not use your organ of excretion to speak to me, because that is being extremely impolite. Thank you."

    (EJ Insight) August 2, 2016.

    Edward Leung Tin-kei (梁天琦), a prominent member of the localist group Hong Kong Indigenous, has seen his bid to run for a seat in the upcoming Legislative Council election get rejected by local authorities. Leung was disqualified by a returning officer even though he had signed the controversial new declaration form introduced by the Electoral Affairs Commission (EAC), according to RTHK.

    The young political activist had sought to run for a seat in the New Territories East constituency, the same place where he fought a by-election earlier this year. Though he lost the February by-election, Leung won a lot of attention as he secured more than 60,000 votes, pointing to the growing appeal of his political platform. 

    Leung had earlier advocated Hong Kong independence, but signaled a change of stance last week when he agreed to sign a declaration to uphold the Basic law and accept Chinas rights over Hong Kong. Despite that, his application was rejected, as the returning officer apparently had some misgivings.

    The EAC last month introduced a new rule under which all election candidates must sign a new declaration to uphold the Basic law the citys mini-constitution and recognize that Hong Kong is an inalienable part of China. Anyone who fails to do so could face disqualification, the election watchdog warned. Critics have slammed the new rule as a kind of political censorship aimed at stopping people with pro-independence leanings from participating in the September Legco election.

    Leung said he hasnt been given any reason for the rejection of his candidacy.

    Apart from Leung, another localist candidate James Chan Kwok-keung (陳國強) was also denied permission to run in the polls, RTHK reported Tuesday. However, Baggio Leung Chung-hang (梁頌恆) of Youngspiration, was accepted as a candidate. Hong Kong Indigenous had announced earlier that it will support Baggio Leung if Edward Leung is barred from the election.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) August 2, 2016.

    In a decision made by the returning officer, she stated she could not accept that Edward Leung Tin-kei truly changed from his past stance of advocating and promoting Hong Kong independence.

    Leung, of Hong Kong Indigenous, was barred from the Legislative Council election on Tuesday, only hours away from the briefing for confirmed candidates.

    In hopes of being able to run in the election, Leung distanced himself from past statements, media reports, and his old Facebook page, which advocated Hong Kongs independence.

    Leung received an email on July 22 asking whether he still supported Hong Kong independence after submitting his application to run for a seat in the New Territories East constituency. In a reply on July 28, he said the answer was a resounding no.

    Mr Leung has not provided sufficient reasons or evidence to prove that the media reports on his advocacy for Hong Kong independence were not true, wrote Cora Ho Lai-sheung, returning officer of the New Territories East constituency. She added that the law did not prevent her from considering materials that are, or may be, hearsay statements.

    Ho also wrote that it was impossible for Leung to be ignorant of the existence and contents of his old Facebook page, but he has never pointed out that the pages Hong Kong independence content was not coherent with his views.

    Mr. Leung used the [safe] version to describe the new Facebook page, showing that Mr. Leung used the contents of the page to try and obscure his real political views, Ho added.

    Ho wrote that Leung did not express that he no longer supported Hong Kong independence between July 22 and 28, and that he only stated his opposition in his reply on July 28. Ho also cited Leungs statements during a press conference on July 28.

    Leung said then: The regime does not want me to enter the Legislative Council even if I have to crawl inside, through whatever means, I need to join it. I must stand for election in September and win and be a lawmaker.

    I think [the statements made by] Mr. Leung mean that he will use whatever means to enter the Legislative Council, including claiming not to advocate Hong Kong independence anymore; if he becomes a legislator, he will continue to advocate and support Hong Kong independence, Ho wrote.

    Thus, Ho said she could not accept that Leung has truly changed his stance. Because he did not intend to uphold the Basic Law, his candidacy was rejected, she said.

    A statement from Hong Kong Indigenous said the reply from Ho was naked political and thought censorship. The function of the Electoral Affairs Commission is to coordinate election affairs  it has no power and legal basis to censor the political views of candidates, it read. It also pointed out that Leung was allowed to participate in the LegCo by-election in February in which he received more than 60,000 votes but was unable to join the one in September.It is utterly ridiculous, it added. The group said it will lodge an election petition and judicial review to overrule the decision.

    (SCMP) August 2, 2016.

    Hong Kongs election watchdog on Tuesday rejected localist leader Edward Leung Tin-keis bid to run in next months Legislative Council polls, setting off a chorus of complaints about political screening of candidates and raising doubts about the watchdogs neutrality.

    With Leungs rejection, a total of six candidates for the September 4 polls have had their nominations invalidated by returning officers over their advocacy of the citys independence from China.

    There were chaotic scenes at a briefing for validated candidates by the Electoral Affairs Commission on Tuesday night as protesting pan-democratic and localist hopefuls disrupted the session. The commission was forced to cut short the briefing, and police guarding the venue removed the protesters.

    As protesters tried to storm the speakers stage, Demosisto chairman Nathan Law Kwun-chung was seen being pushed to the ground. He later sought medical treatment at United Christian Hospital for leg injuries and planned to file a police report, suspecting he had been manhandled by a plainclothes officer. The election commission condemned the violent acts of the protesters.

    Leung, a member of Hong Kong Indigenous, was expected to have a high chance of winning a seat, considering his strong performance in a Legco by-election in February. He slammed the rejection of his candidacy as a decision made under rule of man, not rule of law. The returning officer doesnt want to believe what I say in black and white and concluded that she simply doesnt believe that I am genuine in what I say, he said. Is she a worm in my mind?

    He went on to claim the elections were being manipulated by the government, and that he would submit an election petition to challenge the rejection the day after the Legco polls. He later went into the briefing as a guest and swore at election commissioner Barnabas Fung Wah as he spoke.

    Leung, a Hong Kong University philosophy student, was an open advocate of independence until last week, when he was forced to clarify his stance before his candidacy was decided. He made a complete U-turn to accept a controversial change to election rules and signed a confirmation form reinforcing his acceptance of Hong Kongs status as an inalienable part of China. The form is an additional requirement to the standard declaration form to uphold the Basic Law.

    Whats causing confusion is that 42 lists of candidates from the pan-democrat and localist camps have been approved even though they refused to sign the new form.

    In a 12-page reply, returning officer Cora Ho Lai-sheung, with the advice of the Department of Justice, attached media reports on Leungs past remarks about independence, and even his own Facebook posts. She included a transcript of remarks Leung had made at a press conference after signing the confirmation form.

    What Mr Leung means should be: in order to enter Legco, he would take whatever means, including stopping advocating Hong Kong independence; and once he becomes a lawmaker, he will continue to advocate independence, she wrote. I therefore do not trust Mr Leung genuinely changed his previous stance for independence.

    A government spokesman denied political censorship, insisting that returning officers were acting lawfully to ensure the elections would be run in accordance with the Basic Law. The justice department said it had taken into account candidates right to stand for elections when advising returning officers.

    Letter from Returning Officer to Edward Leung Tin-kei

    Videos:

    Facebook https://www.facebook.com/chankawairicky/videos/1040623149306381/
    Facebook https://www.facebook.com/chuckyboyboy009/videos/1795124450735135/
    Localists vs. localists outside the Election Affairs Commission meeting.

    - While the League of Social Democrats/People Power/Demosisto leftist retards charge the stage to seize the microphone and, more importantly, be filmed by the news media, Wong Yeung-tat was bemused from the position of his throne.

    Facebook https://www.facebook.com/chuckyboyboy009/videos/1795007810746799/ Wong Yeung-tat vs. localists

    Facebook https://www.facebook.com/chankawairicky/videos/1040560225979340/ Edward Leung gets on chair to raise middle finger and scream obscenities ("You eat shit" and "Fuck your mother").

    Facebook https://www.facebook.com/chankawairicky/videos/1040553939313302/ Localists surround candidate Junius Ho

    Leticia Lee vs. Alvin Cheng Kam-mun (Civic Passion) https://www.facebook.com/chankawairicky/videos/1040606739308022/

    - They are so close to each other that the question inevitably arises: Are they going to kiss each other?

    - Candidate Ricky Wong asked: "Am I at the right place?"

    - How about some Valentine embellishment for this match made in heaven?

    Ko Tat-bun (Voice of Loving Hong Kong) being assaulted by a masked man https://www.facebook.com/chankawairicky/videos/1040623149306381/
    See also Oriental Daily http://hk.on.cc/hk/bkn/cnt/news/20160802/bkn-20160802225817075-0802_00822_001.html
    Oriental Daily https://www.facebook.com/chankawairicky/videos/1040718712630158/

    SocREC
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxexa0QpT8s Lau Siu-lai was carted out of the meeting hall
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4zN9RT2CQlk Nathan Law was taken out to the ambulance

    Internet comments:

    - TVB Edward Leung: "Today in Hong Kong, there are two types of people. One part is called Hongkongers. They enjoy their rights under the Basic Law. But there is other part of Hongkongers. About 17%. They are lower-class Hongkongers. This 17% of Hongkongers have no right to find someone to represent them. This 17% of Hongkongers do not have the right to elect. This 17% of Hongkongers do not have freedom of speech, because when they bring up the political views in their minds, they are censored and suppressed. Their political rights are deprived. Therefore in Hong Kong today, there are more than 1 million lower-class Hongkongers. The Basic Law cannot protect them. When you ask us to uphold this Basic Law, you deprive us of the right to vote under Article 26 of this Basic Law, freedom of speech under Article 27. Is this a society of rule-of-law? This is such a society which wears a coat of rule-of-law but is actually running rule-of-man. Hong Kong is completely manipulated by the Chinese Communists. Such is Hong Kong today. When tyranny becomes reality, what else can I do? Revolution is our duty. This is the only way. As long as we are under the rule of Chinese Communists, I cannot enter this Legislative Council. This is reality. What else can I do?"

    - As long as this is the Legislative Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China, the Basic Law will work this way. Whether Edward Leung files a election petition or a judicial review, the ultimate authority is the National People's Congress Standing Committee and the same outcome will result. If Edward Leung wants a different outcome, he should set up a parallel government of the Hong Kong Republic which can enact its own legislation, levy its own taxes, raise its own national army, etc.

    - When the election season started, Edward Leung talked up Hong Kong independence because that is his base. When the Returning Officer sought clarification about this apparent violation of Basic Law Article 1, Edward Leung made a 180-degree turn to embrace the Basic Law. After the Returning Officer nevertheless invalidated the nomination, Edward Leung made a 180-degree turn to call for armed revolution. Edward Leung changes his face faster than a Sichuan face-changing opera even though he is from Hubei province, People's Republic of China.

    - It is argued that if Edward Leung was allowed to run in the New Territories East by-election earlier this year, then he should be allowed to run in this election as well because his advocacy ofn Hong Kong independence has always been the same.

    There is a story about a friend. He was going to cross the street and came up to a red pedestrian stop light. However, there were no cars coming as far as the eyes can see. About a hundred other pedestrians began walking and my friend followed them. When he got to the other side, a police officer called him over and issued a summons to him. My friend complained that none of the other pedestrians were fined. The policeman told my friend to complain to the judge.

    So my friend took time off from work and made a special trip to court and tried to talk to the judge. The judge cut him off and asked: "Was the light red at the time? Yes or no?" My friend said: "Yes." The judge asked: "Did you cross the street while the red was light? Yes or no?" My friend said: "Yes." The judge said: "Go over there and pay the fine. Next case!"

    The point is not how many others were caught, or how often you did it before without being caught. The point is what happened this time was against the law. "Yes or no?"

    - (Bastille Post) At the court trial, a 60-something-year-old taxi driver was accused of charging a foreigner a fee for two small hand-carry suitcase. After the prosecutor presented the case, the taxi driver immediately pleaded not guilty and excitedly that he has been charging such fees for even the smallest piece of hand-carry luggage for more than 40 years without ever being prosecuted. Therefore he accused the government of abusing its authority.

    The magistrate got very upset and immediately told the taxi driver to shut up. The magistrate explained that each court case is handled independently. Never having been charged for the same thing previously is not an excuse for this offence. "You may not have been prosecuted before for many reasons: maybe nobody complained, or maybe the police did not have the manpower, or whatever. But just because you were not prosecuted before does not mean that you must be excused for this time. Each case will be dealt with independently by the court depending on the evidence that is presented for the case.

    - Secretary of Justice Rimsky Yuen has explained that Edward Leung's position on Hong Kong independence was fuzzy during the by-election, but it became gradually very clear leading up to this election.

    - (Bastille Post) In the case of Wan Chin, his articulations on Hong Kong independence after filing the nomination papers were very ambiguous. The Department of Justice reviewed what he said and wrote and thought that the evidence was too weak. Therefore Wan Chin's nomination was validated.

    - (Speakout HK) Senior counsel Ronny Tong said: "Nobody believes that Edward Leung is not pro-independence. So why do you insist that the Returning Officer must believe it?" That is the true test, rather than 12 pages of minutiae.

    - In the courtroom, is the judge reduced to asking the defendant: "Did you do it? Yes or no?" If the answer is no, then the defendant has to be released?

    - While the pan-democrats charged the stage, the Youngspiration candidates took selfies to post on Facebook:

    Afterwards, Yau Wai-ching apologized about the disrespect shown to the victims.

    - What is the meaning of "being valiant"? (Wen Wei Po) August 5, 2016.

    - Traditional pan-democrats only know how to get in front of the camera. What else do you know?

    - In front of the camera, you put on an act. Behind the camera, you tell people to go to hell.

    - I only know for certain that all those who charge onto the stage are running in the election. What the fuck good would it do for Edward Leung if he also charge onto the stage and actually beat the fuck out of Barnabas Fung.

    - What good does it do to jump on stage today? Where the fuck were you during all the other times? Why do you only show up when an election is on?

    - Ultimately, being Legislator Council is just a job for them. They are not really fighting back at anything.

    ---

    - So these are the valiant ones? Even their much-despised leftist retards are more valiant.

    - Where the fuck were those valiant Hong Kong independence warriors? Where did they go?

    - Edward Leung was very valiant today. He got on a chair, raised his middle finger and yelled: "Barnabas Fung, you eat shit! Fuck your mother!" No act can be as brave and courageous.

    - (Oriental Daily with video) August 2, 2016. The Election Affairs Commission briefing for the candidates was delayed for 15 minutes because the security guards clashed with the candidates beforehand. Each candidate was entitled to bring two others but some candidates apparently brought more than two. This caused some candidates to be angry at the security guards and they clashed. Chairman Barnabas Fung started to speak but pan-democrats started yelling "We oppose political screening" and "We want fair elections" and held up banners that said "Self-determination by the people of Hong Kong." But other persons yelled back "Shameless to disrupt public order!" Eventually the police removed the pan-democrats.

    Photos of people rushing the stage:

    - (Cable TV) August 2, 2016. The Election Affairs Commission meeting began amidst protests. After chairman Barnabas Fung introduced the regulations, Edward Leung left. When Fung was done speaking, Avery Ng (League of Social Democrats) rushed onto the stage to seize the microphone. Members of People Power and Demosisto also charged onto stage while the workers tried to stop them. Fung left under escort while the police removed many persons from the meeting venue. Some of those who stayed behind stood on their chairs to quarrel. After about 20 minutes, the speeches by the ICAC and Hong Kong Post representatives were canceled and they began to draw candidate numbers. When it came to New Territories East, Returning Officer Cora Ho directed the drawing. The pan-democrats demanded to know why she invalidated Edward Leung's nomination but the workers blocked them and took them away. The media were kept away from Barnabas Fung and Cora Ho. The meeting was quickly over.
    More from Cable TV

    - (SCMP) The Civic Party condemned the disqualification of the six pro-independence candidates, calling it political screening and accusing the election watchdog of deviating from the principle of political neutrality.

    Let it be noted that the Civic Party stop short of saying that it is a universal right to stand for election, including those who advocate overthrowing the constitution/separatism/armed insurrection/etc.

    - American History: Article 2, Section 1 of the Constitution requires that before presidents can assume their duties they must take the oath of office. The completion of this thirty-five-word oath ("I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.") ends one president's term and begins the next.

    - Time for yet another White House petition.

    It won't make a difference, but signing it will make you feel good.

    - The next time that I don't like my Big Mac at McDonald's, I'm going to rush out to protest at Burger King. Why? Because McDonald's is too strong and powerful. But why would Burger King listen to my complaint and how would they improve food quality over at McDonald's?

    - My iPhone 6+ isn't working. I am going to call the Samsung hotline to complain.

    - (Wen Wei Po) (Wen Wei Po) August 5, 2016.

    - We support the United States sanctioning China.

    - Why not ask the American imperialists to take back sovereignty of Hong Kong?

    - I hope that President Obama can help us with one last thing -- use a nuclear bomb to fucking flatten Beijing. He should kill as many Chinks as possible. It would be best if they all fucking die, so that they cannot cause any more mischief.

    - Ten fucking nuclear bombs to kill 1 billion people.

    - What is wrong with seeking American help? In recent world history, which revolution did not have foreign involvement?

    ---

    - Americans? They are fucking useless. There have been many White House petitions on behalf of Hong Kong already. Has the White House ever done anything? Please tell me.

    - Well, sometimes a US State Department person would make a statement that will draw a rebuke from the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson. You know, something about "Mind your own business!"

    - What do Americans care? Do you think that they could be bothered about what happens in Hong Kong?

    - I know that you did this in order to declare yet another moral victory over the Chinese Communists.

    - Why the fuck should you get the Americans involved? Hongkongers should depend on themselves. My advice to you is not to be too "pan-democratic" by running over the Americans for every little thing.

    - Just nonsense. If you have to run to the Americans over eligibility to run in a local election, how can you ever hope to become independent? (reference: Dependency Theory)

    - The whole point of Localism is that the locals should decide local affairs. That is why we have groups such as Tuen Mun Affairs for Tuen Mun People, Hung Hom Affairs for Hung Hom People, etc.  If this is a Hong Kong issue, then it is a Hong Kong affair for the Hong Kong people. Okay?

    - (Bastille Post) August 2, 2016.

    Firstly, this will trigger street resistance. Hong Kong Indigenous gained fame with the Lunar New Year's Day riot in Mong Kok. So they will surely attempt to start street resistance. The question is just how many traditional pan-democrats and other localists will go into the streets with them.

    But why did the Election Affairs Commission go after Edward Leung but not some of the other radical localists? Everything depends on the evidence. What a person says before the election counts less. What really counts is after the person signs the standard form about upholding the Basic Law. If the person persists in advocating Hong Kong independence, he will be invalidated. So some of the other radical localists clamped up after they submitted their nomination forms, and they got their nominations validated. Now that they are on the inside looking out, it is rational for them to make a show to support Edward Leung but they won't be caught either supporting Leung on Hong Kong independence or throwing bricks in the streets.

    Secondly, the government consulted Queen's Counsels in the United Kingdom beforehand. There are many precedents from the 1970's with the Irish Republican Army. For example, Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams was rejected as a parliament candidate for cause. So the government goes in well-prepared, in addition to knowing that the National People's Congress Standing Committee is there to interpret the primacy of Basic Law Article 1 over Articles 26 and 27.

    Thirdly, there are 24 candidate lists for the 9 seats in New Territories East. Based upon the previous HKU-POP poll, Edward Leung was ranked third with 8.3% support. He could have secured a seat. But now that he is out, the ninth-ranked traditional pan-democrat and the tenth-ranked radical localist stand to gain most. This is a zero-sum game, where the pro-establishment camp can't benefit from.

    Fourthly, the agenda has just moved from "Anybody but CY Leung" (ABC) to something else. Instead of the pro-establishment candidates being pushed whether they support the re-election of CY Leung, the pan-democrats will be asked whether they support Hong Kong independence.

    Fifthly, the candidates cannot advocate Hong Kong independence openly. If they do so, they may be charged with making a false statement to the Election Affairs Commission.

    - 120-lb weakling Nathan Law (Demosisto) tried to rush the stage but came out at the losing end. He wants to file a complaint against someone whom he thinks is an undercover police officer.

    - (Bastille Post)

    Hong Kong Bar Association ex-chairman Edward Chan King-sang said that the government wants to replace judges by government officials when they let the Returning Officers invalidate nominations because they thought that the candidates did not sincerely support the Basic Law. Chan said that making a false oath is a criminal offence which should be decided by a judge and not a government official.

    Edward Chan is being disingenuous here because he is switching issues. The original issue is the Returning Officer determining whether the candidate is filing accurate information. The switched issue is the judge determining whether a person has made a false oath.

    In any case, assuming that Chan is correct, then the Returning Officer becomes a rubber stamp with no authority whatsoever. If a candidate shows up before the Returning Officer. On one hand, he is signing the document to pledge support of the Basic Law. On the other hand, he is setting a copy of Basic Law on fire and saying "Here! I am fucking supporting the Basic Law!" According to Chan, the Returning Officer can do nothing except to validate the nomination. The only recourse for the government is to charge the candidate with making a false oath. The court trial may be scheduled for years later. Even if the government wins, the Legislative Council have to vote by at least 2/3 to disqualify one of their own members.

    The point is that even in a judicial review, the judge is not going to decide in place of the Returning Officer. The case will be based upon whether the Returning Officer has exceeded his authority under the law. There is no intention to make the court responsible for making all executive decisions.

    In the Orwell Prize winning book Rule of Law by Tom Bingham, it was pointed out that judges work with the law on a daily basis and they may not be qualified in other domains (such as running elections) in which they have to make decision. So when the Parliament passes laws to authorize a certain government official to make certain decisions. The Parliament does not want to let a certain judge to make that decision on his own.

    Bingham makes it very clear that the judge will only decide whether the decision by the government official is in accordance of the law. The judge will not make that decision for the government, as Chan suggested.

    - (SCMP) Lawyers are not the sole arbiters of who should stand in Legco elections: its a matter for us all. By Alex Lo. August 6, 2016.

    Oh, the arrogant presumption of some lawyers.

    This week, all 30 members of the legal sub-sector of the 1,200-strong Election Committee that picked Hong Kongs leader in 2012 criticised the government for banning individuals from entering elections based on their political stance. In a joint statement, they claimed returning officers were not empowered to make such a subjective and political decision.

    So far, six pro-independence activists have been barred from running in next months Legislative Council elections. The decisions by the returning officers were of course political, but that doesnt mean its illegal, as those lawyers have claimed. As for their being subjective decisions, the lawyers criticism is just incoherent. How is it subjective if those activists have said they advocate independence and returning officers believe they do?

    The case of Hong Kong Indigenous Edward Leung Tin-kei appears to present a problem, because he has on record claimed he has renounced his independence stance. But no one believes he has done so, least of all his supporters. He is lying through his teeth while winking at us.

    Those decisions by the returning officers are of course political because the issue of independence for Hong Kong cuts right to the very foundation of our constitutional order. The Basic Law stipulates one country, two systems but expressly states that Hong Kong is an inalienable part of China.

    Everything else flows from these two stipulations, including the rule of law, an independent judiciary and an executive-led government.

    Should we allow those who seek the overthrow of our constitutional order and government system to serve as legislators? Reasonable people may and do disagree on this point. But it is such a fundamental question that it concerns all Hong Kong citizens, not just those self-important lawyers who claim special expertise in this matter.

    It has been argued that those secessionists are not seeking independence now, but only after 2047 when one country two systems will have come to an end.

    If thats really the case, why are we tearing ourselves apart over something decades away? Clearly whatever they say, our young secessionists want to bring that date forward, which again means undermining our government system.

    They may want to start a revolution, but we are not obligated politically, legally and morally to let them wreak havoc. Quite the contrary.

    - (Kinliu) August 5, 2016. In the Rule of Statutory Interpretation under Common Law, the most basic rule is the Literal Rule. However, if a literal rule leads to an absurd result, then the literal meaning can be altered under the Rule Against Manifest Absurdity (The Golden Rule).

    Here is one example. In Smith v Hughes (1960), the English law prohibited solicitation for prostitution purposes in streets and public places. But two female prostitutes set up in an apartment and hailed pedestrians from the verandah. They were arrested and convicted, after which they appealed on the grounds that they were not in the street at the time. The court of appeals ruled that the Literal Rule led to an Absurd Conclusion, because the purpose of the law was to make sure that pedestrians do not get harassed by prostitutes. So if the pedestrians are harassed, then it does not matter where the prostitutes were standing at the time.

    Applied to Legislative Council Ordinance CAP 542 s. 40: What requirements are to be compiled with by persons nominated as candidates:

    (1) A person is not validly nominated as a candidate for an election for a constituency unless (Amended 25 of 2003 s. 23)

    ... (b) the nomination form includes or is accompanied by-

    (i) a declaration to the effect that the person will uphold the Basic Law and pledge allegiance to the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region

    The Literal Rule would say that the nominee is only required to go through the formality of signing a piece of paper but can otherwise go about advocating Hong Kong independence (thus contravening Basic Law Article 1) and overthrowing the HKSAR government.

    Is this Manifest Absurdity? Did you think that the spirit of the Legislative Council Ordinance was to collect a piece of paper to be filed away by the Returning Officer? Or was it to prevent those who oppose the System from entering the System and destroying it from within?

    - (HKG Pao) August 6, 2016. Alvin Cheng Kam-mun was one of the first to sign the confirmation form. Today at the radio forum for Hong Kong Island Legislative Council candidates, Cheng declared that Hong Kong independence has always been his position. He said that public opinion polls showed that 17% of the people of Hong Kong support independence. Therefore, either you prosper with the trend or you will be destroyed.

    - (HKG Pao) August 7, 2016. The "King of Judicial Reviews" Kwok-cheuk-kin has filed for a judicial review over the decision of Electoral Affairs Commission Barnabas Fung. In his brief, he said that New People's Party legislator once served under the British colonial administration in which she pledged loyalty to the United Kingdom. Therefore she does not support the People's Republic of China. However, she was allowed to enter the Legislative Council elections. This should mean that Chan Ho-tin and Edward Leung should both be allowed to run. Kwok said that the Registration and Electoral Office should not be making such decisions, which should be left to the voters.

    - The Returning Officers were not concerned about what happened before the nomination period, because people can always change their minds. They were concerned about what happened after the nomination papers were filed. If you sign a pledge but you continue to advocate Hong Kong independence, then the validity of that pledge is questionable.

    - (Ming Pao) August 10, 2016.

    Hong Kong Indigenous' Edward Leung was just one step away from entering the Legislative Council when he was shut out because of his pro-Hong Kong independence stance. Leung said that he is worried about his future, because he is already a "Double NO young wastrel (NO school and NO job)." He has no idea what he can do. "I have given up the idea of being an elected representative."

    Within six months, Leung went from an unknown student of philosophy at Hong Kong University to become a Localist star. He said: "Being a public figure is very irksome." This is because he has to look after three images: the public image, the Facebook image and his true personal self.

    After the Lunar New Year riot in Mong Kok, people think that Leung's "resistance without any bottom lines" means that he is cold-blooded. "But I am not", he said. He said that he did not want to see people shed blood or go to jail. He said that some revolutions are peaceful.

    After being shut out from the elections, Leung said: "When tyranny becomes reality, revolution becomes a duty." This gave the impression that he wants to start an even more radical round of resistance. "I never wanted an armed revolution to come. I don't want to see blood spilled. I don't want to see martyrs. I don't want things to happen when they are not necessary." At the time of the Mong Kok clash, Leung said that the old methods of resistance could not budge the authorities an inch and nobody else was willing to use more radical methods to apply pressure on the government. "If there is no one else, then we at Hong Kong Indigenous will do it."

    As for "resistance without any bottom lines," Leung recalled that he was asked "Do you have any bottom lines?" after a certain function. "At the time, I took a look at him and I said 'No, I don't have any bottom lines as a pesron.' This became our main political stance afterwards."

    Leung said that he recognized the importance of local district work. He said that ideology alone is not enough. He says that they need to deliver results in the local districts and improve the lives of citizens in order to prove that they are not just trouble-making young wastrels. At the moment, Hong Kong Indigenous lacks the local work experience, and so they may work with other organizations to fill this gap.

    - Here is the mystery. If Leung says that he is a "Double NO" young wastrel, did he graduate or not? Previously, he listed himself as a fifth-year undergraduate student in the department of philosophy at the Hong Kong University. Did he graduate his year? Or was he kicked out of school due to non-attendance/failing grades?

    - (Ta Kung Pao) August 10, 2016.

    Hong Kong Indigenous' Edward Leung Tin-kei told the media that he entered the election in order to seize political resources. A legislator takes in more than $10 million in resources over the four-year term. If he doesn't seize it, some other political party will seize it.

    Although Leung claimed that his "resistance without any redline" was a random quote, the fact that he was shouting that slogan during a rally for his New Territories East by-election in February and he has stated the same stance during many past interviews.

    (SCMP) July 30, 2016.

    A member of the separatist Hong Kong National Party has been disqualified from running in next months Legislative Council elections, sparking speculation that others who hold pro-independence views could be disqualified.

    Chan Ho-tin, whose candidacy was invalidated by the citys election watchdog on Saturday, is one of a number of localists who refused to sign a recently introduced additional declaration form which reinforces acknowledgement that Hong Kong is an inalienable part of China. Those who oppose it see the controversial requirement as a tool to censor political thought and suppress the right to stand for election. Its validity is already the subject of a legal challenge by three potential election candidates.

    Chan said he would fight back by seeking both a judicial review and a future election petition.

    The National Party is honoured to become the first party to be banned from joining a democratic election by the government due to political difference, the party wrote on its Facebook page as it announced the latest development. It urged other parties that support democracy to boycott the election as the move has violated the Basic Law.

    A government spokesman backed the invalidation decision made by the returning officers who have the duty as well as power to make those decisions according to the relevant electoral laws. Independence [of Hong Kong] is inconsistent with the constitutional and legal status ... stipulated in the Basic Law, as well as the established basic policies of the PRC regarding Hong Kong, he said. Upholding the Basic Law is a basic legal duty of a legislator. If a person advocates or promotes the independence of the HKSAR, he cannot possibly uphold the Basic Law or fulfil his duties as a legislator, he said.

    The Electoral Affairs Commission said its officers had made the decision in accordance with the law, and the watchdog would not comment as it did not have legal powers to make such a decision.

    About 100 people joined a rally in Tamar park to support Chan on Saturday night.

    Separately, a group of pan-democrats held a gathering outside the Chief Executives Office to protest against Chans disqualification.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) July 30, 2016.

    The government said the nomination of a pro-independence Legislative Council election candidate was invalidated as he cannot possibly uphold the Basic Law or fulfil his duties as a legislator. Chan Ho-tin of the Hong Kong National Party was notified by the Electoral Affairs Commission on Saturday of the decision.

    The Returning Officers have the duty as well as power to make those decisions according to the relevant electoral laws, a government spokesperson said.

    The spokesperson said that the returning officer for the New Territories West geographical constituency decided Chan did not comply with section 40(1)(b)(i) of the Legislative Council Ordinance (Cap 542).

    The section states that the nomination form for candidates includes a declaration that they will uphold the Basic Law and pledge allegiance to the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.

    The candidate cannot possibly comply with the requirements of the relevant electoral laws, since advocating or promoting independence of the HKSAR is contrary to the content of the declaration, the spokesperson said. Decisions made by the Returning Officers are aimed to ensure that the LegCo election is held in strict accordance with the Basic Law and other applicable laws in an open, honest and fair manner.

    There is no question of any political censorship, restriction of the freedom of speech or deprivation of the right to stand for elections as alleged by some members of the community, the spokesperson added.

    Chan, in response, tore apart the letter from the Electoral Affairs Commission in front of reporters on Saturday. It is a piece of rubbish, he said. Because we didnt bow down to the Peoples Republic of China, they did not let us run, he said. As long as we dont admit to be Chinese, they wont let us enter the Legislative Council.

    He said the legislature is officially pronounced dead after the new political censorship measure, adding that people should boycott it. He also urged Hong Kong people to join him at Admiralty on Saturday evening to express their anger towards the decision.

    Chan said the party will write to the United Nations and the UK government to raise the incident to an international level. He will file a judicial review and election petition to challenge the decision. Pan-democratic parties will stage a protest outside the Chief Executives Office at 7:30pm on Saturday protesting against Chans disqualification.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) February 13, 2018.

    Pro-independence activist Andy Chan Ho-tin has lost his bid to overturn the 2016 Legislative Council election, in which he was barred from running.

    Mr Justice Thomas Au ruled that a returning officer can examine matters beyond the formal compliance of the nomination form, but should only conclude that candidates do not have intentions to uphold the Basic Law or pledge allegiance to the HKSAR at the time of nomination if there is cogent, clear and compelling evidence. Candidates then should be given reasonable opportunity to respond to any materials raised by returning officers.

    Chan lodged a petition to nullify the election in 2016, but the case was only heard in May last year owing to legal aid issues. The judgment was handed down on Tuesday, nine months after the hearing.

    To run in the New Territories West constituency, Chan signed a declaration in the nomination form stating that he would uphold the Basic Law and pledge allegiance to the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. However, he did not sign an additional confirmation form separate to the nomination form which asked for the same pledge.

    He was barred from entering the election race by a returning officer district officers who temporarily oversee administrative electoral affairs. The officer asked Chan if he would maintain his pro-independence position, which the officer said Chan advocated based on news reports and other sources. Chan did not reply.

    In a 104-page judgment handed down on Tuesday, Court of First Instance judge Thomas Au ruled that the Electoral Affairs Commission had the power to issue the confirmation form requesting further information from a candidate. The returning officer, therefore, is entitled to take into account a candidates failure to return the Confirmation Form, Au said.

    Au also said that even without the form a returning officer is entitled to ask whether the candidate understands the relevant Basic Law articles, and that there is criminal liability for making false declarations under the Electoral Affairs Commission Regulation. The officer can examine matters beyond the formal compliance of the nomination form, he said.

    The judgment also confirmed that Beijings 2016 interpretation of the Basic Law also applied to standing for election, and Legislative Council candidates must therefore genuinely and truly uphold the Basic Law and swear allegiance to the HKSAR of the PRC. The declaration requirement was hence a constitutional requirement for election, he said.

    Judge Au further added that a signed declaration should constitute strong objective proof that there is such an intent to uphold Basic Law and pledge allegiance to the government. Only where there is cogent, clear and compelling evidence that the candidate does not have such intentions notwithstanding the signed declaration could the returning officer conclude otherwise.

    Au also said: Needless to say fairness requires that generally the Returning Officer should give a reasonable opportunity to the candidate to respond to any materials that the Returning Officer says are contrary to an intention to carry out the obligations under the Declaration.

    The judge found that Chan and his party had indeed advocated for abolishing the Basic Law when seeking to establish an independent Hong Kong as a republic which would be, in any reasonable view, the very antithesis of an intention to uphold the Basic Law.

    The Hong Kong government welcomed the judgment which, it said, confirmed the power of returning officers to examine candidates nominations, as to whether they truly believe in the declaration to uphold the Basic Law and pledge allegiance to the HKSAR.

    A statement issued by Chans Hong Kong National Party said Chan and his legal team will consider whether to appeal: In past years, the rulings made by the courts of Hong Kong in regards to various political cases have already demonstrated that our judicial courts have submitted to Chinas despotic sovereignty, and no longer the defender of the civilised Rule of Law, it said.

    But no matter and whatever the outcome, the Hong Kong National Party calls for our supporters and the like-minded to not harbour any hope for the current Hong Kong judicial system. For as long as we are under Chinas colonial rule, the Rule of Law will never be fully realised.

    (Hong Kong High Court Court of First Instance HCAL 162/2016) Chan Ho-tin vs. Lo Ying-ki and others.

    Internet comments:

    - (TVB) July 30, 2016. In his press conference, Chan Ho-tin said that he was angry not for himself, but for the several hundreds of thousands of voters whose right to vote for Hong Kong independence has been deprived. At 0:57, Chan tears up the letter from the Returning Officer of the Registration and Electoral Office.

    - (HKG Pao) July 30, 2016. Chan Ho-tin said that the government walked right into a trap and has triggered a constitutional crisis. The Hong Kong National Party will write to the United Nations and the United Kingdom to protest. They will raise the affair to the "international level." They will file an election petition so that "the forces of Hong Kong independence" can enter the system. Chan Ho-tin also called on citizens to demonstrate in Admiralty. He said that the Hong Kong National Party is organization "a major action" but he cannot divulge what it is yet.

    What can possibly happen as a result of the Hong Kong National Party writing a letter to the United Nations and the United Kingdom?

    China is a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council and can veto any vote on anything. So this is a waste of time for everybody concerned. Who is going to take up this case? If the United States does so because it wants to pique China, how does it respond to the identical issues on Puerto Rican independence? Furthermore, the Hong Kong National Party argues that Hongkongers are a different race from the Chinese. This just beggars belief. Even better cases such as Xinjiang or Tibet independence get nowhere, and the Hong Kong case is even worse than the Taiwan case because at least one-third of the people of Hong Kong were born in mainland China.

    The United Kingdom is a party to the Sino-British Joint Declaration. If you want the United Kingdom to act on the basis of this Declaration, you must accept its contents, which includes:

    1. The Government of the People's Republic of China declares that to recover the Hong Kong area (including Hong Kong Island, Kowloon and the New Territories, hereinafter referred to as Hong Kong) is the common aspiration of the entire Chinese people, and that it has decided to resume the exercise of sovereignty over Hong Kong with effect from 1 July 1997.

    2. The Government of the United Kingdom declares that it will restore Hong Kong to the People's Republic of China with effect from 1 July 1997.

    3. The Government of the People's Republic of China declares that the basic policies of the People's Republic of China regarding Hong Kong are as follows:

    (1) Upholding national unity and territorial integrity and taking account of the history of Hong Kong and its realities, the People's Republic of China has decided to establish, in accordance with the provisions of Article 31 of the Constitution of the People's Republic of China, a Hong Kong Special Administrative Region upon resuming the exercise of sovereignty over Hong Kong.

    (2) The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region will be directly under the authority of the Central People's Government of the People's Republic of China. The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region will enjoy a high degree of autonomy, except in foreign and defence affairs which are the responsibilities of the Central People's Government.

    (3) The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region will be vested with executive, legislative and independent judicial power, including that of final adjudication. The laws currently in force in Hong Kong will remain basically unchanged.

    (4) The Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region will be composed of local inhabitants. The chief executive will be appointed by the Central People's Government on the basis of the results of elections or consultations to be held locally. Principal officials will be nominated by the chief executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region for appointment by the Central People's Government. Chinese and foreign nationals previously working in the public and police services in the government departments of Hong Kong may remain in employment. British and other foreign nationals may also be employed to serve as advisers or hold certain public posts in government departments of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.

    (5) The current social and economic systems in Hong Kong will remain unchanged, and so will the life-style. Rights and freedoms, including those of the person, of speech, of the press, of assembly, of association, of travel, of movement, of correspondence, of strike, of choice of occupation, of academic research and of religious belief will be ensured by law in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. Private property, ownership of enterprises, legitimate right of inheritance and foreign investment will be protected by law.

    (6) The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region will retain the status of a free port and a separate customs territory.

    (7) The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region will retain the status of an international financial centre, and its markets for foreign exchange, gold, securities and futures will continue. There will be free flow of capital. The Hong Kong dollar will continue to circulate and remain freely convertible.

    (8) The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region will have independent finances. The Central People's Government will not levy taxes on the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.

    (9) The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region may establish mutually beneficial economic relations with the United Kingdom and other countries, whose economic interests in Hong Kong will be given due regard.

    (10) Using the name of "Hong Kong, China", the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region may on its own maintain and develop economic and cultural relations and conclude relevant agreements with states, regions and relevant international organisations. The Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region may on its own issue travel documents for entry into and exit from Hong Kong.

    (11) The maintenance of public order in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region will be the responsibility of the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.

    (12) The above-stated basic policies of the People's Republic of China regarding Hong Kong and the elaboration of them in Annex I to this Joint Declaration will be stipulated, in a Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China, by the National People's Congress of the People's Republic of China, and they will remain unchanged for 50 years.

    The Declaration accepts the sovereignty of the People's Republic of China over Hong Kong effective July 1, 1997. Does the Hong Kong National Party accept this? If so, then there is nothing to do. If not, how can they move the United Kingdom to renounce this Joint Declaration and promote Hong Kong independence instead from a completely different starting point?

    Article 3 section 5 talks about "rights and freedoms, including those of the person, of speech, of the press, of assembly, of association, of travel, of movement, of correspondence, of strike, of choice of occupation, of academic research and of religious belief will be ensured by law in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. Private property, ownership of enterprises, legitimate right of inheritance and foreign investment will be protected by law."

    Isn't it interesting that they do not mention "the right to vote and the right to stand for election in accordance with law" (which is covered by Article 23 of the Basic Law after the handover only)? Why didn't they? Because the British did not grant Hongkongers the rights to elect or stand for election as either the Governor (=Chief Executive today) or Legislative Councilor.

    - (HKG Pao) July 30, 2016. The Hong Kong National Party called on all political parties that support democracy to boycott the Legislative Council.

    Here is the analysis on the three possible outcomes:

    (1) All 'pro-democracy' political parties and candidates withdraw from the Legislative Council elections, and all 'pro-democracy' voters refuse to cast any votes. The Legislative Council election will be held. The voter turnout will be lower than usual, but probably higher than the 17.5% of the 2010 by-election (a.k.a. de facto referendum). The entire Legislative Council will be filled by pro-establishment legislators. Over the next four years, they will proceed to pass all manners of legislation without any filibustering. Thus, we will see the enactment of Article 23 on state security, Copyright (Amendment) Bill, National Education, etc. By the time that they are done, Hong Kong will be just like mainland China.

    (2) Some 'pro-democracy' political parties and candidates withdraw while some others remain in the race. It is doubtful that those who REMAIN will pick up all the votes for those who LEAVE. The Legislative Council election will be held. The voter turnout will be lower than usual but higher than Scenario (1) above. The Legislative Council will have a veto-proof pro-establishment majority. Over the next four years, they will proceed to pass all manners of legislative with some filibustering. Thus, we will see the enactment of Article 23 on state security, Copyright (Amendment) Bill, National Education, etc. By the time that they are done, Hong Kong will be just like mainland China.

    (3) None of the 'pro-democracy' political parties will withdraw because anyone who quits will lose both ways. Firstly, they will lose any chance to be in the Legislative Council and nobody will remember them four years from hence. Secondly, they will lose on all the issues that they are concerned about (Article 23, etc) as well as all the financial resources that comes with the job. Conversely, if they remain in the race, they stand to gain the votes of those who quit and make a lot of money.

    Rational people will take (3). But who says politicians are rational? (Reference: they vetoed the Chief Executive election bill in 2015)

    - The exclusion of Chan Ho-tin means that the Legislative Council election is no longer in line with the international standard of "universal suffrage with civil nomination." If the pan-democrats insisted on this international standard for the Chief Executive election, they must surely insist on the same here. Right? Do you see them quitting the race in protest?

    - What do you think the pan-democrats do? Why do you ask? Don't you know that the Pope is Catholic?

    The pan-democratic Legislative Council candidates held a photo-op opportunity for the media during which they posed with banners saying "Oppose political screening" and "Defend fair election." The usual suspects were present: Cyd Ho, Ip Kin-yuen, Leung Yiu-chung, Helena Wong Pik-wan, Claudia Mo, Jeremy Tam, etc. Afterwards, they went home to prepare for more campaign activities tomorrow.
    (SOC-Rec) https://www.facebook.com/socrec/videos/1446386872054906/

    - Their point is that the Legislative Council is in recess already, so that they can no longer pursue the matter in any official capacity. But if you re-elect them in September, they can come back and demand to know just how CY Leung ordered the Returning Officers of the Electoral Affairs Office to do his bidding ... So don't forget to vote for them (P.S. More importantly, don't forget to donate money to them because they need money to win).

    - When the pan-democrats issued a statement to strongly denounce CY Leung, they mentioned the case of "an individual candidate" instead of Chan Ho-tin by name. Fuck your mother! Has Chan Ho-tin become He-who-must-not-be-named?

    - (Wen Wei Po) July 31, 2016. The pan-democratic parties (Labour Party, Civic Party, Democratic Party, Neighbourhood Workers Service Centre, ADPL, League of Social Democrats, People Power) gathered outside the Chief Executive Office to protest. They said that a candidate should not be excluded because of his political views, for that would be political censorship that interferes with a fair and just election.

    After their own show, they proceeded to Tamar Park. When they got there, they shouted slogans such as "We oppose political screening, we defend a fair election." League of Social Democrats legislator Leung Kwok-hung led the chanting. When the demonstrators already there objected to the pan-democrats hijacking their assembly, Leung countered with: "Drop dead, valiant one!" "Go home, four-eyed guy, valiant one." Then someone yelled out: "The principal Chan Ho-tin is here himself!" But the pan-democrats ignored Chan. People Power chairperson Erica Yuen even rammed her banner against Chan and said: "Excuse me, please." Leung also told Chan not to enter the election. There was a shouting war of words between the two sides. The scene got pretty chaotic for a while.

    - (Wen Wei Po) August 1, 2016.

    After the traditional pan-democrats finished with their usual ritual of tossing paper airplanes at the Chief Executive's Office, they marched down to Tamar Park. At the time, Chan Ho-tin thought that the pan-democrats came to support him, so he put away his half-eaten bun. But the pan-democrats acted as if they never saw him. People Power chairperson Erica Yuen even asked him to make way.

    The Localists yelled at the pan-democrats: "Drop dead!" "The person who is politically persecuted is over here. Why do you just barge in and run into people?" "You say that you are against screening. Here is the first victim. Have you said anything on his behalf?"

    Leung Kwok-hung said: "Did I say nothing? I am walking over to him right now and say something to him! ... I can't tell him that he cannot run. I am not the one who told him!" Leung pointed at a young Localist supporter and said: "Kid, drop dead, valiant one! I am standing right in front of you. Be valiant! Go home, four-eyed kid, valiant one!"

    After Leung was steered away, the young Localist shouted "Fuck your mother!" League of Social Democrats member Tsang Kin-shing replied: "Why are you fucking someone's mother? Why are young men fucking people's mothers?" Neighbourhood Workers Service Centre legislator Leung Yiu-chung told the young man to forget it. As the League of Social Democrats and People Power supporters leave, they told the Localists: "Go assault the Chief Executive! Go intimidate the Chief Executive! Why intimidate ordinary citizens! Is that what Localists are fucking good for?" "Remove your masks! Fuck you mother!" "Civic Passion signed the confirmation forms!"

    Traditional pan-democrats even accused Chan Ho-tin of exploiting his own case. They said that he refused to go with the team. "We invited him to participate in our march but he refused and came out on his own. It is clear that who is exploiting who here!"

    - (Wen Wei Po) August 1, 2016.

    Internet comments:

    - Leung Kwok-hung told Chan Ho-tin to 'drop dead'? I fuck your mother, move aside! If you have any sense of shame, you would retire. And who the fuck are you, Erica Yuen? The pan-democrats went down to Admiralty to exploit the situation and she even told Chan Ho-tin, "Excuse me, please make way!"

    - If the pan-democrats have courage, they should boycott these elections.

    - Brother Chan Ho-tin is magnificent. He offered his own blood so that other politicians can have their blood-soaked steamed buns. We must remember this moment, we must remember the faces of each and every one of them.

    - How far can one go to exploit the halo effect? They went to a funeral and covered up the name of the deceased while saying that they are doing something for him.

    - Chan Ho-tin was in Tamar Park while you people were at the Chief Executive's Office. You march down to Tamar Park and you act as if Chan Ho-tin was not there. You even told Chan to make way for your entourage. Fuck your mother, may your whole families all die!

    - We should be throwing bricks at these pan-democratic bastards. We must purge internally first before ousting the outside forces.

    - (Wen Wei Po) August 1, 2016.

    Apart from the traditional pan-democrats, other Localists also drew ire because they also refused to join the boycott.

    - Soon it will be the turn of the Four-eyed Guy Edward Leung!

    - Faced with such injustice, Hong Kong Indigenous is still sticking to issuing statements.

    - What is the difference between Localists issuing statements and traditional pan-democrats issuing statements? Both of you hold a peaceful assembly and you disperse peacefully after making a couple of remarks. And both of you show up in small numbers too. Please state your position on the boycott so we know the difference (if any) between you two!

    - You fools! How does the fate of the Hong Kong National Party fucking matter to Hong Kong Indigenous?

    - I am disappointed. Why hasn't the brick-throwing started yet?

    - When are Civic Passion/Proletariat Political Institute/City-State going to quit the election in response to the call of Chan Ho-tin?

    - And when localist Chan Ho-tin was ejected from the field, did the other localists rally to his side? At Tamar Park, the following persons were nowhere to be found:
    Edward Leung (Hong Kong Indigenous)
    Ray Wong (Hong Kong Indigenous)
    Baggio Leung (Youngspiration)
    Yau Wai-ching (Youngspiration)
    Wong Yeung-tat (Civic Passion)
    Cheng Chung-tai (Civic Passion)
    Cheng Kam-mun (Civic Passion)
    Raymond Wong Yuk-man (Proletariat Political Institute)
    Wan Chin (Hong Kong Resurgence Order)
    ...
    When the going gets tough, the tough gets going ...

    - One vote less for Chan Ho-tin means one vote more for the other localists.

    - Chan Ho-tin was the first to go. Previously, it was rumored that three of them will go. Next on the list was Alvin Cheng Kam-mun (Civic Passion) who signed the confirmation form but stated publicly that he will continue to push for Hong Kong independence. Later he said that those views were personal and not applicable to his campaign platform. This is the split personality argument. The third one was Edward Leung Tin-kei, who disavowed everything that he said before just so he can get into the Legislative Council. He even said that everything on his Facebook was done by other persons who made posts that didn't represent his own views.

    - At Tamar Park, a massive turnout of several dozen persons showed up to chant "Hong Kong independence" in support of the Hong Kong National Party.
    https://www.facebook.com/socrec/videos/1446403212053272/

    - At Tamar Park, the demonstrators engaged in the usual activity -- quarreling among themselves (more specifically, wearing masks while fucking each others' mothers) . Here is League of Social Democrats legislator Leung Kwok-hung:
    https://www.facebook.com/socrec/videos/1446386872054906/
    This is the fatal weakness of the Hong Kong National Party. Chan Ho-tin might be selling his case as one in which "the people of Hong Kong" have been deprived of their rights to vote for him, but how many people actually pay any attention to him?

    - Chan Ho-tin's Facebook

    Here is how Chan Ho-tin explained the low turnout at Tamar Pack tonight: there was another event organized for Pokmon GO users on the Sai Yeung Choi Street South (Mong Kok) pedestrian mall to support Hong Kong independence.

    (Oriental Daily) Here are the five Pokmon GO users who showed up in Mong Kok. That's all five of them. When asked whether they heeded the call to support Hong Kong independence, they said: "I don't know." They held up placards saying "The Heavens destroy China" and "Chinamen, go back to China!"

    YouTube: Five Little Monkeys Jumping On The Bed

    - Those Chinamen are already in China, because Hong Kong is an inalienable part of China under Article 1, Basic Law.

    - Mong Kok is just not the right place for Pokmon GO users to look for virtual creatures. Meanwhile here is the mob scene in Morse Park (Wong Tai Sin district). They should have called for a rally at Morse Park and then they will be able to count every Pokmon GO player there as supporters of Hong Kong independence.

    - (Tai Kung Pao) July 31, 2016.

    At the Facebook of the Hong Kong National Party, they announced that the "armed revolution" will start. Some of the comments were:

    - Since democratic election has failed, revolution is the only option left. The evil-doing authorities must pay the price.

    - We must be psychologically prepared to throw bricks, rocks, bombs, whatever. Are we prepared to die for the revolution? Of course we are.

    - Today in this history of Hong Kong, peaceful resistance has formally ended.

    - Petrol bomb assemblies will formally commence.

    - It is time to start an armed revolution.

    - There is no option left except for revolution.

    - I really look forward to the Great Hong Kong Riot.

    - May the whole family of New Territories West Returning Officer Alan Law Ying-ki die.

    - He will die. It is certain that he will die.

    - I hope that his family doesn't get caught up. But it is hard to predict accidents.

    - His family should watch their step when they go outside. By the way, it doesn't mean that they are safe if they stay home.

    - Those who deprive others of their democratic/human rights do not deserve personal safety for themselves and their families.

    - We must go after not just this bloke, but the entire Electoral and Registration Office hierarchy from this guy up.

    - We can no longer wait for Hong Kong independence. Apart from the judicial review, we should think about how to bring this to the international level. We should see whether we can push public opinion to force all those legislators who don't want pre-screening of candidates to boycott this election. We should make this as big a deal as possible.

    - (Speakout HK @ YouTube)

    Chan Ho-tin: This was political censorship because in accordance to the requirements of the law, I had already taken an oath in front of him. I also signed the declaration.

    Radio host: But the key is that you filled out the thing ... but do you really uphold the Basic Law? Every part within it?

    Chan Ho-tin: I disagree. I do not accept it. We advocate the elimination of the Basic Law. Actually as long as you have signed the document, you have signed it. He should not proceed to assess how sincere you were when you signed it.

    Radio host: At the moment when you signed it, did you sincerely support the Basic Law?

    Chan Ho-tin: Of course not.

    - This is enough to make your head spin!

    - (HKG Pao) Asked whether he supported the Basic Law when he signed the document, Chan Ho-tin denied that he supported the Basic Law. He said that he did it for political expediency and that he wanted to eliminate the Basic Law. He cited Confucius: "When you are forced to the table, not even the gods will mind." He said, that legally speaking, he supports Basic Law once he signed the document. It is therefore unreasonable for the Returning Officer to scrutinize his thoughts now.

    Chan Ho-tin also said that the "Hong Kong person" and "Chinese person" identities cannot co-exist. He said that Hongkongers can only think that they are Hongkongers only and not Chinese. If a native-born Hongkonger feels that he is Chinese, then he is only a potential Hongkonger whose racial consciousness has not yet awaken.

    - How many generations of Chan Ho-tin's family were native-born in Hong Kong? At some point, they must have come to Hong Kong from somewhere in China.

    - There is no such thing as the Hong Kong race.

    Merriam-Webster definition of race: a breeding stock of animals; a family, tribe, people or nation belonging to the same stock; a class or kind of people unified by shared interests, habits, or characteristics; an actually or potentially interbreeding group within a species; a category of humankind that shares certain distinctive physical traits.

    - The only Hong Kong race is the horse races organized by the Hong Kong Jockey Club in Happy Valley/Sha Tin.

    - Nakade Hitsujiko's Facebook

    The Electoral and Registration Office wants the pro-Hong Kong independence candidates to support the Basic Law? Alright, no problem. But they better not fucking regret it.

    After filing my nomination, I will show how to support the Basic Law on one hand and joining foreign forces on the other hand. I will get the international community to intercede on the issue of sovereignty in Hong Kong for the second time. I will invite the American army to enter Hong Kong where they will be guided by young localist people all the way to Beijing in order to force the Central Government of our neighboring country to eliminate Basic Law Article 1. Basic Law Dafa is good, you will be safe if you agree to guide the way.

    - (Hong Kong Free Press) August 2, 2016.

    Pro-independence candidate Nakade Hitsujiko was barred from running in the upcoming Legislative Council election as the returning officer said he believed the Hong Kong city-state advocate does not uphold and does not intend to uphold the Basic Law.

    Nakade, an IT specialist who changed his name from Chung Ming-lun last year, was nominated to run in the New Territories West constituency. He has signed the declaration on the nomination form and the controversial new confirmation form that he will uphold the Basic Law and pledge allegiance to the Hong Kong SAR.

    But he still received a query from the returning officer as to whether he will continue to support Hong Kong independence. Nakade replied that the Hong Kong he advocated independence for did not mean the Hong Kong SAR but the rough physical area that was often called Hong Kong.

    The independence I proposed is a full-sovereignty independent country formed from the land generally called Hong Kong or reformed from the existing political body, he wrote.

    Or depending on feasibility and practical situation, I would switch to advocating for forming or reforming from the existing political body a political body of a pseudo-sovereign country, meaning pseudo-independence.

    Nakade also mentioned in the reply that one of the options for the pseudo-independence of Hong Kong was to legally move the Hong Kong SAR to the moon by an order issued by China after China claimed sovereignty over the moon  so that the physical area Hong Kong could form a new entity not bound by the Basic Law.

    But the returning officer of the New Territories West constituency Alan Lo Ying-ki rejected his idea, stating that the Hong Kong Nakade mentioned clearly means or includes the Hong Kong SAR.

    Thus, I believe Mr Nakade Hitsujiko in fact advocates and promotes the independence of Hong Kong SAR and the formation of a full sovereign country from the Hong Kong SAR, Lo wrote.

    Lo wrote that Nakade did not make a declaration in accordance with section 40(1)(b)(i) of the Legislative Council Ordinance, and thus his nomination was invalid.

    The section states that the nomination form for candidates includes a declaration that they will uphold the Basic Law and pledge allegiance to the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.

    Nakade said on social media that the decision was a breach of power of the returning officer.

    He added that he will bring the incident to the attention of the US Consulate General in Hong Kong and the US Congress. One of his policies was to form civil diplomacy ties with other countries.

    He also said he will look into the cases of other candidates who were banned from running and contact them to seek common ground for cooperation.

    - I can do the work of the lazy media and the US Consulate for them.
    Question: "What is the United States' response to Nakade Hitsujiko's complaint about being banned to run in the Legco elections?"
    Answer: "We have not received a complaint from Nakade Hitsujiko."
    Question: "How would the United States respond if such a complaint comes in?"
    Answer: "We do not answer hypothetical questions. We will answer if and when it actually happens."

    - You should realize that the US Consulate cannot answer generically with "Everybody who wants to run should be able to run, because the people should have the chance to decide for themselves." Why not? Just ask Bernie Sanders, who was politically screened/censored.

    - (Wen Wei Po) August 4, 2016. Here is a way of civil disobedience to protest against these elections.

    According to Facebook user Benson Tsang under the title "Seriously speaking, not joking," the electoral laws do not restrict the maximum amount of time allowed for a voter to cast the vote. Therefore, "each of us could stand at the booth and think for 15 minutes, 30 minutes, even one hour and we would be breaking any laws. If after careful consideration and we still stamp the wrong candidate, we can ask for a new ballot and think all over again."

    Tsang said: "The list of candidates is very long. As responsible voters, we should understand the policy platforms, faces and gender of each and every candidate. If you are religious, you can bring a Bible or Scripture to the booth and pray for guidance." Tsang emphasized that as soon as the voter steps into the voting area, nobody can interfere with him anymore. "On voting day, we don't have to hurry. We should be thinking slowly! Remember to vote together and fulfill our civic duties!"

    Other Internet users came up with other ideas. Some said that they will stop senior citizens from voting. Others said that they will keep stamping the ballots incorrectly and ask for replacements until the station runs out of ballots. Another said to consult chemists to see what chemicals can be dropped into the ballot box to destroy all the ballots.

    Singer Denise Ho forwarded Benson Tsang's post but said: "I am not inciting people" and "I am only forwarding this because it seems so cute." She said: "Casting a ballot is a very solemn matter. So you should obviously carefully decide whom you vote for. You must think this through very thoroughly and carefully. This is about civic duty, right or not? ... But I really don't have any opinion. You should decide for yourselves. You are grownups, right or not?"

    Sha Tin Community Network chairman Ventus Lau Wing-hong said that if two to three voting stations were suddenly blockaded by large number of citizens such that the voters cannot enter to vote, then the elections must be held all over again." He said that the Hong Kong Police do not have the manpower to station large numbers of policemen at all voting stations. "So if some voting stations are down, the entire election will have to be done again." He said that that such an action is criminal "and you shouldn't do this if you can't deal with the consequences."

    Chinese University of Hong Kong Student Union executive Wong Yu-kiu forwarded the information and wrote: "It is not hard to paralyze the voting stations in this fake election. Civic disobedience, fearless and dauntless."

    - Passion Times

    Ultimatum from Civic Passion/Proletariat Political Institute/City-State to the Chinese Communists

    It was a stupid decision by the Returning Officer to invalidate Chan Ho-tin's nomination for political reasons. We are promoting Constitution Amendment by the People and Permanent Continuation of the Basic Law. This is the last time that we will offer a choice to the Chinese Communists and the Hong Kong government. This is a choice for peaceful reform. If you reject this choice, it means that you have chosen bloody revolution. We will go with you all the way to the bitter end.

    This is the last opportunity that we are giving you, so that the Hong Kong Communists can break through the dilemma in Hong Kong. This is the last opportunity to maintain stable development in Hong Kong and China. If you want a dead end, I swear to you on this day that I will fucking give it to you.

    Wong Yeung-tat

    - As Chan Ho-tin himself says, he has two more legal options: a judicial review before the elections or an election petition after the elections. If he gets his way before the elections, his name may be placed on the candidate list. If he gets his way after the elections, new elections may be called. Is that a good thing?

    A political party has spent a certain sum of money to campaign and win seats in the Legislative Council. If new elections are mandated, they have to do this again. The conventional view is that they may be out of money. The more realistic view is that they would love to have another opportunity to get even more donations.

    Here is the case of "Teacher Siu Lai" Lau Siu-lai:

    (Wen Wei Po) July 30, 2016.

    Recently, Lau Siu-lai posted on her Facebook that she needed to raise $300,000 in one week to pay to mail pamphlets to voters. In order to skirt the requirement of reporting the names/addresses of donors who give $1,000 or more, she wrote: "In order to reduce the amount of administrative work and let the supporters engage directly into the election campaign, I call on everybody to donate $999."

    Baggio Leung (Youngspiration) countered on Facebook: "Let me provide you with an estimate. This year, Youngspiration has reserved less than $40,000 for the election pamphlets. For $300,000, we would be able to have gold-plated characters on our pamphlets." Ray Wong (Hong Kong Indigenous) also wrote on Facebook: "We have to print many more two-sided A3-paper tri-fold pamphlets in New Territories East and we are spending less than $200,000. Kowloon West has a lot fewer voters. How many pages does she intend to print?"

    Another Internet user questioned: "The government is paying for the postage of one mailing. How can you need so much money? You must be swindling people to donate." Lau Siu-lai responded: "The printing costs is 60 to 70 cents per copy. Together with the labor costs for folding at 25 cents per copy, this means the cost is 80 cents per copy. There are 470,000 voters in Kowloon West, and we are only sending one copy per home."

    But another Internet user did a calculation based upon four persons per home: 470,000 / 4 * $0.8 = $94,000. Democracy warriors rake in plenty of money. She is making $200,000 in profits!" Lau Siu-lai posted the pricing documents but nothing can stop the Localists. They reminded her that large amounts of money sent into an account may arouse the suspicion of the bank; someone even said that they are filing a police report about "illegal fund gathering."

    Ergo, you want elections to be held as often as possible so that people will donate to you as often as possible.

    - (SCMP) July 31, 2016.

    A second pro-democracy localist candidate was disqualified from running in Hong Kongs upcoming Legislative Council elections after he did not pledge to uphold the citys mini-constitution.

    The invalidation of Yeung Ke-cheongs candidacy in Kowloon West came just one day after Chan Ho-tin, convenor of the Hong Kong National Party, was banned from running by the Electoral Affairs Commission for violating Basic Law, the citys mini-constitution since its handover in 1997.

    Yeung, of the Democratic Progressive Party, was positioned second on a candidate list with Jonathan Ho Chi-kwong in Kowloon West. Hos nomination was validated, but Yeungs was not.

    The returning officer has affirmed Hos candidacy. I was disqualified as I deliberately stated that I would not uphold the Basic Law and thus did not sign the relevant statement, Yeung wrote on his Facebook page on Sunday.

    Both Ho and Yeung did not sign the additional declaration form introduced by the commission weeks ago reinforcing acknowledgement that Hong Kong is an inalienable part of China. Yeung also refused to sign the standard nomination form required by the Legislative Council Ordinance.

    Section 40(1)(b) of the ordinance states that a persons candidacy will not be validated unless his nomination form includes a declaration that he will uphold the Basic Law and pledges allegiance to the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.

    Instead, Yeung submitted to the watchdog a separate statement asserting that the citys mini-constitution no longer applied to Hong Kongs current situation and thus it would be difficult for him to sincerely uphold it.

    I fully understand such a move does not comply with the requirement laid out by section 40 of the relevant ordinance and could ban me from running, Yeung wrote in the statement he submitted to the commission. But I think the relevant legal clauses have violated basic human rights and freedom of speech and unreasonably limit my right to run. On this basis I will launch a judicial review.

    Reference: Hong Kong Democratic Progressive Party

    - Do not be conned by Yeung Ke-cheong, because he is just a clown who is pretending to be politically suppressed. The statement that he did not sign is the one stipulated in Legislative Council Ordinance Article 40(1)(b) which is required of every candidate. It is not the additional confirmation form. Therefore Yeung Ke-cheong should be disqualified under the law. Do not be conned.

    - (HKG Pao) August 1, 2016. According to a Sing Tao columnist, the Returning Officers are still scutinizing the cases of Alice Lai (Conservatives) and Sha Tin District Councilor Chan Kwok-keung. The latter had written directly to the Returning Officer about the intention to continue to promote Hong Kong independence. Meanwhile Alice Lai had already took part in a Hong Kong Island forum.

    At the Hong Kong Island forum, Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee said that the United Kingdom often legislate (e.g. the BNO 'passports') to exclude Hongkongers. "They don't want us to live over there." Alice Lai said that "Hong Kong became a British colony in 1882. In addition, in 1872, Hong Kong turned from a non-autonomous entity to become ... so it should be listed among non-autonomous entities."

    To which Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee said: "Will you remember the right dates, okay?" The host had to intercede and said that Alice Lai meant the 1842 Nanking Treaty.

    Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee asked Alice Lai whether she agrees with the "high real estate price" policies during the British rule of Hong Kong, leading to the current situation. Alice Lai said that the people of Hong Kong wanted to develop light manufacturing industries and therefore the factories moved to mainland China. This forced the British government to push up real estate prices in order to collect enough taxes. Regina Ip Lau Suk-kee said that the high real estate prices refer to residential units and not industrial lands; meanwhile the industrial base of Hong Kong moved to mainland China during the 1980's and 1990's when prices for home properties were already high.

    Breaking News: Edward Leung, Alice Lai and Chan Kwok-keung were invalidated. Here are the particular details for Alice Lai.

    - (Oriental Daily) August 3, 2016. Alice Lai and several supporters went to the British Consulate to ask the United Kingdom to intercede. She said that the Causeway Bay Books affair and the invalidation of pro-independence candidates showed the Chinese Communists have violated the Sino-British Joint Declaration. They presented a petition which was received by a security guard. Then they left peacefully.

    (SCMP) Hong Kong journalists held in Shenzhen 'because magazines have mainland subscribers'. June 8, 2014.

    Two Hong Kong journalists were detained in Shenzhen for "operating illegal publications" because they sold political magazines to two subscribers and to casual buyers on the mainland, a lawyer for one of the pair said.

    Veteran journalist Wang Jianmin, a publisher of two Chinese-language magazines in Hong Kong, New-Way Monthly and Multiple Face, and his colleague Guo Zhongxiao were detained by police on May 30, Wang's lawyer, Chen Youxi, confirmed yesterday.

    Shenzhen police announced the arrests a week ago but did not name the two.

    Observers said the charge was merely an excuse to crack down on external publications critical of state leaders. The two publications are among a raft of political gossip magazines popular with mainland visitors to Hong Kong for their wild speculation about power struggles, corruption and the secret lives of leaders.

    Chen said Li Daoyan, another lawyer from his firm who will defend Guo, visited both men on Thursday. They tried to apply for bail, but were turned down.

    No trial date for Wang and Guo had been set, as the authorities were still collecting evidence, Chen added.

    Guo, 38, was born in Hubei province and is a Hong Kong permanent resident, while Wang holds Hong Kong and US passports. But he entered Shenzhen using his home-return permit, according to Chen.

    Wang, a graduate of Xiamen University, joined Yazhou Zhoukan, a popular magazine in Hong Kong, in the mid-1990s. He left in 2007 and established New-Way Monthly in 2010 and Multiple Face in 2012. Guo worked in Shenzhen before joining Yazhou Zhoukan in 2004. He resigned last year to rejoin Wang.

    (SCMP) Hong Kong journalists plead guilty to running illegal publication business in mainland China. November 6, 2015.

    A pair of Hong Kong journalists behind two political affairs magazines have pleaded guilty to running an illegal business in Shenzhen in a case that underlines the legal risks facing reporters who straddle the border.

    Publisher Wang Jianmin and editor-in-chief Guo Zhongxiao appeared before Nanshan district court yesterday.

    Prosecutors said their company National Affairs Limited, registered in Hong Kong, had earned HK$7 million through the publication of two magazines, New-Way Monthly and Multiple Face.

    Both are printed in Hong Kong but copies are sent to eight people on the mainland, all friends of the publisher, the defence said. The mainland audience accounted for 66,000 yuan (HK$80,600) of total revenue, less than half the 150,000 yuan minimum needed to raise the offence to the level of running an illegal business. The prosecution wrongly counted Hong Kong revenue as part of the mainland business to make their case, lawyers argued.

    Wang, 62, and Guo, 40, are Hong Kong ID holders but were living in Shenzhen when arrested in May. They made weekly, sometimes daily, trips across the border. In his statement to the court, Wang said: "The trial was fair and I'm grateful for the [Communist] Party's and the government's education." Guo said: "We published unverified news and have tarnished the image of the party and the government."

    Guangdong province's print and broadcast regulator said the magazines were "illegal publications" not registered on the mainland but nevertheless sold to local readers. Wang's wife, who helped send copies of the magazines via the post, as well as a freelance contributor from Henan province also pleaded guilty to operating an illegal business before the same court.

    Sentencing is expected later. Mainland customs is responsible for overseeing the importation of media and regularly stops books or monthlies that touch on political topics.

    Chen Nansha, the defence for Wang, argued that under "one country, two systems", publications in Hong Kong should be protected by Hong Kong laws, and the two magazines were legal in Hong Kong.

    Li Daoyan, Guo's lawyer, argued Guo only edited the magazine and was not involved in the business. "If editing a Hong Kong magazine in Shenzhen is a crime, do all journalists on the mainland who work for overseas news organisations face the same risk?"

    (SCMP) In echo of missing booksellers case, Shenzhen court jails two Hong Kong journalists for running illegal business. July 26, 2016.

    A pair of Hong Kong journalists behind two political affairs magazines were jailed in Shenzhen yesterday for running an illegal business, the same charge that landed five local booksellers in trouble last year.

    The two were imprisoned a month after one of the five booksellers, Lam Wing-kee, returned to Hong Kong to make explosive claims about being taken away after crossing the border into Shenzhen and put through eight months of mental torture.

    Publisher Wang Jianmin, in his 60s, was jailed for five years and three months, while editor-in- chief Guo Zhongxiao, 41, was sentenced to two years and three months. They had pleaded guilty in the Shenzhen Nanshan District Peoples Court last year. Guos lawyer, Xia Qianhai, said his client would be released next month, since the pair were arrested in May 2014.

    The two Hong Kong identity card holders were living in Shenzhen when they were nabbed. Prosecutors said their company, National Affairs Ltd, which was registered in Hong Kong, had earned HK$7 million through the publication of two magazines, New-Way Monthly and Multiple Face. The two publications specialised in rumours and gossip about the Chinese leadership before they were suspended in April 2014, according to their website.

    The defence argued that the two magazines mainland readers only accounted for 66,000 yuan (HK$80,600) of total revenue less than half the minimum 150,000 yuan minimum required to justify prosecuting someone for running an illegal business. Under mainland Chinese law, if an illegal business operation involves less than 250,000 yuan, the jail term will be below five years.

    It was understood that Guo was convicted without the judge actually determining the amount of his illegal earnings a rare occurrence, according to mainland lawyers. The publications were printed in Hong Kong, and copies were sent to only eight people on the mainland, all friends of the publisher, the lawyers had said.

    In a statement, Lam Wing-kee said: [The sentence] shows that Beijing is trampling on the one country, two systems principle ... Hong Kong must express its strong protest.

    Hong Kong Journalists Association chairwoman Sham Yee-lan described the verdict as a blow to the freedom of speech, publication and press in Hong Kong. The jail terms were very heavy. The publications were in fact printed in Hong Kong by registered companies here, she said. It appears that the Chinese government has intensified its crackdown on such publications. She said the Hong Kong government had a responsibility to offer help to its citizens.

    Human Rights Monitor director Law Yuk-kai said: Freedom of publication is protected under the Chinese constitution and Hong Kongs Basic Law.

    (TIME (AP)) China Sentences Two Hong Kong Journalists to Prison For Up to Five Years. By Amanda Calvo. July 27, 2016.

    Four people, including two Hong Kong journalists were sentenced to up to five years in prison by a Chinese court Wednesday, accused of running an illegal business after mailing copies of their political magazine across the border into the mainland, reports the Associated Press.

    The sentencing follows the high-profile disappearance of five Hong Kong booksellers, who were detained in China on the same charges, and whose case sparked concerns that Hong Kongs status as a semi-autonomous territory was being eroded.

    Magazine publisher Wang Jianmin, 62, was sentenced to five years and three months and editor Guo Zhongxiao, 40, was given two years and three months, reports the South China Morning Post. The pair were reportedly detained back in 2014 in the southern Chinese city Shenzhen. The identity and reasons for conviction of the other two people remain unclear.

    Wang and Guo published New Way Monthly and Faces, magazines concerning the dealings of the Communist Party of China. Wangs lawyers maintain the two men were not running a mail-order business, but rather, they had sent eight copies of the magazine to friends in the mainland. The two had pleaded guilty to the charges last year.

    The Hong Kong Journalists Association and Independent Commenters Association expressed concerns over the sentencing, saying the verdict was another attempt by Beijing to target Hong Kong publishers and clean the origin of mainland political gossip in Hong Kong.

    One of the missing booksellers, Lam Wing-kee, returned to Hong Kong last month and delivered a surprise press conference, detailing his capture, eight-month detention and mistreatment at the hands of Chinese authorities.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) Shenzhen court jails two Hong Kong journalists for sending political magazines to China. July 26, 2016.

    Wang Jianmin and Guo Zhongxiao, two veteran Hong Kong journalists, were sentenced to jail terms on Tuesday by a Shenzhen court for running an illegal business two political magazines published in Hong Kong.

    Wang was sentenced to five years and three months in prison, while Guo was jailed for two years and three months. Wang was also found guilty of two other charges: bid-rigging and bribery. They pleaded guilty in a trial in November last year.

    Both Wang and Guo, originally from the mainland, were arrested in May 2014 in Shenzhen, where they lived. They were accused of earning around HK$7.8 million through publishing the New-Way Monthly and Multiple Face magazines, some of which were sent to the mainland.

    The magazines were published by the National Affairs Limited company registered in Hong Kong in 2007 by Wang and Guo, who had both acquired the status of Hong Kong permanent residents. The magazines often reported the internal political struggles of the Chinese Communist Party.

    The defence lawyer of the two journalists said during the trial at Shenzhens Nanshan District Court that the magazines were printed in Hong Kong and legally published in Hong Kong. According to the lawyer, their earnings from mainland sales were only 66,182 yuan (HK$76,923), and the two magazines were only sent to eight people on the mainland, reported Initium Media.

    Their lawyer argued that the business involved less than 150,000 yuan (HK$174,327), the minimum amount required for the illegal business offence, and they had not seriously disrupted the market, another requirement for the offence.

    Wang, also a US citizen, was the publisher of the magazines. Guo acted as an editor. He did not participate in operations on the business and publishing side and did not know about the eight readers on the mainland, their lawyer said during the trial.

    The lawyer also argued that Guos work in Shenzhen was no different from a foreign journalist reporting in China, though the prosecution said there was a difference between writing an article and completing the editing of a magazine.

    Guo may be released soon, as he has already been detained for two years and two months.

    Before running their own magazines, Wang and Guo worked for the Hong Kong magazine Yazhou Zhoukan, which focused on political issues in East Asia.

    Wangs wife Xu Zhongyun, who helped send the magazines, was sentenced to a year in jail, suspended for two years. Liu Haitao, a freelance writer for the magazines, was sentenced to two years in jail, suspended for three years.

    They also pleaded guilty. None of them will file an appeal, according to Initium.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) China denying access to jailed Hong Kong journalist and naturalised American, says US. July 28, 2016.

    The US State Department has confirmed that its diplomats were unable to meet with Hong Kong journalist and US citizen Wang Jianmin, who was jailed by a Chinese court this week after his arrest two years ago.

    Spokesperson John Kirby said at a daily press briefing that the State Department has repeatedly asked Chinese officials for permission to visit Wang also known as James Wang since his arrest on May 31, 2014. The department has also asked to attend his trial, which took place in November.

    Those requests have all been denied, said Kirby. Were going to continue to request access to Mr. Wang so that we may provide the appropriate consular services.

    Wang, 62, was accused of running an illegal business in China. Two magazines that he founded and published in Hong Kong were sent to eight readers on the mainland and earned profit, the Shenzhen court found. The magazines often reported the internal political struggles of the Chinese Communist Party.

    The court also found Wang guilty of two other charges: bid-rigging and bribery. He was given a jail sentence on Tuesday of five years and three months, along with a fine of 200,000 yuan (HK$233,059).

    Guo Zhongxiao, 41, the chief editor for the two magazines, was sentenced to jail for two years and three months and fined 50,000 yuan (HK$58,265).

    Their lawyer argued during the November trial that the business involved less than 150,000 yuan (HK$174,327), the minimum amount required for the illegal business offence, and that they had not seriously disrupted the market, another requirement for the offence.

    Both Wang and Guo were originally from the mainland but became Hong Kong permanent residents. Wang is also a naturalised US citizen.

    Chen Nansha, Wangs lawyer, was cited by the New York Times as saying that Wang entered China from Hong Kong using local travel documents and not his American passport.

    American citizens who do not use their US passports to enter China cannot receive consular protection in the country, according to the US State Departments website.

    The sentencing came after a Hong Kong publisher was convicted in 2014 for smuggling ordinary goods after planning to publish a book on Chinese leader Xi Jinping, and the Causeway Bay Books incident, in which five booksellers went missing before reappearing on the mainland confessing to running an illegal business.

    The League of Social Democrats marched to the China Liaison Office in Sai Wan on Thursday morning in support of Wang and Guo.

    Along the way, they chanted that Hong Kong should have press freedom and demanded the release of the pair.

    (EJ Insight) HK must stand up to China over jailed journalists: Lam Wing-kee. July 27, 2016.

    The government should lodge a strong protest with mainland authorities over jail sentences handed by a Chinese court to two Hong Kong journalists, said bookseller Lam Wing-kee, who returned to Hong Kong last month after an 8-month detention in China.  The jailing of the journalists marks another violation of the one country, two systems principle, which Hong Kong cannot afford to ignore, Lam said. Accusing Beijing of trying to curb free speech and press freedom in Hong Kong, Lam said the Hong Kong government must act to preserve the rights of local citizens.

    The comments came after two veterans in Hong Kongs publishing industry were given jail terms by a Shenzhen court Tuesday on charges that they operated an illegal business that sent political magazines to the mainland. 

    Wang Jianmin, 62, publisher of two political affairs magazines New-Way Monthly and Multiple Face, was sentenced to five years and three months imprisonment by the Nanshan District Court, while Guo Zhongxiao, 41, editor-in-chief of the magazines, was given two years and three months in jail.

    New-Way Monthly and Multiple Face, which began publication in 2010 and 2012 respectively, had gained a reputation for revealing the innermost secrets of the Chinese regime.

    The publications specialized in chatter about the Chinese leadership even as authorities in Guangdong and other provinces in southern China began cracking down on illegal and harmful publications from Hong Kong and Taiwan since May 2010.

    Wang and Guo, who are both Hong Kong permanent residents, pleaded guilty in November last year after they were taken away from their homes in Shenzhen in May 2014. They had been detained in the mainland since.

    Shenzhen prosecutors accused the duo of selling illegal magazines to mainland readers. Guos wife told the Hong Kong Economic Journal that there is nothing she can do but accept the court ruling.

    But bookseller Lam, who made explosive revelations last month about his long detention in China, said the Hong Kong government should not just sit and watch in the wake of the latest developments. 

    If the government doesnt lodge a strong protest over the jailing of the Hong Kong residents, it will suggest that the Basic Law, which is based on the 1984 Sino-UK Joint Declaration aimed at preserving Hong Kongs autonomy, has lost its meaning, Lam said.

    Democratic Party lawmaker Albert Ho Chun-yan, who has been helping Lam since the latter returned to Hong Kong on June 14, also urged the government to take the initiative and not remain idle with regard to the case of the two jailed journalists. It is worrisome that Hongkongers are now under risk of being prosecuted in the mainland for actions that are considered legal in Hong Kong, Ho said.

    The Independent Commentators Association and the Hong Kong Journalists Association have also expressed concern about the journalists detention. Beijings selective suppression of publications will jeopardize freedom of press in Hong Kong and the publics right to know, they said, calling on China to respect the one country, two systems.

    (Committee to Project Journalists) China sentences Hong Kong publisher, editor. July 28, 2016.

    The Committee to Protect Journalists today condemned the convictions and prison sentences by a mainland Chinese court of Wang Jianmin and Guo Zhongxiao, the publisher and editor, respectively, of two Hong Kong magazines, alongside an editorial assistant and the publisher's wife.

    The Nanshan District Court in Shenzhen, Guangdong province, today sentenced Wang Jianmin, publisher of two Chinese-language magazines in Hong Kong, New-Way Monthly and Multiple Face, to five years and three months in prison on charges of operating an illegal business and on bribery and corruption charges in relation to his other business, in the natural gas industry. The court sentenced Guo Zhongxiao, editor of the two magazines, to two years and three months in prison.

    Wang and Guo, who have been imprisoned since May 2014, said they would not appeal, the U.S.-government-funded broadcaster Radio Free Asia reported. The time they have already served will count against the remainder of their sentence, and Guo is scheduled to be released next month.

    Liu Haitao, an editorial assistant at the magazines, was sentenced to two years in jail, suspended for three years. The court sentenced Wang's wife, Xu Zhongyuan, who helped mail the magazines to the mainland, to one year in prison, suspended for two years. Guo, Liu, and Xu were all convicted of operating an illegal business, according to the South China Morning Post.

    The two publications specialized in publishing insider information and speculation about Chinese political elites before authorities detained Wang and Guo and the magazines ceased publishing, according to their websites. In an editorial at the time of their arrest, the Hong Kong- and Taiwan-based newspaper Apple Daily described Wang's magazines as "close" to the political factions of former Chinese President Jiang Zemin and former Vice-President Zeng Qinghong. CPJ believes the corruption charges against Wang are in retaliation for his activities as a publisher.

    Under China's "one country, two systems," residents of Hong Kong are entitled to civil liberties, including freedom of speech and of the press, that have traditionally supported a flourishing industry for books on Chinese politics that are banned on the mainland. But Hong Kong's once-vibrant publishing industry is increasingly under pressure.

    "Chinese authorities apparently are not content with tightly controlling information on the mainland--they are trying to restrict what is published in Hong Kong," said CPJ Deputy Executive Director Rob Mahoney. "We call on Beijing to stop harassing and jailing journalists like Wang Jianmin and Guo Zhongxiao and to allow citizens free access to any news media."

    Prosecutors said Wang's company, National Affairs Limited, had made more than 7 million Hong Kong dollars (US$900,000), including 66,000 Chinese yuan ($10,000) in sales from the two magazines in mainland China. Defense lawyers disputed this, saying copies of the magazines were sent to only eight people on the mainland, according to press reports. But at a November 5, 2015, hearing, the three journalists and Wang's wife pleaded guilty to the charges against them, Hong Kong newspapers reported at the time.

    Guo, originally from the mainland, is a Hong Kong resident. Wang holds passports from Hong Kong and the United States. China does not recognize dual nationality.

    In the past couple of years, Hong Kong-based publishers and journalists have been detained, journalists have been physically attacked, and self-censorship is on the rise, amid increasing influence from Beijing.

    Over the course of the last months of 2015, five employees of Mighty Current, a Hong Kong publishing house that specialized in publishing and selling books about China's political leaders, went missing. They later reappeared in mainland China, and were televised saying that they had illegally sold books to customers in mainland China. Lam Wing-kee, one of four booksellers subsequently released, told reporters upon returning to Hong Kong that he had confessed under duress. One of the five people to disappear, Gui Minhai, is still missing.

    On May 8, 2014, Hong Kong publisher Yao Wentian, who was preparing to release a book critical of Chinese President Xi Jinping, was sentenced to 10 years in jail for "smuggling ordinary goods" to Shenzhen. His family told CPJ at the time of his detention that Yao believed he was bringing bottles of paint over the border for a friend.

    Internet comments:

    - (EJ Insight) HK must stand up to China over jailed journalists: Lam Wing-kee. July 27, 2016.

    The government should lodge a strong protest with mainland authorities over jail sentences handed by a Chinese court to two Hong Kong journalists, said bookseller Lam Wing-kee, who returned to Hong Kong last month after an 8-month detention in China.  The jailing of the journalists marks another violation of the one country, two systems principle, which Hong Kong cannot afford to ignore, Lam said. Accusing Beijing of trying to curb free speech and press freedom in Hong Kong, Lam said the Hong Kong government must act to preserve the rights of local citizens.

    (Wen Wei Po) July 28, 2016.

    Lam Wing-kee is trying to mislead people. He said that this case makes people wonder whether freedom of speech is being restricted in Hong Kong. This is false. According to the indictment document, Wang Jianmin and Guo Zhongxiao did most of the pre-production work on the two magazines in mainland China. Wang Jianmin was responsible for planning the editing, printing and distribution. Guo Zhongxiao was responsible for writing, editing, layout and cover design. When Guo was done with the copy, he used the Internet to send it over for Wang to go over. Afterwards Wang would send it along to a printing house in Hong Kong to print. Between September 2012 and April 2014, more than 284,000 copies of the magazines were distributed with a retail value of HK$ 7,797,000. The indictment document also pointed out that the Wang couple knew that the magazines cannot be sold on mainland China, but they used Wang's dual-plate (Shenzhen and Hong Kong licenses) vehicle to surreptitiously import the magazines into mainland China for faster distribution to the mainland readers.

    It is precisely the fact that Lam Wing-kee is still spouting his nonsense publicly that proves that One Country Two Systems is alive and well. There is no extradition agreement between Hong Kong and mainland China, and that is what allows Lam Wing-kee to come out and spout his nonsense even though he is a wanted fugitive on mainland China.

    - The numbers don't make sense. The defence lawyer said that the earnings from mainland sales were only 66,182 yuan (HK$76,923), and the two magazines were only sent to eight people on the mainland. Therefore the average revenue per customer is 66,182 / 8 = 8,352 RMB. Can you get that kind of money selling some magazines over 18 months?

    - The numbers make sense if the eight persons (friends or relatives) are distributors. If the prosecution said that 284,000 of the magazines were distributed with a retail value of HK$7,797,000, the average retail price per magazine is 7,797,000 / 284,000 = $27. However, a part of the money goes to cover the mailing costs and another part of the money goes to the distributors. The defence lawyer is minimizing Wang and Guo's returns by saying that they only made 76,923 / 284,000 = HK$ 0.27 per magazine, whereas the prosecution is maximizing their returns that the total retail value is $7,797,000 which was shared by many other parties (including the postal/courier services).

    Table 1. How important are these social values? (0=very unimportant, 10=very important)
    Average scores:
    Freedom of press: 8.49
    Social harmony: 8.57
    Democratic development: 7.61
    Economic development: 8.26
    Judicial independence: 8.84
    National interests: 7.07

    Table 2. Do you support or oppose One Country Two Systems after 2047?
    45.1%: Very supportive
    24.4%: Somewhat supportive
    21.7%: So-so
    3.2%: Somewhat opposed
    2.8%: Very opposed
    2.7%: No opinion/refused to answer

    Table 3. Do you support or opposed direct governance of Hong Kong by China after 2047?
    5.8%: Very supportive
    8.0%: Somewhat supportive
    23.4%: So-so
    19.1%: Somewhat opposed
    40.1%: Very opposed
    3.6%: No opinion/refused to answer

    Table 4. Do you support or oppose Hong Kong independence after 2047?
    6.2%: Very supportive
    11.2%: Somewhat supportive
    22.9%: So-so
    19.0%: Somewhat opposed
    38.6%: Very opposed
    2.1%: No opinion/refused to answer

    Table 5. Do you think that Hong Kong independence can happen in the foreseeable future?
    53.3%: Completely unlikely
    27.9%: Not very unlikely
    13.0%: So-so
    1.8%: Somewhat likely
    1.9%: Completely likely
    2.2%: No opinion/refused to answer

    Table 6. What is your impression of these political groups? (0=very negative, 10=very positive)
    Average scores
    Localists: 3.45
    Pan-democrats: 4.53
    Pro-establishment camp: 4.00

    Table 7. Do you agree peaceful and non-violent principles should always be upheld in the fight for constitutional reform?
    49.6%: Very much agree
    21.7%: Somewhat agree
    22.0%: So-so
    3.5%: Somewhat disagree
    2.4%: Very much disagree
    0.8%: No opinion/refused to answer

    Table 9. How much do you trust the Hong Kong SAR government? (0=completely distrust, 10=completely trust)
    Average score = 4.43

    Table 11. How much do you trust the Central Government? (0=completely distrust, 10=completely trust)
    Average score = 4.33

    Table 13. How much do you trust the Hong Kong Police? (0=completely distrust, 10=completely trust)
    Average score = 5.93

    Table 15. What is your view of future developments in Hong Kong society? (0=very pessimistic, 10=very optimistic)
    Average score = 4.81

    Table 17: Have you considered immigrating overseas?
    16.4%: Yes, I have considered it
    3.3%: Yes, I have seriously planned for it
    1.3%: Yes, I am doing it right now
    78.4%: No
    0.4%: Don't know
    0.2%: Refused to answer

    (SCMP) July 22, 2016.

    A former University of Hong Kong student union president has denied threatening the schools governing council chairman Professor Arthur Li Kwok-cheung at a meeting in January as he pleaded not guilty to four charges at his first court appearance.

    Billy Fung Jing-en, 22, faces one count of criminal damage and its alternative charge of disorderly conduct in a public place, plus another count of criminal damage and one of attempted forcible entry. He pleaded not guilty to all charges on Friday through an interpreter, each time shaking his head as he stated not guilty.

    His arraignment before acting principal magistrate Joseph To Ho-shing was heard before a full house at Eastern Court. Many in attendance were Fungs schoolmates, including his successor at the student union, Althea Suen Hiu-nam, and the Federation of Students former secretary general, Alex Chow Yong-kang.

    Prosecutors said Fung threatened Li outside the main entrance of the Hong Kong Jockey Club Building for Interdisciplinary Research at Pok Fu Lam on January 26 this year.

    It was alleged he behaved in a disorderly manner with intent to provoke a breach of peace at the time or when such a breach was likely to be caused, shouting: Dont let him go! Dont let Arthur Li go! Kill him! Kill him!

    He was also said to have damaged the frame of a glass door in the building, joined by unidentified persons, without any lawful excuse.

    A final charge accused him of attempting to enter the building in a violent manner along with unidentified persons.

    Four prosecution witnesses, including Li, were expected to testify against the student leader. The court also heard there would be video evidence used against Fung but that prosecutors needed time to authenticate it and establish a chain of evidence.

    Fung was granted bail at HK$10,000 on condition that he not contact any of the prosecution witnesses.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) July 22, 2016.

    Security guards at the meeting venue in January called the police when the incident occurred. Citing the universitys executive vice-president Steven J. Cannon after a meeting, current student union president Althea Suen Hiu-nam said the secretariat of the school called the police again in February, upon the request of members of the council, and with the authorisation of the schools senior management team.

    Suen said according to Cannon, some of the members of the senior management team have given statements to the police, and submitted a report to the police requesting investigation of the incident. She urged the school not give further information to the police. The school has no obligation to provide CCTV footage or other evidence to the police, she said.

    Suen said it was not appropriate for the school to report the case to the police, that the university as an educational institution should not see student protests as criminal offences. The senior management team includes president Peter Mathieson, seven vice-presidents, the registrar and the director of finance. Mathieson described the incident at the time as mob rule .

    A statement from HKU said A judicial process is under way and it would be inappropriate for the university to comment further.

    The Hong Kong University Students Union issued a statement on Friday supporting Fung. [T]he current university authorities have forgone their integrity and the aim of education to cling to the powerful, allowing universities to become a political tool and the higher education to fall because of their moral bankruptcy, it said. The union said it was obviously a revenge directed against Fung as only he was charged out of dozens of people who joined the protest. The university authorities may believe that we will submit out of fear after this incident, but we say eloquently that we shall never back down. Filled with rage and having certainly no fear, we shall stand with Billy until the truth defeats the power, it added.

    The University of Hong Kong Alumni Concern Group said Arthur Li should bear the biggest responsibility for causing the chaos as he did not explain the developments after the meeting to students, alumni, and members of the public. The students there were asking for conversation and explanation. We believe they did not have the intent to intimidate or damage the universitys facilities. The school could handle the damage caused by the incident using existing procedures of the university, it said in a statement.

    The Hong Kong Federation of Students and the student union of the Chinese University of Hong Kong also criticised the school for suppressing its students.

    Link: HKU Council Battle - Main Event (2016/01/26)
    Link: HKU Council Battle - Postlude (2016/01/28)

    Internet comments:

    - Based upon the following screen captures, a police report has been filed against Hong Kong University Students Unions president Althea Suen for obstruction of justice.

    Althea Suen: I strongly issue this request


    Althea Suen: I hope that he will not provide other information.


    Althea Suen: Because the school has no obligation or responsibility


    Althea Suen: To provide the so-called closed circuit television segments.

    - The next time that a crime (e.g. robbery, rape, murder, etc) takes place on campus, please don't bother to call the police. How can they investigate any crime when you don't have the obligation or duty to provide any evidence to help solve the case?

    - (TVB) Barrister Ronny Tong said: "To convince certain witnesses to not testify in court, or not to provide certain evidence to the police may constitute obstruction of justice. I think that this student is acting dangerously. She should stop and seek legal advice first."

    - (SCMP) Alex Lo. July 23, 2016.

    To defend Billy Fung, his successor at the HKU Student Union has told the universitys administration on television, no less that it has neither the duty nor obligation to offer evidence to the police or cooperate with them. This is to protect the future of its students and the reputation of the school, according to Althea Suen Hiu-nam.

    Well, Althea, people do have a legal duty to give evidence and provide witness. And telling people not to do it may amount to interfering with witnesses and perverting the course of justice, which any well-informed secondary school child knows are criminal offences. I dont fret about youthful rebellion. Its the quality of student leadership I worry about. And they are all running for Legco!

    - Arthur Li and Billy Fung: "Don't let Arthur Li leave! Kill him!"

    - It is alleged that Billy Fung said aloud: "唔好畀李國章走！隊冧佢！" This can be translated as "Don't let Arthur Li leave! Kill him!" But "隊冧佢" is gangster talk and not approved to be used in decent society. So a better translation is "Don't let Arthur Li leave! Fucking kill him!"

    - Spoof photo of Billy Fung: Why should I be afraid? At most, I'll be sentenced to community service.

    Evidence of forcible entry

    - Democracy Wall, inside the Hong Kong University campus

    The intention was to say, "Arthur Li, Fuck your mother!" Instead, the writer missed the comma. So it is coming out as "Arthur Li fucks/is fucking/fucked your mother!"

    - I once thought that illiteracy was limited only to the Demosisto punks who didn't have good enough DSE marks to enter university. Now I know that illiteracy is rampant among Hong Kong University students as well.

    - Arthur Li comes from a wealthy family. So I can completely understand why you want Arthur Li to be your daddy.

    - There were two other banners on the wall, both of which were problematic as well. The one above says: "我們的杏林﹐我們會奪回來" which "We'll take back our medical sector." This makes zero sense, because they really wanted to say "我們的翰林﹐我們會奪回來" which means "We'll take back our academic world." So this was a typographic error.

    - When that writer gets a cold, is he going to visit a philosopher professor or a medical doctor?

    The other banner said: "Hong Kong University takes the side of the evildoers, we voice our support for Billy Fung Jing-en, Mathieson is shameful." Unfortunately this can also be taken to read: "Hong Kong University takes the side of the evildoers, vocal support for Billy Fung Jing-en/Peter Mathieson is shameful."

    - Here is the HKU student Tsz Hou Li who posted those disgraceful words:

    He said: "Those who know me all know that I don't use a lot of obscene language. But in this case, I have nothing to add."

    - Tsz Hou Li wants Arthur Li to fuck all your mothers. Arthur Li is 70 years old; if he has to fuck the mothers of the several tens of thousands of students, teachers and staff members at Hong Kong University, he will surely die from exhaustion. This is very clear and Tsz Hou Li does not need to add anything more.

    - (Oriental Daily) According to the rules for the HKU Democracy Wall, obscene language and/or personal attacks are now allowed and the HKU Students Union has the right to remove any offensive items. However, these posters have been there for four days already in apparent violation of the rules. HKU SU president Althea Suen has not responded to our inquiry about the posters. The HKU administration said that the Students Union is in charge of the Democracy Wall and they respect the autonomy of the Students Union in dealing with such matters in a responsible and tolerant manner.

    - Of course, the HKU administration is clearly being sarcastic here. Allowing the posters to stand for four days is neither responsible nor tolerant.

    - The fascinating thing is that they are completely oblivious to the negative impression created by the illiteracy and infantilism as exhibited in these posters.

    - Former Hong Kong University Students Union president Yvonne Leung brought others to charge into the Western District Police Station https://www.facebook.com/hkjoesin/videos/10154289030227381/ The police officer said that there are security reasons for not allowing too many people inside the police station. Leung demanded to know the maximum number of persons allowed under the regulations. The police officer said that the police decide based upon the situation.

    - Why did the police officer mean? Well, twenty 10-year-old girls in school uniforms would not be a threat. Ten masked Black Bloc men carrying machetes would be a threat. One 8-year-old school girl with sticks of dynamite wrapped around her waist and a detonator in her hand would be an even greater threat. Therefore the decision cannot be based solely upon an absolute number of persons present.

    - Yvonne Leung's brain is too small to understand what you just said.

    - (Kinliu) Who is going to pay for Billy Fung's legal bill? That is an interesting subject which the media has not reported on so far.

    So far it is known that senior barrister Linda Wong (Civic Party) is handling the case. If Wong does this pro bono, then all it proves is that the Civic Party was behind the disturbances at Hong Kong University. If Wong charges for her services, then the legal bill will be considerable.

    Will Hong Kong University pay the bill? That is unlikely. After all, Hong Kong University called in the police and provided the information for them to file the charges against Billy Fung. They can't possibly pay for the legal fees in order for Billy Fung to prove that he is innocent.

    Will the Hong Kong University Students Union pay the bill? At the time, Billy Fung was the HKU SU president. But was he acting as the HKU SU president representing the student body or as an individual? If the HKU SU pays a million dollar legal bill for Billy Eng, is that fair? Did the students ever consent to have their dues spent to defend someone who brought infamy to their university without consulting them?

    Will Billy Fung pay the legal bill himself, with the help of his family? That could be very costly to family finances and harmony.

    - (Ming Pao) Meanwhile over at Shue Yan University, the administration said that three individuals (a recent graduate; a third-year student; a first-year student who has already dropped out) hung up two banners that read: "You will regret it for the rest of your life if you enter Shue Yan University" and "Open University and Hang Seng Business School are better." According to information provided by another student, "the three individuals prepared the banners inside the Student Union conference room and left at 1030pm to hang up the banners." Afterwards many students, teachers, staff members and alumni said that they were upset.

    - If these people think that Shue Yan University is a shitty place, they should have dropped out and stayed far away. Instead, they spent so much time to prepare these banners.

    - (Oriental Daily) July 26, 2016. Last night, the Shue Yan University Student Union posted on Facebook that their president Joe Yueng was ambushed by four likely "undercover police officers" outside the Main Building. The four men also robbed Yeung of his mobile phone. The Student Union said that the four men began loitering around 7pm. Yeung thought that the men were acting in a suspicious manner, so he went up to check their identities. One of them pretended to be a student but could not produce an ID. So this man suddenly fled. The other three persons grabbed Yeung's mobile phone and fled.

    The Shue Yan University Student Union exterior affairs vice-president Liu Chun-sing confirmed that Joe Yeung was robbed of his mobile phone and is now giving a statement at the North Point Police Station. Liu said that the four men not only loitered around the grounds, but also kept taking the elevators up and down. During this time, a student heard one of the men speaking on the phone and saying "Someone has gone up to the second floor." The second floor is where the Student Union office is located. Therefore Liu suspected that the four men were targeting the Student Union. Liu said that when Yeung went up and took out his mobile phone to film them, the men fled while seizing the mobile phone.

    Why did these men look as if they are "undercover policemen"? Liu said: "They wore crew cuts, they wore sport shirts and they spoke as if from scripts. So they look like undercover policemen." Why were these men interested in the Student Union? Liu said that he does not know. He said that the Student Unions has not organized any controversial events recently.

    But Yeung's statement to the police did not mention that these four men look like undercover policemen.

    More about Joe Yeung: Seizing the Flag on Internet Article 23; Rubbish!; More on Rubbish!

    - A simple formula to remember: Crew cut + sport shirt + scripted speech = undercover police.

    - Every day I learn something new ... I would not have guessed this formula in a thousand years ...

    - Have you watched any triad gangster movies? Do you know what an undercover cop looks like?

    - Is a student union president authorized to demand citizens show him their ID's? Even the Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region has no authority to do so.

    - (Oriental Daily) August 9, 2016. According to Hong Kong University Student Union's publication Undergrad, 385 HKU students were interviewed June-July. 60% of the interviewees support Hong Kong independence, which is 24% higher than 2 years ago. 41% think that the best Hong Kong political system is Hong Kong becoming an independent nation. 31% said that they support armed revolution to achieve Hong Kong independence. 34% believe that Hong Kong will become independent.

    When asked which methods of resistance should be used, the students ranked from high to low: labor strike; occupying major government buildings; blocking major roads; school strike; tossing petrol bombs; attacking major Chinese Communist political figures in Hong Kong; throwing rocks/garbage; self-immolation; hunger strike. The methods best suited for Hong Kong are labor strike; occupying major government buildings; assembly/demonstration, etc.

    Q1. What is your overall rating of the political parties in Hong Kong?
    49.7%: Dissatisfied
    39.1%: In-between
    5.3%: Satisfied
    6.0%: Don't know/hard to say

    Q2. Compared to one year ago, what is your overall impression of political parties in Hong Kong?
    54.0%: Worse
    36.8%: The same
    5.3%: Better
    3.9%: Don't know/hard to day

    Q3. Why are you dissatisfied with the political parties? (Base: Those who are dissatisfied)
    24.7%: Political parties failed to accomplish anything
    15.7%: Political parties look after the interests of themselves instead serving the citizens
    15.2%: Political parties only know to squabble with each other
    10.1%: Political parties do not represent the opinions of citizens
    6.5%: Political parties often engage in filibustering
    3.9%: Legislators from political parties often fail to attend meetings
    3.4%: Political parties are biased on behalf of the government
    2.5%: Political parties won't tolerate dissent
    2.2%: Political parties behave poorly/have bad image
    2.0%: Political parties politicize everything
    9.8%: Other reasons
    3.9%: Don't know/hard to say

    Q4. Why are you satisfied with the political parties (Base: Those who are satisfied)
    31.6%: Political parties represent the diverse opinions among citizens
    13.2%: Political parties are able to help citizens
    10.5%: Political parties can effectively monitor the government
    7.9%: Political parties performed well in the lead-in-water incident
    5.3%: Political parties are not squabbling without reason, they are appreciated and accepted
    2.6%: Political parties can held weak and vulnerable groups
    7.9%: Other reasons
    15.8%: Don't know/hard to say

    Q5. How you optimistic or pessimistic about the future for development of political parties over the next ten years in Hong Kong?
    54.1%: Pessimistic
    33.8%: Half-half
    5.4%: Optimistic
    6.7%: Don't know/hard to say

    Q6. Do you agree that the Hong Kong SAR government should be led by political parties through election?
    25.8%: Disagree
    29.7%: Half-half
    35.8%: Agree
    8.8%: Don't know/hard to say

    Q7. Which political party do you support?
    8.9%: DAB
    8.7%: Civic Party
    7.6%: Democratic Party
    2.4%: New People Party
    1.9%: Federation of Trade Unions
    1.7%: Liberal Party
    1.4%: Hong Kong Indigenous
    1.0%: Neo Democrats
    0.8%: Labour Party
    0.7%: Youngspiration
    0.6%: People Power
    0.6%: League of Social Democrats
    0.1%: ADPL
    ---
    4.6%: Pan-democratic camp
    2.2%: Pro-establishment camp
    1.0%: Localist camp
    5.0%: Other
    50.8%: DOn't know/hard to say/none

    Q8. Are you a registered voter?
    14.1%: No
    85.0%: Yes
    0.8%: Don't know

    Q9. Will you vote in the September Legco elections? (Base: Registered voters)
    5.4%: No
    21.5%: Possibly
    66.4%: Definitely
    6.7%: Don't know/hard to say

    Q10. Which political party will you vote for? (Base: Likely voters)
    10.3%: DAB
    6.4%: Democratic Party
    5.5%: Civic Party
    1.8%: Federation of Trade Unions
    1.6%: New People Party
    1.4%: Liberal Party
    ---
    7.5%: Pan-democratic camp
    2.5%: Unaffiliated/middle-of-the-road/independent candidates
    2.5%: Pro-establishment camp
    1.1%: Localist camp
    5.9%: Other political part/group
    53.6%: Undecided/blank vote/don't know

    (South China Morning Post) July 15, 2016.

    Radical pan-democratic legislators seeking re-election have vowed to defy a change to election rules for the Legislative Council polls in September despite the risk of being disqualified.

    The controversial change targeting independence advocates requires candidates to sign a declaration acknowledging Chinas sovereignty over Hong Kong and allowing electoral officials to follow up on their compliance, but pan-democrats are up in arms against it.

    They complained yesterday that the new rules amounted to political censorship, and planned to meet the chief of the citys election watchdog over the matter on Tuesday. They will not sign the new declaration until their concerns are addressed.

    Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying stressed that independence for Hong Kong was out of the question even after 2047, when the governing principle of one country, two systems expires.

    The two-week nomination period begins today, and all candidates have to make the standard declaration to uphold the Basic Law and pledge allegiance to the city. But under the new rules imposed by the Electoral Affairs Commission, they will have to sign a second form agreeing to provide information if requested on their compliance. Refusal to sign could risk disqualification.

    Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Raymond Tam Chi-yuen denied political censorship, and said candidates could submit their nominations without signing the new form, but that would be a factor in deciding whether to approve their candidacy.

    People Power lawmaker Albert Chan Wai-yip and his pan-democratic colleagues demanded the commission clarify the consequences if a candidate refused to sign the new declaration. They would not rule out launching a judicial challenge.

    Elsie Leung Oi-sie, vice-chairwoman of the Basic Law Committee under the national legislature, said the new measure only repeated the constitutional requirement for lawmakers to swear allegiance to Hong Kong. If you make an oath thinking it is meaningless and you do something later to break it, it would be a criminal offence, she said.

    Maria Tam Wai-chu, a member of the same committee, warned candidates to think about your stance clearly when you take the oath.

    Anyone who makes a false statement in an election-related document commits an offence and is subject to a maximum fine of HK$5,000 and six months in prison.

    The Progressive Lawyers Group, a legal concern group, said: We sincerely hope that the declaration is not used as the first step towards an illegal restriction of fundamental rights ... such as that of standing for election and of free speech.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) July 15, 2016.

    The government has required Legislative Council election candidates to declare that Hong Kong is an inalienable part of China or they may not be nominated, in a surprise effort to potentially bar Hong Kong independence advocates from running.

    Anyone making a false declaration on the nomination form is liable to criminal sanction. The maximum penalty, according to the Elections (Corrupt and Illegal Conduct) Ordinance, is a fine of HK$100,000 and three years of imprisonment, and offenders cannot be elected as district councillors and lawmakers for five years.

    Localist candidates who support the citys independence have criticised the move introduced by the Electoral Affairs Commission on Thursday, while some pan-democratic parties questioned the declarations legality.

    In the original nomination form, candidates were already required to declare that they will uphold the Basic Law and pledge allegiance to the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. But the new declaration requires them to specifically support three articles in the Basic Law.

    Articles number one, 12, and 159(4) are about Hong Kongs status in China. They say that it is an inalienable part of China with a high degree of autonomy under the Central Government and that no amendment to the Basic Law shall contravene Chinas established basic policies regarding Hong Kong.

    The move came after announcements from several independence advocates that they will join the election in September, ahead of the start of the nomination period on Saturday. According to a preliminary poll by the University of Hong Kongs public opinion programme, two candidates from the camp may win in the election.

    A spokesperson for the government said we take the view that advocating and promoting the independence of Hong Kong is contrary to the content of the declaration that the law requires a candidate to make, namely rendering it questionable as to whether the concerned candidate is capable of being validly nominated, causing uncertainties to the solemn Legislative Council election and confusion to electors. The government agreed that there was a need for the Electoral Affairs Commission to take certain corresponding measures in the electoral process, added the spokesperson.

    The Electoral Affairs Commission said [i]n making the declaration, candidates must clearly understand the relevant context and legal consequences. Upon receiving the nomination form, the Returning Officer shall process the nomination according to the law and the procedure, and determine and announce whether the nomination is valid according to the law, a spokesperson said.

    Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Raymond Tam Chi-yuen denied that it was a measure of political suppression. He said that if candidates refused to sign the declaration, it will not directly lead to disqualification, as returning officers will instead communicate with them to determine the outcome on a case-by-case basis.

    Edward Leung Tin-kei, who is considering running for a LegCo seat, told HKFP that he will not sign the declaration, unless my groups lawyers tell me it is absolutely necessary. His lawyers are still looking into it, he said. He said he was considering submitting his nomination form on Saturday. We may not sign the declaration  we may watch the reaction from the Electoral Affairs Commission and make plans after that, he said. Leung who is spokesperson for Hong Kong Indigenous added that he will still speak about his advocacy for Hong Kong independence during his run no matter what the consequences are.

    Alan Leong Kah-kit of the Civic Party said candidates were already required to make the declaration in the original nomination form, and that he could not see any legal grounds for the declaration. Im guessing it is aimed at censoring certain political ideals it is challenging our freedom of speech and thought, he said.

    Pro-Beijing lawmaker Starry Lee Wai-king said the new declaration was reasonable, as candidates should know that they would have to pledge allegiance to the Basic Law after being elected anyway.

    (EJ Insight) July 15, 2016.

    Pan-democrats opposed a move by the Electoral Affairs Commission (EAC) to require candidates in the Legislative Council election to declare that the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region is part of China.

    The requirement, a declaration attached to the nomination form that must be signed by all Legco candidates, is seen as an attempt by the government to prevent those who are advocating independence and self-determination for Hong Kong from running in the election scheduled for Sept. 4.

    In a press statement, the EAC announced on Thursday that candidates must agree to uphold the Basic Law and swear allegiance to the Hong Kong SAR before they can be nominated to run for Legco seats, the Hong Kong Economic Journal reports.

    The two-week nomination period starts on Saturday. Anyone who fails to sign the form will not be validly nominated as a candidate, the EAC said, adding that running for the election, signing the nomination form, and making the declaration are solemn acts.

    Civic Party legislator Alan Leong Kah-kit, who is a barrister, questioned the legal basis of the declaration form, while Democratic Party lawmaker Emily Lau Wai-hing said the new form is unnecessary and may backfire, broadcaster Radio Television Hong Kong reported.

    The nomination forms are available for collection starting Friday. The returning officer will process the nomination after the form is received, and determine and announce whether the nomination is valid, the commission said. It also warned that candidates who make the declaration must clearly understand its relevant context and legal consequences.

    Making a false declaration is liable to criminal sanction, which may involve a fine of up to HK$100,000 and three years imprisonment in addition to deprivation of the right to run in District Council and Legco elections for three years and five years respectively.

    In explaining the new requirement, the EAC said questions have been raised by the public as to whether candidates fully understand the Basic Law.

    It specifically pointed out three provisions in the Basic Law that all candidates must bear in mind, namely Articles 1, 12 and 159(4) which state that the Hong Kong SAR is an inalienable part of the Peoples Republic of China, that it enjoys a high degree of autonomy and comes directly under the central government, and that no amendment to the law shall contravene Chinas basic policies regarding Hong Kong.

    Following the EAC announcement, the government said in a statement on Thursday evening that advocating and promoting Hong Kong independence is contrary to the content of the candidates declaration, rendering it questionable as to whether the concerned candidate is capable of being validly nominated, and causing uncertainties to the Legco election and confusion to electors.

    Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Raymond Tam Chi-yuen denied the declaration form is tantamount to political censorship, as some have alleged. A source in the government told HKEJ that there will no legal consequences or criminal conviction for any candidate who refuses to sign the form.

    Leong said he is surprised that EAC chairman Barnabas Fung Wah would allow such a form that has no legal basis whatsoever.

    Edward Leung Tin-kei, a member of the localist group Hong Kong Indigenous who is running again in the New Territories East geographical constituency after losing in the Feb. 28 by-election, said the EAC move is clearly aimed at pro-independence candidates, who are seen as a threat to the regime. He said he will sign the form if his lawyer suggests to him to do so, but that is only to be able to run in the election. He said he will continue to promote the idea of independence during the campaign.

    (EJ Insight) July 18, 2016.

    One in three nominees in the Sept. 4 Legislative Council elections has refused to sign a declaration to uphold the Basic Law.

    The Registration and Electoral Office (REO) said it received 33 applications on Saturday, the start of a two-week nomination period, the Hong Kong Economic Journal reports. Nearly a third did not sign the declaration which also includes a pledge of allegiance to the Hong Kong government.

    The declaration, announced Thursday by the Electoral Affairs Commission (EAC), quickly came under fire as an attempt by the government to weed out pro-independence candidates. EAC, which called the declaration a solemn act, said only nominees who signed the form are valid candidates. But REO said the declaration is not part of the nomination form and all nominations will processed.

    The Democratic Party and several of its allies have said their nominees will not sign the declaration. Labor Party chairwoman Suzanne Wu said such a pledge is unnecessary.

    Pan-democrats are scheduled to meet with EAC chairman Barnabas Fung to demand the retraction of the requirement.

    Edward Leung of the localist group Hong Kong Indigenous, who is running in New Territories East after losing in the Feb. 28 by-election, refused to sign the declaration when he filed his candidacy on Saturday.

    A spokesman for the pro-independence Hong Kong National Party, whose convenor Andy Chan Ho-tin plans to file his candidacy on Monday, said none of its nominees will sign the declaration.

    Alvin Cheng of the radical political group Civic Passion is the only non-establishment candidate who has signed the pledge. But he said he will continue to promote his pro-independence agenda.

    Peking University law professor Rao Geping, a member of the Hong Kong Basic Law Committee, said the declaration is a political requirement that is consistent with the Basic Law and the Chinese constitution.

    (SCMP) July 23, 2016.

    The election hopes of Hong Kong independence advocates hang in the balance as the best known figure in the camp on Saturday asked for more time to respond to government questions on his stance.

    Edward Leung Tin-kei of Hong Kong Indigenous made the plea after the Electoral Affairs Commission gave him 24 hours to say whether he was continuing to push for independence.

    As the deadline fell at 11am, Leung told the media: I wrote in reply asking for more time due to the legal complexities. As it was a weekend, I could not reach my solicitor and barrister to discuss the requisite legal research.

    The Hong Kong government has been trying to stop pro-independence politicians from taking part in the Legislative Council elections in September. Candidates must sign a new declaration form pledging allegiance to three Basic Law articles that effectively make independence calls unconstitutional. Leung has not signed this but he did sign the traditional form that Legco members would uphold the Basic Law.

    This was not enough to satisfy election officials and on Friday they sent him an email that asked: Do you admit that, even though you signed the declaration ... you are in fact continuing to advocate and push for Hong Kong independence?

    Another likely candidate, Avery Ng Man-yuen, said he would seek a judicial review on Monday to challenge the governments new rule. He suspended his electioneering to follow the judicial process.

    At issue is whether using a persons past remarks to determine his or her eligibility to become a Legco candidate is in breach of the constitutional provision on the right to stand in an election.

    Defending the governments move, Legcos outgoing president Jasper Tsang Yok-sing said it would be impossible for someone who calls for Hong Kong independence a fundamental challenge to the one country, two systems principle to qualify as a lawmaker.

    For Leung, however, the election officials scrutiny amounted to political screening, saying that their email referred to news reports in which he had stated his views. Well, actually I also shared a song in support of the Basic Law on my Facebook, Leung said. Why didnt they use it as proof of my political stance?

    (Hong Kong Free Press) July 23, 2016.

    A localist candidate for Septembers Legislative Council election has encountered yet another challenge after receiving an email from the returning officer asking for his stance on the independence of Hong Kong, in order to determine whether his nomination would be accepted.

    Do you admit that, although you signed the declaration upholding the Basic Law and pledging allegiance to the Hong Kong S.A.R. on the nomination form, you in fact still continue to advocate and promote Hong Kong independence? the email, sent to Edward Leung Tin-kei of Hong Kong Indigenous, said. It was sent at 11am on Friday he was allowed 24 hours to answer.

    Leung said it was clear political censorship. At around 10:50am on Saturday, he asked for the deadline to be extended until Wednesday morning, as it was a complicated legal issue and he has yet to be able to discuss it with his barrister.

    Leung said the email included several news clippings and social media posts from his group which stated his stance on Hong Kong independence. The clips state that he had said he will promote the idea even after joining the Legislative Council.

    Leung added that he called the returning officer 11 times but she did not pick up.

    The Peoples Republic of China and the Hong Kong S.A.R. do not want to see a candidate advocating independence entering the LegCo, he said.

    Asked whether the incident will increase his chances of getting elected, he said he was not optimistic.

    I dont even know whether Ill be able to run  whether it will bring benefits, I dont know how to answer, he said.

    Leung said his solicitor told him he could do two things, including a judicial review after his nomination was rejected, but when the judicial review is approved, the election will have ended its also a question as to whether it will [even] be approved.

    My lawyer told me it was the first time Hong Kong since its establishment carried out political censorship regarding candidates political ideals in an election, he said.

    Another option was to lodge an election petition to challenge the result.

    He remained tight-lipped at a press conference on Saturday regarding his stance on independence, as he said the returning officer was targeting all of his statements.

    He also called off plans to print promotional materials, as it may be costly should he be barred from standing for elections.

    But Leung said that he has the freedom to talk about the future of Hong Kong after 2047 even after he declared he would uphold the Basic Law, as it was not clearly laid out in the mini-constitution. The agreement which safeguards the citys autonomy from China is set to expire in 2047.

    (SCMP) July 26, 2016.

    The High Court will hold an urgent hearing on Wednesday to decide whether to allow a legal challenge to a new election rule targeting independence advocates.

    Candidates preparing to run in Septembers Legislative Council elections on Monday filed two separate applications for judicial reviews, arguing that the citys election watchdog had acted beyond its powers.

    Three aspirants are racing against time to get a court decision before the nomination period for candidates ends on Friday.

    In a related development, two more localist candidates received inquiries from the Electoral Affairs Commission about their stance on independence.

    Radical localist leader Edward Leung Tin-kei and two pan-democrat candidates, Avery Ng Man-yuen and Chan Tak-cheung, challenged the legality of the commissions new confirmation form, which asks candidates to specifically acknowledge three parts of the Basic Law that state Hong Kong is an inalienable part of China.

    The new requirement is a supplement to the standard declaration which asks candidates to pledge they will uphold the Basic Law in general.

    The applications filed by the trio urged the court to declare the new form illegal, as a result of the election watchdogs misinterpretation of the law and acting beyond its powers.

    Returning officers, they argued in the writs, were not legally entitled to determine whether candidates were bona fide in signing their nomination forms, because their duties were confined by the law to ensuring only that the nomination form included the usual declaration, and that it was signed.

    They also argued that although officers had limited legal power to invalidate a candidates application, the power lay largely in procedural matters, such as the nomination form not being completed or the candidates failure to pay deposits.

    If those officers are allowed to make inquires on how genuine the candidates are with the declaration, it is tantamount to empowering the returning officer to ascertain the political view of the candidate in order to determine whether he is validly nominated, the writs continued.

    They likened the new measure to asking candidates if they supported same-sex relationships or Article 23 of the Basic Law, which requires the city to enact its own version of national security legislation.

    Leung, who is required to reply to the commission on Tuesday, said he would ask the court to clarify the law urgently. After he submitted his nomination last week, signing only the standard declaration, he was approached by a returning officer by email, asking him to clarify whether he would continue to push for the citys independence.

    League of Social Democrats chairman Avery Ng Man-yuen noted that although his party did not advocate independence, it doesnt mean we cannot speak out for [Leungs] right to take part in an election.

    The Hong Kong National Partys Andy Chan Ho-tin was contacted for follow-up inquiries.

    Localist Alvin Cheng Kam-mun, who signed the new form unlike Leung and Chan also received a follow-up inquiry from the electoral office on Monday night.

    An officer asked him to clarify his position on independence, attaching media reports of his recent remarks. Cheng said he would seek legal advice before making a response.

    The Democratic Party said two of its candidates who did not sign the new form were told their nominations were validated. The Civic Party said one of its candidates who did not sign it was also accepted.

    Internet comment:

    - (HKG Pao) The Hong Kong National Party announced that the people on the Election Affairs Commission are kidding themselves if they think that they can stop Hong Kong independence from becoming mainstream. They said that all pro-Hong Kong independence organizations should not be intimidated or follow the requirement by the Election Affairs Commission to make the pledges. Instead, we should rip off the resources of the Hong Kong Communist government to push for Hong Kong independence.

    The declaration said that even if the Hong Kong National Party makes the pledge, they will continue to promote Hong Kong independence. If the Election Affairs Commission rejects their nominations, there will be political consequences. If the law enforcement agency should charge them with making a false statement, they are willing to fight the charges all the way.

    - If you refuse to take the promissory oath because you are an conscientious objector, your nomination is incomplete according to Legislative Council Ordinance CAP 541/542 and therefore you won't be one of the listed choices on election day. You can apply for a judicial review (using legal aid, of course) but the outcome won't be known until a couple of years later. It would be extraordinary for any court to rule in your favor, because the law (the Basic Law and the Legislative Council Ordinance) is very clear and the courts are reluctant to breach the separation of powers and dictate what the Election Affairs Commission should be doing. Besides, if you win, it means that the 2016 Legislative Council elections would be voided and taken all over again (at a cost of several hundreds of millions of HK dollars).

    - Why is the government doing this just before the nomination period begins? This is setting a trap for the pro-Hong Kong independence folks.

    (1) If you refuse to sign the promissory oath, you won't be allowed to run in the election.

    (2) If you sign the promissory oath but continue to preach Hong Kong independence, you are guilty of perjury.

    (3) If you sign the promissory oath and won't speak for Hong Kong independence again, you will have betrayed your avowed cause.

    - (3) is the best option. You can tell everybody that you will stop speaking for Hong Kong independence for now. But if elected, you will be shielded by Basic Law Article 77:

    Members of the Legislative Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region shall be immune from legal action in respect of their statements at meetings of the Council.

    You promise that you will spend every minute of your speech time at the Legislative Council to say how great Hong Kong independence is.

    - (TVB) Demosisto chairman Nathan Law said: "This is not only suppressing the Localists, but this rule is also a form of suppression on the political rights of the people of Hong Kong. This is more than not dealing with it when it is not an advocacy of Hong Kong independence."

    This is typical of Demosisto that their comments are incomprehensible. They need to learn (1) logic/reasoning based upon acquisition of relevant facts and (2) command of the language of expression.

    - (Bastille Post) Edward Leung (Hong Kong Indigenous) refused to sign. He said that this was political censorship. If he signed the pledge and then expressed support for Hong Kong independence, the government can rescind his candidacy because he has violated his pledge. In fact, he may be charged with making a false oath. But Leung also acknowledged that failure to sign the pledge may mean that he is ineligible to run. The chances of winning a judicial review are slim because the candidates were previously required to pledge to support the Basic Law in its entirety and the government is adding a form that lists certain articles of the Basic Law now.

    - (HKG Pao) A number of Legislative Council candidates have refused to side the pledge of allegiance, including pro-independence elements as well as traditional pan-democrats. On the surface, they seemed to be saying: "I think that it is wrong for the government to do this. So I will stick to my principles and do the right thing by not signing."

    But the truth is that refusing to sign is a political ploy. By declaring that you won't sign, the media will come and ask you to make brilliant comments. If the government responds, you will make even more brilliant comments that the media will report, etc. This is a lot more fun than just signing the pledge.

    But what if the Election Affairs Committee stands firm and insist that all those who refuse to sign won't be eligible to run in the election? What happens to those who initially refuse to sign?

    Some of them will throw their principles away and sign. They will say that it was more important to prevent the Chinese Communists from taking over the Legislative Council. But they will have lost the moral high ground. Everything that they said before will be used against them in the ensuing debates.

    Some of them will stick to their principles and still refuse to sign. If so, I will give them some more respect because they stuck to their principles.

    - When so many pan-democrats refuse to sign the pledge, it means that they are sticking to the principle of "They can't kill us all." That is, the Hong Kong SAR government will not be able to withstand the international outcry if all of them are excluded for refusing to sign the pledge.

    - Unfortunately, it is also international standard for election candidates to pledge allegiance to the constitution and government of the respective governments. If the international community wants to condemn Hong Kong, they will have to explain why it does not apply to themselves.

    - (Oriental Daily) July 24, 2016. It is understandable that the pro-Hong Kong independence advocates would oppose and refuse to sign the pledge of loyalty. But nobody can be more stupid than the mainstream pan-democrats who refuse to sign while saying that they oppose independence." They said that signing the pledge means tacit acceptance of a pre-screening system that will cause the loss of Hong Kong core values. Today you sign this against Hong Kong independence, tomorrow you may be required to sign to support the Communist Party. So they would rather lose the nomination than sign.

    In this case, the pan-democrats are playing the old pressure game against the Hong Kong government. For the constitutional reform, the government wanted universal suffrage while pre-screening the candidates. The government pleaded for support from the pan-democrats, who vetoed the bill so that the government could not get what it wished for. In this current case, the government does not want the pro-Hong Kong independence advocates to get into the Legislative Council. If the pan-democrats say that they won't run either, that is quite fine by the government. If the pro-establishment camp gets a veto-proof majority in the Legislative Council, they will be passing new laws on Chief Executive election, Article 23 national security, etc as quickly as possible. So do not kid yourself that the pan-democrats can apply any pressure on the government in this instance.

    - Normally speaking, there would be an international outcry if the pan-democrats are prevented from running in the election. However, this case is very clear cut here. Not even the United States will accept a candidate who vows to overthrow the Constitution/Bill or Rights, nor will the United Kingdom accept a candidate who vows to overthrow the Queen.

    - (Wen Wei Po) July 24, 2016. Youngspiration convener Baggio Leung said that they have not received any queries from the Returning Officer about whether they support Hong Kong independence of not. Leung said that the Youngspiration's platform only mentions "Hong Kong self-determination by the people of Hong Kong" and not "Hong Kong independence."

    Will Youngspiration change its positions in order to be eligible for the election? Leung said "No" because they enter politics for ideas and beliefs and it would be wrong to give them up because they want to enter the elections.

    - (Bastille Post) Signing the pledge or not is a sure indicator of who is a fool or knave. Among those who signed are Alvin Cheng of Civic Passion. Among those who didn't sign are Lam Cheuk-ting and Hui Chi-fung of the Democratic Party.

    So far the government hasn't even shown its hand yet. They may just decide that those who didn't sign are not eligible to run. And if you don't like it, you can apply for a judicial review which will take years. Even then, even if the Court of Final Appeal rules in you favor, the government can get the National People's Congress Standing Committee to overturn this on constitutional grounds.

    The young doves of the Democratic Party are making a mistake. The gesture may make them seem radical, but the reality is that they will never be so radical as fight for Hong Kong independence. The pledge requirement was never directed at them. They should have signed under protest and then they would have gained the votes of those who refused to sign in the end. If Szeto Wah were alive, he would have been kicking and screaming, but he would still sign. And he would have preferred the Localists not to sign so that he can corral their votes!

    - (Bastille Post) If a candidate says that he supports Hong Kong independence, it is very likely that his nomination will be rejected by the Returning Officer. If a candidate says that he does not support Hong Kong independence but nevertheless continues to make those kinds of statements along the campaign trail, his candidacy may be rescinded and he may also be charged with making a false statement.

    Why is the Returning Officer asking the candidates about whether they support Hong Kong independence or not? The reason is that the government wants to gather the evidence in the event of a court fight. If the government cites third-party statements (such as television news reports), they will need to put in a lot of effort to solidify the evidence. But if the candidate makes a direct statement to the Returning Officer, then this is direct evidence already.

    - Extra! Extra! Edward Leung has just castrated himself! (Ming Pao) Edward Leung has just set up a special Legislative Council election Facebook page which he characterized as "putting on a helmet." The Facebook began with a photo of a copy of the Basic Law and a statement: "I, Edward Leung Tin-kei, declare clearly that I will support the Basic Law and I pledge loyalty to the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region." The Facebook includes the details of the press conference and quickly drew 5,000 LIKE's within 30 minutes. He has purged all the previous contents in his Facebook, including statements supporting Hong Kong independence.

    A Facebook post is not a formal response to the query from the Returning Officer. Furthermore, the question is not about the Basic Law or the Hong Kong Special Administrative Government. The question was specifically about support for Hong Kong independence as indicated by three specific previous instances. With respect to the instances, the formal response would have to be either "No, I didn't make those statements" or "Even if I did make those statements, I repudiate them now because I no longer support Hong Kong independence."

    If the Returning Officer accepts his formal response and hence his nomination as a candidate, he will no longer be able to speak about Hong Kong independence as long as he is a candidate and, if elected, as long as he is a Legislative Councilor. Thus, Edward Leung has castrated himself!

    - (Wen Wei Po) July 24, 2016. Specifically, the Returning Officer asked Edward Leung: "Even though you signed the nomination form that you support the Basic Law and you pledge allegiance to the Hong Kong Special Administration Region, do you deny that you are still continuing to advocate and promote Hong Kong independence in fact and deed?"

    - (Wen Wei Po) July 24, 2016. Here is the summary of the 3 previous news reports for which the Returning Officer wanted Edward Leung to address:

    (1) Hong Kong Indigenous' Edward Leung who advocates and supports Hong Kong independence claimed that he will not sign the pledge without legal advice. He speculated that there are two outcomes. One outcome is that his lawyer will tell him not to sign but the Electoral Affairs Commission will require him to sign. In that case, he will sign and also file a judicial review. He said that he advocates and supports Hong Kong independence and he is willing to bear the consequences of being deprived from entering the election.

    (2) Hong Kong Indigenous' Edward Leung denounced the government for making those who advocate Hong Kong independence compromise and be subdued; he said that Hong Kong Indigenous is seeking legal advice. If he doesn't have to sign, he won't. He emphasized that even if elected, he won't change his position of advocating Hong Kong independence.

    (3) His team of lawyers has begun to study the new arrangements of the Electoral Affairs Commission and discuss whether the government has a legal basis for so doing. If the team of lawyers advise that he does not have to sign but the Electoral Affairs Commission insists all the same, he will still sign but he will file a judicial review at the same time. If the team of lawyers advise that he must sign, he will sign but still persist on supporting Hong Kong independence.

    - (Wen Wei Po) July 24, 2016. During the press conference, Edward Leung was asked repeatedly whether he still advocates and promotes Hong Kong independence. He said that he "needed to get legal counsel first" and at this stage, he "will not answer, he cannot answer and he does not dare to answer."

    Will he put aside Hong Kong independence for now in order to retain his eligibility? He said that this was a matter of human character. "Should I persist with my ideas and refuse to compromise and then retreat gloriously and lose? Or should I endure the ignominy in order to give myself a chance? I am looking at this dilemma. As for the formal answer, I will have to consult my lawyer first."

    - Edward Leung makes the argument that Article 5 of the Basic Law allows for Hong Kong independence after 50 years.

    Basic Law Article 5:

    The socialist system and policies shall not be practised in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, and the previous capitalist system and way of life shall remain unchanged for 50 years.

    In the light of Basic Law Article 1:

    The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region is an inalienable part of the People's Republic of China.

    All this means that it will be re-evaluated 50 years later whether the capitalist system and way of life shall remain in Hong Kong. There is nothing about sovereignty because Hong Kong is an inalienable part of the People's Republic of China.

    - Check the dictionaries about the meaning of 'inalienable':

    Merriam-Webster dictionary: inalienable -- Impossible to take away or give up; incapable of being alienated, surrendered or transferred.

    The Free Dictionary: inalienable -- That cannot be transferred to another or others.

    Capiche?

    - Why did Deng Xiao-ping allow for a re-assessment after 50 years? Because it is possible that Hong Kong and mainland China will have converged economically and culturally by then, in which case having Two Systems is merely cumbersome. 19 years have already elapsed. The more likely situation in 2047 is that Hong Kong will be a third-tier city economically within China (Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Chongqing, Shenzhen, Tianjin will be first tier; Ningbo, Chengdu, Hangzhou, Xiamen, Zhuhai, Qingdao, Shenyang, Xi'an, Wuhan, Nanjing, Dalian will be second tier; Hong Kong will be the economic peers of the likes of Kunming, Guiyang, Nanning, Nanchang, Changchun, Yantai, Tangshan, Guilin, Liuzhou, Haikou, etc).

    - By 2047, Raymond Wong Yuk-man (born in 1951) will be 96 years old [That is, if he is still alive.] Edward Leung Tin-kei (born in 1991) will be 56 years old. Joshua Wong Chi-fung (born in 1996) will be 51 years old. Why do they have to wait until 2047 before they can get this so-called Hong Kong independence thing? Because in the interim they will get paid $93,000 a month plus another $100,000+ allowance a month as Legislative Councilors. In fact, they don't want Hong Kong independence to come too soon -- they will lose their jobs and they will be held accountable for all the unforeseeable bad consequences.

    - (Kinliu) By Chris Wat Wing-yin.

    For the past 19 years after the handover, we have been referring to these people as Legislative Councilors. Thus, we have forgotten that their full titles are supposed to be Legislative Councilors of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China. When you shorten the title, you are discarding the true identities, histories, duties and origins of these people.

    Thus, when Electoral Affairs Commission chairman Barnabas Fung required all Legco candidates to fill out a pledge to confirm that they support the Basic Law, and specifically Article 1 about Hong Kong being an inalienable part of the People's of Republic of China, we are finally coming to state correctly that this is an election for the Legislative Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China. If the candidate does not accept that Hong Kong is a part of China, then they are running in the wrong election.

    The sub-text is understood by all the pan-democrats, and that is why almost all of them are refusing to sign. They know if they sign, it will come back to haunt them later on.

    This is brilliant on the part of the government. If you don't sign, you won't be able to run in the election; if you sign, you are reneging on all your previous talk about independence, self-determination, autonomy, etc. Weren't you saying that you don't want China? Didn't you set the copy of the Basic Law on fire? So why are you down on your knees now? Could this be about the job that pays $93,000 a month for which you will give up your grand beliefs?

    - (HKG Pao) July 25, 2016. At the RTHK City Forum, Chinese University of Hong Kong Student Union president Ernie Chow gave his views. He said that the law says that as long as a potential candidate files a nomination form and the deposit, he will be in the election. If someone thinks that the signed pledge is a false statement, "then please follow through with the legal process and let the Justice Department prosecute him and wait for the court to render a verdict." He said that "the executive branch cannot override the judiciary branch by letting the Returning Officer alone determine whether a person has made a false statement and hence deprived him of his rights." Chow said that the Chinese Communists own sole responsibility for the rise of Hong Kong independence sentiments and armed resistance.

    - This same Ernie Chow said that since he did not consent to the 1984 Sino-British Joint Declaration, he is not obliged to pledge loyalty to the Basic Law. Neither did he consent to the Crimes Ordinance, so he is not obliged to stop robbing, killing and/or raping.

    - The Civil Rights Act in the United States was enacted on July 2, 1964. By Ernie Chow's logic, any American born after that date is not obliged to obey it because they were not born yet and therefore never consented to its enactment.

    - Better yet, the Bill of Rights was ratified in 1791. No living Americans (or their parents or their grandparents) were born yet, so there is no duty for any American to obey it either.

    - And this is the person that the students of the Chinese University of Hong Kong elected to represent them ...

    - (Speakout HK @ YouTube) Ernie Chow: If this force for Hong Kong independence cannot get into the Legislative Council, we will be compelled to use armed force to take back out future ...

    But the next part is hilarious. Firstly, Ernie Chow said: "The people of Hong Kong have never had the obligation to obey the Basic Law." He was asked: "You don't support the Basic Law, right?" Chow said: "Yes."

    One minute later, Ernie Chow invoked the Basic Law to rebut someone: "Article 22. Article 26. The right to vote and the right to be elected in accordance with the law. Article 27. The freedoms of speech and press. Article 23. The personal freedom of the people of Hong Kong cannot be violated."

    So the argument of these young people is always that they cannot be arrested because their rights are guaranteed by the Basic Law. Even though they enjoy the rights of Basic Law, they have no obligation to obey the Basic Law.

    - In like manner, many of these people do not recognize the Hong Kong Special Administrative Government which they said are an Occupation Force for the Chinese Communists. However, they want to run in the elections to compete for seats in the Legislative Council of the Hong Kong Special Administration Region of the People's Republic of China.

    During the Japanese occupation, any Chinese person who assumes a government position is called a traitor. This is irrespective of any claims after the Victory that they only served in order to conduct sabotage.

    - (SCMP) July 25, 2016.

    Under Article 40 of the Legislative Council Ordinance, candidates should be allowed to run if they declare they will pledge to uphold the Basic Law and promise allegiance to the special administrative region. Signing the standard declaration form should suffice. There is no additional requirement, such as the confirmation form introduced by the election authorities.

    - But that is not the main purpose of the confirmation form. Whether there is a confirmation form or not, the public focus is now on Article 1, Article 12 and Article 159(4) within the Basic Law. The point is this: If a candidate signs the standard nomination form to pledge to uphold the Basic Law but nevertheless goes around delivering speeches about Hong Kong independence throughout the campaign, can the Returning Officer overturn his/her candidacy?

    - As events unfold, it seems that people have misunderstood the purpose of the confirmation form.

    James To (Democratic Party), Roy Kwong (Democratic Party) and Sumly Chan (Civic Party) did not sign the confirmation form, but they have already been told by their Returning Officer that their nominations have been validated. Therefore, signing the confirmation form is not a sine qua non.

    Alvin Chen Kam-mun (Civic Passion) signed the confirmation form, but the Hong Kong Island Returning Officer has sent him an email marked "Urgent." It was noted that after filing the nomination papers, Cheng publicly stated his support for Hong Kong independence/nation-building and said that he will continue to articulate these proposals at the election forums. Furthermore, Cheng stated in a July 20 election advertisement that Hong Kong can only become independent with a new constitution from the people. The Returning Officer demanded Cheng to give a written reply as to whether he will advocates and promotes Hong Kong independence/nation-building, and the decision to validate depends on Cheng's reply. Cheng said that he will seek legal advice before he replies.

    Chan Ho-tin (Hong Kong National Party) did not sign the confirmation form, but the New Territories West Returning Officer has sent an email asking him about his stance on Hong Kong independence as articulated publicly many times in the past. Chan said that he will seek legal advice before he replies.

    So the government is focusing on the candidates' positions about Hong Kong independence rather than whether they signed the confirmation form or not. Once the confirmation form was sent out, the candidate must know about Article 1, Article 12 and Article 159(4). It is the knowledge that is important, not the signature. The candidate can no longer plead ignorance.

    What are the options of Alvin Cheng/Chan Ho-tin?

    Option 1: "Yes, I support Hong Kong independence and I will continue to talk loud and clear about it." The Returning Officer will have good grounds to invalidate the nomination.

    Option 2: "No, I do not support Hong Kong independence and the press misunderstood/misreported me in the news clippings that you sent me." The Returning Officer may just validate the nomination, but because you made such an explicit statement to the Returning Officer, you cannot go back on it later.

    Option 3: "I decline to answer this question because the Retuning Officer has no authority to ask it." The Returning Officer will have good grounds to invalidate the nomination based upon your prior statements . You can file a judicial review if you so choose.

    - In the event of a judicial review, both sides will surely debate about Basic Law Article 1, Article 26 (the right to vote/the right to stand for election) and Article 27 (freedom of speech, of the press and of publication). In the worst case, the Hong Kong SAR Government will ask the National People's Congress Standing Committee to interpret the Basic Law conclusively. According to Basic Law Article 158:

    (1) The power of interpretation of this Law shall be vested in the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress.

    (2) The Standing Committee of the National People's Congress shall authorize the courts of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region to interpret on their own, in adjudicating cases, the provisions of this Law which are within the limits of the autonomy of the Region.

    (3) The courts of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region may also interpret other provisions of this Law in adjudicating cases. However, if the courts of the Region, in adjudicating cases, need to interpret the provisions of this Law concerning affairs which are the responsibility of the Central People's Government, or concerning the relationship between the Central Authorities and the Region, and if such interpretation will affect the judgments on the cases, the courts of the Region shall, before making their final judgments which are not appealable, seek an interpretation of the relevant provisions from the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress through the Court of Final Appeal of the Region. When the Standing Committee makes an interpretation of the provisions concerned, the courts of the Region, in applying those provisions, shall follow the interpretation of the Standing Committee. However, judgments previously rendered shall not be affected.

    (4) The Standing Committee of the National People's Congress shall consult its Committee for the Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region before giving an interpretation of this Law.

    - Some of the refuseniks act under the belief that when Legislative Council Ordinance CAP 522 S.40 says that:

    What requires are to be compiled with by persons nominated as candidates

    (1) A person is not validly nominated as a candidate for an election for a constituency unless

    (a) a deposit has, in the manner prescribed by regulations in force under the Electoral Affairs Commission Ordinance (Cap 541), been lodged by or on behalf of the person with the Returning Officer concerned; and

    (b) the nomination form includes or is accompanied by-

    (i) a declaration to the effect that the person will uphold the Basic Law and pledge allegiance to the Hong Kong Special Administration Region; and

    (ii) a declaration as to the person's nationality and as to whether or not the person has right of abode in a country other than the People's Republic of China; and

    (iii) a promissory oath given by the person to the effect that, if elected, he or she will not do anything during his or her term that results in his or her ...

    (2) The person must sign the declarations.
    (3) The deposit is to be of such amount as is prescribed by the regulations for the purposes of this section.

    it means that the sole job of the Returning Officer is to run off the check list for completeness and file the papers away. Imagine what if the Returning Officer reads in the newspapers that Candidate X is a permanent resident of Canada even though the declaration says no. This is a clear violation of the eligibility regulations. Shouldn't the Returning Officer make an effort to investigate? And if true, disqualify the nominee?

    - According to the legal advice given to Edward Leung, the Returning Officer does not have the authority to question his political views, because there is no explicit statement of such authority. Neither does the Returning Officer have the authority to question a candidate about his right of abode elsewhere, because there is no explicit statement as such either. The Retuning Officer is only tasked with ensuring that the candidate has paid the deposit, has signed the form pledge to uphold the Basic Law, has declared to have no right of abode elsewhere, etc, which loops back to the same thing.

    - (Kinliu) Chan Ho-tin (Hong Kong National Party) replied to the Returning Officer before the deadline. First of all, he said that he refused to state whether he supports Hong Kong independence or not, because the Returning Officer has no authority to ask. That's fine, because the Returning Officer will go by all that Chan had said in the public record. Secondly, he said that if his nomination is invalidated, it means his right to run for election and the citizens' right to vote for him will be deprived. As a result, he will call on the people to go into the streets to resist.

    - Go into the streets and resist? So far, this so-called Hong Kong National Party only has two persons who dare to show their faces in public.

    -  (Wen Wei Po) July 27, 2016.

    Previously Alvin "Four-eyed Brother" Cheng Kam-mun (Civic Passion) had signed the confirmation form. The Returning Officer sent him an email about certain pro-Hong Kong independence statements from him that were reported by the press. On the day when he announced his candidacy, he shouted out slogans such as "Build the Hong Kong nation!" Cheng replied that the platform for Civic Passion is "constitution by the people" and "permanent extension of the Basic Law", which cannot possibly be in violation of the Basic Law. When he shouted "Build the Hong Kong nation!", it was merely his own personal position which has nothing to do with the Civic Passion election platform. In this election, Cheng said that he does not intend to promote Hong Kong independence or nation-building as a candidate.

    Cheng also said that his so-called "Hong Kong nation-building" is based upon Wan Chin's City-State Self-Rule in which Hong Kong has its independent judiciary, currency and political system; the international community accepts Hong Kong as a nation-state member; and Hong Kong maintains a federation relationship with China in a way that is consistent with Hongkongers governing Hong Kong with a high degree of autonomy.

    Meanwhile Raymond Wong Yuk-man (Proletariat Political Institute) said that he is not a revolutionary and he only wants to amend the constitution. Wong said that he has never said that he supports Hong Kong independence, but he won't oppose young people advocating Hong Kong independence.

    Meanwhile Chan Ho-tin (Hong Kong National Party) said that he has formally replied to the Returning Officer. He said that the Returning Officer is only responsible for facilitating the nomination process and has "no right" to screen the candidate's political position or whether his pledge was sincere. He said that the political viewpoints and qualifications of the candidates are left solely for the people of Hong Kong to decide and not the Returning Officers. Therefore he refused to reply whether he continues to promote Hong Kong independence. Chan continued to say that he still supports Hong Kong independence and the dismantling of the Basic Law. "Hong Kong must leave China." He said that if he is deprived of the right to run for election, then the citizens' right to vote will also be deprived. He does not exclude the possibility of a judicial review, or even organizing the people to go into the streets and resist.

    - (SCMP) July 27, 2016.

    The High Court on Wednesday refused to immediately hear the first legal challenge to controversial new electoral rules targeting independence advocates.

    High Court judge Mr Justice Thomas Au Hing-cheung said he saw no urgency in dealing with the legal action before the nomination period ends on Friday.

    The candidates were able to submit nominations without confirmation forms, Au said.

    Au was handling two separate applications filed on Monday for judicial review of the election watchdogs new measure.

    A number of candidates had also had their nominations validated without submitting the confirmation forms, Au added.

    One of the cases was filed by independence advocate Edward Leung Tin-kei who is eyeing a seat in New Territories East; and the other by two pan-democrats, Avery Ng Man-yuen and Chan Tak-cheung. Both relate to the new confirmation form that the Electoral Affairs Commission is asking all candidates to sign when submitting their nomination for the upcoming Legco election.

    In addition to the standard declaration asking candidates to pledge to uphold the Basic Law, the new form require Legco hopefuls to specifically acknowledge three parts of the constitution which stipulate that Hong Kong is an inalienable part of China.

    Many candidates from the pro-democracy camp have refused to sign the form, criticising it as a type of political screening.

    A number of localist candidates, including Leung himself, have been asked by returning officers to further clarify their stance on Hong Kong independence after submitting their nomination.

    Outside court on Wednesday, Leung told media that todays ruling might mean he had exhausted judicial measures. When asked whether he would sign the new form, Leung said he had not made up his mind.

    Avery Ng and Chan Tak-Cheung said they would not sign the form.

    - (The Stand) Why did judge Au Hing-cheung turn down the request? It was because Edward Leung could not demonstrate immediate damage. Leung's argument was centered on the confirmation form. But Au observed that nobody has been disqualified for not signing the confirmation form so far; in fact, some candidates who didn't sign have already been notified that their nominations have been validated.

    - (The Stand) Edward Leung said that he has supported the Basic Law from day one, in that he believes that everyone has the right to stand for election.

    Well, he means to say that he selectively supports those articles that he likes, such as Article 26 about the right to vote and the right to be elected in accordance with the law. But he refuses to be pinned down on Article 1, which says that Hong Kong is an inalienable part of the People's Republic of China. Everybody knows that by now. At every campaign forum hereafter, he will be asked if he supports Basic Law Article 1 or not.

    - (Wen Wei Po) July 28, 2016. Avery Ng said that he was disappointed with the decision of the High Court jurdge. He said that he originally planned to enter New Territories East with Chan Tak-cheung on the same list. Due to the legal controversy over the confirmation form, Chan will no longer be running. So Avery Ng will be the sole League of Social Democrats candidate and he won't sign the confirmation form.

    What does that mean? It meant that Avery Ng said not to sign whereas Chan Tak-cheung said to sign. There was a difference of opinions, leading to a parting of ways. But of course they cannot bring themselves to admit something this simple.

    And why is Chan Tak-cheung not against signing? Well, Avery Ng is one of the most famous leftist retards among social activism. The first sign of leftist retardism is the belief in Greater China (mainland, Hong Kong, Taiwan) as one entity and that everything will be fine if only democracy arrives in China. So Avery Ng believes just that. So here is a piece of paper about Basic Law Article 1. It is consistent with Avery Ng's position. Why not sign it? Here is the second sign of leftist retardism: Avery Ng refused to sign it as a matter of principle, even if he agrees with the content. Duh!

    - (Wen Wei Po) July 28, 2016. Yesterday, Wan Chin filed his nomination for the New Territories East Legco election. He signed the confirmation statement. He said that he did so "in order to leave a record" of the fact that he had been "subjected to political persecution." He said that once Communist China collapses, the central government vanishes and Hong Kong becomes independent, there will be a temporary President/Governor who will hold a Nuremburg-style trial to go after all who persecuted Wan Chin before. He told the people over at the "Election Secret Agency" to be "careful" and he used putonghua to chant: "Be careful, because you will not be spared when the day of political reckoning arrives."

    - Eek! An inmate has escaped from the Castle Peak Psychiatric Centre!

    - Full-treatment video: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=iWqwl0FVZtM

    - (Wen Wei Po) July 29, 2016.

    Edward Leung said that the Returning Officer cited certain news reports and Facebook posts which are hearsay statements. Edward Leung had previously filed the Facebook pages as campaign promotions. Today Leung denied any connection to these statements, and he will accept no responsibility. He said that his Facebook page was not administered by himself. As for July 23, he has purged all  previous Facebook information that is inconsistent with his current position and he now has a brand new Facebook. He has also filed to cancel the previous Facebook pages as campaign promotions.

    When asked multiple times whether he will mention during and after the election campaign, Leung only said: "I will not leave any excuse for the government." With respect to the questions from the Returning Officer about his political positions, his reply in English used only the present tense. "I have only one goal -- to enter the election and win to become a parliamentarian."

    - Brexit was based upon the promise by the politicians that there will be a windfall of 350m going from European Union dues to National Health Service. Furthermore, no more refuges will come to the United Kingdom. No sooner was the referendum over than the same politicians said that this was a misunderstanding and that no such thing will take place.

    Everybody lies, but politicians lie more often. If you believe 10% of what Edward Leung says, both your eyes will go blind.

    - (Bastille Post) July 28, 2016.

    The information is that the key demarcation in time is the moment when Edward Leung submitted his nomination papers. Everything that he said before cannot be taken to represent his true views. But everything that he said afterwards is certain. After all, the candidate has promised to uphold the Basic Law. The confirmation form is merely a reminder, for which it is unimportant whether the candidate signs or not. The key is what the candidate said after the nomination papers were submitted.

    In the case of Edward Leung, he gave media interviews and posted on his Facebook that he will insist on supporting Hong Kong independence.

    In the case of Alvin Cheng Kam-mun (Civic Passion), he said that he did not want to promote Hong Kong independence during this election but supporting the "building of the Hong Kong nation" is a realization of "One Country Two Systems, Hong Kong governed by Hongkongers with a high degree of autonomy."

    In the case of Chan Ho-tin (Hong Kong National Party), he said that the confirmation form won't affect his continuation to talk about Hong Kong independence. In fact, it helps to promote the subject.

    According to information, these the nominations for these three persons may be invalidated because they support Hong Kong independence after submitting their nomination forms in which they promised to uphold the Basic Law (including Articles 1, 12 and 159(4)).

    - (SCMP) One-country declaration was ill-conceived but useful. By Alex Lo. July 30, 2016.

    So, its official. You can agitate for Hong Kongs independence and still run in Septembers elections for the legislature.

    The latest news is that one-time secessionist Edward Leung Tin-kei has taken a U-turn and signed a candidacy declaration acknowledging the city is an inalienable part of China.

    But surely the real story is not whether he is lying about his political stance or has suddenly seen the light. Its really about three other radical localists who have stuck to their guns on fighting for independence and refused to sign the one-country declaration. Yet, all three Kenny Wong Chun-kit and Yau Wai-ching, both of Youngspiration, and Kowloon East Communitys Chan Chak-to have been cleared to run in September.

    So you can say the governments exercise in forcing potential Legco candidates to declare their position on one country has been ill-conceived and misguided. But it has not turned out to be political censorship. Officials on both sides of the border probably realise screening out candidates this way will open a whole new battlefront and possibly create a political crisis. But at least now we know who the real secessionists are and who will say anything just to get elected.

    As much as I find independence for Hong Kong an absurd and dangerous proposition, I have a newfound respect for those three. They stick to their political belief, however misguided, and refuse to compromise. Not so their former localist colleague Leung.

    He has now declared, in his own words, a resounding no to the question as to whether he supports independence for Hong Kong.

    Maybe I am too hasty and cynical. Its possible Leung has finally realised the absurdity and futility of trying to separate Hong Kong from the rest of the country. But, if thats the case, hasnt he just nullified his whole raison dtre as a Legco candidate? Why is he even standing for election when he has nothing to offer voters?

    It seems clear he will say anything to get into Legco. He has said so himself: I will do whatever I can to be elected. I must stand for election and be a legislator.

    The funny thing is, he could have expounded extreme localism and still be cleared to run in September. And no one would have questioned his integrity.

    - (SCMP) July 30, 2016.

    On Friday, Hong Kong Indigenous and Youngspiration joined hands and Youngspiration convenor Sixtus Baggio Leung Chun-hang pulled out of his groups election list in New Territories West and applied to run in Leungs constituency, New Territories East, along with a former member of Hong Kong Indigenous.

    Explaining their move, Hong Kong Indigenous spokesman Ray Wong Toi-yeung said if Edward Leungs bid were rejected, then his group would focus all its resources on the backup list.

    Baggio Leung said he still sincerely hoped that Edward Leung would be able to run. If Edward Leungs candidacy is validated, we will use all possible legal means to help him become elected, he said, adding that independence would not be a part of their election platform and that the duo would not sign the new confirmation form.

    Since [my original candidacy] in New Territories West was approved, I cannot see how [the returning officer] can use another set of standards to reject my candidacy in New Territories East, he said.

    - (Kinliu) By Chris Wat Wing-yin. August 9, 2016.

    If everything in the world has to be decided by a judge, then there will never be enough judges around to get everything done.

    Example 1: A student applies to be admitted into a Secondary School. The application states that the student studied at the DBS Primary School. The school worker found that the DBS Primary School transcript appears to be forged. So the student was told: "We are not accepting this transcript. You have been disqualified."

    Example 2: A person comes to apply for a job at a company. His resum states that he graduated from Chinese University of Hong Kong. The company secretary checks with the Chinese University of Hong Kong and found that the applicant had only attended but did not graduate there. So the applicant was told: "We are hiring university graduates and  you are not qualified."

    Example 3: A person entering a building is stopped by the security guard at the front desk. The person claimed to be the tenant in Apartment 28B. The security guard knows the people who live there and this person is not one of them. The person also cannot produce any proof of residence. Therefore the security guard refused to let the person enter.

    Each of the gatekeepers are carrying out their duties. They are exercising their administrative authority. Such authority exists in every organization, every department and every place with people around.

    It is the duty of the Returning Officer to check the status of each nominee. If someone fills out that they are Oxford University PhD's or the chairman of a listed company and the Returning Officer found out that the information is false, can his person be disqualified? If not, then why bother with appointing Returning Officers?

    Some day, a convicted rapist will file nomination papers. He will insist that he has no criminal records. If the Returning Officer looked up the news reports of his conviction and disqualified him, will people think that the Returning Officer is protecting the people's right to vote? Or depriving the right of the rapist to run for election?

    Judges are supreme. But judges can mind everything under the sun. If everything in the world has to be decided by judges, this is not the rule of law -- this is the rule of the judges.

    (The Diplomat) Of Course China, Like All Great Powers, Will Ignore an International Legal Verdict. By Graham Allison. July 11, 2016.

    This week the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) will deliver its award in the Philippines case against China over maritime disputes in the South China Sea. In a bid to thwart Beijings attempt to turn the South China Sea into its own virtual lake, Manila contends that Chinas claim to exclusive sovereignty over all the islands and shoals within the nine-dashed line which encompasses 86 percent of the Sea has no basis in international law. There is not much suspense about what the tribunal will decide: it will almost certainly side with the Philippines. The United States and its allies have already started criticizing China for signaling in advance that it will ignore the courts ruling, which one Chinese official derided last week as nothing more than a piece of paper.

    It may seem un-American to ask whether China should do as we say, or, by contrast, as we do. But suppose someone were bold enough to pose that question. The first thing they would discover is that no permanent member of the UN Security Council has ever complied with a ruling by the PCA on an issue involving the Law of the Sea. In fact, none of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council have ever accepted any international courts ruling when (in their view) it infringed their sovereignty or national security interests. Thus, when China rejects the Courts decision in this case, it will be doing just what the other great powers have repeatedly done for decades.

    From the day the Philippines went to court, China has argued that the PCA has no legitimate jurisdiction on this issue since it concerns sovereignty which the text of the Law of the Sea treaty explicitly prohibits tribunals from addressing. When the Court rejected Chinas objection, Beijing refused to participate in its hearings and made it clear that it will ignore the PCAs ruling. The United States and others have criticized Beijing for taking this stance. But again, if we ask how other permanent members of the Security Council have acted in similar circumstances, the answer will not be one we like.

    When the Netherlands sued Russia after the latters navy boarded and detained the crew of a Dutch vessel in waters off of the Russian coast in 2013, Moscow asserted that the court had no jurisdiction in the matter and refused to participate in the hearings. It also ignored a tribunals order that the crew be released while the dispute was being resolved. After the PCA ruled that Russia had violated the Law of the Sea and ordered Moscow to pay the Netherlands compensation, Russia refused.

    Anticipating the Courts ruling in the case brought by the Philippines, UK Prime Minister David Cameron proclaimed: We want to encourage China to be part of that rules-based world. We want to encourage everyone to abide by these adjudications.  Perhaps he had forgotten that just last year the PCA ruled that the UK had violated the Law of the Sea by unilaterally establishing a Marine Protected Area in the Chagos Islands. The British government disregarded the ruling, and the Marine Protected Area remains in place today.

    The United States has never been sued under the Law of the Sea because unlike China Washington has not ratified the international agreement and is thus not bound by its rules. Expect Chinese commentators to emphasize this point in the mutual recriminations that will follow the Courts announcement.

    The closest analogue to the Philippines case involving the United States arose in the 1980s when Nicaragua sued Washington for mining its harbors. Like China, the United States argued that the International Court of Justice did not have the authority to hear Nicaraguas case. When the court rejected that claim, the United States not only refused to participate in subsequent proceedings, but also denied the Courts jurisdiction on any future case involving the United States, unless Washington explicitly made an exception and asked the Court to hear a case. If China followed that precedent, it could withdraw from the Law of the Sea Treaty altogether joining the United States as one of the worlds only nations not party to the agreement.

    In the Nicaragua case, when the Court found in favor of Nicaragua and ordered the United States to pay reparations, the U.S. refused, and vetoed six UN Security Council resolutions ordering it to comply with the courts ruling. U.S. Ambassador to the UN Jeane Kirkpatrick aptly summed up Washingtons view of the matter when she dismissed the court as a semi-legal, semi-juridical, semi-political body, which nations sometimes accept and sometimes dont.

    Observing what permanent members of the Security Council do, as opposed to what they say, it is hard to disagree with realists claim that the PCA and its siblings in The Hague the International Courts of Justice and the International Criminal Court are only for small powers. Great powers do not recognize the jurisdiction of these courts except in particular cases where they believe it is in their interest to do so. Thucydides summary of the Melian mantra the strong do as they will; the weak suffer as they must may exaggerate. But this week, when the Court finds against China, expect Beijing to do as great powers have traditionally done.

    (Manila Times) Psst All superpowers usually ignore international verdicts  By Riboberto Tiglao. July 14, 2016.

    I REALLY hope the $30 million (P1.4 billion) I was informed we, taxpayers, spent for the legal fees and expenses of the eight top-notch international lawyers and their staff who prepared our case against China in the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) turn out to be well spent.

    Not only did they manage to get the PAC to redefine the standard meaning of arbitration, which for centuries had been defined as procedure in which two parties agree to a third party to settle their dispute. Now, it seems, arbitration can be a unilateral arbitration.

    Now we also have succinct propaganda kit to try to convince the world to kick Chinas ass for its bullying in the South China Sea. The US Central Intelligence Agency or its State Department should reimburse us the P1.4 billionthe suit is a big blow to Chinas clout in the Spratlys, where the Americans have been pulling their hair how they could intervene since they dont have claims in the area, and they even havent ratified the UNCLOS.

    Theres one hitch though, which I bet the very clever lawyers the government hired werent eager to tell their clients. The arbitral courts decision is certainly a blow to Chinas image, which the Court in effect portrayed as a bully in the South China Sea that even drives away lowly fishermen from international waters.

    The hitch is that so far, superpowers normally ignore rulings not only of the Arbitration Court, but even of the International Court of Justice, even with a resolution of the UN demanding that they comply with decisions of such international bodies.

    Superpower here is defined as the four permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, the only UN body with the authority to issue binding resolutions to member states, especially resolutions for going to war. These four, each with veto powers over any of the bodys resolution are: US, Russia, France, United Kingdom, andsince 1971the Peoples Republic of China.

    Id have to have to include long footnotes for this column to convince you, dear incredulous reader, that superpowers routinely have ignored PCA decisions, which the world would later forget. So better just trust the following July 11 article in The Diplomat by a respected academic, Graham Allison, now director of the Harvard Kennedy Schools Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs and former dean of Harvards John F. Kennedy School of Government.

    The articles title was Of Course China, Like All Great Powers, Will Ignore an International Legal Verdict, with the lede, In ignoring an upcoming verdict on the South China Sea, Beijing is following well-established precedent by great powers. Article starts as follows:

    From the day the Philippines went to court, China has argued that the PCA has no legitimate jurisdiction on this issue since it concerns sovereigntywhich the text of the Law of the Sea treaty explicitly prohibits tribunals from addressing. When the Court rejected Chinas objection, Beijing refused to participate in its hearings and made it clear that it will ignore the PCAs ruling. The United States and others have criticized Beijing for taking this stance. But again, if we ask how other permanent members of the Security Council have acted in similar circumstances, the answer will not be one we like.

    When the Netherlands sued Russia after the latters navy boarded and detained the crew of a Dutch vessel in waters off of the Russian coast in 2013, Moscow asserted that the court had no jurisdiction in the matter and refused to participate in the hearings. It also ignored a tribunals order that the crew be released while the dispute was being resolved. After the PCA ruled that Russia had violated the Law of the Sea and ordered Moscow to pay the Netherlands compensation, Russia refused.

    Anticipating the Courts ruling in the case brought by the Philippines, UK Prime Minister David Cameron proclaimed: We want to encourage China to be part of that rules-based world. We want to encourage everyone to abide by these adjudications. Perhaps he had forgotten that just last year the PCA ruled that the UK had violated the Law of the Sea by unilaterally establishing a Marine Protected Area in the Chagos Islands. The British government disregarded the ruling, and the Marine Protected Area remains in place today.

    The United States has never been sued under the Law of the Sea becauseunlike ChinaWashington has not ratified the international agreement and is thus not bound by its rules. Expect Chinese commentators to emphasize this point in the mutual recriminations that will follow the Courts announcement.

    The closest analogue to the Philippine case involving the United States arose in the 1980s when Nicaragua sued Washington for mining its harbors. Like China, the United States argued that the International Court of Justice did not have the authority to hear Nicaraguas case. When the court rejected that claim, the United States not only refused to participate in subsequent proceedings, but also denied the Courts jurisdiction on any future case involving the United States, unless Washington explicitly made an exception and asked the Court to hear a case. If China followed that precedent, it could withdraw from the Law of the Sea Treaty altogetherjoining the United States as one of the worlds only nations not party to the agreement.

    In the Nicaragua case, when the Court found in favor of Nicaragua and ordered the United States to pay reparations, the US refused, and vetoed six UN Security Council resolutions ordering it to comply with the courts ruling. US Ambassador to the UN Jeane Kirkpatrick aptly summed up Washingtons view of the matter when she dismissed the court as a semi-legal, semi-juridical, semi-political body, which nations sometimes accept and sometimes dont.

    Observing what permanent members of the Security Council do, as opposed to what they say, it is hard to disagree with realists claim that the PCA and its siblings in The Haguethe International Courts of Justice and the International Criminal Courtare only for small powers. Great powers do not recognize the jurisdiction of these courtsexcept in particular cases where they believe it is in their interest to do so. Thucydides summary of the Melian mantrathe strong do as they will; the weak suffer as they mustmay exaggerate. But this week, when the Court finds against China, expect Beijing to do as great powers have traditionally done.

    (SCMP) On matters of sovereignty, China is following the US playbook. By Alex Lo. July 14, 2016.

    A weaker country takes its case against a more powerful country to an international court. The stronger country ignores the case, saying the legal body has no jurisdiction. After it loses, it denounces the ruling and tells the other country to stuff it.

    Sound familiar? No, its not China and the Philippines; not even the United States and Nicaragua, back in 1986.

    In March this year, Argentina won its case against Britain at the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf. The unanimous ruling meant the Falkland Islands the same place Britain fought a war over falls within the territorial waters of Argentina. British prime minister sorry, I meant ex-PM David Cameron duly rejected the ruling.

    Granted, the South Atlantic is not as headline-grabbing as the South China Sea. But the way people react to the latest ruling at The Hague makes it sound like China is the first country that ever defied a ruling by an international panel.

    But the 30-year-old case of Nicaragua, which it won against the US, is even more relevant. For one thing, it provided a legal template in the Philippines case against China. Why else would Manila hire as its lead lawyer Paul Reichler, who also helped win the case for Nicaragua? The guy practically wrote the book on how sovereign states can sue each other.

    Ironically, though, Beijing is following, every step of the way, the US playbook in the Nicaragua case.

    Step one: deny the court has jurisdiction. In Chinas case, its the Permanent Court of Arbitration; in the US case, the International Court of Justice.

    Step two: criticise the ruling, then ignore it.

    Step three: wait for a friendlier government to emerge, then settle with it.

    The US had to wait for years for the hated socialist Sandinistas to leave office after failing to oust them by illegally funding the Contra mercenaries through arms sales to Iran. China may be luckier. While former Philippines president Benigno Aquino was encouraged by the Americans and Japanese to pursue the case against China, his successor, Rodrigo Duterte, is more flexible and willing to play both sides.

    My bet is that after The Hague ruling, the Philippines will tilt diplomatically towards Beijing rather than Washington.

    Say what you will about Beijing, but it rarely fails to extract useful lessons from history, even American.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) July 14, 2016.

    Dozens of Hong Kong celebrities with business ties in the mainland have publicly expressed their views on Chinas sovereignty after an international tribunal ruled against its territorial claims in the South China Sea.

    Following the ruling by the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague on Tuesday, celebrities such as Wong Cho-lam, Leanne Li Yanan, William Chan Wai-ting, Yang Ying Angelababy, Donnie Yan Ji-dan and Hins Cheung defended Chinas claim over the disputed waters by posting an image which reads China can not lose even one bit of itself on microblogging platform Weibo.

    The image, which originated from state newspaper Peoples Daily, showed a map of China with the nine-dash line a demarcation indicating Beijings claim over the South China Sea. The image also marks Taiwan and Hong Kong as territories under Chinas sovereignty.

    One version of the poster features a slogan that reads Chinas territorial sovereignty does not need to be arbitrated by other people. This is our home country  not one bit of it can be lost, said Wong in his Weibo post. Fight for every inch of [Chinese] soil, do not give up even one inch of it, said Li on her microblogging account. Actress Angelababy said on her Weibo account on Wednesday that she advocates peace but would not compromise on the subject of national sovereignty.

    Other Hong Kong celebrities such as Jackie Chan and Charlene Choi Cheuk-yin received online criticism from Weibo users for posting pictures unrelated to the ruling, reported Stand News. If I love my country, do I have to say it all the time? said Choi in response to commenters who claimed she was unpatriotic.

    (Hong Kong Economic Journal Insight) July 14, 2016.

    A group of Hong Kong movie and TV celebrities wasted no time weighing in on the decision by an international tribunal to shoot down Chinas claims to disputed waters in the South China Sea. They are using their star power to drive a Peoples Daily post called China not a single dot less through social media. As expected, the viral post is stirring up a lot of controversy.

    And why not, if it came from the likes of model Angelababy, Ip Man Donnie Yen, comedian Wong Cho-nam and wife Leanne Li (who both regularly work in China) and singer Hins Cheung (who posted a map of Red China that includes Hong Kong, Taiwan and the disputed Paracel and Spratly islands)?

    Beijing quickly rejected Tuesdays ruling by The Hague tribunal that these two islands in Chinas nine dash line, stretching hundreds of miles south and east from Hainan, dont belong to China by any historical argument. Beijing has regarded the two islands as part of its sovereignty for centuries.

    Its not uncommon for local artists to express their views on current events given the freedom of speech Hong Kong enjoys. But many mainlanders think they are not patriotic enough when they comment on issues other than Chinas territorial claims in the South China Sea.

    So when movie star Jackie Chan posted his new production on Weibo, he was criticized for clowning around when China just lost a major international battle. Ditto Charlene Choi from the popular duo Twins for posting work photos while staying mum on an important matter. Choi hit back, saying I love my country but do I need to say it every hour? She went on to say everyone has a role which makes our country stronger but that its different if you just talk about being strong. Still, it puts people like her in a no-win situation whichever way the argument goes.

    Doesnt this remind us of the Chinese saying that in a crossfire, you can get shot even with your head down (躺着也中槍)?

    More than at any other time, artists in Hong Kong and Taiwan have to be careful about what they say and what they dont say. Early this year, Taiwan teen pop star Chou Tzu-yu was forced to apologize after she waved the Taiwanese flag in a promotional photo. Ironically, the apology, which came on the eve of Taiwans presidential election in January, helped the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party win a landslide.

    Canto pop singer Kay Tse, a supporter of the civil disobedience group Occupy Central, cancelled a 10-city mainland tour after Anna Chan, convenor of the pro-establishment group Caring Hong Kong Power, complained to the mainland organizer. Then there is Lancme, which abruptly shut down a mini-concert by activist Denise Ho over her controversial political views.

    Now the ball is in Jackie Chans court. People are waiting to hear what he has to say, but does he have to say anything?

    Videos

    (CCTV News @ YouTube) In the daily press briefing at the US Department of State on Sunday, while answering questions on the subject of the US policy of freedom of navigation and the South China Sea, the director of the departments press office Elizabeth Trudeau struggled to respond to a series of tough questions from Associated Press journalist Matthew Lee. Watch the video to see how the American reporter grilled Trudeau, and how she responded.

    (Sina.com.cn) Another day and another US Department of State spokesperson mumbles through a press conference while a reporter hums "I am a rock and I am an island."

    (YouTube) Simon and Garfunkel sing I Am A Rock
    (Silent Radio version) Simon and Garfunkel's song accompanied by news footage

    (RT @ YouTube) CCTV correspondent vs.

    Internet comments:

    - What is a rock? What is an island? Here are the answers as provided by the permanent court of arbitation.

    Okinotorishima is a Japanese island with a total area of 2.096 acres. Because it is an island, the area around the island is a Japanese Exclusive Economic Zone with over 400,000 square km.

    Taiping Island is a reef with a total area of 110 acres administered by the Republic of China/Taiwan. Because the Permanent Court of Arbitration in the case brought by the Philippines against China classified Taiping Island as a rock and not an island, ROC/Taiwan is not entitled to a 200 nautical mile Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ).

    These examples should make very clear the difference between rock and island -- it is about which judges you can buy off to rule in your favor.

    - (UNCLOS Article 121)

    Article 121
     
    Regime of islands
     
    1. An island is a naturally formed area of land, surrounded by water, which is above water at high tide.
     
    2. Except as provided for in paragraph 3, the territorial sea, the contiguous zone, the exclusive economic zone and the continental shelf of an island are determined in accordance with the provisions of this Convention applicable to other land territory.
     
    3. Rocks which cannot sustain human habitation or economic life of their own shall have no exclusive economic zone or continental shelf.

    The Permanent Court of Arbitration did not rule on whether Taiping Island is a rock or an island. It said that since this rock/island cannot sustain human habitation or economic life of its own, it shall have no exclusive economic zone or continental shelf.

    - Several hundred people live on Taiping Island already. They generate their own drinking/cooking water and electricity. They import certain things (e.g. Heinz tomato sauce, Tabasco hot sauce, etc). So can it sustain human habitation or economic life? You tell me.

    - PERMANENT COURT OF ARBITRATION ARBITRATION RULES 2012 Section I Article I.1 --

    Where a State, State-controlled entity, or intergovernmental organization has agreed with one or more States, State-controlled entities, intergovernmental organizations, or private parties that disputes between them in respect of a defined legal relationship, whether contractual, treaty based, or otherwise, shall be referred to arbitration under the Permanent Court of Arbitration Arbitration Rules 2012 (hereinafter the Rules), then such disputes shall be settled in accordance with these Rules subject to such modification as the parties may agree.

    It takes two to tango. A solo tango is something completely different.

    - United Nations (verified user on Chinese microblogging service Weibo)

    The International Court of Justice is a major justice organization established under the United Nations Charter and is situated in the Peace Palace, The Hague, Netherlands. This building was constructed by the non-profit Carnegie Foundation for the the predecessor of the International Court of Justice, namely the Permanent International Court of Law of the League of Nations. The United Nations makes an annual donation to the Carnegie Foundation each year in order to continue to use the building. Another renter of the Peace Palace is the Permanent Court of Arbitration established in 1899, but this organization is not related to the United Nations in any way, shape or manner.

    - (International Court of Justice)

    The International Court of Justice (ICJ) wishes to draw the attention of the media and the public to the fact that the Award in the South China Sea Arbitration (The Republic of the Philippines v. The Peoples Republic of China) was issued by an Arbitral Tribunal acting with the secretarial assistance of the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA). The relevant information can be found on the PCAs website (http://www.pca-cpa.org/). The ICJ, which is a totally distinct institution, has had no involvement in the above mentioned case and, for that reason, there is no information about it on the ICJs website.

    Thus, the International Court of Justice is announcing for the Permanent Court of Arbitration that the latter only provided secretarial assistance to one Arbitral Tribunal which was hired and paid for by the Philippines government in a unilateral arbitration process.

    - Wrong! An arbitration process is always bilateral. There is no such thing as one party going into arbitration against another party which refuses to participate.

    - The biggest mistake for the Permanent Court of Arbitration was to take on this project. The net result is that its brand is completely destroyed as the United Nations and the International Court of Justice raced to cut off all connections.

    - (Discuss.com.hk forum)

    The Chinese Communists were heavily defeated in this arbitration and the nine dash line were totally not mainland territory. This proves that Hong Kong has been illegally occupied by the Red Commies for the longest time with no country acknowledging the occupation. This time, the United States and Japan will be justified to station their soldiers in Hong Kong.

    - Progress UST's own version of the China's national boundaries

    - This map is politically incorrect. It is true that they carved out the nine-dash line, Taiwan, Hong Kong/Macau and Inner Mongolia. So far so good. But they left Xinjiang in with China. How do you explain this to the comrades of the World Uyghur Congress?

    - (RTHK) The meaning of the South China Sea arbitration towards problem-solving. July 13, 2016. This commentary would have gotten no reaction except for the fact that the female commentator was the former Goddess of Democracy Crystal Chow Ching.

    - In what manner is Crystal Chow qualified to be a current affairs commentator. Her only known job experience was as a nightclub 'companion' (although she swore that that she never went to bed with the clients).

    - She is a university graduate. But there are several hundred thousands of those in Hong Kong. Why her? Nepotism!

    - Her manner of speech is slow, disconnected and slurred. She needs to have some professional training first. But for the fact that she was a Goddess of Democracy, she should never have gotten this assignment.

    - From the pro-establishment New People's Party.

    Meanwhile the pan-democratic politicians are silent. On one hand, they cannot afford to offend the Chinese patriots by saying that all of the South China reefs/rocks/islets/islands should be handed over to other nations. On the other hand, they cannot afford to upset their biggest backer, the United States of America.

    - Question to the US State Department? Are the following rocks or islands under the principles enunciated by the Permanent Court of Arbitration? If they are rocks, why does the US have 400,000 square kilometers exclusive economic zones for them?

    Jarvis Island: Total area: 4.5 square kilometers. Highest elevation: 7 meters. While a few offshore anchorage spots are marked on maps, Jarvis island has no ports or harbors, and swift currents are a hazard. It has no natural freshwater lens and scant rainfall. There is no evidence that the island has ever supported a self-sustaining human population. Public entry to Jarvis Island requires a special-use permit and is generally restricted to scientists and educators. The island is visited periodically by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the United States Coast Guard.

    Johnston Atoll: Total area: 6.9 square kilometers. Highest elevation: 10 meters. Used by American military variously as naval refueling base; airbase; nuclear and biological weapons testing; space recovery; secret missile base; chemical weapon and Agent Orange storage and disposal site. The area is environmentally contaminated. It has no inhabitants. Public entry is only by special-use permit from the United States Air Force. It is visited annually by US Fish and Wildlife Service.

    Palmrya Reef: Total area: 12 square kilometers. Highest elevation: 1.8 meters. It has a temporary population of a dozen of so "non-occupants" (staff and scientists employed by various departments of the US government."  Fresh water is collected from the roof of a building. The Reef is located where the southern and northern currents of the Pacific Ocean meet, which means that the beaches are littered with trash and debris. There is no current economic activity on Palmrya.

    Kingman Reef: Total area: 76 square kilometers. Highest elevation: 1.5 meters.  "... hardly, as yet, assumed the distinctive features of an island. It is entirely under water at high tide, but a few coral heads project here and there above the surface at low water."

    Reference point of comparison (ruled by the Permanent Court of Arbitration to be a 'rock' and not an 'island'):

    Taiping Island: Total area: 46 hectares. Population: 600 military/coast guard/support personnel. Taiping Island has four existing wells. About 65 metric tons of water can be pumped from these wells daily to provide drinking water and meet cooking and everyday needs. The island has a power station that generates 50MWh per year. The Taiping Island Airport has a 1200-meter airstrip for C-130 transport planes and a helicopter platform. Additional facilities located on the island include a shelter for fishermen, a hospital (including a civilian doctor), satellite telecommunications facilities, radar surveillance equipment, and other communications equipment. Five public telephones are connected via satellite. The island also has Internet connectivity. Mobile phone reception is available for individuals with international roaming; a signal from China Mobile can be accessed from a GSM base station located on Nanxun Reef. P.S. Taiping Island is a sister city with Lincoln, Nebraska (USA).

    - Double standards are a way of life in western democracy. Remember that Occupy Central was about the international standard of having civil nomination of a Chief Executive elected by universal suffrage (one-person-one-vote)?

    (SpeakoutHK)  The new British Prime Minister is Theresa May, who has already named Philip Hammond and David Davis as ministers into her cabinet. Meanwhile in Hong Kong, appointments of ministers by the Chief Executive have to be approved by the Legislative Council.

    Was Theresa May elected as the new Prime Minister by universal suffrage of 65 million voters? No!

    Was she elected by a vote among the 150,000 members of the ruling Conservative Party? No!

    Did the 650 Members of Parliament elect her? No! The electors were the 330 Conservative Party Members of Parliament.

    There were only two candidates. When the other candidate withdrew, May was automatically elected without even a vote of confidence.

    Was Theresa May directly elected? She has been the Member of Parliament for Maidenhead since 1997. In 2015, she was elected with a vote of more than 35,000. At the time, the Maidenhead voters were not voting for the next Prime Minister, and they did not authorize her to nominate any new cabinet.

    Does any Hong Kong pan-democrat criticize this British style of democracy as being distinctly inferior to what they vetoed in Hong Kong? No!

    - (Sky Post) By Chris Wat Wing-yin. July 14, 2016.

    The outcome of the South China sea arbitration made me think that I was still living at the end of the Qing dynasty 200 years ago when the strong nations met to discuss how to allocate sovereignty and spheres of influence over Chinese territories.

    It is as if someone walked into your backyard and declared: the mango tree belongs to Joe, the laichee tree belongs to Mike ... as if you the owner were non-existent. No wonder why China is upset. No wonder why the Chinese people are upset.

    Being polite does not mean that we are scared. Being polite is sheer manners. We don't want to be a hegemon like the United States, but that doesn't mean that we are willing to be slaughtered at will.

    The five judges who participated in the Permanent Court of Arbitration hearing showed us what rule-of-law means in the western world. Of the five judges, one of them was appointed by the Philippines and the other four were appointed by the chief judge Shunji Yanai. Who is Shunji Yanai? He is a well-known Japanese right-wing politician who helped Prime Minister Abe's campaign to amend the constitution to allow Japan to re-arm. Given this line-up, what do you think that the outcome would be?

    After the South China sea decision, Japan's Foreign Minister called upon China to obey the ruling. In 2014, the International Court of Justice ruled against Japan on whale-hunting. Why are Japanese fishing boats still hunting whales all over the globe as before?

    As for the United States of America, the International Court of Justice ruled for the Reagan Administration to stop mining the harbors of Nicaragua to support the Contras. The American government ignored the court. Not only did they rejected the ruling, but they withdrew from the International Court of Justice altogether. When nobody else obey the rules of the game, why should China do so?

    Hong Kong Island (6 seats)
    26.3%: Regina Ip Lau Suk Yee (New People Party)
    20.0%: Tanya Chan (Civic Party)
    14. 6%: Ricky Wong (independent)
    8.2%: Cyd Ho (Labour Party)
    6.2%: Cheung Kwok-kwun (DAB)
    5.2%: Hui Chi-fung (Democratic Party)
    4.9%: Kwok Wai-keung (FTU)
    2.6%: Cheng XX (independent)
    1.9%: Paul Zimmerman (independent)
    1.9%: Baggio Leung (Youngspiration)
    1.8%: Chim Pui-chng (independent)
    1.6%: Nathan Law (Demosisto)
    1.6%: Lau Ka-hung (People Power)
    1.3%: Tsui Tsz-kin (independent)
    1.3%: Cheng Kam-mun (Civic Passion)
    0.5%: Wong XX

    Kowloon East (5 seats)
    24.8%: Jeremy Tam (Civic Party)
    16.8%: DAB list (16.8%)
    16.8%: Woo Chi-wai (Democratic Party)
    13.6%: FTU list (13.6%)
    13.5%: Tse Wai-chun (independent)
    4.5%: Wong Yeung-tat (Civic Passion)
    3.6%: Tam Tak-chi (People Power)
    3.1%: Oscar Lai Man-lok (Demosisto)
    2.1%: Chan Chak-to (Kowloon East Power)
    0.9%: Woo Wai-san (Labour Party)

    Kowloon West (6 seats)
    19.8%: Claudia Mo Man-ching (Civic Party)
    17.9%: Ann Chiang (DAB)
    16.0%: Leung Mei-fun (independent)
    13.9%: Helena Wong (Democratic Party)
    11.0%: Raymond Wong Yuk-man (Proletariat Political Institute)
    7.3%: Yau Wai-ching (Youngspiration)
    5.4%: Tam Kwok-kiu (ADPL)
    4.9%: FTU list
    1.8%: Lau Siu-lai (independent)
    1.1%: Avery Ng Man-yuen (League of Social Democrats)
    0.5%: Mak Ka-chun
    0.3%: Cheng Cheng-lung

    New Territories East (9 seats)
    21.6%: Alvin Yeung (Civic Party)
    10.4%: Lee Chi-kai
    10.3%: Edward Leung (Hong Kong Indigenous)
    9.9%: Elizabeth Quat (DAB)
    8.1%: Chan Hak-ken (DAB)
    7.9%: Gary Fan Kwok-wai (Neo Democrats)
    7.7%: Christina Fong Kwok-san (independent)
    4.9%: Fernando Cheung Chiu-hung (4.9%)
    4.6%: Leung Kwok-hung (League of Social Democrats)
    3.9%: Lam Cheuk-ting (Democratic Party)
    3.2%: Tang Ka-biu (FTU)
    3.1%: Chan Chi-chuen (People Power)
    2.5%: New People Party list
    1.5%: Wan Chin (independent)
    0.5%: Cheng XX
    0.1%: Liu XX

    New Territories West (9 seats)
    18.0% James Tien (Liberal Party)
    9.8%: Kwok Ka-ki (Civic Party)
    9.3%: Lee Cheuk-yan (Labour Party)
    7.7%: Mak Mei-kuen (FTU)
    6.8%: Chan Hung-ben (DAB)
    6.0%: Raphael Wong Ho-ming (League of Social Democrats)
    6.0%: Leung Chi-cheung (DAB)
    5.7%: Frederick Fung Kin-kee (ADPL)
    4.1%: Andrew Wan (Democratic Party)
    3.7%: DAB list
    3.3%: Junius Ho (independent)
    3.1%: Cheung Chung-tai (Civic Passion)
    2.9%: Wong XX (Neighbourhood Workers Service Centre)
    2.1%: Chu Hoi-dick (Land Justice League)
    2.0%: Chow XX (XXX)
    1.9%: Tik Chi-yuen (XXX)
    1.1%: Tam XX (XXX)
    1.1%: Chan Ho-tin (Hong Kong National Party)

    District Council Super Legislators (5 seats)
    29.9%: James To (Democratic Party)
    27.4%: Starry Lee (DAB)
    10.7%: Leung Yiu-chung (Neighbourhood Workers Service Centre)
    6.2%: Holden Chow (DAB)
    5.5%: Sumly Chan (Civic Party)
    4.9%: Wong Kwok-hing (FTU)
    2.6%: Other pro-establishment candidates
    2.5%: Kwan WIng-yip (Neo Democrats)
    1.8%: Chan Kwok-keung (independent)
    1.6%: Ho Kai-ming (ADPL)
    1.6%: Mandy Tam (independent)

    [Note: This poll took place before the nomination period began, so that the candidate lists are incomplete/incorrect.]

    (Cable TV) June 11, 2016.

    Land Justice League executive member Chu Hoi-dick and several other members projected images of Internet user comments onto a large billboard to be seen from Shenzhen Bay on the Chinese side of the border.

    They point out that a large number of mainlanders are crossing the Shenzhen Bridge to come to shop in Hong Kong. As a result, Tuen Mun and Yuen Long have become crowded and consumer prices for rent and goods are rising. They demand that the government shut down the Shenzhen Bridge for four days a month.

    Internet comments:

    - This news story does not explain what "closing Shenzhen Bridge down" means. It could mean that mainlanders are forbidden to use the Shenzhen Bridge on restricted days but Hongkongers and foreigners could, or it could mean that nobody whatsoever is allowed to use the Shenzhen Bridge on restricted days.

    - If you close the Shenzhen bridge down for four days a month (e.g. every Sunday), you won't affect those who come once a week because they will come on Saturday instead. If you think it was bad on Sunday before, it will be living hell on Saturday.

    If you close the Shenzhen bridge for four days a month (e.g. every Monday), you will affect those who live on the Chinese side of the border but commute to work or study. What do you want them to do?

    If you close the Shenzhen bridge down, people who need to go to Hong Kong will use the other border control points (Lo Wu, Lok Ma Chau, Man Kam To, Sha Tau Kok). Tuen Mun and Yuen Long may be less crowded, but Sheung Shui, Fan Ling, Tai Po and Sha Tin will be more crowded. The problem is merely displaced elsewhere (reference: NIMBY).

    If you close all the border control points four days a month, some Hongkongers may be upset that they can't get fresh vegetables and meats in the markets.

    - The alternate model is that fresh vegetables and meats can be brought in by speed boats at considerably higher costs.

    - Road space rationing is a management strategy to reduce vehicle travel by restricting access based upon the last digits of the license number for certain periods of time. Thus, mainlanders with ID's ending in odd digits will be banned on Monday, Wednesday and Friday while mainlanders with ID's ending in even digits will be banned on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. Those mainlanders who commute to work or study in Hong Kong will work or study half the time.

    - One simple tactic is to deliberately understaff the Immigration control points. This will create a logjam so bad that people will simply stop coming. What trucker will wait 3 days on the queue? Their frozen goods would be melted down long before.

    - Mainlanders coming to Hong Kong cause housing/consumer prices to rise? What the fuck were Hongkongers doing to Shenzhen in the 1990's and 2000's? They bought houses in Shenzhen because it was relatively very cheap compared to Hong Kong, and they ate, got massages and entertained themselves because it was very very cheap. The result was housing and consumption prices rose to the point where the locals couldn't afford it. Why didn't the Hongkongers stop going to Shenzhen?

    - Hongkongers are no longer going to Shenzhen because it is getting to be more expensive than Hong Kong now.

    - Today, it's Shenzhen Bridge. Tomorrow, it'll be the Hong Kong International Airport.

    - That's right. We don't need no stinking third runway at the Hong Kong International Airport. All we need to do is to ban mainlanders from boarding/landing in Hong Kong one day a week.

    - If I have to demand a total ban every time that someone/something annoys me, then there is plenty of other things I want to see done. For example:

    Sze Tat Chau's Facebook
    Every Sunday, the Tai Po Centre invites a number of shitty bands to play in the mall. These people sing even worse than I do. They also sing too loudly and noisily. They are extremely annoying, especially in this extremely hot weather.

    (Wen Wei Po) July 11, 2016.

    According to Internet user Vincent Ho, "There was an emotionally disturbed boy in the IKEA store in Sha Tin. A dickface made a live broadcast of the situation. The workers told him not to film. I told them to call the police. But that dickface began to curse everybody out with obscene language. He did so in front of his own children! As a parent, he lacked sympathy, he was impatient, he used obscene language, he invaded the privacy of others, and he wanted to film everything!"

    Vincent Ho added: "I was upset not necessarily because he used obscene language because he will get his just rewards (note: when his son grows up) ... I appreciate that the mother had tried her very best to control the boy, she tried cajoling, beating, scolding, talking, hauling him away ... but this bastard used Facebook to make a live broadcast ... When others tried to intercede, he cursed them out. I am really concerned about how he is going to raise his children!"

    Internet users immediately identified that the bastard as Lee Ching-hei of Civic Passion. At the time, Lee was live-broadcasting under the title "A locust wanted to eat chicken wings -- a bunch of hypocritical cheap heroic dogs in Sha Tin." The video showed a fat boy screaming about wanting to eat chicken wings. His mother told him to stop and slapped him on the arm. Afterwards someone told Lee to stop, but he began to curse them out.

    Lee said that he took the video because the boy was "really irritating him." He said that the mother was "fiercely assaulting the boy" and "the boy sustained unnecessary harm" etc. But it turned out the assault was not filmed because the camera malfunctioned.

    Pro-Civic Passion Internet commentators rushed to condemn those who wanted to stop Lee from filming. "So many Hong Kong pigs!" "This video was great, because you can see Hongkongers can be such fucking dicks. Either it does not fucking concern them; but when it concerns them, they immediately fucking stand on the moral high ground." They swore that they will identify those Internet users and harass them.

    But contrarian Adams Chung wrote: "You are an insult to Localism. First of all, the boy is not a locust. When you make a live broadcast of the little boy's action, you are definitely causing him harm. If this is the way Localists are, how many votes will you get in September? Actually, other people tried to speak to the mother and son. They tried to talk nice to the little boy. The mother also wanted to leave with the boy. When you only see the video of what happened in the middle without what happened before or after, you might think that there is a problem with the mother. But I saw with my own eyes that she was crying at the exit. The mother tried to control her son but this guy wants to do a live video feed. It was not easy for the mother to endure the gaze of the public. You can say that I am a leftist retard, but I am talking about reason." Of course, the Civic Passion Internet users went after this guy too.

    Daniel Chiu's Facebook
    This is going too far. Today I saw him cross over there to urinate. Uncultured. Damned locust.

    Internet comments:

    - No WHO WHY WHERE WHEN or HOW whatsoever. This could be anyone anywhere anytime, but it makes a political point when the person is ascribed to be a mainlander doing it in Hong Kong yesterday.

    - Why couldn't this be some Japanese man in Tokyo? Such a sight is very common in the Roppongi or Kabukicho districts.

    - Such a sight is common in all the bar districts in all cities in all nations.

    - "I look at this photo and I identify the man as (INSERT YOUR FAVORITE BETE NOIRE POLITICIAN) of the (INSERT YOUR FAVORITE BETE NOIRE POLITICAL PARTY)."

    - I think this Facebook posts reveals more about Daniel Chiu than the particular person in the photo.

    (Oriental Daily) July 13, 2019.

    - Everybody knows that mainlanders engage in uncivilized public behavior in Hong Kong, including talking loudly, picking their noses, urinating, defecating, copulating, fornicating, vandalism, theft of everything including trees, robbery, rape, prostitution, etc. But did you know that they also spray graffiti on public property? Recently there is a video taken at the Kowloon Bay MTR Train Deport. Apparently certain mainlanders cut through the wired fence in the middle of the night and sprayed CRIME TIME on the body of the train. Another video showed the individuals spraying MTR during daytime. Afterwards, the cameraman filmed the masterpieces roll by the Sau Kei Wan and the Quarry Bay stations. These graffiti will have to eventually removed at the expense of the MTR. Depending on the type of spray paint used, it may be hard or easy to remove. This is the reason why mainlanders should not be allowed to come to Hong Kong!

    - In this case, the perpetrators are an American couple named Ether and Utah. They have previously intruded into train depots in Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore, Taiwan and South Korea to spray graffiti. On each occasion, they filmed the process and posted the videos onto the Internet for people to enjoy. According to them, their next stop is China.

    This is the reason why Americans should not be allowed to come to Hong Kong!

    - It is understandable that Americans feel free to spray graffiti all over Hong Kong. The Hong Kong courts wouldn't dare to penalize them because the US Consulate General calls the shots here. However, Ether and Utah showed great courage to do so in Singapore (or so they claimed).

    (Reuters) March 5, 2015.

    A Singapore court sentenced two Germans to nine months in prison and three strokes of the cane on Thursday after they pleaded guilty to breaking into a depot and spray-painting graffiti on a commuter train carriage.

    Andreas Von Knorre, 22, and Elton Hinz, 21, both expressed remorse while being sentenced in the state courts of the island republic.

    "This is the darkest episode of my entire life," said Von Knorre. "I want to apologize to the state of Singapore for the stupid act...I've learned my lesson and will never do it again."

    Hinz added: "I promise I will never do it again. I want to apologize to you, and my family for the shame and situation I've put them into."

    Both were dressed in prison uniform - a white T-shirt and brown trousers with the word "Prisoner" down the sides and on the back. They spoke to the court in English.

    Singapore sentences hundreds of prisoners to caning each year as part of a system that has been criticized by rights groups. Vandalism and over-staying by foreigners are offences that can be punished by caning along with other crimes like kidnapping, robbery, drug abuse and sexual abuse.

    According to the U.S. State Department, 2,203 caning sentences were carried out in 2012, including 1,070 foreigners caned for committing immigration offences.

    "The Singapore judicial systems shameful recourse to using torture in the form of caning to punish crimes that should be misdemeanors is indicative of a blatant disregard for international human rights standards," said Phil Robertson, deputy director of the Asia division of Human Rights Watch.

    "One of the defendants said that sentencing day was the darkest day of his life, but in reality every day that Singapore keeps caning on its books is a dark day for the countrys international reputation," he said in an e-mail.

    In Berlin, a foreign ministry official said the government respected the sovereignty of Singapore. "But it speaks out against corporal punishment as a form of sentence worldwide - and that also means in Singapore," the official added. "The German government has made that clear."

    The two Germans were accused of vandalism and trespass after they broke into one of Singapore's train depots last November to spray-paint a carriage. They then fled Singapore, only to be tracked down in neighboring Malaysia in an international manhunt and were brought back to the city-state to face trial. Their lawyers said they would meet the prisoners on Monday to decide on whether to appeal.

    Almost five years ago, Swiss national Oliver Fricker was sentenced to seven months in jail and three strokes of the cane after he pleaded guilty to cutting through the fence of a train depot and spray-painting graffiti on train carriages.

    Singapore, well known for its cleanliness and its zero tolerance for crime, uses the rattan cane to carry out the sentence. Prisoners are stripped and strapped to a wooden trestle with a medical officer on hand to intervene if necessary. People who have been caned have called the pain excruciating.

    For the two Germans, the court ordered four months imprisonment for entry into a protected area and another five months jail and three strokes of the cane for vandalism.

    Singapore's vandalism laws became global news in 1994 when American teenager Michael Fay was caned for damaging cars and public property, despite appeals for clemency from the U.S. government, including then President Bill Clinton.

    The Campaign to Stop Organ Donations

    1. The Hong Kong Red Cross has been found out to send blood donated by Hongkongers to the Chinese Communist Nation, such that there is a run on the local blood bank.

    2. The pro-Communist Hong Kong government officials are pushing the Opt-Out method to compel organ donations. If you don't register to indicate your objection to organ donation, you will be taken as willing. But if you register, there will be retaliation against you later on.

    3. The Chinese Communist Nation has listed Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan under the National Human Organ Allocation System.

    4. The pro-Communist Hong Kong government officials are accelerating the invasion of mainland locust doctors in Hong Kong through the reform of the Medical Council.

    5. Within the Chinese Communist Nation, organ transplant is a huge business.

    When all five things happen, the worst situation will be:

    When a Hong Kong citizen enters a hospital due to illness/accident, he/she will not receive proper treatment. He/she will be forced to donate his/her organs which will be immediately shipped to China for the use by senior government cadres or wealthy people. Someone will make big money out of this.

    If you don't want this to happen, SAY NO to the compulsory opt-out organ donation!

    You should immediately register to stop organ donation!

    Tell your friends and families too that when they die, their organs can only be used by Hongkongers.

    Internet comments:

    - (Oriental Daily) July 10, 2016. The Hong Kong Red Cross Blood Transfusion Service said that they have noted the misinformation on Facebook. They said that they are the only organization authorized to collect, handle, test and distribute blood to all local hospitals. All gathered blood samples are used locally. If Hong Kong patients have a rare blood type for which they cannot find local donors, they will assist the patient to seek the right blood supply from outside Hong Kong. Based upon humanitarian considerations, when they have adequate blood supplies and when Hong Kong people have no immediate need, they may offer some of their supplies to patients in need outside of Hong Kong.

    The Red Cross emphasized that the Hong Kong blood bank has never experienced an oversupply situation. Over the past 5 years, the demand has steadily increased by 10.4% for the ageing population. Today, 62% of the blood plasma is used for senior citizens aged 60 or over and 28.2% for senior citizens aged 80 or over. The Red Cross encourages more citizens to give blood in order to ensure an adequate supply of blood plasma for Hong Kong patients.

    - Why should I believe anything that Hong Kong Red Cross says? The Facebook said clearly that they have been taken over by pro-Communist individuals. I know that plenty of people waiting on line at public hospitals speak improper Cantonese, which means that these mainlanders are stealing our medical services. The hospitals do not discriminate between genuine Hongkongers and sneaky mainlanders.

    - Yes, I completely agree. Medical services at Hong Kong public hospitals should be restricted to only those who pass a pre-admission speaking/reading/writing test in Cantonese. P.S. And the local history test too!

    - The Hong Kong blood bank needs to maintain two different banks, one for Hongkongers and one for mainlanders, and never the twain shall meet.

    - So what happens if a foreigner needs a blood transfusion? Which bank can he/she use? The answer is simple, because the underlying premise is about racial superiority/inferiority. Thus, Americans, Brits and Aussies can use the Hong Kong bank, while Nigerians, Colombians and Indonesians can use the mainland bank. Everybody knows their own place in the scheme of things.

    - What happens if the father of a child is American and the mother is Nigerian? Or if the parents are Nigerans who became naturalized American citizens?

    - Simple: Only the nationality of the father counts.

    - For example, if there is a natural disaster elsewhere in Southeast Asia with massive casualties, the local Red Cross there may issue a regional appeal for blood supplies. The Hong Kong Red Cross may ship some of its oversupply to that place based upon humanitarian reasons.

    If some day Hong Kong gets hit with a natural disaster with massive casualties (e.g. subway collision during peak hour), the local blood bank will be running low. The Hong Kong Red Cross will make a regional appeal for help and others (including China) will respond as well. It would be unbecoming for Hong Kong to say that they will only take from others but they will never give.

    - Let me declare this: If war should break out between China and the United States, I will donate blood to American soldiers so that they can come and liberate Hong Kong!

    - Why would Americans accept blood donated by inferior chinks? You may think that you are a Hongkonger and not Chinese, but when the Americans take a look at you, they will say that you are a Chink! A Chink is a Chink is a Chink!

    - Only Hong Kong localists could believe in such a story on Facebook. Do you think that China has to depend on Hong Kong's blood oversupply in order to get by? Do you think 7 million Hongkongers can supply the blood needs for 1.4 billion Chinese?

    If there is a natural disaster with massive casualties and China needs blood urgently, there are other sources. President Xi Jinping is the supreme commander of the 2-million strong People's Liberation Army. He can order immediately blood donations from the PLA soldiers (plus all the other functionaries such as police, firemen, government workers, education workers; etc). Only Hong Kong localists continue to dwell in the fantasy that China cannot live without them.

    - (People.cn) August 13, 2015. Mainland Chinese people queued up to donate blood in Tianjin after the warehouse explosion.

    - No. These mainlanders are selling their blood in order to buy iPhone's! Everybody knows that this is true, because Facebook says so.

    - Ditto the situation with organ donations. How many hundreds of livers and kidneys are donated by Hongkongers each year? According to Organ Donation: Statistics, there were 66 kidneys donated from deceased donors and 15 from live donors while there are 1,941 patients waiting for transplantation. So do you think that Hong Kong has any kidneys to spare?

    - Meanwhile in China, the Falun Gong is saying that (1) tens of millions of government officials and party members have resigned to join the Falun Gong because they realized that (2) the Chinese Communists persecute the Falun Gong by executing tens of thousands of them in order to harvest their organs (see Wikipedia). With this virtually unlimited supply of ready-for-order organs, why would China need to think about getting organs from Hong Kong?

    - Well, someone who has never crossed the border to China for their entire lives will obviously be clueless. But you don't have to be there to understand statements such as "If each Chinese citizen spits at you once, you will be drowned immediately" and "If each Chinese citizen takes a fart, the people of Hong Kong will choke to death."

    - (Oriental Daily) July 10, 2016. The Food and Environmental Hygiene Department said that there is no formal system for Hong Kong to share donated organs with medical authorities outside of Hong Kong. At present, organs donated by deceased Hongkongers are reserved for needy Hongkongers as a matter of principle. Only when there are no suitable Hong Kong recipients will the Hospital Authority consider transferring the organs outside of Hong Kong.

    In January this year, the Hospital Authority approved one case of allowing a liver donated by a Hong Kong citizen to be used by a Taiwan patient. At the time, there was no Hong Kong citizen suitable for receiving that liver. The Hospital Authority obtained the permission of the donor's family and consulted the Food and Environmental Hygiene Department before shipping the liver to Taiwan. The Hospital Authority emphasized that this was a special case and that there is no system for processing such cases.

    - An organ donation to a Taiwan patient is acceptable to the people of Hong Kong. The people of Taiwan are a different race from the mainland Chinese people, and its current government is a strong supporter of Hong Kong independence. Therefore it is okay to send the liver to Taiwan. I along with the rest of the people of Hong Kong completely approve this action.

    - What! What the fuck do I care about whether some Taiwanese person live or die? Why are you speaking as if you represent me! We don't owe the Taiwanese anything!

    - When the people of Hong Kong refuse to donate blood and organs, who do you think that they will hurt? The people of Hong Kong or the people of mainland China?

    - When the Hong Kong localists harassed mainland tourists in order to discourage from coming to Hong Kong, who are they hurting? The people of Hong Kong or the people of mainland China? The mainland Chinese have plenty of other tourist destinations, and they are flooding South Korea and Japan right now. Meanwhile, the tourism, hospitality and retail industries in Hong Kong are taking major hits because the big mainland spenders aren't coming any more.

    -  When I donate blood, I want to save lives.

    - But you shouldn't be donating blood to save mainland Chinese lives, because the Chinese are trying to invade and take over Hong Kong. We must resist and do everything and anything possible to make sure that all the Chinese die!

    - I used to donate blood too. But when I realized that rich people go to private hospitals and poor people go to public hospitals, I stopped doing so. I am doing my bit in fighting the rich-poor wealth inequality.

    - This makes zero sense. If there are no voluntary blood donors, the poor people at the public hospitals will die while the rich people at the private hospitals will buy blood from overseas and live happily afterwards.

    - It makes perfect sense. When there are fewer poor people than rich people, the Gini coefficient for income/wealth inequality is a lot smaller. So this is working in the right direction.

    - Alternately, when there are fewer poor people to work for slave wages or be otherwise exploited, the rich people won't be as wealthy.

    - When a patient receives a blood transfusion in Hong Kong, the blood is supplied by the Red Cross and therefore free. The difference between private and public hospitals is in the service fee, and not for the blood itself.

    - Even if the Hong Kong Red Cross has an oversupply of blood here, the surplus should not be shipped to mainland China no matter what.

    - Any oversupply should be shipped to the United States of America. Each year, about 50,000 Americans are shot intentionally or accidentally, so the need for blood transfusion is clearly very great over there. Excess blood should be sent where it is needed most.

    - The Hong Kong race and the Chinese race are two completely different races, and their blood should not be mixed. The United States has laws that ban "race-mixing" or "miscegenation."

    - (Wikipedia) Miscegenation. The Nazi ban on interracial sexual relations and marriages was enacted in September 1935 as part of the Nuremberg Laws, the Gesetz zum Schutze des deutschen Blutes und der deutschen Ehre (The Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honour). The Nuremberg Laws classified Jews as a race, and forbade extramarital sexual relations and marriage between persons classified as "Aryan" and "non-Aryan". Violation of this was condemned as Rassenschande (lit. "race-disgrace") and could be punished by imprisonment (usually followed by deportation to a concentration camp) and even by death.

    - I am less worried about Hong Kong blood being secretly shipped to mainland China than the reverse case. The superior bloodline of the people of Hong Kong will be contaminated if we unknowingly received blood transfusions that were donated by inferior Chinese mongoloids.

    - Worse yet, we all know that hepatitis/AIDS are rampant in China and we would be suffering from a fate worse than death if we received blood from mainlanders. Reference: Plasma Economy.

    - Eh, blood transfusion service centers collect the blood and then they test it before it can be used. The safeguards are in place (unlike And The Band Played On).

    - (SCMP) June 10, 2016.

    A regular blood donor in her home country Denmark, Larsen wanted to do her civic duty and donate in her adopted Hong Kong. However she was shocked to hear she was unable to give blood because of fears of Variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD), the human form of mad cow disease.

    I went through two steps: filled out the forms and had a blood sample taken. But on the third step the interview with a nurse I was told I couldnt continue because Ive been in Europe more than five years after 1980, says the 30-year-old.

    According to the Hong Kong Red Cross donor selection guidelines, anyone who spent three or more months in Britain from 1980 to 1996, or five or more years in Europe from 1980 to the present, are unable to donate blood in Hong Kong due to fears of transmitting vCJD. This rule is based on evidence from a small number of case reports involving patients and laboratory animal studies that vCJD can be transmitted through transfusion.

    Similar measures apply in other countries including the US, Australia, New Zealand, Japan and Singapore.

    According to the Hong Kong Department of Health, two cases of vCJD have been recorded in Hong Kong since 2001, one of them fatal and both classified as imported cases from Britain.

    The first case in 2001 involved a 34-year-old woman who lived in Britain during the 1980s and 1990s. She died in 2002.

    A 23-year-old British man who came to Hong Kong in 2006 was diagnosed that year. According to the latest information, he is now living in Britain.

    Early symptoms of vCJD include memory loss, unsteady gait and loss of coordination of limbs, according to the Department of Health. These dementia-like symptoms will worsen and twitching of limbs and trunk also occur. Besides, visual disturbance, abnormal behaviours and seizures can occur. Most patients die within one to two years after onset of symptoms.

    The World Health Organisation says there are no reliable tests to use before the onset of clinical symptoms of vCJD. Currently diagnosis can only be confirmed following pathological examination of the brain post mortem.

    Says Larsen: I definitely think there needs to be a rethink on the rules governing blood donation as they are way too strict at the moment.

    A British man who wanted to donate blood at a Red Cross blood-donation drive in his office earlier this year was also surprised when told he could not because of fears over vCJD.

    Cases are very rare judging from my own research, and symptoms generally prove fatal within 12 months. If I had caught this disease before 1996 Id either be a) long dead or b) a medical miracle. Im neither, says the Briton, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

    It sounds crazy and outdated considering both the government and Red Cross are trying to encourage blood donations. Im not sure how many people in Hong Kong are excluded, but Im sure its a significant part of the citys population.

    The Red Cross says its donor selection criteria is under regular review by the Hospital Authority and undergoes revision based on the latest scientific and epidemiological evidence.

    - This Facebook shows the essential difference between Hong Kong and mainland China. In mainland China, anyone spreading this story is subjected to arrest for disturbing the peace. In Hong Kong, anyone spreading this story will be praised for honesty, intelligence, righteousness, heroism, courage and valor. Long live freedom of speech!!!

    - In a previous case, the judge had said that real-life laws cannot be applied to crimes committed in virtual worlds. So this Facebook user will be released immediately without even the usual 80-hour community service.

    - (SCMP) June 27, 2016.

    The National Peoples Congress is overhauling the 23-year-old law on the Red Cross Society of China, vowing to punish any person or group that further smears the charitys already tarnished image, mainland media report.

    The revisions by the top legislative body come after a series of scandals in recent years undermined the reputation of the charity, which is not affiliated with the International Red Cross.

    A draft amendment tabled on Monday sets out the legal responsibilities of the public and staff at Chinas Red Cross, the mainlands largest charitable organisation and a body with close ties with the government.

    Any one who fabricates, publishes and disseminates false information that smears the reputation of the Red Cross, who misappropriates or abuses the funds or assets of the Red Cross or pretends to be someone else, misuses or tampers with the name and label of the Red Cross would receive administrative punishment, or even be subject to criminal law, The Beijing News reported. The draft says the Red Cross should set up mechanisms to independently audit and monitor its funds and assets. It also calls on the charity to be transparent about the donations it receives.

    But the legislative bill, now in its first reading, does not specify how those changes should be implemented. The existing law managing the charitys operations was passed in 1993.

    The charitys public image was battered in 2011 when a woman called Guo Meimei flaunted luxury goods online while claiming to work for the organisation. Guo was later jailed for five years after being convicted of running an illegal casino.

    Although her claims of links to the Red Cross were confirmed as false, the reputation of the organisation took another hit in 2013 after it was found to have directed earmarked funds to other projects without the consent of its donors.

    Many observers said that any changes to the law needed to cut the charitys dependence on and close links with the government, something the draft changes would not accomplish, The Beijing News reported.

    - In Hong Kong, citizens enjoy the inalienable right to destroy the reputation of the Red Cross. In mainland China, people go to jail for doing so. In a nutshell, that is the difference between Hong Kong and mainland China. That is why we must valiantly resist the mainlandization of Hong Kong!

    - This is an old story. At first, somebody made a similar post at the discussion forums where it ran into massive opposition. But now, the same post is re-emerging on Facebook and it is being circulated among like-minded Yellow Ribbon Facebook pages. The point here is that the discussion forums is closer to a broad community whereas Facebook is an echo chamber of like-minded people who exclude dissidents.

    - (SCMP) May 10, 2016.

    The Hong Kong Red Cross will not provide blood to mainland hospitals, the organisation said after internet users on a popular internet forum urged the public to boycott blood donations. Discussions on Golden Forum suggested it was suspicious of the organisation to announce a shortage for the third time this year and suspected it would send its supply of local blood to the mainland.

    But the Red Cross clarified that its appeals were necessary, contending the lack of blood donations in the city stemmed from a prolonged flu season and more would-be donors being found unfit. Recent extreme weather and examination periods for school children also meant there was a dip in the number of volunteers.

    The organisation said it needed an average of 1,100 donors a day, in order to supply around 800 bags of blood to the citys public hospitals. All the blood collected from our service supply is for local use, said Dr Lee Cheuk-kwong, a consultant of Hong Kong Red Cross Blood Transfusion Service.

    Typically about 10 per cent of new blood donors were unfit to donate due to their low blood pressure or lack of haemoglobin, the latter a result of poor eating and living habits. Recent extreme weather and examination periods for school children also meant there was a dip in the number of volunteers.

    The organisation said it needed an average of 1,100 donors a day, in order to supply around 800 bags of blood to the citys public hospitals. All the blood collected from our service supply is for local use, said Dr Lee Cheuk-kwong, a consultant of Hong Kong Red Cross Blood Transfusion Service. Typically about 10 per cent of new blood donors were unfit to donate due to their low blood pressure or lack of haemoglobin, the latter a result of poor eating and living habits.

    However, internet users on Golden Forum raised their suspicions concerning the Red Cross, a non-government humanitarian organisation embroiled in a money donation scandal in China, and it urged the public to stop donating. In a discussion generating over 100 comments, a user who claimed to be a regular donor said he would now stop. Another said: Hong Kong Red Cross has a very complex relationship with its mainland counterpart. I am very suspicious about where the blood goes. But many users said a boycott would mean there would not be enough blood to save themselves or their loved ones.

    Lee rejected the suspicions. None of our blood will supply other places, he said. A majority of it goes to public hospitals, usually for elderly people.

    - The solution is simple: You sign a document to stipulate that your blood and organs will not be used for Hong Kong traitors, which include at least the following persons:

    - All Hong Kong government officials and their immediate family members (parents, spouses, siblings, children)

    - All members of the Disciplinary Services (Police, Fire Services, Emergency Services, etc) and their immediate family members

    - All members of pro-establishment political parties (DAB, FTU, etc) and their immediate family members

    - All members of the mainstream pan-democratic political parties (Democratic Party, Civic Party, Labour Party, etc) and their immediate family members

    - All real-estate property developers and their immediate family members

    - All others who have participated directly and indirectly in the destruction of the unique characteristics of Hong Kong.

    The Hong Kong Red Cross will be responsible for screening out these people before my blood and organs can be used.

    (EJ Insight) July 4, 2016.

    Media entrepreneur Ricky Wong Wai-kay announced that he is running in the Legislative Council elections in September to represent the Hong Kong Island geographical constituency.

    Speaking on Facebook live on Monday, the chairman of Hong Kong Television Network said his aim is to prevent Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying from securing a second term, broadcaster RTHK reports. He said he hopes to do that by forming an alliance with at least half of the 70 Legco members. He said he could work with both pro-democracy and pro-Beijing lawmakers, as long as they all believe that Leung should not be allowed to get a second term.

    Wong said he has written a 100-page political manifesto which can be downloaded from his website. He also said he doesnt have a political party to support him, which is why he is urging people to volunteer for his campaign.

    Video:

    RTHK https://www.facebook.com/HongKongGoodNews/videos/1136893186384616/ Ricky Wong's press conference

    Internet comments:

    - (Silentmajority.hk) July 6, 2016.

    After Ricky Wong declared his intention to run for Legislative Council in Hong Kong Island, various pan-democrats immediately stabbed their daggers into Wong.

    Democratic Party district councilor Au Nok-hin had formed a Facebook page to support Ricky Wong's HKTV in 2013. He was criticized later for using the HKTV logo to raise money for his party. After Wong's declaration to run, he immediately posted "There is no need to turn Ricky Wong into a deity" because Wong is just another selfish Hongkonger.

    Civic Party's Tanya Chan is also running in the Legco election in Hong Kong Island. She wrote on Facebook: "Someone is attempting to say that they are 'Anything But CY' and 'Oppose CY Leung' so that they can blend into the pan-democratic camp. He is underestimating the intelligence of the voters if he thinks that he can muddle his way through."

    Demosisto's chairman Nathan Law posted on Facebook: "The democrats cannot afford to united with Ricky Wong. With respect to Wong's proposal to include a foreign language on top of the 8 compulsory school subjects, Law said that this was typical of "monster parents." Law said; "Wong does not understand education in Hong Kong, so it is no wonder that Wong sends his own children to study overseas ... please spare our children, okay?"

    - (Silentmajority.hk) July 6, 2016.

    Once again, Demosisto showed that they even lack the most basic stuff of grammar and logic.

    In English, they had declared that the July 1st march was not just going to just a demonstration to oppose Chief Executive CY Leung. They said:
    NOT JUST "ANYONE BUT CY"
    FOR DEMOCRACY
    FOR DETERMINATION

    But after Ricky Wong made his declaration of intent to enter the Legco election, Agnes Chow Ting posted on Facebok: "Hong Kong needs a democratic movement, not anti-Leung movements." Nathan Law said that he does not support ABC ("Anyone but CY").

    Hey, does Demosisto even understand the difference between "NOT JUST 'ANYONE BUT CY'" and "NOT 'ANYONE BUT CY'."?

    Civic Party member Tanya Chan who will be running against Demosisto's Nathan Law in Hong Kong Island wrote on Facebook: "Somebody talks and talks about the pan-democrats only caring about ABC (ANYONE BUT CY). Taken out of context, this is misleading the public. As a pan-democrat, my position is very clear." Demosisto has been frequently made fun of in the media for being ignorant and incompetent. They may not be deliberately misleading the public; it is just that they don't know enough.

    - (NOW TV) July 4, 2016. DAB chairwoman Starry Lee said that she does not understand why Ricky Wong would use "Anyone but CY Leung" as his main election platform position. After all, a Legislative Councilor has constitutionally little or nothing to do with who is the Chief Executive.

    - When Starry Lee says so, she is clearly pretending not to understand. Everybody in Hong Kong knows that Ricky Wong entered the Legco election because he is still upset at CY Leung for denying a license to HKTV. If HKTV had gotten the license, Ricky Wong would be laughing to the bank instead of running in the Legco election.

    - No, a Legislative Councilor automatically becomes a member of the Election Committee. If elected, Ricky Wong will have 1 vote in the 1,200-person Election Committee. Therefore it cannot be said that Ricky Wong will have zero impact on the outcome of the Chief Executive election.

    - (EJ Insight) Why the 'ABC' campaign is illogical. By Michael Chugani. July 4, 2016.

    It is a fact that many Hong Kong people dont like Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying. But does this hatred run so deep that if the central government offers him a second term, a million people will take to the streets in a second wave of Occupy Central?

    Civic Party member Dennis Kwok Wing-hang, for one, believes that it will indeed happen. He told an English-language radio show that he will be one of the first to join a second wave of mass civil disobedience if Leung gets a fresh term.

    I personally dont think that a million people will take to the streets just because Beijing gives Leung a second term. Even though many people loathe him, this hatred alone is not a strong enough trigger to cause a mass protest of that magnitude.

    Even during Tung Chee-hwas unpopular rule, Article 23 national security legislation, the SARS outbreak, negative-equity home prices and a financial crisis, only 500,000 people joined a mass street protest in 2003.

    Organizers said recently that about 6,000 joined a protest march against the central government after Hong Kong bookseller Lam Wing-kee claimed mainland security agents had abducted him for interrogation when he crossed the border late last year and that his colleague Lee Po had been kidnapped in Hong Kong by mainland agents and taken across the border, violating local laws.

    The case of the booksellers strikes at the very heart of one country, two systems, yet a protest march against mainland heavy-handedness drew just thousands.

    Some estimates have it that one million people joined the 2014 Occupy movement. But it would be inaccurate to say one million people occupied streets in Admiralty, Mong Kok and Causeway Bay at the start of the Occupy protest in the same way that 500,000 people took part in a mass protest on one single day on July 1, 2003.

    The Occupy movement lasted 79 days and it may be that during this time one million people, including actual protesters, curious Hong Kong people, and foreign and mainland tourists went to the various protest sites. That is not the same as claiming one million people took part. I went to the protest sites many times but it would not be accurate to say I was a protester who joined the movement. I went merely as a journalist and an observer.

    Although all the possible candidates, including Leung, Chief Secretary Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor, Financial Secretary John Tsang Chun-wah, and New Peoples Party chairwoman Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee have refused to clearly say if they will run in next years chief executive election, all the signs are that Leung is preparing to seek a second term.

    When the time comes, he will, of course, only run if he gets the support of the central government.

    My view is that if he runs, Lam and Tsang will not because it would not look good for the central government if either the chief secretary or the financial secretary competes against the sitting chief executive. The central government will face the dilemma of having to decide who to support.

    Supporting Leung instead of, for example, Lam, will send the negative message that Beijing doesnt trust Hong Kongs chief secretary. Supporting Lam, meanwhile, will send the signal that Leung had failed as chief executive. Running also means Lam will have to resign her post to focus on the election. Same thing if the financial secretary runs.

    As the chief executive, Leung will not have to resign to run but will have to focus on the election. This means two of the top three people in the government will not be able to focus on governing Hong Kong.

    The situation was different when Henry Tang Ying-yen resigned as chief secretary in 2012 to run for chief executive because Donald Tsang Yam-kuen who was not allowed by law to run for a third term could still focus on governing Hong Kong.

    The opposition camp has embraced the ABC Anyone but CY slogan as a campaign strategy for this Septembers Legislative Council polls and next years chief executive election.

    Ricky Wong Wai-kay, whose application for a free-to-air TV license was rejected by Leung, has said that if he formally decides to be a candidate in the Legco election, he will use the ABC slogan as his sole campaign strategy.

    But I find the ABC movement puzzling. The movement rests solely on the principle of targeting a man rather than his policies. Are pan-democrats saying they dont mind even if the central government selects a far less qualified person than Leung?

    For the sake of argument, will the pan-democrats not mind even if Beijing makes Arthur Li Kwok-cheung the next chief executive? Are they saying they dont want Leung even though many of his livelihood policies are things they support? How can that be logical? Surely, its in the overall interest of Hong Kong to have the most qualified leader possible, even if that leader is hated by many.

    The ABC movement puzzles me because the opposition camp is now asking the central government to replace Leung even though whoever takes over will, of course, also be someone loyal to Beijing. This same opposition camp voted down a political reform framework last year that would have given millions of Hong Kong people the right to elect their own chief executive through universal suffrage.

    Pan-democrat legislators rejected the framework with the argument that it was not genuine democracy because candidates would be screened out by a nomination committee filled with pro-Beijing people, which means only candidates loyal to the central government can compete.

    Now, which is better giving people the right to vote out Leung and elect another Beijing loyalist through universal suffrage or asking the central government to do the same thing through a small circle election which allows only 1,200 people of an election committee to vote?

    The pan-democrats rejected a plan that could have replaced Leung with another loyalist through one person, one vote but now embraces an ABC movement that seeks to replace Leung not through one person, one vote but through Beijing. It makes no logical sense.

    It is too early to say if Beijing will buy the ABC reasoning, which is that five more years of Leung will tear apart Hong Kong politically. The central government likes to keep its cards close to its chest, re-shuffling them when necessary.

    There is no doubt that Leung is widely seen as a divisive rather than a unifying figure. Many people see him as a leader who puts the central governments interests above those of Hong Kong. This perception was further cemented by Leungs weak response to the case of the five Causeway Bay booksellers who were seized and detained by mainland agents for interrogation.

    Lam Wing-kees astonishing revelations that mainland agents grabbed him and whisked him away blindfolded to secretive locations for months of questioning when he crossed the border will add fuel to the ABC campaign.

    But the question is whether the central government still cares so much about Hong Kong that it prefers a unifying figure to someone it can trust completely.

    Another question is if not Leung, then who?

    None of the possible candidates mentioned so far have shown they are far more qualified than the current chief executive. But the ABC philosophy is that qualifications are not important, and that anyone whose name is not CY Leung will be accepted with open arms.

    All the signs so far are that Beijing prefers a chief executive who is a hardline loyalist than a more likeable one who is better skilled in unifying the people. There is also the fact that it cannot really make a difference whoever becomes our next leader. I said this in a previous column some months ago.

    Lets assume that Beijing buys the ABC philosophy and makes Lam our next chief executive. Will the pan-democrats then no longer demand so-called genuine democracy? Will the independence movement end its campaign? Will the localists give up their call for self-determination? Will Beijing soften its hardline position against so-called true democracy?

    Of course not.

    Whoever becomes chief executive will still have to do Beijings bidding. And it is no secret that Beijing and the opposition camp are poles apart on issues such as democracy and self-determination. This will guarantee continued confrontation whoever becomes our next leader.

    Add to that our dysfunctional political system and we have a recipe that makes Hong Kong virtually ungovernable. I have said in a previous column some months ago that Hong Kongs political system is so outdated that it makes governance very difficult whoever is chief executive.

    Former chief executive Tung Chee-hwa has now also said that governance is difficult because the chief executive is not allowed under the Basic Law to be a member of a political party. Thats why I believe even if the ABC movement succeeds it will not make much difference.

    - (EJ Insight) Who will be Hong Kongs next chief executive?   By Michael Chugani. August 9, 2016.

    Will Chief Secretary Carrie Lam become a candidate in next Marchs chief executive election?

    She has said numerous times she is not interested in becoming Hong Kongs next leader but the media just doesnt believe her.

    Commentators and political analysts insist there is a strong possibility she will run against Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying.

    I have asked many politicians from both the opposition and establishment camps why they dont believe her when she says she wont become a candidate.

    All their answers were the same: saying no doesnt really mean no in politics.

    Some went as far as to say she really wants to become chief executive.

    But influential people and business leaders I have talked to told me she had privately told them she will retire from government next year when her term as chief secretary ends.

    Those who believe Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor will run point to the fact that Leung Chun-ying had also once said he would never run for chief executive yet joined the 2012 election against Henry Tang.

    But there is a big difference between the two.

    Leung Chun-ying had only said once in general that he would never run.

    In his case, saying no doesnt necessarily mean no because he had said it a long time before he actually ran.

    In Lam Cheng Yuet-ngors case, she had said it numerous times in public and in private conversations with influential people.

    She was still saying no as recently as a few months ago.

    She only stopped saying it after the media refused to take her for her word and kept asking her.

    If she has indeed changed her mind and is now thinking of running, she would have a hard time explaining it to those she had told in private that she would not run.

    People would mock her as an untrustworthy person in the same way they now mock Leung Chun-ying for having said he would never run yet did run.

    I have no inside information and I am not a betting man but I would bet that she wont run.

    Commentators and the media have named Financial Secretary John Tsang as another possible candidate.

    He, too, has said he wont become a candidate.

    But the difference between him and Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor is that he has not said as clearly as she that he wont become a candidate.

    He, too, has stopped giving a direct answer to the media when asked if he will run. But his behavior, body language, and words lately has fueled speculation that he is indeed interested in becoming chief executive.

    His open support of localism in terms of local culture, movies and cuisine has boosted his popularity among many Hongkongers, especially the young, who fear mainlandization.

    By making clear his definition of localism doesnt include separatism and self-rule, it seems he wants to reassure the central government that his promotion of localism doesnt mean he is siding with Hong Kongs self-rule camp.

    Many people I have spoken to believe Tsang Chun-wah is trying to show Beijing that his popularity, softer image and ability to have dialogue with the pan-democrats makes him a good alternative to the unpopular and hardline Leung Chun-ying should mainland leaders decide to have a new face as the next chief executive.

    It is no secret that the Liberal Partys James Tien loathes Leung Chun-ying and is actively supporting Tsang Chun-wah to replace him. But many people inside and outside government say the financial secretary lacks ambition, motivation and innovation.

    Some even describe him as a laid-back person who is not hard-working enough to become chief executive.

    But it is well-known that most property developers and business leaders much prefer Tsang Chun-wah to Leung Chun-ying.

    They consider him as a business-friendly official who is on their side but see the chief executive as their enemy because of his populist policies such as poverty alleviation, property cooling measures, affordable housing and tighter control on mainland tourists coming to Hong Kong, which the business sector considers as damaging to its interests.

    There is no doubt New Peoples Party chairwoman Regina Ip yearns to be chief executive.

    She is quite popular as a legislative councilor but this doesnt necessarily mean her popularity will follow her if she decides to run for chief executive.

    Being a legislative councilor and being the chief executive are two different things.

    A legislators power is limited while that of the chief executive is extensive.

    Will Hong Kong people, many of whom remember her fierce defence of the widely unpopular Article 23 national security legislation, trust her with extensive executive powers?

    I dont think she can beat either Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor or Tsang Chun-wah in a chief executive election if one or the other decides to run.

    But can she beat Leung Chun-ying?

    It has become quite clear he will seek a second term even though he has been evasive when asked by the media.

    Who will the people prefer: Leung Chun-ying or Ip Lau Suk-yee?

    Of course, it is not the people but the 1,200 members of the election committee who will decide.

    But members have shown they will pay attention to public opinion, as they did in 2012 when Tang Ying-yens popularity plummeted after the media exposed his illegal basement.

    Legislative Council president Tsang Yok-sing has said the central government wants a competitive election this time instead of anointing a candidate as in the past.

    The opposition camp, which competed in previous chief executive elections, has indicated it wont put up a candidate in the election.

    But pan-democrats have said they will compete fiercely in the election for the 1,200 seats of the Election Committee so they can have a big say in who becomes the next leader.

    The main reason the opposition camp wants a bigger say in the Election Committee is because of ABC, which means Anyone but CY Leung.

    If the central government really wants a competitive election among the loyalist candidates it trusts, then Leung Chun-ying will no doubt face a tough fight against Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor or Tsang Chun-wah should either decide to run, especially if pan-democrats win a good number of seats in the Election Committee.

    They will follow the ABC philosophy and do their best to oust Leung Chun-ying even though many of his livelihood policies are policies the opposition camp supports.

    The irony is that even though Tsang Chun-wah is preferred by the property tycoons because they consider him to care more about their interests than the interests of the grassroots, the pan-democrats in the Election Committee will still vote for Tsang Chun-wah because of the ABC philosophy even though they claim they are on the side of ordinary Hong Kong people.

    But as I said in my previous column, I doubt that Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor or Tsang Chun-wah will run if Leung Chun-ying runs.

    It would be awkward for mainland leaders to see Hong Kongs top officials competing against each other, especially because the media will be digging up dirt on the candidates as it did in the 2012 election.

    For sure, the central government wont allow all three to run at the same time because that would affect governance in Hong Kong.

    But if the central government really wants a true competition as Tsang Yok-sing said, then the best way to prove that is to let either Tsang Chun-wah or Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor run against Leung Chun-ying, or to ask Leung Chun-ying to step down to pave the way for the chief secretary and financial secretary to run against each other.

    It would also be a true competition among pro-establishment candidates if Leung Chun-ying and Ip Lau Suk-yee run against each other without the central government taking sides.

    If this happens, will pan-democrats in the Election Committee choose Ip Lau Suk-yee because of the ABC philosophy?

    And will the opposition camp in general actively support her even though she has far less leadership experience than Leung Chun-ying and has not shown the same level of passion he has in pushing for livelihood policies?

    If the opposition camp makes ABC the top priority, then it has no choice but to support Ip Lau Suk-yee.

    Thats why I said in my previous article that ABC is totally illogical.

    It targets a person rather than the persons policies, even though many in the ABC camp support the policies. Ricky Wong Wai-kee, who will run in Septembers Legislative Council elections, clearly showed how illogical the ABC philosophy is. He said he is running only because he supports ABC.

    Ricky Wong Wai-kee, who will run in Septembers Legislative Council elections, clearly showed how illogical the ABC philosophy is. He said he is running only because he supports ABC.

    He wants to see Leung Chun-ying ousted yet many of the policies in his manifesto are similar to Leung Chun-yings policies.

    What sense does it make to compete in an election with the single slogan of ousting Leung Chun-ying when he supports many of Leung Chun-yings policies?

    - (Hong Kong Free Press) Anyone But CY? Hong Kongs reviled leader and media tycoon Ricky Wong are virtual soulmates. By Kent Ewing. July 6, 2016.

    Yes, Leung Chun-ying is the most divisive, hard-headed and reviled chief executive Hong Kong has suffered in the nearly 20 years since the handover from British to Chinese rule.

    But dont believe maverick media tycoon Ricky Wong Wai-kay, who this week entered the political fray to win a seat in Septembers Legislative Council elections, or other pandering pols who jump on his ABC (Anyone But CY) bandwagon: Evicting Leung from Government House will not make things much better and could, God forbid, make them worse.

    ABC may turn out to be an effective populist election slogan that wins a Legco seat representing Hong Kong Island for Wong, but it is also cheap, grossly oversimplified politics and bad for Hong Kong.

    Moreover, it smacks of revenge as Wong is still clearly smarting from losing his bid to make HKTV one of the citys free-to-air television stations after his application for a license was denied by the Leung administration.

    Indeed, HKTV may very well have deserved that license, and Wongnot to mention millions of ordinary people fed up with the tired, formulaic dramas and entertainment shows offered by TVB, the citys dominant free-to-air broadcasterwas understandably miffed by the wholly inadequate explanation offered by the Executive Council (Exco) for its denial.

    But that was then, and this is now. The dubious rejection of a free-to-air television license in 2013 should not translate into a Legco seat for the HKTV chairman in 2016especially on a dishonest, misleading ABC platform.

    Dishonest because, if you check the record, Wong actually agrees with Leung on just about every major issue except who should be the next chief executive. The personalities of the two men may clash spectacularly, but on paper they are virtual soul mates.

    Like Leung, for example, Wong is no environmentalist. He and Leung are both keen to transform parts of our country park system into housing developments and rush into building a costly third runway at Hong Kong International Airport that critics say is unnecessary and could spell the end of the Chinese white dolphin in Hong Kong waters.

    Also, like Leung, Wong is no friend of democracyat least not the kind of democracy recognised in most of the rest of the world. He fully supports the political reform package for Hong Kong proposed by the Standing Committee of the National Peoples Congress that would see candidates for chief executive chosen by a Beijing-controlled nominating committee, thus assuring that only those pre-approved by the central government could win in a subsequent sham city-wide election.

    And remember, Wong may be maverick in comparison to Hong Kongs older generation of tycoons such as Li Ka-shing and Lee Shau-kee, but he is still a businessman and on livelihood issues will vote like one. So its no surprise that he opposes legislation that would standardise working hours in a city where low pay and long hours are the norm.

    Wongs idea to set up an electronic, referendum-style voting system on key issues within the next decade or so has merit, but who knows if it will ever really happen or is just a gimmick to garner votes now.

    In the end, how can a candidate who is so much like CY in his thinking wage a campaign for Legco headlined ABC? The patent contradictions in Wongs rhetoric and record underscore the  fundamental disingenuousness of a candidacy that is attempting to exploit Leungs record-breaking low popularity ratings so as to enhance, undeservedly, his own.

    Plus, the ABC campaign is just plain wrong. Alarmingly, there are worse choices out there than the currently serving CEamong them former finance chief Antony Leung Kam-chung.

    Sensing CYs vulnerability, Leung is showing his face a lot more around town these days, hoping people have forgotten about Lexusgate, the scandal that forced his resignation as finance minister 13 years ago after he purchased a HK$790,000  Lexus LS 430 just prior to imposing a tax on new vehicles in his budget.

    Or how do you like the sound of thisChief Executive Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee? Ip is another failed official in the administration of Hong Kongs first chief executive, Tung Chee-hwa, who resigned in disgrace after Article 23, the unpopular anti-subversion legislation she so enthusiastically pushed as Tungs security czar, prompted a 500,000-strong protest that forced Tung to shelve the bill and Ip to disappear into self-imposed exile in the United States for three years.

    Ever since her return to the city in 2006, Ip, now a legislative councillor and an Exco member, has been hard at work reinventing herself as a champion of the Hong Kong people. Dont buy it: Nobody wants to be CE more, and no one deserves it less.

    Sad to say, this city could do a lot worse than CY. And even if one of the marginally more promising possible candidatessuch as current finance secretary John Tsang Chun-wah, Chief Secretary Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor or Legco president Jasper Tsang Yok-singwere to win the job, it wouldnt make a great deal of difference as the bosses in Beijing would still be pulling all the levers. Besides, although John Tsang has been making positive albeit non-committal noises since his budget speech in February, Jasper Tsang and Lam have stated they are not interested in the job.

    Maybe they are simply being coy, but at this point in Hong Kongs post-handover history, it seems fair to ask: Why would any sensible person want this no-win position?

    As for CYwho clearly does want another termhe should counter Wongs campaign with one of his own.

    How about CBW? It doesnt boast the perfect alphabetical succession of ABC, but its message is more accurate: Could Be Worse.

    - The story about Ricky Wong's t-shirt:

    Ricky Wong: Are you being silly? If it costs $2,000, I won't even think about it. I bought this online for only $1,2000. A while ago, it was even 25% off.
    Yuen Kawai: Only $1,200 ... I can only say that I lost.
    Joshua Wong: Declaration of interest: I am used to wearing $120 shirts.

    Sze Tat Chau: Fuck your mother, Joshua Wong! What are you imitating others to make fun of Ricky Wong. Regardless, he earned his money as opposed to you political hacks always begging for donation! You lied to the citizens that you needed $2 million to run for the Legco elections in two districts. You raised $1.6 million and you only entered one district. What happens to the extra $600,000? Where the fuck did the Scholarism assets go? You said that it will be transferred to the "new student organization." But it has completely gone off the radar. You are political swindlers!

    As for your $120 t-shirts, here you are in a photo wearing the Hollister t-shirt that is much preferred by you leftist retards. There is no way that it costs $120 (unless it is a Made-In-China contraband).

    - How did you think Joshua Wong respond? As always when he is caught in an imbroglio, Wong deleted his Facebook post. Nothing to see here, move along folks.

    - (EJ Insight) August 19, 2016.

    Caroline Wilson, outgoing British Consul General to Hong Kong and Macau, said the United Kingdom will not reclaim Hong Kong, and the territorys prosperity lies in its being a part of China.

    Speaking during a live broadcast on her Facebook account, Wilson said the one country, two systems framework adopted by Beijing has been functioning well since the citys return to China in 1997, the Hong Kong Economic Journal reports.

    Answering netizens questions as the end of her four-year term in October nears, Wilson said the city will continue to develop hand in hand with the mainland, although some challenges are unavoidable.

    She dismissed accusations that the UK government has not fulfilled the promises it made in the 1984 Sino-UK Joint Declaration. Britain has never walked out on Hong Kong nor has it broken its promises, Wilson said.

    She noted that her government has been issuing a report on Hong Kong every six months since the handover and has been doing its best to make sure freedom and human rights in the city are protected.

    - (SCMP) August 28, 2016.

    Britains highest-ranking official in Hong Kong said on Thursday that one country, two systems had worked incredibly well and any small challenges between the city and the mainland could be overcome.

    The comments from Caroline Wilson, the British Consul General to Hong Kong and Macau, came during a Facebook Live session where she responded to questions and comments from the public.

    The diplomat, who has served as consulate to Hong Kong and Macau since September 2012, is preparing to conclude her four-year post before returning home.

    When asked during the session if the UK would take back control of Hong Kong, she said: This is an easy one because no, the UK will not take back Hong Kong.

    We thought about this long and hard 30, 40 or 50 years ago, the fact is that Hong Kongs place is firmly within the Peoples Republic of China under the one country, two systems framework, which has on the whole worked incredibly well in the 20 years since the handover.

    In any place, there are challenges. I am absolutely confident that Hong Kong and China will overcome any small challenges and Hong Kong will continue to prosper and flourish.

    A second Facebook user asked whether Wilson thought Hong Kong would have improved trade if it returned to UK rule. But she re-emphasised she thought the one country, two systems framework would be more beneficial to Hong Kong.

    What we think is good feng shui and good for business is actually again to have very strong ties with Hong Kong as a special administrative region part of the Peoples Republic of China, she said. We have very strong ties now with China as well as with Hong Kong, I am delighted to say, and those are going to continue going forward.

    James Sung Lap-kung, political analyst at City University, said it appeared the British Consulate was keen to distance itself from the localist movement ahead of the upcoming Legco elections.

    Obviously the independence of Hong Kong is the main issue, as is the self-determination of localists, he said. The UK is getting some political pressure from the so-called localist groups in asking the UK to help them achieve independence. In that sense, it is good for the consul to say something before the election, that the one country, two systems is right. The problem for the localists is that the UK has no interest in taking back power in Hong Kong.

    Sung also said that the consulate might be hesitant to appear sympathetic to the localists cause in light of the efforts by Prime Minister Theresa May to placate the Chinese government over the stalled Hinkley Point nuclear power station deal. There have been tensions over the HK$180 billion deal after UK spies suggested Chinese investment in its nuclear power could threaten national security.

    Dr Chung Kim-wah, assistant professor of politics at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University, agreed that the British consul generals comments reflected her reluctance to jeopardise the UKs relationship with mainland China. In the past few years, the British government is more concerned with its relationship with mainland China, he said. What the consul general said was realistic and practical. She said it in order to avoid offending China.

    - (Hong Kong Free Press) August 30, 2016.

    The outgoing British Consul-General Caroline Wilson said in an interview with HKFP that the UK does not support independence for Hong Kong and it has never been an option for the city. It doesnt make any sense, quite frankly, she said.

    - (SCMP) Advocates of Hong Kong independence have no allies. By Alex Lo. August 31, 2016.

    Every localist, separatist and colonial flag-waving malcontent who wants Hong Kong to break away from the mainland should read the latest Post interview with outgoing British consul general Caroline Wilson. I say this not because I want to attract more hits and eyeballs to our website.

    Rather, the British diplomat is explaining the most obvious and basic truth about one country, two systems, which with the noisy and heated debates about independence, it tends to be forgotten or overlooked.

    She said the British government had made it clear it did not support Hong Kongs independence, and she felt the idea doesnt make any sense.

    All has to be done with respect for the law and the broader constitutional framework in Hong Kong, she said. As the representative of the country that signed the [Sino-British] Joint Declaration, I support freedoms to be exercised in Hong Kong, but I also have to recognise ... Hong Kongs constitutional structure.

    She added that she considered one country, two systems principle that governs Hong Kong an unprecedented success.

    Those who wave the colonial flag during anti-government or anti-Beijing protests may fantasise about the paradise that was once colonial Hong Kong, but those days are long gone and will never come back. The Brits dont support you. They dont want us. If anything, they side with Beijing.

    And they are not necessarily being immoral, irresponsible or cynical. No, they negotiated the Joint Declaration; and the notions of one country, two systems and of 50 years of maintaining Hong Kongs social, economic and political systems and way of life that became the foundation of the Basic Law.

    If the Brits were to support independence, they would breach their own treaty obligations. But the British government is not alone. Every government in the world recognises one country, two systems and the status of Hong Kong as an inalienable part of China. The world simply has too much invested, in terms of foreign and economic policies, in intellectual and financial capital, in China and one country two, systems to operate otherwise. The most they would do to come to your defence is to take up what may be called the Voltaire position: I disapprove of what you say, but will defend to the death your right to say it.

    Any successful struggle for independence requires outside recognition of its justice and legitimacy. Hong Kongs separatists have neither.

    (SCMP) September 22, 2016.

    Asked to give a view on the small but growing body of public opinion advocating varying degrees of autonomy for the city, from the status quo to full independence, new US envoy Kurt Tong said: The US view is crystal clear. Hong Kong is definitely a part of China, but we also value the high degree of autonomy it has under one country, two systems.

    A couple of weeks ago we saw Hongkongers turn out in record numbers to exercise their freedom to participate in choosing the citys legislature. I think that turnout, with voters lining up late into election night, showed how much people here are committed to the idea of democratic participation in politics.

    (SCMP) June 24, 2016.

    The killer blaze that burned out of control for four days at an industrial building in a densely packed Hong Kong neighbourhood was finally tamed on Friday night, as the citys security minister rejected concerns that the entire block could collapse.

    The inferno at the Amoycan Industrial Centre in Ngau Tau Kok was brought under control at 7.38pm, more than 80 hours after it broke out on Tuesday, killing two firefighters over two days.

    Thomas Cheung, 30, and Samuel Hui Chi-kit, 37, have been hailed as heroes, amid an outpouring of public support and sympathy. Two others were still in the hospital yesterday in a stable condition. The fire started at the SC Storage facility on Tuesday, making it the longest running blaze in the city in more than 20 years.

    (SCMP) Ignore online rumours and get behind our firefighters, Hong Kong public urged. June 24, 2016.

    Top Hong Kong officials and unionists on Friday urged the public to support the citys firefighters, saying hearsay and criticism of the strategies used in tackling an industrial building inferno had piled pressure on frontline officers.

    While firefighters unions said the morale of the force was high, some frontline officers posed angry messages online questioning the decisions of their commanders and blasting inaccurate media reports.

    A four-minute clip consisting of 11 short voice messages purportedly from firefighters circulating online blamed the top managements ignorance about the actual situation at the scene for the two deaths. One message claimed that under external pressure, senior firemen gave up the safer approach of fighting the blaze from the outside. Buildings [Department] told them the building could collapse, so they sent some dare-to-die corps up there, and the accident happened.

    An executive committee member of the Fire Services Officers Association, Mak Kam-fai, said he understood the feelings and emotions of junior staff, but their morale was high. In real life it is not practical for the seniors to explain tactics to them fully, Mak said. Mak also said the frontline firefighters faced huge pressure from the challenge of dealing with the deadly blaze in complex circumstances, and from also the public. All the guessing, hearsay and rumours upset us and put pressure on us, he said. It is irresponsible for people and so-called experts to spread negative remarks and criticism, as they have absolutely no idea what the fire situation is like.

    He said the firefighters were doing their best to put out the fire as quickly as possible. Some frontline colleagues who were supposed to be off after a full day there had also volunteered to return and do back-up work. Mak expressed sadness at the two fallen officers but said the public should not confuse their deaths with the firefighting strategy.

    Some members of the public have criticised fire service management for sending officers inside the burning building even though no one was trapped. So we should just let the fire burn? he asked, adding that firefighters had to enter the core area to put out the blaze regardless of whether there were people inside or not.

    Jerry Nip Yuen-fung, chairman of the Fire Services Department Staff General Association, said firefighters were angry at rumours that some of them were sent in when they were not ready. They have worked very hard in fighting the fire. Such groundless rumours should not be spread around, he said.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) June 22, 2016.

    A group of four pro-Beijing politicians have been criticised for attempting to take political advantage of a fire that claimed the life of a firefighter after they published a photo of themselves at the scene.

    The four district councillors of the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong posted the photo on Tuesday afternoon, showing them standing next to fire trucks at the Kowloon Bay fire scene.

    Netizens slammed the councillors for hindering the firefighters work. Facebook users compared the image with a controversial photo of four Filipino police officers who posed next to a tour bus involved in the 2010 Manila hostage crisis which left eight Hongkongers dead.

    One such post attracted more than 5,000 likes and 2,000 shares as of Wednesday afternoon.

    Jack Cheung Ki-tang, one of the district councillors, even took to the page himself to counter the criticism.

    It is normal for district councillors to be at the scene to understand the situation, and to take photos to report to citizens, he wrote. I believe those residents who read our Facebook pages would care about the situation.

    Netizens went on to criticise Cheung, and other politicians in the photo, including Au Yeung Kwan-nok, Cheung Yiu-bun and Wilson Or Chong-shing. They said that they were not even part of the constituency that the fire occurred in.

    Some commenters also said that, even if they were taking photos of the scene to report on the situation, it was unnecessary to include their faces.

    Wilson Or Chong-shing, who is tipped to run for a Legislative Council seat in September, was the most active of the four on social media. Or posted nine Facebook posts after the fire started, including some saluting firefighters, and some photos showing him helping residents. But he did not post the controversial photo, and did not respond to the controversy on his page or other pages.

    Tam Siu-cheuk, the DAB partys district councillor for the constituency where the Ngau Tau Kok blaze unfolded, defended his colleagues on social media. I am the district councillor for the constituency the roads were blocked and people could not go home, buses could not enter the estates, so why shouldnt we report on it? he asked. He added that the four in the photo had a responsibility to be at the scene in order to understand the incident before a meeting at the Kwun Tong district council on Wednesday to discuss it.

    Peter Chan (Chinese University of Hong Kong student)

    Those bastards normally have lots of time. They eat and then they sit around to wait to defecate. This time, they got what they deserved. But two deaths are too few. There are more than 9,000 Fire Department workers. Excluding the 2,000 who are emergency rescuers, at least half of them should die (that is to say, 3,000 of them). Can you imagine what a waste of public funds to have 7,000 people sit around, eat, play basketball, go to the gym, flirt with girls and fuck them?

    - The man in the photo is a fireman who worked at the scene. His photo was expropriated by some unknown person to use in this post. It is pathetic that this person can do this, and it is worse that people should actually believe this.

    Kiko Tsang (Civic Passion)
    [Left photo: with Raymond Wong Yuk-man; Right photo: with Wong Yeung-tat]

    Each day, somebody dies. It goes with the job. The Hong Kong pigs and moral prigs have forgotten about the facts of life when they ask.
    [YAWN]

    Who is truly serving the People? You know!
    The firemen risked their lives to protect Hong Kong.
    The Hong Kong Public Security Bureau wield their batons to beat defenseless Hongkongers who want democracy.

    - If you get your wish and the Hong Kong Police is disbanded, then you may find the following things happening:

    --- A hacker breaks into your bank account and steal all your money with no possibility of recovery
    --- Your parent have to stay indoors as soon as it becomes dark outside to avoid being mugged
    --- You have to escort your daughter to and back from school every day to fend off the sex offenders
    --- Your 9-year-old son tells you that he needs $3,666 because the triads at his school are forcing him to enlist and pay tribute
    --- Your wife is hit and crippled for life by a drunk driver who speeds away immediately
    --- You go down to the parking garage to get your car and you find that someone has stolen all four wheels
    --- Your family goes to a birthday party and when you arrive home, you find that everything has been removed by your neighbors who saw you leave
    --- You eat at a restaurant for a simple soy chicken on rice. You are told that the bill is $10,000. You refuse to pay. You are beaten up by the waiters, taken forcibly to the ATM and withdraw the money to pay them
    --- You tell someone that you support genuine universal suffrage, and they smash a beer bottle over your head

    Normally you call the police. Now you have nobody to call. So you got the idea of Death Wish ...

    Civic Party

    We demand that the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Government cancel all celebratory events on July 1st.

    Joshua Wong (Demosisto)

    We strongly demand the Hong Kong government to cancel the reception to celebrate the establishment of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and donate the budget to the fund for families of deceased firemen. All government officials should cancel all official celebratory activities and not appear in their official capacity at any of the celebratory activities.

    - Ask not what the HKSAR government has done for you. Ask what you have done for the HKSAR.

    - Although Demosisto was founded a short time ago, they are known to have raised several hundred thousands of dollars. How much have they contributed to the firemen so far? Ten bottles of water! If you want to impress me, write out a check for $1,000,000. Lead us by your own example and we will follow. But if you can't do that, then STFU!

    - July 1st should be made a day of mourning for all of Hong Kong for the two heroic firemen. Therefore, we strongly demand that the Civil Human Rights Front cancel their July 1st demonstration march out of respect for the heroes and their families. Of course, this means that all the pan-democratic political groups (including Civic Party and Demosisto) will miss out on the biggest fundraising event of the entire year. If you dare to demur, I will say: Have you no sense of decency?

    - Alternately, the Civil Human Rights Front can redirect the theme of the July 1st demonstration march to commemorate the two heroic firemen. And all donations made to all organizations during the event will be handed over fully and completely to the wives of these heroic firemen. Thus, everybody will do everything that they can.

    - Be careful! The pan-democrats have a habit of "keeping the money in their pockets temporarily." Auditors will have to be hired to watch the donation boxes.

    - What is the use if they hire Benny Tai's accountant/auditor? The financial statement preceding the 2014 Occupy Central period hasn't even been done yet even though this is the year 2016 now.

    - Well, but what about Ray Wong (Hong Kong Indigenous) promising that his people will dress in Black Bloc and take 'action' at the China Liaison Office on the night of July 1st? Ray Wong said that they are doing this because Lam Wing-kee has personally stated that he was kidnapped by the Chinese Communists. Right on, brother!

    - Joint Announcement
    We thank the Hong Kong firefighters
    The Democratic Party, Civic Party and Labour Party have decided to donate all the donations collected this year and last year to the families of the deceased firefighters.

    - The difference with the Communist government of Hong Kong couldn't be starker! The pan-democrats listened to the voices of the people and they will give all the donations that they received to the families of the deceased firefighters. This is why you must vote for the pan-democrats in the September Legislative Council elections.

    - Of course I won't believe a word of this. They are going to rake in $1,000,000 and tell the world that they only got $100.

    - For last year, they announced what they each collected. So they have to donate those amounts. For this year, they should say that they won't accept a cent from anyone; if anyone wants to donate to them, the money should go directly to the two families and they will be hands off.

    - This is a fake photo. For one, the Civic Party has declared that they will donate $20,000 to the families. As for the hundreds of thousands of dollars that they raised over the past two years, they need it for the Legislative Council elections. This is an important election because of FREEDOM DEMOCRACY HUMAN RIGHTS UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE RULE OF LAW. In fact, you should donate more money to the Civic Party more frequently.

    - The Democratic Party and the Labour Party have also issued denials. But they didn't offer to donate a single cent. They do tell you that you should donate more money to them more frequently.

    - (Headline Daily) June 28, 2016.

    The pan-democrats have issued a statement to clarify that donations collected during the July 1st march will not be given to the families of the deceased families. They said that the information in the photo on the Internet is inaccurate.

    - New 'fake' poster for the pan-democrats


    Democratic Party, Civic Party and Labour Party
    "We WILL NOT give the donated money to the firefighters"

    (Hong Kong Free Press) June 23, 2016.

    A netizen who asked for donations on Facebook for a firefighter who died on Tuesday has been criticised for being a potential scammer. A person claiming to be the deceaseds cousin said that those who were using the incident to cheat people at this time should move away.

    A fourth-alarm fire occurred at a mini-storage at Kowloon Bay on Tuesday and continued into Wednesday. Thomas Cheung, a 30-year-old senior station officer, died at the scene after being found unconscious inside the Amoycan Industrial Centre on Tuesday evening. The government has vowed that it will inspect all mini-storages after the fire claimed a life.

    The netizen posted in a Facebook group saying that he only wanted to ask the kind people here if [they] could donate money. In the post, he said that he knew the family and would hand the money to them. He then provided an account and asked people to spread the word.

    However, he mistook one of the Chinese characters of the deceased firefighters name for another in his post. The two characters are pronounced the same in Cantonese. Someone claiming to be the firefighters cousin commented saying you are scamming whats your problem? She also said that if you want to donate, I can give you the familys account.

    According to Apple Daily, the post was later deleted and the poster said I hope everybody will forgive me.

    For the 2016 Appropriation Bill draft, Legislative Council members introduced certain amendments. Here is a revisit of the list:

    Amendment #64 (motion introduced by Chan Chi-chuen (People Power)) The motion is to reduce the appropriation for the Fire Department by $5,198,792,000 (the reduction is about equal to the entire operational budget of the Fire Department).

    Amendment #65 (motion introduced by Leung Kwok-hung (League of Social Democrats)) The motion is to reduce the appropriation to the Fire Department by $173,597,000 (the reduction is about equal to the budget of the Fire Department for machinery, vehicles and equipment).

    ...

    Amendment #71 (motion introduced by Leung Kwok-hung (League of Social Democrats)) The motion is to reduce the appropriation to the Fire Department by $76,952,000 (the reduction is about equal to the budget of the Fire Department for small machinery, vehicles and equipment).

    Amendment #72 (motion introduced by Leung Kwok-hung (League of Social Democrats)) The motion is to reduce the appropriation to the Fire Department by $148,257,000 (the reduction is about equal to the entire budget of the Fire Department for ambulances).

    When just asked about those amendments to cut funds from the Fire Department now, Leung Kwok-hung said that the Fire Department budget should not be cut without good reason. He didn't blink or blush.

    - April 28, 2016 the Legislative Council Financial Affairs Committee record showed that Chan Chi-chuen said: "I proposed to cut the appropriation of the Fire Services Department. But I am unable to explain why I want to cut the appropriation of the Fire Serves Department. In the past, I have said that I am targeting the government and the administration of the Fire Services Department." And this is the reason why Chan Chi-chuen wanted to cut the entire budget for the Fire Services Department.

    - Yes, and therefore CY Leung must resign! He murdered those firemen!

    (Kinliu)

    After a fireman died in the Ngau Tau Kok fire, Oscar Lai (Demosisto) tried to find ammunition for his Kowloon East Legislative Council election campaign. He posted on Facebook on the question of "Who killed our firefighter heroes?":

    According to the Fire Department, there are 650 industrial buildings older than 30 years of which 120 are in the Kwun Tong area. In 2007 Fire Safety (Buildings) Ordinance, all buildings built before 1987 had to be upgraded in terms of firefighting equipment, but not the industrial buildings older than 30 years. In fact, tragedies have occurred before. In March 2010, one fireman was killed and three more were injured in a Cheung Sha Wan industrial building fire; in 2007, seven firemen were injured in a Tsuen Wan factory fire. ... Isn't it government indifference that killed our heroes?

    Hundreds of critical comments poured in, such as "Oscar Lai, you political thug! You only know how to blame the government but you never offer a single constructive idea!" "You go eat shit, you only know how to exploit a situation!" Oscar Lai immediately deleted this post and replaced it with the Demosisto "Salute to the firemen"!

    - Oscar Lai is either too stupid or too deceptive about the two cases that he cited to support his presentation. In the 2007 Tsuen Wan fire, the factory had a sprinkler system installed, but it did not function. The fireman was killed by a flash burn. In the 2010 Cheung Sha Wan fire, the ceiling and the shelves collapsed on the fireman. The causes of death in this new incident will be determined by the court of inquest. It is no wonder that Oscar Lai has drawn the ire of citizens.

    - (Wen Wei Po) June 23, 2016. Oscar Lai replaced his Facebook post with another post saying that his Kowloon East election campaign team had just learned that the Lam Tin Community Centre was opened for those who are displaced by the Ngau Tau Kok fire. He even provided instructions on how to proceed from Tak Po (Kowloon Bay) by foot to Lam Tin.

    -From Tak Po through the Choi Ying Estate pedestrian bridge to Kai Tin Community Centre? That would be four MTR stations! Does anyone over at Demosisto know how to read a map?

    - Oscar "Magnet Man" Lai chose to run in the Kowloon East district. But he has not done his homework about local geography. Besides, there is a closer community center in Kwun Tong that is open.

    - (Wen Wei Po) June 24, 2016. First, Agnes Chow Ting posted on Facebook:

    I bought a batch of bottled water in Kowloon Bay and took it over to Amoycan Industrial Centre.

    Please, everybody should give a little bit to do something for others.

    P.S. The Kowloon Bay MTR is very close to the scene of the fire. It is absolutely not hard for any individual to bring ten or so bottles by foot. Please, everybody.

    Joshua Wong immediately shared that post.

    But Wong Yeung-tat (Civic Passion) countered: "Will all political hacks not call on citizens to head towards the scene at Amoycan Industrial Centre! Do not go to deliver bottled water or watch the fire! No! You are going to interfere with the mission of the firemen. Besides it is dangerous because of the heavy smoke. Residents are telling me that the smoke carries a heavy plastic smell and causes dry throats. Please spread this information around." Other Internet users pointed out that the Fire Department has plenty of matriel already.

    Agnes Chow then amended her post with this addition: "But please do not interfere with the work of the firemen and do not stay to watch." And then she added: "It is enough to leave the water behind the police line."

    But Internet users said that Agnes Chow must think the firemen are beggars.

    Finally Demosisto issued its statement: "The Kowloon Bay fire is still not under control. There are cracks on the outer wall of the building. Citizens should avoid going to the scene."

    Demosisto did not know when to stop. On Facebook, today they issued "Four questions that the government must answer." This ended up with a tidal bore of bad reviews:

    - The fire has not been put out yet. A few firemen are still in critical condition. Why are you demanding the government to answer your questions? Why do they have to answer you here and now? Who do you think you are? Apart from opposing the government on everything and telling people to donate money to you all the time, what have you contributed to society?

    - It is Demosisto which must answer questions from the citizens. Here is one question for a starter: Why did Agnes Chow tell citizens to go to the scene when there is the danger of a building collapse as well as toxic smoke inhalation?

    - And here is another question: Why is Agnes Chow encouraging citizens to give presents to members of the Disciplined Services in violation of the well-known code of conduct against tipping public service workers?

    - And this question was asked a long time without being answered: Demosisto says that any donations going to them will be monitored by a lawyer and an auditor/accountant. What are the names of these professionals?

    - And this next question is even simpler: Have you start paying taxes yet?

    - Here is the Oscar "Magnet Man" Lai: It has now been proven wrong to maintain physical condition by playing ball at the fire station when there is no fire. I hope that everybody support me to enter the Legislative Council and reform the Fire Department.

    But wait ...

    Oscar Lai Man Lok:
    Earlier today (June 25) there was a screen capture that pretended to be me giving my opinion on training methods for firemen. I solemnly clarify that I have never said anything like that. I know that I am not a professional, and therefore I hold no opinion about training methods at the Fire Department.

    At this time, the firemen are still fighting the fire at the industrial building. Some person with ulterior motive deliberately framed me and disrupted the regular flow of information. This is disgusting. Rumors stop with wise people. I issue this statement for clarification.

    - Oh, really? Was it a forgery? In that case, I will say sorry. But Oscar Lai is well-known to having written many ill-conceived posts and deleting them quickly upon negative feedback. As a result, when I see a screen capture of an Oscar Lai post, I can't really go to his Facebook and see if it is actually there. Just because it is no longer there doesn't mean that he didn't do it. I think Oscar Lai should spend more time thinking about what he is writing so that he does not have to delete so frequently.  But that would be asking too much given the size of his brain ...

    (Photoblog.hk) June 24, 2016.

    - This photo is clear evidence that the Hong Kong Communist government is suppressing freedom of press. This photo showed clearly that the emergency workers in neon orange jackets were interfering with democracy-loving photojournalists who were trying to satisfy the people's right to know. The Hong Kong Journalists Association will surely bring the case to the attention of the United Nations High Commissioner on Human Rights.

    - When one photojournalist takes photos at a disaster site, he is said to be courageous. When 100 photojournalists take photos at a disaster site, they are interfering with rescue operations.

    - The contrast between the "courageous fireman who was injured in the line of duty" versus "the photojournalists who used every means possible to get some photos" is obvious. This is a simple case of Hero vs. Villain. Today, nobody believes that photojournalists will make way for an ambulance to pass through. In Hong Kong, when a small number of photojournalists cross the line, there is no effective system to restrain them (because of FREEDOM OF PRESS). Therefore common folks are angry at all of them.

    - (HKG Pao) Beyond covering the fire itself, the media brought up: "Did the Chief of the Fire Services Department commit errors of command, thus causing the deaths of his colleagues?" They quoted many spectators who criticized the judgment of fire fighters. Over the past 5 years or so, Hongkongers have been brainwashed by the notion of so-called 'democracy.' They have become ignorant and arrogant. But who are you people? What do you know about fire fighting procedures? What is your source of information? And who is this anonymous retired fireman that gets quoted? What is the basis for saying: "Let the fire burn itself out; there is no need to send anyone inside" and "They should not be breaking down doors unless they need to save someone"?

    Firstly, you are not professional fire fighters. Secondly, you are not present at the scene. Thirdly, you don't have access to all the information. In spite of all this, you still want to tell the Fire Services Department how to fight this fire!? I have plenty of ideas myself too, but I know that I don't have the expertise. Therefore I maintain my silence and humility in deference to the experts. Do you want the people of Hong Kong to hold a referendum and then the Fire Services Department will take the course of action as chosen by popular opinion?

    - (Bastille Post) When a fireman is take onto the ambulance, the media rushed up to take photos. We firemen get upset about this and other interference by the media with our work at the scene. When we scold them, the media retaliate with inaccurate reports plus nasty comments. I dare say that they are doing this because they want to attract eyeballs ...

    - Indeed, this double tragedy must lead to one and only one thing: the resignation of Chief Executive CY Leung.

    - This is shameful! Official blunders caused two firemen to die, but that still can't make CY Leung resign. This Hong Kong Communist government is truly unpopular with the people.


    Speechless Part 1

    - Speechless? Why? I've got something to say. It is obvious that the father and son are mainlanders. Hongkongers won't do this because they are a superior race.

    - I analyzed this photo. The boy is still in elementary school. The male photographer has fully grey hair. So that means that their age difference is at least 50 years. This fits into the typical Hong Kong story of a single 50-year-old man marrying a 20-year-old mainland woman and having a son. Therefore it is not true that both father and son are mainlanders.


    Speechless Part 2
    HK Valiant's Facebook: Salute to the Hong Kong firemen

    - HK Valiant is in the business of setting off the fires that the firemen have to put out. Thus, HK Valiant is the meal ticket for the firemen.


    Mong Kok Fish Ball Revolution, February 2, 2016.

    - Well, that is incorrect. When the fire engines came, the valiant warriors obstructed their progress because they wanted the fires to keep burning. What is the point of having firemen when they are not allowed to put out fires? That is the reason why legislative councilor Chan Chi-chuen wanted to cut the entire budget of the Fire Services Department.

    - Passion Times https://www.facebook.com/passiontimes/videos/1045254302204403/ Video of valiant warriors throwing bricks at firemen who were trying to put out fires. That was then, but today the valiant warriors want to pay tribute to the marvelous and courageous firemen.

    - Indeed, everybody in Hong Kong knows that the firemen are leeches who want to get paid playing volleyball/basketball/football all day. There is no reason to pay them a cent! Meanwhile, the people who work really hard are the lifeguards, who have been out on strike in order to obtain the same pay scale as the firemen.

    - (RTHK) Hundreds of lifeguards have decided to delay a planned strike this Sunday in view of the raging fire in an industrial building in Kowloon Bay that has claimed the lives of two firefighters and injured ten others. The Hong Kong and Kowloon Lifeguards Union announced the postponement on Friday, a day after announcing the strike following fruitless talks with government officials.

    - Indeed every day the lifeguards risk being eaten by sharks or getting melanoma due to exposure to the sun but they do so in order to save countless number of Hong Kong citizens from drowning. They deserve to earn whatever it is that they are demanding.

    - Fuck! The spokesperson for the Hong Kong and Kowloon Lifeguards' Union is Alex Kwok Siu-kit, known as an Occupy Central marshal who took one year with pay for a work-related injury but who seemed to have no problems with fighting counter-demonstrators and policemen.

    - The cowards at HK Valiant knew that they had stepped on a hornet's nest, so they apologized: "One of our administrators placed the wrong photo (about fire). We have no intention of hurting people's feelings towards firemen. We apologize profoundly for this!"

    (Kinliu) What do you know about fires? By Chris Wat Wing-yin. June 26, 2016.

    When I was teaching at Baptist University, I had the habit of looking out of the window during recess and tests. The Baptists School of Journalism classes were held in the Baptist University Communication and Visual Arts Building. On one side, the class rooms face Renfrew Road. On the other side, the classrooms face Baptist University Road. The scenery is the typical serenity of Kowloon Tong, very few pedestrians, very few cars, everything is still outside.

    Students asked me what is so good to look at?

    "What is that?" I asked as I pointed.

    "Fire Department." The whole class answered together.

    "Which district?"

    "Kowloon." "No, it should be Kowloon Tong." "Or Kowloon City?" "It could be Mong Kok ..." Everybody chimed in.

    "This is the Kowloon Tong Fire Station and Rescue Station. It says so on the sign over the building. You walk by there every day. Have you never looked?"

    "It's enough to know that it is the Fire Department ..." A student rebutted.

    "Do you know what firemen normally do?" I asked.

    "Play volleyball!" "Basketball!" "Football!" "Gym!" "..." There were plenty of answers.

    "Did you see them doing it?"

    "I guessed!" "They said so on television ..." "Everybody knows that" "..."

    "Why don't you come over to the window and look for yourselves? The Fire Department station is right over there. The firemen are right underneath your eyes. Why don't you stand up and see if the firemen are playing volleyball every day? Why don't you walk over to them and conduct a special interview? Why don't you follow them around for a few days and tell the world what firemen do?"

    "I've taught here for several years. Each class lasts 3 hours. I like to look out the window. I can see everything from up here. I see the firemen sometimes training to extract people trapped in cars. I see them pry open the car door. I see them haul a heavy water hose up the stairs. I see them scale up and down a ladder ... over the years, I have watched them at various times. I have never seen anyone play volleyball."

    "Therefore, reporters must never say as others say. Your duty is to find the truth and tell the world that some things are mistruths and rumors. You are not supposed to repeat what others say and make things worse."

    Before this Ngau Tau Kok mini-storage fire was even put out, a number of reporters and politicians were already trying to hold people responsible and demand their resignations. With respect to fires, we are all amateurs. Reporters and legislative councilors don't know everything under the sun. How can you question the professional opinions of experts and demand their resignations? If you are merely following certain Internet opinions and rumors, shouldn't you investigate whether they are truthful and valid first? Can't you find those who are really qualified to give expert opinions and then seek accountability later?

    Normally you people take the Fire Services Department for granted. Legislative councilors Chan Chi-chuen, Leung Kwok-hung and Chan Wai-yip wanted to cut the budget of the Fire Services Department. Now you turn around and become fire fighting experts. You sit in an air-conditioned room and you want to know why the firemen at the 1,000-degree-heat building are taking so much time? And why did the two firemen die? Who did right and who did wrong? The heroes who are fighting the fire should be asking you: "Who are you? What do you know?"

    TVB, NOW TV, Cable TV, Phoenix TV, ViuTV, TVB Network Vision, Commercial Radio, RTHK and Metro Radio have joined hands to produce a tribute called "Support HK Firefighters." More than 100 entertainers are participating. The group called on all citizens to take a white sheet, write down the words "Support HK Firefighters," shine a flash light, take a photo and post on Facebook with the hashtag #Support HK Firefighters.

    TVB's version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXkm8UzxqeU
    Commercial Radio's version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuiAqddB3uI

    Music video: Salute to Our Fighters https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aSg0klLgr3U More than 100 entertainers
    Music video: The Sincere Hero (Jackie Chan, Wakin Chau, Anthony Wong and Jonathan Lee) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ea9I6SKahnk

    - They are wasting money here. All money should go to the families of the deceased firemen.

    - More than 100 entertainers are going to participate? None of them were willing to participate in the #We Are All Denise Ho campaign. This shows that they are Hong Kong traitors.

    - On the contrary, it showed how unpopular Denise Ho is within the industry. Ho politicized a simple contract dispute and forced every entertainer to make clear that they are pro-China or else face career extinction.

    - Other Internet users have started a #We Are All Lam Wing Kee campaign. Response has been tepid. This shows that citizens are letting Hong Kong down.

    - On the contrary, it showed that most Hongkongers do not think betraying your wife, betraying your sons, betraying your girlfriend, betraying your colleagues, betraying your country and telling self-contradictory lies to everyone from one day to the next are core values of Hong Kong.

    - Here are the fake photos to support Lam Wing-kee and his cause of Hong Kong independence:

    - (Yahoo) The Hong Kong Fire Services Department Staffs General Association's former chairman has condemned the fake photos of entertainers, saying that they are disrespectful to the two deceased firemen as well as the entertainers. "Although I respect derivative art, it is appalling in these circumstances!"

    - (YouTube) Hacken Lee and Joey Yung paid tribute to the firefighters during a concert at the Guangzhou International Sports Performing Arts Center for 15,000 persons.

    - (Oriental Daily) June 29, 2016.

    Sammy Leung was one of the hundreds of entertainers who took part in the campaign. He said that paying tribute to the firefighters is the right thing to do. But if entertainers are intimidated by Internet users not to do it, that would be White Terror. Naturally he drew the wrath of the "Internet uesrs."

    - I really want to know in what way are you qualified to educate the citizens.

    - What the fuck are you talking about? Hypocritical entertainer!

    - Why haven't you come up to support the two highway repairmen? Are you waiting for Big Brother Jackie Chan to issue the order first? Hypocritical entertainer!

    - There is nothing wrong with taking the photo
    But you are causing trouble by saying this on your radio show.
    On July 1st, you should march to support Denise Ho and Lam Wing-kee.
    That's all.

    Sammy, come out and support the two highway repairmen. You have the chance to speak out but you keep quiet? Are you being threatened with White Terror? Hypocritical entertainer?

    - You want to educate the citizens? Radio is meant to provide information and entertainment! How are you qualified to educate the citizens? I observe that you have changed ever since your 40th birthday. I seem to seeing how Ko Chi-sum, Wong Jing and Natalis Chan evolve to what they are! People at the radio call you "Elder Brother" and now you think that you are really "Elder Brother" who must re-educate all the citizens who object to your point of view. When I see you, I know how the Communist Party evolve into what they are. It pains my heart to see a native Hongkonger could evolve into this!

    (YouTube) Sammy Leung's radio show on the true meaning of the tribute to the fire fighters.

    - "You must support Denise Ho. You must support Lam Wing-kee. If not, you are not allowed to support the two firefighters." Is this genuine democracy? Or autocracy?

    - Sammy Leung's true offense was saying:

    "Firefighters, police and soldiers use their own lives to defend the safety of others. A life is invaluable. So no matter how high the salary is, why are they willing to take these jobs? They do so because everybody respects them."
    Sammy Leung should never have listed the firefighters with police and soldiers. In Hong Kong, firefighters are respected but the police are hated.

    - Sammy Leung's father was a fire fighter. Sammy said: "This is the right moment for anyone (whether he is an an entertainer or not) to salute the fire fighters."

    - (HKU POP) Net satisfaction rates for the Hong Kong Disciplined Services, November 2015

    Fire Services Department: 88%
    Government Flying Service: 88%
    Auxiliary Medical Service: 81%
    Customs and Excise Department: 76%
    Immigration Department: 72%
    Independent Commission Against Corruption: 53%
    Civil Aid Service: 54%
    Correctional Services Department: 56%
    Hong Kong Police Force: 29%

    - Really? Since firefighters only play volleyball/basketball at work, why don't we make them issue parking/jaywalking tickets instead? Let see if their popularity plummets or not.

    - (HKG Pao) Who didn't "Salute our Firefighters"? The most glaring cases are Anthony Wong Yiu-ming, Denise Ho, Kay Tse, Ellen Loo, Endy Chow, Deanie Ip and Chapman To. In the case of Anthony Wong Chau-sang, he explained publicly that he is using his own way to support the fire fighters, including a Facebook call on people to donate to the families. What were those seven thinking? Were they not in Hong Kong? Were they not aware? Or did they choose not to stand with the people of Hong Kong? We don't know.

    - (Apple Daily) Leon Lai donated $500,000 to the Apple Daily Charity Foundation to assist the families of the two fire fighters and the two highway repairmen. This information came from an informed source who said: "He donated the money to the Foundation. I wanted to tell this because I see many singers post photos on the Internet and record a song. Perhaps they meant well but I don't think that they are too practical. Although money isn't everything, it is sad for them to lose husbands and fathers. I know that Leon Lai did this. I want to praise him." Apple Daily called Leon Lai's management company to verify the donation, but they said: "No comment."

    - Ha ha ha ha ha!!!! An anonymous donation was made to a Foundation and then an informed source reveals everything. Nobody can beat Leon Lai in Machiavellian machinations.

    - A donor who requested anonymity with the Apple Daily Charity Foundation has been identified publicly in Apple Daily. On one hand, the Foundation has failed to honor the request of its donor. On the other hand, the newspaper has violated the privacy of a citizen who was seeking to protect his own privacy.

    - Don't donate to this foundation and don't read this newspaper. PERIOD.

    - Well, does this informed source know that the one hundred plus entertainers didn't donate millions anonymously?

    - Well, I can easily imagine that this 'informed source' would refuse to disclose if it happens that Jackie Chan or Eric Tsang also donated large sums of money. "I know that they did this. But I don't want to praise them (because of their politics)."

    - Alas, this story has so many possibilities.

    Possibility#1: Leon Lai planned all this. He donated $500,000 and requested anonymity which the Apple Daily Charity Foundation honored. But Leon Lai went and used another party to leak the information to Apple Daily. Leon Lai does not comment, as he is famous for having said: "I do not reply to hypothetical questions."

    Possibility#2: Leon Lai did nothing whatsoever. But the Apple Daily fiction writer made up this unsourced story and made the popular Leon Lai seems as if he objects to what hundreds of other entertainers are doing with their photos and singing.

    Possibility #3: Leon Lai, the Apple Daily Charity Foundation and Apple Daily collaborated on this PR scheme. It is not as bad as you think, because the intention was to encourage many more others to make donations.

    - It is true that Leon Lai has been involved heavily in charitable activities, so that donating a large sum of money is not surprising. Specifically he is a board member of the Community Chest of Hong Kong. So why does he want to donate $500,000 anonymously to the Apple Daily Charity Foundation? Why not donate $500,000 publicly to Community Chest in order to encourage others to do likewise?

    (Sky Post) By Chris Wat Wing-yin. June 29, 2016.

    Several days after the fire started, Democratic Party legislator Wu Chi-wai formed a Amoy SC Storage Fire Victims Grand Alliance with those who rented mini-storage units there. In so doing, legislator Wu probably forgot that another group of victims had been waiting for before, namely the Fire Ordinance Victims Grand Alliance.

    Previously on June 12, Woo Chi-wai, Cy Ho (Labour Party) and 200 others held up the flags of the Democratic Party, Labour Party and ADPL and marched to the Fire Services Department headquarters to demand "amending the evil Fire Ordinance" and "suspend citations for violations."

    In 2007, the Fire Safety (Buildings) Ordinance stipulated that all buildings built in 1987 or before must have fire safety equipment. On that day, Wu and Ho led others to demand that older buildings be exempt from having water tanks to fight fires.

    The Amoycan Industrial Centre is 66 years old and was exempt from having an automatic sprinkler system. So when fire broke out, the first line of defense did not exist. So what are the politicians complaining about? Aren't they the same ones who want to erase the Fire Ordinance and rock the foundation of our personal safety?

    Two highway road repairmen were hit and killed by a taxi while working in the rain
    They were also serving socity
    They also ran into a sudden accident
    They were also two lives
    Two also let families behind
    But they got different treatments (from the two firemen)
    These two workers encountered an unexpected disaster
    They got no pension, no donations, no Facebook campaign of tributes
    They don't have celebrities to salute them
    Isn't the difference too great?

    - The sole purpose of this kind of comparison is to create more conflicts among people, setting people against each other.

    - When faced with an unfortunate event, a good and positive media should use its influence to call on citizens to help those in need. They should not be creating conflicts to set people off against each other!

    - We don't need any comparisons. We need to help. If you can help, please help.

    (SCMP) June 20, 2016.

    There was chaos and violence at Chinese Universitys council meeting on Monday, as students urged the governing council members to set up a governance review panel.

    Physical conflict erupted among students, some protesters from outside the university and security guards, as about 50 students and other protesters tried to storm the meeting venue at Bank of America Tower in Admiralty at around 5pm.

    During the chaos, a security guard suffered an injury to his right eye which drew blood.

    Students at the university have been demanding the council review the current governance system where the chief executive becomes the chancellor by default and has the power to appoint members. Critics said such a system would expose the university to political interference, thus threatening academic freedom.

    University vice-chancellor Joseph Sung Jao-yiu and council chairman Leung Nai-pang later promised protesters that the council would discuss setting up the panel at the meeting, before the chaos calmed down.

    (Oriental Daily) June 20, 2016.

    The Chinese University of Hong Kong council was holding a meeting at the CUHK Educational Centre at Bank of America Tower when fifty people charged into the meeting area. Security guards blocked the intruders and there was pushing and shoving. One security guard was bleeding in the face, and some students claimed to be injured. Among the intruders were some who were not CUHK students, such as "Four-eyed brother" Cheng Kam-mun (Civic Passion) who will be running in the Legco election and Hong Kong University Students Union president Althea Suen. Some of these intruders wore black face masks, black hoods and even black veils.

    CUHK Student Union president Ernie Chow presented four demands to the CUHK Council chairman Norman Leung and CUHK vice-chancellor Joseph Sung: (1) establish a panel with a clear time table to study the law by which the Chief Executive becomes the chancellor automatically; (2) the CUHK Council should have student and teacher representatives; (3) reduce the number of council members who are appointed directly by the Chief Executive; (4) CUHK Student Union representatives should be able to attend council meetings before the reforms take place.

    Norman Leung said that the Council will discuss these demands, but Leung and Sung cannot promise anything because it all depends on the opinions of the full council. The students let the two go. Shortly afterwards, another round of clashes started because somebody said that the council members were leaving. The students immediately rushed to block the back door. Then somebody said that it was not true, and the students calmed down again.

    Legislative Councilor Helena Wong (Democratic Party) said that the council had previously voted not to form a panel because of the lack of a social consensus on the issue. Today's meeting agenda does not include the demands today. Wong said that while she understands that the students are concerned about the university ordinance, demands should be expressed peacefully.

    CUHK SU president Ernie Chow said that the action today was pre-planned along with the Hong Kong Federation of Students. He said that the university ordinance is not solely a CUHK issue, but it affects all students and all of society. Chow said that physical clashes were inevitable during the tense situation, and he believes that both sides did not harbor evil intent.

    Legislative councilor Tommy Cheung left around 6pm. He was surrounded by about 20 students and other individuals who chased outside the Bank of America Tower. They stopped Cheung from getting into his car, accusing him of illegal parking. Eventually Cheung left on foot.

    At around 7pm, three more council members left including deputy vice-chancellor Fanny Cheung. The intruders blockaded the corridor once more. At around 715pm, School of Business Administration dean Chan Ka-lok wanted to leave but was blocked. So he went back into the meeting room.

    Videos:

    Oriental Daily https://www.facebook.com/HKYDS/videos/637893936378509/

    TVB http://news.tvb.com/local/5767d07d6db28c7564dc345b/

    Now TV http://news.now.com/home/local/player?newsId=183137

    Cable TV https://www.facebook.com/bbtauseeworld/videos/501911086672940/

    HKG Pao https://www.facebook.com/368513580020590/videos/566867336851879/

    Facebook https://www.facebook.com/chankawairicky/videos/1016365941732102/

    Facebook https://www.facebook.com/chankawairicky/videos/1016608498374513/

    Resistance Live Media
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9VHMYXC3-0g
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGKceIwhqBM

    Internet comments:

    - Do you think that these are Chinese University of Hong Kong students? Or Civic Passion reporters? Or what?

    - The Buddhists believe in karma. In this case, the relevant Chinese phrase is 姑息養奸 (to tolerate is to nurture an evildoer). Joseph Sung tolerated all the shenanigans before and therefore he is reaping the harvest today.

    - Example of toleration of evil: The Chinese University of Hong Kong security guard was cut around his eye. CUHK refused to called the police. They only called an ambulance to take the security guard to the hospital where he received five stitches.

    - Did the security guard agree? Or did CUHK 'agreed' him?

    - (Oriental Daily) The Hong Kong Security Guards and Property Management Workers Association said that there has been more than 30 incidents in which demonstrators caused physical clashes. This year, there has been four incidents including Hong Kong University students charging at the council meeting and now the Chinese University of Hong Kong students charging at their council meeting. Whenever that happens, the personal safety of the security guards is at risk. The Association demanded that the government and insurance companies review how they can protect the security guards. They urged the government to prosecute the attackers and arrange for police presence.

    - I keeled over in laughter when I read in (Wen Wei Po) that the students stopped council members from leaving because they don't want the meeting to be called off due to lack of quorum. Ha ha ha. What has been happening at the Legislative Council over the past several years? Is it true that Legislative Council members can be prevented to leave by force?

    The students also said that council members cannot leave the council meeting because they have to attend to personal business. Ha ha ha. Would you care to check out absenteeism at the Legislative and District Councils?

    - (SCMP) Universities are allowing radical students to get off scot-free even when they resort to violence. By Alex Lo. June 22, 2016.

    A group of students and outside protesters wearing intimidating black masks gatecrashed a meeting of the Chinese Universitys governing council.

    They caused mayhem, resulting in the injury of a security guard. Instead of calling the police and reprimanding the students by name, council members invited two of them to the meeting. Even then, the intimidation didnt stop. They were protesting against the law that automatically makes the chief executive the head of Hong Kongs public universities.

    The university did issue a statement condemning the violence, but only in the most general terms. Well, we all know violence is not a good thing. But how about chasing, naming and punishing those responsible? Probably not.

    One of the protesters said violence was unavoidable but refused to take any responsibility. The universitys student union president, Ernie Chow Shue-fung, one of the two student representatives invited to the council meeting, said: When the situation has reached such an intense stage, some physical conflict is unavoidable.

    Tell that to the injured guard and his family that it was for a good cause. One thing we do know about administrators at our top universities well, not top anymore according to some recent international rankings is that they are generally spineless when it comes to dealing with radical students.

    Similar chaos had broken out during protests at meetings of the University of Hong Kongs council in the past year. Former HKU council member and student union president Billy Fung Jing-en had helped lay siege to them. Reprimand or at least a warning letter? Not a chance at HKU.

    The University of Chicago this month almost refused an undergraduate degree to protest leader and student body president Tyler Kissinger for helping to occupy a university building. For his action, he was hauled before a disciplinary committee that accused him of premeditated and dishonest behaviour and contributing to an unsafe situation in the building.

    He, too, was protesting for worthy causes like boycotting investments in fossil fuels, paying university workers a minimum wage of US$15 an hour and ending racist policing on campus. Ultimately, he got off scot-free but was at least taught a lesson that things you do have consequences, even if its for a good cause.

    Reprimand our student leaders? No, that would be political persecution.

    - Chris Wat Wing-yin. June 23, 2016.

    ... On the next day, the student representative was asked on radio why they used violence. The answer was that they have to exercise the public's right to violence in order to fight the System's violence.

    Excuse me, I have lived and studied for many years and I only learned the terms "public's right to violence" and "the System's violence" in recent years. But I prefer to characterize them as "word play."

    When you injured somebody, you have injured someone. If you apologize, I may still give you some respect as an upright, honest person. But now you did it and you don't want to admit it, so you package it as an act of justice. This is a disgrace to the Chinese University of Hong Kong brand.

    The incident took place at the Chinese University of Hong Kong Education Centre inside the Bank of America Tower in Admiralty. At the time, teaching classes were being held in the other rooms. A foreigner teacher was upset at being disrupted and he came out to the corridor and told the troublemakers not to disturbs. Unexpectedly, these university students who had just been screaming and yelling at the council members suddenly shut up. They were tongue-tied and only knew to stutter out one English word: "Sorry."

    This makes me wonder if the solution is to hire more foreigners to become police officers, security guards, spokespersons and mediators. As soon as these thugs see a foreigner with red hair and green eyes, they get intimidated. When the foreigners start speaking in English, the thugs will immediately raise up their hands to surrender.

    If there aren't enough white people, then there are plenty of South Asians who have rushed over to Hong Kong in recent years. As long as they speak English, they will have the best weapon against the thugs. If that isn't enough, you can hire the tall, strong black men looking for work outside Chungking Mansion. When there are black men wearing police uniforms, the thugs can't chant "Black cops" because the black men will charge them with racial discrimination at the Equal Opportunities Commission.

    I look forward to seeing this.

    - (Headline News) If I were the injured CUHK security guard. By Poon Lai-king. June 23, 2016.

    If I were the injured CUHK security guard, I would ask Vice-chancellor Joseph Sung why he didn't call the police? Aren't you the doctor who risked his own life to save others during the SARS period? Aren't you our Hero of Asia? You saw that the CUHK students and the masked men in black clothes surround the meeting venue, scream and yell. In order to maintain order, I got cut in the corner of my eye, blood gushed out and I went to the hospital to receive five stitches on my wound. The university called an ambulance, but they did not call the police.

    I am a lowly security guard. In order to protect the reputation of your university, you did not consider calling the police. You were not willing to see justice done for me. Actually, you should call the police not for my sake but for the Chinese University of Hong Kong. When my attacker is not brought to justice and punished, you are tolerating violence and it will be worse next time.

    I had hoped that someday my son would become a CUHK student. But right now I am ashamed of the actions of those students.

    CUHK Student Union president Ernie Chow was interviewed. He said that he was blockading the place that day. If he didn't get his answer, he would prevent the council members from leaving. That is imprisonment. When the security guard got injured, he refused to apologize and he refused to show any concern. He said that the security guard could have been injured by his colleagues. Besides the security guards used improper violence themselves. He refused to accept any responsibility.

    As the vice-chancellor, this would have been a great chance in education. What is respect? What is peace? What is reason? What is responsibility? But a university that is supposed to be in education hid behind a feeble statement. The students who led the way will not be punished as they should be.

    Worse yet, society is tired and numbed by the never-ending show of students acting as thugs who assault, imprison and curse out people. Reporters don't even follow up anymore.

    The university and the students are cowards. As a lowly security guard, I was not only hurt in the eye but I am broken-hearted as well.

    (Oriental Daily) June 13, 2016.

    Yesterday at around 240pm, five men who looked like mainlanders appeared near the home of Next Media chairman Jimmy Lai Chi-ying. Four of the men are between 40 to 50 years old and another man 20 to 30 years old. The younger man wore a neon yellow wind jacket and held a blue foldable umbrella in his hand.

    The five men proceeded from the bottom of the hill up the hill. Four of them walked up to Number 87, which is right across the home of Jimmy Lai. The fifth man walked up to Number 81. One of the four men used a camera to film Jimmy Lai's home as well as St. George's Court next door. Then they stood around the entrance to Lai's home. After about one minute, the four men walked down the hill and left.

    At around 430pm, three of these men were observed in Tseung Kwan O filming exterior of the Apple Daily building? So who were these men? Why were so interested in filming Jimmy Lai's home and office? So far, nobody has the answer.

    Neither Jimmy Lai nor his neighbors called the police. Most citizens would call the police if they find suspicious characters wandering around. But Jimmy Lai didn't. About 30 minutes later, sme Next Media reporter showed up at Jimmy Lai's home.

    Internet comments:

    - Derivative spoof: Who are those guys? The Hong Kong Police, or the Independent Commission Against Corruption, or a certain bureau/department in a certain Strong Nation?

    - (Oriental Daily) Next Media chairman Jimmy Lai has previously been characterized as the "black hand" behind the illegal Occupy Movement. Yesterday five mysterious men filmed outside his home and office for unexplained reasons. They had crew cuts, they carried sling bags and they wore striped t-shirts, all of which are telltale signs of mainland agents.

    The situation in Hong Kong is getting out of control, and Jimmy Lai is the biggest reason. Beijing is beginning to lose its patience. If economic punishment doesn't work, then law enforcement may be the only solution. Earlier a state leader had said: "Nobody is above the law. No lawbreaker can find excuse to evade the long arm of the law." Unfortunately the Hong Kong government has not been able to enforce the law. On one hand, the Justice Department has failed to prosecute Jimmy Lai and others. On the other hand, the courts have repeatedly failed to punish Occupy Movement lawbreakers. Under such circumstances, the five mysterious men outside Jimmy Lai's home may be a warning: If the Hong Kong government won't enforce the law, the bureau/department of the Strong Nation will come to Hong Kong and enforce the law. Before you know it, Jimmy Lai may become the next Lee Bo "who used his own method to go back to mainland China to cooperate with the investigation of the authorities."

    (Oriental Daily) June 16, 2016.

    After the court verdict on Bawang vs. Next Magazine, about 10 Bawang employees dressed in black and another 20 members of the "Support Bawang Concern Group demonstrated outside the Next Media building in Tseung Kwan O. They held banners on "Hooligan media lose public trust," "Down with Chinese traitor Jimmy Lai, give us back out national corporation," "Six years of slander finally cleared, give us justice and clear our names." Very soon, Next Media sent out reporters to film and ask: "Are you being paid?" The Concern Group members retorted: "You have no conscience. How dare you say that we are being paid?" There was a quarrel. Next Media summoned the police to keep order. The protest continued for about 40 minutes and then the demonstrators left.

    At 335pm, the demonstrators showed up outside Jimmy Lai's home in Kadoorie Avenue. In addition to the aforementioned banners, they added: "Down with Chinese traitor Lai XX!" and "Evil Next Media is media gangster!" The police were also present. The demonstrators left around 445pm. One of the demonstrators bore a resemblance to one of the five men who were here several days ago. When asked, this demonstrator only identified himself as a Bawang employee. The Bawang International Group was asked about the demonstrators, but they said that they won't comment on the spontaneous actions of certain employees.

    (Oriental Daily) June 17, 2016.

    At around noon, about 10 persons from the Justice Alliance demonstrated outside the Next Media building. They threw darts at the figure of Jimmy Lai and chanted "Down with Jimmy Lai, down with Apple Daily, down with bad media." According to Justice Alliance convener Leticia Lee, Jimmy Lai is the enemy of Hong Kong, because he libeled Bawang, persecuted public servants, conspired with the United States, gave secret donations to Legislators, incited Occupy Central, etc. "We want to cleanse Hong Kong from the mud of Jimmy Lai and keep media clean."

    At around 4pm, a group of investors who claimed to have purchased Bawang share protested outside Jimmy Lai's home. They chanted "We support the Bawang Group, we want our money back."

    At around 1230pm, Jimmy Lai left home for the Sai Kung Yacht Club. He declined to speak to the reporters waiting for him there.

    Jimmy Lai's bodyguard prevented reporters from exercising their freedom of press.

    (Oriental Daily) June 17, 2016.

    At around 2pm, a dozen people demonstrated outside Jimmy Lai's home in Kadoorie Hill. They  carried banners that said: "Down with Chinese traitor Lai XX." These members of the "Support Bawang Concern Group" shouted slogans such as "Evil Next Media is media gangster." Thirty minutes later, another dozen or so more people showed up.

    One of these demonstrators said that he was an investor in Bawang Group stocks. After Next Magazine published its libelous story on Bawang, the stock price plunged and he lost tens of thousands of dollars. Therefore he was there to demand justice from Jimmy Lai. The protest lasted until around 3pm before the demonstrators left. The police watched from the side.

    Videos:

    https://www.facebook.com/chankawairicky/videos/1015216831847013/
    https://www.facebook.com/chankawairicky/videos/1015216648513698/

    https://www.facebook.com/chankawairicky/videos/1015202728515090/
    https://www.facebook.com/chankawairicky/videos/1015202978515065/

    (Oriental Daily) June 18, 2016.

    At around 320pm, two men drove a white van to Kadoorie Avenue and walked up to Jimmy Lai's home to case the situation. About one minute later, they drove up and tossed two bottles containing fruit juice at the gate. The plastic wrap on the gate as damaged, and some fruit juice was spilled on the gate. The perpetrators left in the car. The security guard called his supervisor who came and called the police. The Police is listing this as a case of criminal damage of property. Police detectives came and gathered evidence, which includes a plastic bag and bottle caps left outside singer Kelly Chan's home, which is right across the street from Jimmy Lai's home.

    (Oriental Daily) June 21, 2016.

    At around 1050am, more than 20 young persons in their 20's arrived in a white tourist bus to protest outside Jimmy Lai's home. Some of these people wore surgical masks and sunglasses. They held banners that said: "Apple Daily's inaccurate reports misled citizens and damaged Hong Kong's reputation," "The shame of Hong Kong newspapers hurt Hong Kong and its good people." They used megaphones to chant slogans such as: "Inaccurate reporting, fictional news" and "Evil media cause trouble in Hong Kong, corrupting young people." The police were summoned. A protestor was questioned by the police, but he said that they were "spontaneously organized" to protest inaccurate reporting by Next Media. The demonstrators continued to change slogans. At 1135am, they left in the same bus.

    At 4pm, the same group of protestors plus several middle-aged men and women arrived at the scene. They unfurled banners and chanted slogans. They left by tourist bus about 20 minutes later.

    (Oriental Daily) June 22, 2016.

    At 3pm, 45 members from the Hong Kong Travel Agency Owners Association, the Hong Kong Tourism Industry Workers Association and the Justice Alliance protested outside Next Media building in Tseung Kwan O. They said that Next Media has promoted the anti-parallel protests, smeared Hong Kong and destroyed the tourism industry, such that the industry has lost $10 billion already.

    The demonstrators unfurled banners about "Chinese traitors," "eradicate the cancerous poisoned Apple Daily cells," "eradicate poisonous media," "Poisonous Apple Daily is the most shameless," etc. They chanted slogans such as "Eradicate the number one bad egg," "Insult our country, deceive our citizens," etc. The demonstrators placed a photo of Next Media chairman Jimmy Lai on the ground and tossed eggs and apples at it.

    (Oriental Daily) June 22, 2016.

    At around 3pm, more than 30 members of Justice Alliance and Peace Forum showed up with banners and placards outside Jimmy Lai's home. At around 320pm, they were joined by more than 20 tourism industry workers. The more than 60 people chanted slogans until 4pm.

    Justice Alliance convener Leticia Lee said that she was here because Next Media had published the private photos of her and her family members. Loyal Militia member Man Shek said that he was there because Next Media had sent an undercover reporter to his beauty salon in order to smear his business. "The report was 10% true and 90% false. The only thing true was the photo of the worker."

    Video: https://www.facebook.com/chankawairicky/videos/1017453364956693/

    https://www.facebook.com/chankawairicky/videos/1017482924953737/

    (Oriental Daily) June 24, 2016.

    About 20 people showed up at noon outside Jimmy Lai's home. They carried placards that said: "Dark money harms society, libel hurts businesses." They demand that the Justice Department punish those who are involved in the dark money affair. The police watched on the side. The group left at around 1pm. Meanwhile Jimmy Lai couldn't less as he went to the Sai Kung Yacht Club to take a cruise with a foreigner.

    (Oriental Daily) June 25, 2016.

    At 1030am, more than 20 demonstrators marched up to outside Jimmy Lai's home. They chanted: "Jimmy Lai is shameless," "He caused trouble to Hong Kong and its people," "He is a sinner for eternity", etc. Some of these demonstrators claimed to be investors who bought Bawang shares. Others said that they came spontaneously after reading about Jimmy Lai's secret donations. The demonstrators showed various cartoons of Jimmy Lai. They placed a photo of Jimmy Lai on he ground and stomped on it. They stayed for about 10 minutes and then they left.

    (Headline Daily) June 26, 2016.

    At around 11am, Bawang Group chairman Chen Kai-yuan and about 30 Bawang workers dressed in yellow shirts went to protest at the Next Media headquarters in Tseung Kwun O. Chen said that Next Media used freedom of the press as shield to libel a Chinese company, causing economic losses at the Bawang Group.

    (Headline Daily) June 26, 2016.

    At around 330pm, Bawang Group chairman Chen Kai-yuan and more than 30 Bawang workers arrived at Jimmy Lai's home. They held up placards and chanted slogans. They accused Next Media of using freedom of the press as shield to libel a Chinese company. Chen demanded Lai to come out and answer him. Security guards at the Lai mansion took videos. Five policemen were present to observe. The demonstrators left after one hour. Chen said: "Lai did not dare to come out when he saw that there were so many people outside."

    (Oriental Daily with video) July 9, 2016.

    Justice Alliance convener Leticia Lee and more than 10 others went to protest outside Jimmy Lai's home at 3pm. The demonstrators held up signs about Jimmy Lai quitting Taiwan and Hong Kong and is now in hiding from the people. "You better not leave until you paid the bills." They burned papers with Jimmy Lai's photo and criticized Next Media for poisoning Hong Kong.

    (Oriental Daily) July 10, 2016.

    At around 11am, 24 persons who claim to love Hong Kong protested outside Jimmy Lai's home. The demonstrators held up placards with "Support One Country Two Systems in Hong Kong, defend law and discipline." They accused Jimmy Lai of opposing China, harming Hong Kong, destroying One Country Two Systems and ignoring law and discipline. Several policemen came and took down the ID's of two of the demonstrators. The group left at 1135am.

    (Oriental Daily) July 12, 2016.

    About 20 protestors showed up outside Jimmy Lai's home at around 3pm. They claimed to be from the Secret Political Campaign Donations Concern Group. They held placards that accuse Jimmy Lai of being a Chinese/Hong Kong traitor who used secret donations and his media publications to destroy Hong Kong. The group stayed until 4pm. So far, there have been at least 15 demonstrations outside Jimmy Lai's home or the Tseung Kwun O Next Media headquarters within the past 30 days. Of these, 7 were Bawang employees or investors; 3 were by the Justice Alliance; 5 were by tourism industry and others.

    (Oriental Daily with video) July 14, 2016.

    This morning and this afternoon, about 25 went to protest at Jimmy Lai's home and the Next Media building. At around 430pm, they showed up outside Lai's home. They held placards that demand the shameless evil media return their blood-sweat money. They took out photos of Jimmy Lai and trampled them. According to the security guards nearby, this same group showed up in the morning too.

    (Oriental Daily) July 17, 2016.

    At noon, about 20 persons demonstrated out Jimmy Lai's home. They held up placards saying "Black Gold corrupting Hong Kong" and "selling out Hong Kong for money," and they chanted slogans such as "Jimmy Lai is the shame of the media." They sat for about 2 hours before leaving.

    (Oriental Daily) July 18, 2016.

    At noon, abot 20 persons demonstrated outside the ICAC Headquarters in North Point. They held placards such as "uproot Fat Lai and purify Hong Kong," etc. These people claimed to be from the Anti-Black Gold Concern Group. They held up photos of Jimmy Lai and pan-democratic legislators who have taken money from Lai. There were also placards saying things like "Fai Lai has to face the law, Black Gold has to be buried" and "Long Hair has to go to jail, the Legislative Council has to be reformed."

    At around 430pm, this group went to Jimmy Lai's home to demonstrate. They stayed for around 14 minutes. So far there has been at least 20 demonstration against Jimmy Lai at his home in Ho Man Tin or the Next Media Headquarters in Tseung Kwan O.

    (Oriental Daily) July 19, 2016.

    At around 11pm, about 30 persons demonstrated outside Jimmy Lai's home in spite of the hot weather. They chanted slogans such as "Black gold harming Hong Kong!" They dispersed peacefully after 10 minutes. They told the reporters that they are spontaneously organized and do not belong to any political party or organization.

    At around 230pm, another group of 30 or so persons who also said that they do not belong to any political party or organization demonstrated outside Jimmy Lai's home. They held up placards saying "Chinese traitor Jimmy Lai, black gold legislator Lee Cheung Yan, they are bad people for opposing China and harming Hong Kong." They waved the Chinese and HKSAR flags and used imperfect Cantonese to chant "Jimmy Lai, get out of Hong Kong.) They left around 250pm.

    (Oriental Daily) July 20, 2016.

    At 240pm, about 20 persons showed up outside Jimmy Lai's home. They said that they are connected with any political party or organization. They stood silently while holding placards that read: "Poisonous Media harming Hong Kong, black gold hurting China." They left around 350pm.

    (Oriental Daily) July 22, 2016.

    At 1130am, around 30 persons not belonging to any political party or organization demonstrated outside Jimmy Lai's office. They changed slogans and trampled upon balloons with Jimmy Lai's image. At around 3pm, they came back and put Jimmy Lai's effigy on an air balloon in the shape of a dog. They left around 15 minutes later.

    (Oriental Daily) July 25, 2016.

    At around 10am, 20 persons who said that they don't belong to any political party or organization demonstrated outside Jimmy Lai's home. They chanted slogans such as "Dark money politics with Jimmy Lai, poisonous media Jimmy Lai, libelous court cases aplenty." They left around noon.

    (Oriental Daily) July 27, 2016.

    At around 11am, about 30 persons who claimed to be spontaneously organized demonstrated outside Jimmy Lai's home. They held up signs that said: "We must the Bawang Group Concern Group, down with Chinese traitor Jimmy Lai." They left in about 10 minutes before the police even showed up.

    (Oriental Daily) July 28, 2016.

    At around 220am, 18 persons demonstrated outside Jimmy Lai's home. They held up a longer banner that read: "Chinese traitor Jimmy Lai uses dark money to sell out the country, Next Media manufactures rumors to cause trouble for Hong Kong and its people." They left after about 1 hour.

    (Oriental Daily) July 29, 2016.

    At around 10am, about 20 persons who claimed to be spontaneously organized demonstrated outside Jimmy Lai's home. They carried placards saying things such as "Support Hong Kong's One Country Two Systems" and chanted slogans. They stayed for about 1 hour and left. Fifteen minutes later, they returned and chanted: "Down with Jimmy Lai!" "Jimmy Lai is a national traitor" "Jimmy Lai causes trouble for the nation and its people!" "Jimmy Lai's dark money causes trouble" They stayed for around 5 minutes before leaving.

    (Oriental Daily) July 30, 2016.

    At around 1150am, more than 20 spontaneously organized persons demonstrated outside Jimmy Lai's home. They brought a toy dog with Jimmy Lai's face to show that Lai is a running dog for the Americans. They brought a toy guillotine to behead the dog. They kept chanting "Down with Jimmy Lai". They left peacefully after abut 30 minutes.

    (Oriental Daily) August 7, 2016.

    At around 230pm, around 20 people who claimed to be spontaneously organized demonstrated outside Jimmy Lai's home. They carried a banner with "News fiction-writing to mislead citizens, evil man selling out Hong Kong and the nation." They stayed for more than one hour before leaving.

    (Oriental Daily) August 8, 2016.

    At around 230pm, a group of about 20 individuals who claimed to be Hong Kong patriotic Internet users demonstrated outside Jimmy Lai's home. They displaced a banner with the words: "Trash Lai start Hong Kong independence after failure in Occupy Central, Hong Kong independence funder Lai wants to split up the nation." According to the organizer Cho Tat-ming, Jimmy Lai is the behind-the-scene "black hand" who is backing Hong Kong independence. They left after about 1 hour.

    (Oriental Daily) August 9, 2016.

    At around 1130am, around 30 people who claimed to spontaneously organized demonstrated outside Jimmy Lai's home. They carried placards that said: "Dark money causing chaos in Hong Kong, Canine Lai is shameless." They trampled upon a plastic doll with Lai's image and kicked it. They left after around 30 minutes.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) June 16, 2016.

    Recently returned bookseller Lam Wing-kee has said that he was only allowed to return to Hong Kong from China if he agreed to travel back with a hard drive full of evidence from his book store. Lam the founder of Causeway Bay Books, which sells political gossip titles banned in China returned to the city on Tuesday. He was due to return to China on Thursday but held a surprise press conference at the legislature with lawmaker Albert Ho instead to expose what really happened during his eight month detention. Lam Wing-kee.

    The hard drive demanded by the Chinese authorities contained sales records from the bookstore. Lam said that Lee Bo, another bookseller who returned to Hong Kong in March, copied a hard drive of customer records. Lam was asked to look through the records to identify customers.

    The records include some 600 people, mostly mainlanders, and some 4,000 book titles.

    I was afraid my readers would be affected, that they would think Hong Kong people or I sold them out, he said. But I did not do so Now they were doing something even worse asking me to bring them a hard drive as evidence.

    He said he was accompanied back to Hong Kong by two men. One was surnamed Chen a chief and another surnamed Shi. They separated after crossing the border as they could not be seen near him. He added that Shi treated him kindly but was not allowed to speak to him.

    Lam said that he could not read any information when he was in the mainland, and that he felt touched when he returned to Hong Kong and read that 6,000 supporters had marched for the release of the booksellers in January.

    I watched videos on my phone for two days, he said. I dont know these 6,000 people they spoke out for the five of us, our small bookstore I am thankful.

    He said he was supposed to return to the mainland on Thursday and hand over the hard drive to a central special unit. However, after seeing the support from Hongkongers, he hesitated at the Kowloon Tong MTR station en route to the border.

    He said he spoke out after coming back because he was less burdened in that his family was not on the mainland. He said he had dinner with his sister and a phone conversation with his son upon returning to Hong Kong.

    Lam said that, on the day he was accosted on the mainland last October, he was originally planning to visit his girlfriend, who he met after living away from his family. She was also detained on the mainland as she had helped him with sending banned books into China. She was released on bail.

    I am sorry for my girlfriend, he said. But I dont consider this a personal matter anymore, rather a matter for the whole of society Hong Kong people were forced without any way out. He said it was unacceptable that his colleague Lee Bo was kidnapped from Hong Kong.

    Hong Kong has rule of law I am not afraid for my personal safety, and I do not plan to go to the mainland again, he said. This is the red line for Hong Kong people Hong Kong people will not give in to the powerful regime.

    Regarding the booksellers that returned to Hong Kong and went to the mainland again, he said he hoped the Chinese government would treat them well. Just like God treats human beings well I only hope for that, he said.

    Five booksellers from the Causeway Bay store went missing from Thailand, China and Hong Kong last year. The whereabouts of Swedish national Gui Minhai are still unknown. The UK and the US governments, and the European Union, have expressed concern over the issue.

    Lam founded and operated the banned book store before it was purchased by Mighty Current in 2014. He last used his computer at the shop on October 23 and was reported missing by his wife on November 5. He called his wife the next day to say he was safe, following media reports of his disappearance. He was confirmed to be in China on February 4 this year.

    Lam stood accused of being involved in illegal activities on the mainland. Chinese authorities said that criminal compulsory measures were imposed upon him and he was under investigation.

    (SCMP) June 16, 2016.

    A bookseller who went missing for nearly eight months and only returned to Hong Kong from the mainland this week described on Thursday his harrowing detention at a border crossing and sustained efforts by authorities there to extract information from him.

    Lam Wing-kee also stated during a 70-minute press briefing that fellow bookseller Lee Po told him he had been taken away from Hong Kong contrary to Lees contention after his release on March 24 that he had entered and left the mainland voluntarily.

    The Hongkonger said mainland police detained him on October 24 while he was visiting Shenzhen and offered to release him if he could hand over a Causeway Bay Books hard drive listing readers who had bought books from his business, and that they had asked him to return to the mainland on Thursday with it. I did not return, he said before a packed briefing room at the Legislative Council complex. Of course, I dared not return.

    Lam said he thought the authorities were more concerned about who wrote the books that were sold at the Causeway Bay establishment than who purchased them. I suspect they wanted to know who wrote them, he said. But I dont know the authors. I only sell the books. And as many people know, the contents are not always reliable.

    He claimed he had been kept alone in a room measuring about 200 or 300 sq ft for five months following his detention. He added he had lost sleep the last two nights since returning to Hong Kong.

    Lam said he was taken from Shenzhen to Ningbo in Zhejiang province by train, one day after he was intercepted at Lo Wu Control Point in the New Territories. I was handcuffed and my eyes were covered, he said. It took about 13 or 14 hours. I noticed I was taken to Ningbo, because I glimpsed the station when we got off the train.

    Recalling his detention, he said: I was afraid, feeling helpless. I didnt know what would happen or if there would be a trial. I was alone. I couldnt believe this could have happened to me, he continued. It was very surreal I hoped it was only a dream.

    During November, December, January, February, and March, for five months, I was detained in a 200 or 300 sq ft room, he added. For 24 hours, six groups of people took turns watching me. I was allowed no outside communication, no lawyer.

    Lam said he was detained for questioning in a large compound a 45-minute car ride away from the station. He also claimed he was not told what offence he had committed until after he was taken to Ningbo. He said he believed the officers detaining him were not from the national security council.

    As for his confession on mainland TV in February. It was a show, and I accepted it, he said. They gave me the script. I had to follow the script. If I did not follow it strictly, they would ask for a retake.

    On Lees earlier claim that he went to the mainland voluntarily, Lam said: Obviously, it was exactly the same situation in which I was forced to make a televised confession.

    He said he was not told what offence he had committed until after he was taken to Ningbo. He said he believed the officers detaining him were not from the national security council.

    Lam, one of five individuals associated with Causeway Bay Books who went missing over a three-month period from October last year, was accompanied by Democratic Party lawmaker Albert Ho Chun-yan at the partys office in Legco.

    Upon his return to Hong Kong, Lam asked local police to drop their probe into his missing person case. He also told them he did not need help from the authorities, according to a government statement issued on Tuesday.

    Police stated Lam declined to give further details.

    The request to abandon investigative efforts mirrored the approach taken by Lams three Hong Kong associates who returned home before him, despite unanswered questions about the circumstances of their disappearances and concerns that they had been kidnapped by mainland agents acting beyond their jurisdiction.

    (SCMP) June 17, 2016.

    Q: Did the Hong Kong government give you any protection at all?
    Lam    : No

    Q: Is there anything you want to say to Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying? He kept saying that he has been following up on the cases of you and the others.
    A:     I have nothing to say to him. He cant do anything, so what is there to say?

    A: I was very afraid. I was alone. I didnt know how they would deal with me. I didnt know whether there would be a trial. At the time, I couldnt believe this could happen to me. It was very surreal. I thought I was in another world and even hoped my situation was a dream and not reality. As a Hongkonger, I am a free man. I did not commit any crimes but I was locked up for no reason for five months.

    Q: After this incident, is there anything you would like to say to Hongkongers?
    A:     I hope Hongkongers will say no to an authoritarian regime.

    Q: Do you think that in the circumstances Hong Kong finds itself, we can really say no to an authoritarian regime?
    A:     I can do it, so why cant you?

    Q: Have you thought what might happen to Hong Kongs freedom if you didnt come and speak out today?
    A:     If I didnt come out to say anything, freedom of speech and publication in Hong Kong would continue to be attacked. I dont want to see this happen.

    Q: How was the interview on Phoenix TV conducted?
    A:     I dont know about the others. But for me there was a director, a script.

    Q: Which parts (of the script) were contrary to your true beliefs ?
    A:     They said I had committed crimes, thats already against what I thought. I dont think I committed any crimes.

    Q: During the interview, you admitted the books were all made up and expressed regret, are these not your words?
    A:     These are the things they made me say. They wanted me to admit them. I couldnt not admit them.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) Full, complete transcript of returned bookseller Lam Wing-kees press conference and Q&A

    Last October 24th, when I crossed the Shenzhen border to visit my girlfriend in Dongguan, I was detained by Shenzhen police.

    So when I was detained, I asked them what crimes had I committed. I kept asking for an entire day, and nobody was able to answer me. I recalled that when I crossed the border, the gate closed. I was trapped at the crossing, and then two officers pointed and then a few more customs officers came. I dont know if this counts as detainment.

    They took me to a corner on the left, and they probably recognised me. And then there were a few people, I remember there were at least 11 people, they took me away to examine [me], and then [we went] to the Shenzhen police station, where they confiscated my identification documents.

    At that time I went after them and asked what crimes I had committed. All along nobody answered me so I could only sit inside the police station, the place where I was detained, until it was nighttime. There, someone who asked me Your surname is Lam, right?

    My ID and everything had been taken away when I was crossing the border, so I was in the police station that night. I was in the criminals chair. I sat there and I could not sleep, but of course there was food provided for me to eat. Around 7 oclock, very early [in the morning], the people from the police station and some who took me away gave me breakfast to eat. [Then] I remember I sat in a car and was headed to the North of China, heading in that direction.

    As they were taking me away, they handcuffed me. I wore an eye mask and they gave me a baseball cap almost covering me entirely, and I sat on the train, and sometimes I sneaked a peek [to see] just what crimes had I committed and where was I going. I sat on the train for a total of 13 to 14 hours and then later on I found that they had taken me to some place in Ningbo I saw that when we got off.

    [After] getting off the train, they took me to a large compound which was about 45 minutes away by car. They took me to one of the rooms on maybe the second floor, and they searched me, and that night I also asked them what crimes I had committed, and still no one could answer me. And then the next day, around the afternoon, someone came and did a news piece with me and at that time they did not tell me what crimes I had committed.

    They detained me, they only gave me two pieces of paper and asked me to sign my name.

    On one piece of paper, there were two conditions one is that I promise to give up my rights to contact my family, the other is to promise not to hire a lawyer.

    Under these conditions, in reality I did not have any ways to find anyone who could give me any suggestions. I was alone so I could only sign the paper because the situation was that I could not refuse to sign the paper, so They started asking me my position at the bookstore, and if I was previously the owner of that bookstore. It is the Causeway Bay Bookstore.

    They also asked me why I continuously helped mainlanders send books [into the mainland], where I had made my profits from at the bookstore, what made me sell [the bookstore] to the publisher Mighty Current, what relationship did I have with Mighty Current before that. And of course we are a legitimate bookstore according to Hong Kong law, running a typical small bookstore for Hong Kong is legal.

    At first they said because in Hong Kong I brought or sent some banned books into the mainland that I had broken their law and they said that books published in Hong Kong are basically not allowed  to be sent or brought into the mainland, and that counts as an illegal activity. Then they said that they might prosecute me afterwards because I had broken their law by sending books from 2013 till 2015. Before that I had also brought some books across the border.

    One time I was discovered by them, and they verbally warned me, detaining me for a few hours.

    They also said that me bringing books [into the mainland] broke laws of the Chinese government. After that time I no longer dared to bring books and switched [my] thinking.

    Some readers like to read. Hong Kong is a free [place] where you can read and publish and I thought that on one hand it was a necessity [of running the bookstore], on the other hand it also satisfies mainland readers and situations they want to understand.

    So I helped them send books from Hong Kong. My situation is legal in Hong Kong and did not violate any Hong Kong laws so I did not understand why my sending books from Hong Kong had violated their laws. If they think I had broken Chinese law they can, in Hong Kong, go through criminal prosecution or the court to prosecute me because there is such a space and such condition.

    Why did the Chinese government when I was crossing the border say nothing and suddenly detained me? Of course in this process they did not give me any difficulties, they gave me food to eat there was a doctor for me to see, there was a place for me to sleep. But from October 24th, apart from one night in Shenzhen [I sat] on a train to go to Ningbo, November December January February March, five months I was in a room of around 200-300 square feet. 24 hours.

    Two in a group, six groups of people took turns monitoring me in the 24 hours. Took away all my freedoms.

    I want to ask whether this detainment is necessary before they charged me. They beautified it and said that it was monitored living. I didnt even [have the chance to] do anything wrong. I could only look up into the sky. I could not hire a lawyer. I was not allowed to call my family.

    I didnt know that such a big and strong Chinese government could do [this] to a bookstore. To think that it has violated Chinese laws, that it can treat people like that.

    I want to invite relevant departments in the Chinese government to give me an explanation, because this incident is not just a personal matter or a matter of Causeway Bay Books. It is a matter of Hongkongers rights, the freedom to read anything.

    You say One Country, Two Systems. Please regarding Hong Kongs freedoms my personal experience, as well as my colleagues, did the Chinese government violate One Country, Two Systems? We dont need to do anything to make a fuss. We just need to watch.

    Justice is in our hearts. That is why I had come out [to speak] through Albert Ho, to meet with Hong Kong and world media, saying what I want to say.

    After March, they let me go to Shaoguan. Shaoguan was better but I could not leave a certain area in Shaoguan. They rented a room for me to live long term, to intend for me to live long term from around April, because they released me in March. I lived there until now, June. The time there was more relaxing and the let me read freely.

    They arranged accommodations for me and they successfully requested that Mighty Current, as a compensation for dismissal, pay me HK$100,000 [to cover my] living expenses. This is what they did to take care of us and this was what let me solve daily problems while I was staying there, a sort of compensation for us. But this, personally, I was not the one requesting this. The only thing I hoped to request was freedom.

    Until just now, the day before yesterday, because I had always requested to come back to Hong Kong to meet with my family and my teacher, we talked for a very long time before they agreed [to let me go]. But they had a condition. They requested that I take the hard disk with records of those who we sent books to in the past and bring it back to them as evidence.

    When they had interrogated me before, I did not think that they would do this. From what I remember, [they asked] Lee Bo to copy [information from] a hard disk for them in Hong Kong and they showed me the information on a computer. They asked me to identify who had ordered books and what relations I had with them.

    I knew that they will investigate those readers according to the information. Why I am speaking about this here is because I didnt want to risk it. The thing I am scared of is that my readers will be affected and that they will think that we Hongkongers, or me, betrayed them. But I did not do that.

    At first I thought that telling [the guards] directly, they will have the information but not the physical object. But I didnt expect that they will find someone to copy it from Hong Kong. Now its getting so bad that they are asking me to get the hard drive for them as evidence for court.

    When I had come over [to Hong Kong], they did not let me go alone. There as a director surnamed Chen and then there was a Mr Shi. Mr Shi was very nice to me. He looked after me and for this I am personally very grateful towards him. He had always looked after me. But policy wise many things were not up to him.

    I have a girlfriend because I met her after I separated from my wife. I hope that this is made clear I met her after I separated from my wife. She is still in the mainland now. Because I had asked her to help me send some books, meaning that it also involves her, that she is also seen as having violated Chinese law and is in the same situation as me. She is now on bail and awaiting trial and is living in the mainland.

    I have a few colleagues who are in Hong Kong who have to go back to the mainland, for example, Lee Bo and Lui Por. Cheung Chi-ping is in the mainland. I hope that the Chinese government will not, because of this incident [my press conference], cause trouble for my friends and colleagues. I hope that the Chinese government will treat them kindly just like how God treats people kindly. I can only hope that it is like that.

    In the two days since I came back to Hong Kong, I actually almost did not sleep at all. Because I didnt have information in the mainland, I completely did not understand what happened because of this incident [of the missing booksellers]. I looked up information for two days, news for two days. I am very touched, especially because of the 6,000 protesters who went on the streets. These 6,000 people are all Hongkongers and I do not know them. They can do this for the five of us, a small publisher, a bookstore, to speak out for us and voice their support.

    I am very grateful because of these five people, compared to them, I have less [connections in the mainland]. At least my family is not in the mainland, only my girlfriend. I feel sorry for this girlfriend of mine, but I thought about the fact that this matter is no longer my own. It matters to the entire society, Hong Kong society, and everybodys demands for freedom.

    The Chinese government has left Hong Kong people with nowhere else to retreat to. This is the bottom line. Especially since Lee Bo was kidnapped. This is something we cant acceptcrossing the border and enforcing the law. If you say this is One Country, Two Systems what problems does this have? I dont want to go into it.

    I reiterate, this evidence here is I was willing. Ive thought about this carefully. Hong Kong is a place of rule of law and there is still a protection of rights. Im not worried about my personal safety here. I also do not plan to go to the mainland in the future.

    I only want to convey one message here. Hong Kong people there are a lot of Hong Kong reporters here were all pretty much in the same boat. Myself, or my colleagues at the bookstore, lost our freedom. This will happen to all of you in the future. This is for sure. If nobody speaks out, if I, the one of five with the smallest burden, doesnt speak out, there is no salvation for Hong Kong.

    I will do everything I can. Everything I can. I had to muster a lot of courage. I thought about it all night for two nights, until I could half make sense of it. and tell everyone, and tell everyone in the world. If we dont consider this my personal matter Hong Kong people have a baseline. Hong Kong people will not submit to authority.

    Ho: There are a lot of people here. Ill pick people to ask questions.

    Mr. Lam, can you say who arrested you and did they tell you clearly, at the end, what crime you committed, and was national security involved? And was Gui Minhais video the same situation as yours, made voluntarily?

    When they caught me in Shenzhen, they didnt tell me what crime I had committed.

    And now?

    When I reached Ningbo and they were interrogating me, thats when someone told me I had broken the business law.

    Because of the books?

    The books. It was also because I was in Hong Kong sending books to the mainland for readers. You asked who they were? They never told me, up until now. But I heard. They werent national security, and they werent police.

    The military?

    Not military either. They were the Central Special Unit. On this, Iexcept for hearing it during the Cultural Revolution, I dont know. If you say Central Special Unit or whatever if they can use this Central Special Unit, I think we should all think about what Central Special Unit means. Im really not sure.

    Were you the only one in Ningbo, or were the others in Ningbo as well? Also did you see the others afterwards?

    No. I only knew that the others were in Ningbo as well.

    You knew the others were in Ningbo. Did you have tea together? There were reports that said you drank tea together.

    Drinking tea together was arranged by them. They took us to a place called Shenzhen Kylin Villa and at the time, Lee Bo gaveeveryone, all three of usthe HK$100,000 to us as a severance fee. It was to cover our living expenses to stay in the mainland.

    Do you think the Hong Kong government, in saving people

    Im not aware of anyone that the Hong Kong government has saved.

    Everyone else has already been let go. Why were you released so late?

    Was it because you wouldnt give in?

    No, Im not that brave.

    Im just a regular Hong Kong person. If they wanted me to sign, I signed. If they wanted me to act in a video, I acted. Minhais videoGui Minhais video, did you answer the way they told you to? On Phoenix TV.

    I dont know about the others, but I had a director and a script that they wanted me to read.

    What was it like at the time?

    At the time, if I couldnt remember they would give me more time, and I would write it out.

    From the beginning, how did they tell you to say it how long

    In they said it was illegal business operations, going to the mainland to sell books

    Can you tell us about the entire set up for the video interview?

    Its very simple. They mainly wanted me to read. One part was taken from the evidence letter I wrote. If they werent satisfied we would add to it or take away. They wanted me to remember it, and then in the video say it according to the script. Thats it, but of course they had not used physical force on me.

    But which parts were done according to your wishes?

    Well, they think I committed a crime but of course I dont agree. I really dont think I committed a crime.

    In the video you said you knew the books were made up

    Thats right.

    You said you realised you were wrong. What about this?

    Well, thats what they thought. They wanted me to admit it. I couldnt not admit it.

    Mr. Lam, you said a director brought you back to Hong Kong

    I dont know if he was a director thats what I heard.

    So someone accompanied you to Hong Kong, at least is that cross border law enforcement?

    Thats your interpretation, I dont know.

    Did he say he was kidnapped in Hong Kong?

    I dont want to sayat the time the situation was being monitoredbut everything should have been recorded. I was still in Shenzhen.

    Can you tell us how you came back to Hong Kong? [inaudible] 

    I said whatever they told me to say.

    Has anyone said or implied that if you break the law again that they would bring you back? And now youre holding a press conference, are you afraid that this will impact your family? And members of the media have photographed a woman outside your home, was that a sex scandal?

    Of course that was my woman. That was my woman but whether it was a sex scandal or not depends on what evidence they have. For myself, no. Or I can tell you, when I was in Shaoguan at 1 in the middle of the night, there were two small cars that pulled up. I dont have anyone in Shaoguan, no friends. They knocked on my door at one in the morning I opened the door to see.

    One tall, one short. They didnt say anything. I understood at the time that they were probably looking for business. I told them that they had found the wrong person. I dont know if

    Actually the two didnt know Cantonese. One asked me, he didnt understand, what? And they were blocking the door, not letting me close it. I was surprised. Its rare that theyre so bold. So I told them again that they had the wrong person. They closed the door and left. This was weird, right?

    Do you think it was the authorities?

    I dont know, I cant say. I just remembered this. Just now when I was here with Albert Ho, he showed me. This thing happened out of the blue, I dont know whether it has anything to do with it.

    How is Gui Minhai doing? He said in the video that he was involved in a car accident some ten years ago and killed someone

    I saw that stuff too, but I dont know what his situation is.

    I want to ask why it took so long for you to come back.

    It took so long because they took that long to release me.

    When you were required to read the scripts or to sign papers, when you seemed unwilling, did they imply that something would happen to you, or ?

    They didnt need to imply anything. In that situation, you couldnt not sign.

    The condition for your return was to bring back the records for the book, do you ?

    It was a store of readers information.

    Did you promise to bring it to them and did they say when you had to return to report to them?

    They came yesterday to get the computer. In Hong Kong, someone called Chan was helping them, I heard. I dont know who he is. In the bookstore, gave it to Lee Bo.

    They might have taken the wrong one. Yesterday I went up myself to bring the hard disk back to the hotel. At night I looked again and they had taken everything. It wasnt the one I used to use. So I told the two people accompanying me that I needed to get the original one I was using. So I went up and grabbed the one I used to use. That means it has our readers data on it whether from the mainland or from other places. But the hard drive I didnt give it to them.

    At Kowloon Tong, I went out of the station. And last night and tonight and afterwards I didnt give it to them. Seeing 6000 people on the streets and chanting for us, if I, as a Hong Konger,I dont say anything, out of us five I have the lightest burden, I thought I had to come out and disclose everything.

    When do you have to go back to see them?

    Ho: They are asking if you will go back up?

    They originally wanted me to go back today.

    Ho: Let him finish, okay?

    I answered them.

    Ho: No, they asked if you would go back up?

    Of course I wont.

    But are you worried that theyll bring you back up, like Lee Bo?

    Theres nothing I can do about that. That depends on the Hong Kong government and whether our safety is guaranteed in HK. This will tell us whether our lives are guaranteed in Hong Kong.

    Will you ask the Hong Kong police for help?

    I would rather ask Albert Ho. I dont know if [Chan] was a director. I heard

    There were mainlanders coming to Hong Kong with you. What was that situation like? Can you elaborate? Where did they bring you?

    In Shaoguan, they bought train tickets and then gave me back my ID. Those people split up. They were a little worried that they would be photographed. Whether it was cross-border law enforcement, I dont know. The process was like that. They split up with me in Hong Kong. They didnt dare stay with me. I can only contact Lee Bo myself.

    How did you get away actually?

    Because you from when you returned to Hong Kong until you came to this press conference there was somebody following you, like this morning.

    I dont know I dont know if there was anybody following me.

    But how did you get rid of the two?

    They did not dare to appear next to me in Hong Kong.

    The Mr Chan you just mentioned, is he the one who took over Causeway Bay Books?

    Thats what Ive heard.

    Could you say some more about this?

    I am not clear about this. TheyI heard Mr. Lee say that [Chan] was going to take over the bookstore, but who was behind this I dont know.

    These few days, didnt you just say

    (correcting the reporter) These two days

    That you went with him to the bookstore together to get stuff

    I didnt go up to Causeway Bay Books I only went to Lee Bos office.

    With him?

    No. Mr Chan I have heard Mr Chan took the computer to Lee Bo and I went to take it at Lee Bos office.

    I want to ask whether you know where your case is in in the prosecution process? That is when will you go to court?

    Can you talk about the legal process in the mainland?

    I dont know about legal process.

    Or when you will or when will the case be judged or sentenced and everything?

    No idea. No they only said that I am on bail and awaiting trial.

    I want to ask about closing the case. Did the mainland police ask you to close the case with the Hong Kong police?

    Yes. I answered that just now.

    Mr Lam, you mentioned that what happened

    Ho: He does not speak English.

    Mr Lam I want to clarify whether Lee Bo had taken the bookstores hard drive with readers information on it or  was it all Mr Chan bringing it up?

    And do you completely

    Chan I heard that Chan took the hard drive to Lee Bo, and I went to Lee Bos office to take it.

    This all happened in Hong Kong?

    Yes.

    Before, there were rumours saying that you were arrested because

    I took the wrong one the first time, the second time was OK.

    Before, there were rumours saying that you were arrested because there were some books related to [Chinese President] Xi Jinping.

    Actually, you were up there for a few months this time, the whole interview process do you think it is related to what you guys published or do you think they just want to catch those who are reading banned books?

    Those who read banned books are probably not a big deal. I suspect that they are trying to get information on those who wrote the books because they asked me whether I knew some of the authors.

    Which books authors did they ask you about?

    Yes, and what kind of person wrote them.

    So which kinds of books?

    Did they say in particularly which book or all books?

    Books about Chinese senior official, sources, power struggles, or about sex scandals news.

    Can you give some examples?

    I am not clear on this.

    But they had asked you so did you give [information], actually?

    We dont even know we just sell books.

    So you did not know of these information?

    We did not know.

    So Lee Bo and Gui Minhai did?

    Not possible, because a lot of these information, as everybody knows, not reliable.

    Do they have information on the authors?

    That I am not clear about.

    Mr Lam, did you make contact with other colleagues?

    The first time it was eating in Shenzhen, because they had arranged it at Kylin Villa.

    Why did they arrange for you guys to have a meal?

    Did they clarify whether Lee Bo or Gui Minhai had been kidnapped?

    No, they did not mention these things. We only talked about daily happenings.

    When you were being interviewed, that time on Phoenix?

    They were not clear about it and I was being interviewed. I was being interviewed, not interviewed, being interviewed.

    So not being interviewed together?

    No.

    What did they use to did they use that drag things on? You just said that you needed to eat as well what does that mean?

    You have fear. What they wanted to do we dont know. Personally, I did not know.

    I want to ask if you will consider reporting to the police or request personal protection because you just said, are you afraid that the mainland will be angry and will find someone to take you back to the mainland after you held the press conference? What kind of protection will you seek?

    I did not think about this at all.

    Do you think that the Hong Kong Police cannot protect you?

    Seeing the Admiralty incident we know, the tear bombs, the students without any weapons.

    So you dont think the Hong Kong Police is standing on the side of the Hong Kong citizens?

    I see that they really dont.

    Do you have anything to say to [Chief Executive] Leung Chun-ying? Because he said that he had already done a lot regarding this matter. But do you have anything to say?

    Regarding this we have nothing to say. what is there to say.

    Did you completely not see how the Hong Kong SAR government protected you in this case?

    No, no.

    In 2012 your bookstore was bought by Mighty Current

    2013, no, 2014.

    And up to now, do you think that you are being implicated by Mighty Current because of their publication business and you are selling books. Do you think that way?

    We are in the same boat. What happens to them may happen to us. What happens to us may also happen to anybody.

    Mr. Lam do you know about Lee Bo or Lui Pors situation right now and are you afraid of holding this press conference and revealing the situation that it will be

    I am afraid of the situation of those colleagues who are staying [in the mainland] or will have to go to the mainland in the future. I hope that the Chinese government will treat them kindly.

    Your family in Hong Kong, did they get harassed or investigated?

    As far as I know, no.

    Do you think that all five [booksellers] are innocent?

    I am not sure about Gui Minhai. If it is simply about mailing or publishing what they think is banned books, then from the perspective of Hongkongers, there is no crime.

    Did Gui write some books?

    I am not very clear about this.

    Can you tell us about the hard drive? The hard drives containing the mainland readers information. Did Lee Bo take the hard drive?

    He copied it. As I know he copied.

    But not the hard drive?

    The hard drive stayed at the bookstore

    So has it been taken into the mainland or not?

    No.

    So it is still in your hands?

    Yes, I am keeping it

    So I want to ask the central government

    I dont want to give a bad impression to mainland Chinese people, that I would give such half copy [evidence] to the Chinese government, I did not want [them to think] that.

    Is it true that without the hard copy there would not be enough evidence to [interrupted by Lam]?

    I do not know that. I do not understand law.

    Does the central government have information about your clients?

    Pardon?

    Does the central government now have information about the people who you sent books to?

    Yes, because Lee Bo copied the files for them. They showed the files to me in Ningbo, asked me to confirm them.

    How many people were in the files?

    I estimated it must have been about 500 to 600 people. As for books, they counted, there were more than 4000.

    Were those information about mainland readers or Hong Kong readers?

    Both. But majority were mainland readers.

    Did they tell you they were going to find these people?

    No idea.

    Mr Lam what is your plan to ensure your own safety. You said you dont trust the police.

    [Lam turns to Ho] Ho: I think today Mr Lam has told us his situation in this press conference. If anything happens to him, it wont be that he took a shampoo boat back to the mainland. (A shampoo boat is a boat running illegally between Guangdong and Hong Kong on which passengers can solicit prostitutes. This is a reference to lawmaker Ng Leung-sings earlier comment that the five booksellers were caught on such boats.) You would know what happened to him.

    Ho: I believe we are an open society. Media workers, you have the freedom and obligation to cover many important events comprehensively. I hope, I believe that your attention is the best protection for Mr Lam, and me also.

    Has anyone told you to admit that everything was Guis fault?

    What they asked me to admit was that I mailed the books. I did mail the books.

    After this incident, do you have anything to say to the Hong Kong people?

    Er I hope Hongkongers can say no to hegemony.

    But do you think we can still say no under the current circumstances?

    I can, why cant you?

    Would you continue working in the publishing industry?

    Its possible I may.

    Mr Lam will you seek political refuge elsewhere?

    I am a Hongkonger, born and raised here. I dont need to leave Hong Kong.

    Do you have regrets about all this, about sending books to mainland?

    Why regret? Sending books is legal in Hong Kong. If they think I broke the law then [approach me] through legal means. [They] shouldnt have detained me. This I cannot accept. Hong Kong is a society ruled by law.

    Mr Lam do you have your identification papers? You said they were taken away from you.

    They gave them back to me when they let me go. They gave me back my HKID card. The home return permit I didnt want.

    Does your family know you were going to hold this press conference?

    I called my wife and my sister just now.

    Do you worry about their safety?

    They should be fine. I am not that worried.

    There has been a rumour that the authorities in mainland arranged for you to work in a library. Could you tell us about that?

    The library was just a place for me to spend my time.

    Where was it?

    It was the Shaoguan Library.

    Albert, now you have evidence about what really happened in this case, what are you going to do to pursue justice?

    Ho: First of all, I think theres a blatant non-compliance on the part of the mainland authority in failing to provide information about Hong Kong citizens being put under compulsory criminal measures in China, OK? With all particulars as soon as reasonably recognised. In fact he has been confined for some many months before information that he was under compulsory measure was notified to the Hong Kong government.

    Ho: And in fact a lot of material information was missing, such as the reason for the compulsory criminal measure, place where the measure was put in place and also the reason, ok? So I think the Hong Kong government should follow up and ask for a full account as to why there was such a blatant non-compliance.

    Ho: And secondly, we are of course still very concerned about Mr Lee Bo, who obviously had been kidnaped and forced to go to the border to the mainland. This matter is not closed and we got to pursue further until a satisfactory explanation is given to us.

    Ho: Thirdly about his personal safety. I dont think from what he told us he committed any offence on the mainland. All the books were mailed out from Hong Kong. OK? All the books were published in Hong Kong. And within the territory of Hong Kong all these acts are lawful. So theres no reason he should be detained, or threatened to be prosecuted for certain acts committed in Hong Kong, which are perfectly lawful.

    Ho: I think again the mainland government ought to explain. I think everybody, every hong kong citizen, including the media should keep an eye on I and Mr Lam, make sure he wont suffer the same situation, the same experience as Mr Lee Bo had painfully suffered a few months ago.

    Ho: So I think his safety should be protected by all Hong Kong people. All of us should be committed to keeping a close watch and concern for his family. One by one Please listen to me and follow the rules.

    Mr Lam, Lee Bo has told the media that he voluntarily returned to the mainland. But you just said he was taken away forcefully. How did you know that?

    I talked to him about this. In private he admitted to have been kidnapped.

    When did he tell you and under what circumstances?

    I didnt ask him when it happened. I asked him this morning.

    So you asked him this morning?

    He didnt tell me directly.

    Does he know you were going to hold a press conference?

    He didnt know.

    What do you mean he didnt tell you directly? How did he tell you?

    He told it in passing that he was taken up there from Hong Kong.

    Illegally taken away?

    I dont know if it was legal.

    You said you struggled for two days thinking whether to tell your story. What was your struggle like? Did the 6000 protesters give you hope and courage? I also want to ask, whats your plan to protect yourself now?

    Lets see if the Hong Kong government can protect me. I really havent slept in the past two days watching videos; they touched me a lot. I really think Hong Kong people should come out. Because this is not just my own business, its all of your business.

    Did Lee Bo say specifically he was taken away by mainland officers?

    No he did not.

    How did you ask him and how did he answer?

    He told it in passing when he was talking about something else, he didnt specify.

    So he was taken away against his will?

    Of course.

    Do you believe it was mainland police [that took him away]?

    No idea.

    I apologise if you already answered this in Cantonese, but when you and your colleagues first went missing, the loudest concern in Hong Kong was that it was an unprecedented violation of One Country, Two Systems, Do you agree with this interpretation and if so, what do you think this means for Hong Kongs freedoms?

    Ho, translating for Lam: I agree. Their behaviour taking away five people secretly, its obviously [a violation of One Country, Two Systems. And their charge for us illegal publishing. We published and ran our business in Hong Kong without breaking any law, there shouldnt be any problem. I think they just confined us like this, its a violation of One Country, Two Systems.

    Sorry can you summarise what he said?

    Ho: He said that it was a blatant violation of One Country, Two Systems because the acts of mailing books because the act itself is not unlawful OK?

    Ho: So um, he said it would pose a threat to the Hong Kong people that such acts are taken as criminal acts in mainland China.

    Did Lee Bo tell you anything about his plan for the future or about the other colleagues situation today?

    No. He wishes this would end soon.

    Did he say anything about what to do with the bookstore?

    He said the bookstore would be taken over, by that Mr Chan. And he said the lease would be extended but whether the money is from Mr Chan, this I dont know.

    Did Lee Bo tell you why he still wants to go back to the mainland, and if he is free right now?

    They asked him to go back after managing some company affairs here. Thats what I heard.

    Have you watched his TV interview? He said he smuggled himself up there. Just now you said you think he was spirited away. Why did he say that on TV?

    You are asking me the same question as the one about why I admitted guilt on TV. Its the same thing, we were coerced.

    Some people say that four of the five missing booksellers have returned to Hong Kong to cancel their missing persons reports so there is no need to investigate further, what do you think of this?

    This incident obviously represents a breach of Hong Kongs human rights.

    Maybe those people said that because they thought you wouldnt speak out.

    Yeah maybe they think they have nothing to fear.

    Did you receive any warning or any signs before this happened?

    Personally I did not.

    Did you sign any papers to admit guilt in China?

    When they questioned meyes I did sign such papers.

    Did you sign anything else?

    Even if they asked you to sign a slavery contract you had to under those circumstances.

    But did you sign?

    Yes.

    What else did you sign?

    I dont know.

    Did they say or imply that if you make the same offence again they would arrest you again?

    I had a feeling they would.

    So from their conversations with you, you sensed that

    Yes.

    Did they ask you not to hold press conferences? What did they say?

    Yes, a Mr. Shi who questioned me told me [not to hold press conferences.]

    What did he say exactly? How did he say it?

    He told me if police ask me if I need protection I should say no. If they ask if I feel safe I should say yes.

    What about interviews?

    Of course no interviews.

    Reporter, asking Ho: As lawmakers how would you follow up this case?

    Ho: As I said before, the Lee Bo incident, and the whole Causeway Bay Books incident has shocked Hongkongers and made them angry, infuriated. I had never heard anyone was emigrating out of fear for their safety before. After the Lee Bo incident many said they had no choice but to emigrate.

    Ho: I also heard many people said their families told them not to take part in politics, because the mainland government is capable of anything: they dont keep their words, they have no respect for the law, they can use their power to crush anything. So many people are scared. But as Mr Lam said before, 6,000 people came out to speak out for the bookstore. I believe they [the booksellers] must have been touched by this. But we know, those of us who spoke out, we were doing this for ourselves, not just for them.

    Ho: Most of us are not leaving Hong Kong. Where can you go? Hong Kong is our home. I myself wont. So we need to, like Lam said, have the courage to say no to hegemony, to pursue the truth and protect each other.

    Ho: This Lee Bo incident I think Beijing knows Hongkongers are very unhappy. There is also a lot of opposition internationally. Gui Minhais daughter testifying in the US also attracted a lot of attention around the world. Many people are asking if One Country, Two Systems has crumbled, if they can still come to Hong Kong to invest. These questions are being asked overseas.

    Ho: So if the Beijing government does not want Hong Kong, as an international financial centre, to fail, does not want Hong Kong, as an international metropolis, to see its reputation go under overnight, it needs to immediately promise to stop doing this.

    Ho: I told Lam today. Theres no need to be too scared, because if he is arrested, Hong Kong people wont accept it. If he suddenly goes missing again, there wont be another explanation. If anything happens, there is no other explanation.

    Can you describe what you went through in those months of detention. Were you scared at the beginning? Were you angry? What did you do during those days? How did you spend your time? How has it impact you?

    At the time of course I was scared, very scared and lost, felt lonely and helpless. Didnt know what they were going to do to me they werent going by the law. I didnt know if I would be tried. [long silence] I couldnt believe this had happened to me.

    It did not feel real. I thought I was in an absurd place. I even hoped what was happening was a dream, not reality.

    As a Hong Kong citizen I am a free person. I had never broken the law in Hong Kong. For, as I see it, no reason at all, they just jailed me for five months, I couldnt take a walk, couldnt read the news, couldnt [inaudible]. And the environment I was put in, everything was babyproofed, all desks and chairs were wrapped in soft padding.

    The water tap was wrapped in plastic paper. What were they afraid of? They were afraid that people would kill themselves after going crazy because of the long confinement.

    It was really obvious. They wanted to keep you there until you go crazy. Such measures prove that in the past people had [killed themselves]. For example the toothbrush they give you, it was a small one but it was tied to a string. Every time you brush your teeth, a guard is holding that string. You have to return the toothbrush to him after you finish brushing your teeth. Because they are afraid you would kill yourself with that. Did you know this? No?

    For example when they give you a nail clipper, the nail clipper is also tied to a string; they are afraid you would swallow that to kill yourself. Their suicide proof measures were done very well. But the more I thought about it the more I was afraid. Why would anyone kill themselves? Unless they have been confined for so long they go crazy. Only insane people would do this. Then [a person] would [commit suicide]. Theyre very experienced, I could see this.

    So during that period you have not had any contact with the outside world?

    No, no news at all.

    Did they do anything to you that scared you?

    Psychological torture.

    How? Did they say anything to you?

    During the later period, there were two who were sent from Beijing. I dont know what their identities were, they said I was under control.

    Under control?

    The government will not show mercy when it comes to people like us. They scolded us so much it put me in a state of confusion. It made me really confused. Selling books can also be put under control.

    The place where you were held captive, was there anyone nearby, what was the inside of the place like?

    There were about 12 people, they were split into two teams and would watch over me 24 hours a day.

    Ho: Were there any other prisoners?

    In the other room, according to my knowledge, there were, but I dont know what people were being held in it, because we were never allowed out of our rooms.

    Were there any windows? Could you see what is outside of the window?

    [Outside] the window was something like a detention house, and there were similar rooms.

    What about the place you were located at?

    Mine was just one of them. I counted about 20 windows in the building, so about 20 rooms. So if they were holding people prisoner I could see washing basins, and towel, toothbrushes and toothpastes inside the washing basin. Sometimes they would ask me to go out for an interrogation I dont know where to and they would blindfold me, and take me out. And out of the corner of my eye, in the rooms next door, I could see that there were washing basins and towels, so evidently they were keeping people captive in there. Maybe its the legal procedures they believe in and theyve demonstrated that.

    What kind of place were you being held in?

    A room.

    What kind of building?

    Was it a detention house?

    I dont know if it was a detention house. I have no idea.

    What organisation? What unit?

    There was no information at all.

    You mentioned that you were interrogated. How many times were you interrogated? Youve mentioned that people were sent from Beijing to question you and scold you. Do you know what their identities were?

    I dont know. I dont even know what their surnames were. They dont tell you.

    What did they say, to make you feel terrible?

    They think that publishing these books was [an act of] slandering their leader, that it hurt his reputation. They think its an act of spreading rumours to create trouble.

    Do you feel like they were brainwashing you?

    They werent brainwashing me, they were just scolding me. I should succumb to authoritarian rule.

    I want to ask you about your interrogation. Where did it happen?

    Where I slept. There was a table, theres a file and theres a computer. And then there was a period when they would produce a document of the answers I gave and the process of the interrogation, and they would make a record, and ask me to sign it, put my thumbprint on it and confirm.

    Like Lee Bo, with the charges laid and and assisting investigation.

    Lee Bo? I dont know anything about this.

    But you said, the documents they asked you to sign, the affirmations and testimony, does it match up with what you have told them?

    They said I was running a business illegally. So even if I didnt admit to that, I still have to sign.

    Any impression of how many times you underwent an interrogation?

    In terms of leaving the room, maybe two times, but in the room I think maybe 20 to 30 times.

    So every week?

    Sometimes less frequently, sometimes three to four times a week, sometimes not even once over the span of two weeks.

    So they inform you of [when] the process [takes place]?

    They inform me, interrogations are conducted, they ask me questions about what happened. Then I answer.

    How long was each questioning?

    Each time, half an hour to 45 minutes. Sometimes longer, maybe longer than an hour.

    What if you didnt answer or refused to

    I had to cooperate, there was no other way. I dont know what consequences there were if I didnt answer them. I was in a state of fear.

    So you trust them?

    Theres no other way except to trust them.

    Did you go to the public security bureau at any point or was it all in the room?

    Yes.

    Have you asked to contact your family or see a lawyer during the process?

    They requested me not to speak to a lawyer or my family. The first day, they made me promise and sign a document.

    So you didnt dare bring it up again [while you were detained]?

    There was no point in bringing it up. Because according to the declaration I signed there was no point mentioning it again, I gave up [the right to do so anyway].

    About the bookstore, if Mr Chan had taken it over, why has he not shown up?

    I suggest you ask him.

    About the Central Special Unit, during the whole process they were in charge? You said a department head came along with you what department it was?

    I do not know. What I know is the person taking my statement, there was someone who said he was the Central Special Unit. When I was held by the Shenzhen immigration, when I was being questioned that night, he was [from] the Central Special Unit. And this guy, back in 2013 when I was crossing the immigration *carrying books* and I was caught by him, this young person was the one in charge of making a written statement. Because he recognised me and I recognised him in 2013 when I was carrying books across the border, he was in charge of making a record. I think his surname was Lee.

    Was he a part of the public security, his identity, when he was making a written record?

    Do you mean 2013? I think he was from the National Security Bureau just from what I remember.

    You said department head so should be from the Central Special Unit?

    He should be, from the natural understanding of things, but whether the department head, I dont Its what I heard from Lee Bo.

    After so many questionings, during the process apart from asking you to hand over the information, what were the questions about?

    They mostly want to know who wrote the books that were being published. They gave me a list of authors names and asked me if I knew them.

    They wanted to know the identities?

    They wanted me to provide information in detail.

    He asked you to disclose their identities?

    He demanded that I disclose in detail. For example there was one author I recognised called Liu Lu. I recognised him because there was a book published. I skimmed through it it was a book about the human rights situation. Of course I answered directly, but I dont know much about Liu Lu.

    Mr. Lam, youve been detained for eight months how is your physical and mental state? Have you lost weight?

    I used to work 13 hours a day, but when they detained me I didnt need to work. So my physical health is actually better than before. But Ive faced great mental stress.

    How great?

    I didnt know how they would deal with me they didnt go through legal means. What evidence was there to prove that I violated Chinese law? I wasnt breaking the law in Hong Kong. Why would I have broken the law once I crossed the border?

    How has this incident changed your opinion of the Chinese and Hong Kong governments?

    All I can say is that One Country, Two Systems exists only in name. Because if they can kidnap Lee Bo, then they are enforcing law extraterritorially. But you have to ask Lee Bo to know more about this.

    Mr. Lam, you mentioned that you distrust the Hong Kong government.

    You have not asked the police to protect you.

    Have you considered moving abroad? Or will you stay in Hong Kong?

    I am born and bred here. Ive seen Hong Kong grow since the days when we had nothing. Some families had no telephones or televisions. Hong Kong is really my home our home. I have no plans to leave Hong Kong.

    Over these few months, apart from the Central Special Unit, have any other people disclosed the identities of government departments or agencies that they work for to you?

    They revealed to me they were from the Central Special Unit. But whether they were from the Ministry of State Security or the Public Service Bureau I didnt know.

    They didnt tell you during the interrogations?

    I asked but they wouldnt answer. They just demanded I sign papers.

    Mr. Lam, your family members have been speaking to the newspapers and television about your situation. Have you had the chance to speak to them about what to do next and how they can help you more?

    No I havent discussed with them yet. I contacted Albert Ho before I called them, so no.

    So you havent seen your family yet?

    I ate dinner at my sisters last night and saw my wife. I ate dinner with my sister the night before as well. So Ive seen my family twice.

    And your son?

    They have their own livesbut weve spoken on the phone.

    Have you seen Cheung Chi-ping and Lui Por?

    I wasnt allowed to. Ive only seen Lee Bo.

    You werent allowed to see them after you returned to Hong Kong?

    As far as I know, I wasnt allowed.

    What do you think would be the effect on Hong Kongs freedoms, if you hadnt come out to speak today?

    Its for the best that I spoke outIt shows that there are still people who speak out in Hong Kong. If I didnt speak out, Hong Kongs freedoms of speech and press would suffer suppression in silence. This is something I dont want.

    Youve returned to Hong Kong for two days. Have you spoken to Lee Bo or Cheung Chi-ping?

    I spoke to Lee Bo when I gave him the computer.

    Lui Por?

    Lee [Bo]. Lee Bo is one of the shareholders of [Mighty Current]. As for Lui Por, as far as I know, hes currently doing something somewhere else.

    In mainland China?

    No, in Hong Kong, from what Ive heard.

    You said you heard a womans voice outside your residence just now. Was that your wife?

    I didnt hear clearly, Im not sure.

    Did you know what she was talking about?

    Im not sure.

    Could you describe the people who interrogated you? Were they in uniform?

    No uniform.

    Were they dressed nicely, or?

    One of them was dressed nicely. One surnamed Shi treated me very well. I want to say that Im grateful. But I want to call on the Chinese government to treat him nicely. Because this incident could implicate him. And I have a girlfriend in mainland China. I also hoped that she will be treated nicely.

    How did you do what you did [over these past two days] in Hong Kong?

    Like when you [turned back] at Kowloon Tong station

    I dont know if anyone followed me. I just exited the station gates. I just thought about the questions Ive been contemplating over the last two nights.

    Ho: I believe that [the authorities did this to avoid us accusing them of extraterritorial law enforcement. Some people might have been watching [over Lam] but they can say they are not enforcing law. I think they are doing this deliberately. Now that [Lam] is in Hong Kong, there appears to be no interference with what he says or does, for the time being. Thats the truth, I have to say.

    Mr. Lam, what are your plans for the future? Whether related to this incident or yourself, personally.

    I hope that Hong Kong will become better. I hope everyone in Hong Kong can make their voices heard.

    Regarding your title, you are the head of the Causeway Bay Bookstore?

    Yes.

    Ho: Thank you everyone. Lets give him some rest.

    Mr Lam, thank you.

    Thank you all.

    (SCMP) June 18, 2016.

    As he led an estimated 6,000 outraged Hongkongers in a protest against Beijings alleged violent suppression of free speech, Causeway Bay bookseller Lam Wing-kee urged everyone in the city to fight for themselves.

    Lam said on Saturday that he is not worried about his personal safety because he knows that he is supported by the people of Hong Kong.

    The bookstore is located in Hong Kong, a place where the freedom of speech and of publishing is protected. And the country is making use of violence to destroy it, because the country wants to tighten the freedom of Hong Kong people gradually, Lam said. I hope that, after this incident, if we are ever to face other incidents in the future, Hong Kong people need to come out again. Dont let it end here.

    Lam made the remarks before a march from Causeway Bay to the central governments liaison office began. Organisers estimated that 6,000 people took part, after the march ended before 6pm.

    As Lam and marchers reached Southorn Playground in Wan Chai, several protesters from pro-Beijing Voice of Loving Hong Kong shouted: You are anti-China and messing up Hong Kong. They brought a banner, which read: It was right to arrest Lam, it was shameful for anti-China politicians to accuse Beijing.

    Lam and chairman of the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China, Albert Ho Chun-yan, left the protest at Admiralty after marching for more than an hour.

    Several pan-democrat lawmakers continued, and reached Central at 4.30pm.

    At 5.40pm, the procession arrived at the Beijing governments liaison office in Sai Wan, after a 160-minute walk.

    The Labour Partys Cyd Ho said: Although this march was announced with less than 24 hours notice ... and there was the rain and wind [this morning], you have come to respond to Lams bravery, to defend our two systems, and to stand up for our personal safety.

    We dont know if we will face any consequences tomorrow, but we know ... every difficulty we faced will build a stronger foundation for our struggle, Ho said.

    Lam attended the march after making explosive claims earlier this week about how he was kidnapped by the mainlands secretive central investigation team while crossing the border last October. Lam has also said that his associate Lee Po has told him he was kidnapped from Hong Kong last December.

    In response to Lees claims on Saturday morning that he never told Lam he was kidnapped, Lam said: Although Lee Po is now in Hong Kong, he is being controlled because he has family members in the mainland. I knew he has said a lot of things against his will.

    (EJ Insight) Lam Wing-kee epitomizes the spirit of Hong Kong people. By Wong On-yin. June 22, 2016.

    Ive said before that Hong Kong citizenship can sometimes offer a person more protection and reassurance than what people holding other foreign passports can get if they fall in trouble in China.

    Lam Wing-kee, the co-owner of Causeway Bay Bookstore who had been detained in the mainland for more than 8 months, and who is a 100 percent Hong Kong citizen, has come home in one piece and is unafraid to speak up.

    That is in contrast to his fellow booksellers who are either staying mum after their release, or are still unaccounted for.

    The developments surrounding Lams colleagues Lee Bo and Gui Minhai, both of whom have foreign passports, show that an overseas citizenship is of no help when you are on Chinese soil and the mainlands secret police is after you.

    As I was writing this article I learnt that Lam had given an interview to Channel News Asia, during which he told the reporter in no uncertain terms that he is for the independence of Hong Kong.

    I heard that TVB had also arranged for an interview with him, but cancelled it at the last minute as it got cold feet, probably due to the fear that Lam might drop another bombshell during the interview which could land the network in trouble.

    The video clip of Lams interview with Channel News Asia went viral on the internet shortly after it was aired, and the bookseller has become talk of the town for his unwavering advocacy of Hong Kong independence.

    Thanks to the internet, the traditional print and broadcast media no longer have the monopoly on the dissemination of information, which means media owners and the authorities can no longer control the public discourse like they did before.

    The information superhighway now enables people from around the world to stay tuned to up-to-the-minute reports on basically everything that is going on across the globe. Media blackouts imposed by dictators, to keep the public in the dark about controversial issues, no longer work.

    During his interview, Lam used vivid metaphors to describe Hong Kong-China relations, winning praise from many viewers.

    The relationship between Hong Kong and the mainland is like that of a forced marriage, Lam said.

    We were forced to marry China against our will, and almost 20 years on it has become crystal clear that it hasnt been a happy marriage. So why dont we just divorce and move on separately, he said.

    Chinas state police might have thought that Lam would be just another pushover like Lee Bo, and that he will zip his lips and keep a low profile for the rest of his life. Thats why they let him go home.

    What they didnt know is that Lam was probably just pretending to be submissive when he was in custody in the mainland in order to fool the communist authorities into believing that he had converted and hence it was safe to send him home.

    That has proved to be one heck of a masterful trick.

    The political officer who signed off on the paper to release Lam would have never imagined that an old guy like Lam was putting on an act for eight months in order to get released early.

    Lam always kept in mind that he had a more important mission to complete, which is, to tell the entire world the stark truth the Chinese Communist Partys disrespect for basic human rights hasnt changed a bit, despite all the nations material wealth and progress over the years.

    Lams unwavering determination and courageous act epitomizes the go-getting spirit, righteousness, resourcefulness, endurance and mental toughness that define Hong Kong people.

    He has not only set a good example to citizens in Hong Kong who are in their 50s or 60s like myself, but also inspired our young people who want to make a difference.

    Hong Kong independence is no longer a topic restricted to a small minority in the city, but has instead become a legitimate subject for open debate in mainstream society.

    Following Lams bold remarks, one cannot avoid or push this subject aside anymore.

    Videos:

    Apple Daily https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUHj5_KOJQA (Full version, 1:23:33)

    Internet comments:

    - Even if you don't understand Cantonese, you should watch the video of the press conference for the body language.


    Left: Lam Wing-kee who was telling the 'truth'
    Right: Lee Bo who was telling 'lies'

    - Lam Wing-kee said that he does not understand why the Chinese government would treat him in this manner. He does not believe that this concerns just himself personally or Causeway Books. Instead, this concerns all of Hong Kong society. He says that the Chinese government has pushed the people of Hong Kong up against the wall with nowhere to go.

    Ha ha ha. There are numerous bookstores all over Hong Kong. So why did the Chinese government target Causeway Bay Books and the five booksellers? What were you people selected? You have said nothing at all. How can you go around accusing the Chinese government?

    - Lam said that they were publishing/selling books that tell the truth about China. That is not an opinion that is shared by most others. (SCMP) January 5, 2016: Some of the banned books, especially those concerning politicians who are still alive, contain sensational, or even fabricated, elements intended only to grab eyeballs. They are like entertainment magazines people read them to pry into celebrity affairs, but do not take them seriously.

    - Does Lam Wing-kee really not understand what he did? He sold unauthorized books in mainland China over an extended period of time, and he was detained when he crossed the border to go to mainland China. If I may make an analogy. In Hong Kong, it is legal to sell Nazi flags, insignia and uniforms. In Germany, Strafgesetzbuch section 86a prohibits such activities. If a Hong Kong resident brings a trunk full of such materials into Germany for sale, he will be arrested, charged and convicted.

    - As another example, marijuana is legalized in Holland but if a Dutch citizen faces the death penalty if he brings some marijuana joints into Singapore. As you know, Dadah = Death PERIOD

    - These books are 'banned' in China not just because of the contents. In China, books are are legally published by a proper publishing company which have International Standard Book Numbers (ISBN) allocated to them. Any book published in China without a Chinese ISBN is illegal. So if you cannot get an ISBN for your book, you can say that it is 'banned' from publishing.

    - Why won't a publishing house publish these books? Do you really think freedom of expression covers libel, defamation and slander anywhere in the world?

    - Criminal Law of the People's Republic of China

    Article 10. Any person who commits a crime outside PRC territory and according to this law bear criminal responsibility may still be dealt with according to this law even if he has been tried in a foreign country; however, a person who has already received criminal punishment in a foreign country may be exempted from punishment or given a mitigated punishment.

    Article 103. Whoever organizes, plots, or acts to split the country or undermine national unification, the ringleader, or the one whose crime is grave, is to be sentenced to life imprisonment or not less than ten years of fixed-term imprisonment; other active participants are to be sentenced to not less than three but not more than 10 years of fixed-term imprisonment; and other participants are to be sentenced to not more than three years of fixed-term imprisonment, criminal detention, control, or deprivation of political rights.

    Whoever instigates to split the country and undermine national unification is to be sentenced to not more than five years of fixed-term imprisonment, criminal detention, control, or deprivation of political rights; ringleaders or those whose crimes are grave are to be sentenced to not less than five years of fixed-term imprisonment.

    Article 105. Whoever organizes, plots, or acts to subvert the political power of the state and overthrow the socialist system, the ringleaders or those whose crimes are grave are to be sentenced to life imprisonment, or not less than 10 years of fixed-term imprisonment; active participants are to be sentenced from not less than three years to not more than 10 years of fixed-term imprisonment; other participants are to be sentenced to not more than three years of fixed-term imprisonment, criminal detention, control, or deprivation of political rights.

    Whoever instigates the subversion of the political power of the state and overthrow the socialist system through spreading rumors, slandering, or other ways are to be sentenced to not more than five years of fixed-term imprisonment, criminal detention, control, or deprivation of political rights; the ringleaders and those whose crimes are grave are to be sentenced to not less than five years of fixed-term imprisonment.

    - Lam said that he had previously been detained while bringing books into China. So he knew that this was a crime under Chinese law. So what was he and his colleagues doing? They were bringing in large number of books from Hong Kong into China for sales/distribution.

    It was not the case that Causeway Bay Books took telephone/online book orders and shipped the books through Hong Kong Post or other courier services (such as SF Express). If that were the case, they might argue that they were Hongkongers doing what is legally allowed in Hong Kong.

    That would not work, because a parcel containing a single book mailed from Hong Kong to mainland China would likely be opened for inspection by Chinese Customs, it will be confiscated and payment will not be made due to non-delivery.

    Instead, the bookstore workers (Lam Wing-kee, Lui Por and Cheung Jiping) shipped the books to Shenzhen in bulk cartons which were less likely to be inspected. There, they (and others such as Lam Wing-kee's girlfriend named Hu) removed the covers of the banned books and glued in covers of innocuous mainland Chinese titles with proper ISBN's. That is the nature of their operation. They were selling and distributed unauthorized books in China in order to make money.

    These details came from Cheung Jiping previously. Lam Wing-kee has completely avoided this matter during the press conference today and only talked about wanting to bring the truth to the people of China. Nobody in the media seemed to remember what Cheung Jiping said either.

    - Lam Wing-kee said that he was detained in Lohu and admitted he brought banned books into mainland China. When a Hong Kong citizen breaks mainland Chinese law and is detained in mainland China, why is that a violation of One Country Two Systems? Are Hongkongers exempt from criminal charges on mainland China?

    Conversely if a mainlander robs a bank in Hong Kong and is arrested, should he be charged in Hong Kong? There should be a symmetry in how the Two Systems work.

    - A recent case is that of a mainland woman assaulting a Hong Kong woman in Hong Kong. She was arrested and held in Hong Kong while awaiting trial here in Hong Kong.

    - The Hong Kong localists say that they need to defend Hong Kong against the parallel traders who buy infant milk formula, personal products, etc cheaply in Hong Kong and bring it to sell expensively in mainland China. But this is exactly what Lam Wing-kee was doing -- he was buying banned books cheaply from publishers in Hong Kong and selling them expensively in mainland China for profit.

    - How was Lam Wing-kee arrested? Lui Por and Cheung Jiping who live in Shenzhen were both arrested in mainland China first. Lam Wing-kee was in mainland China at the time. Whether Lam Wing-kee knew about Lui and Cheung or not, he tried to cross back over to Hong Kong. He presented his Home Visit Permit to the Chinese immigration inspector, who summoned officers to detain him. So his case is not one of cross-border arrest.

    Lam Wing-Kee said that this morning Lee Bo told him that he returned to China against his will. This is hearsay and what was said or heard is unclear as well. This will have to wait for Lee Bo to explain himself.

    - (Oriental Daily) June 17, 2016.

    This morning, Lee Bo (=Paul Lee) responded on Facebook:

    Originally I don't want to say anything more but I need to clarify some of the things that Lam Wing-kee said:
    1. I have never used any computers over at Causeway Bay Books, and I have never printed any customer list. Obviously I could not have handed over any customer list to the Chinese public security bureau.
    2. When I spoke to Lam Wing-kee, I never mentioned anything about how I got back to the mainland, and I did not say anything to him in the order of "taken back to the mainland against my will."
    3. During this period, I cooperated with the Ningbo Public Security Bureau. I have never heard of any "central investigation unit."

    A large number of reporters waited outside Lee Bo's home this morning. Lee Bo: "Everything that needs to be said has been said. I don't want to say anything more. I hope that you can give me and my family some peace and privacy."

    - Just in case you don't understand, here is the summation:

    - Lee Bo has relatives living in mainland China, so it is understandable that he has to lie.

    - Lam Wing-kee has a girlfriend living in mainland China, so it is understandable that he tells the truth.

    (TVB) June 18, 2016.

    As Lee Bo left his North Point residence this morning, he said: "Yes, I have met with Lam Wing-kee. But during our meeting, I never told him about how I went back to mainland China. Therefore I deny what he said about me."

    On the subject of the customer list, Lee Bo said: "That's something else that must be said. I can solemnly say that I have never used any computer at Causeway Bay Books. Therefore it is fictional when you say that I took the information to mainland China. And about what he called the 'central investigation team.' His information may be different from mine. I have only dealt with people from the Ningbo City Public Security Bureau. I don't know anything about any 'central investigation team.' I ask people that you can say whatever you want about yourself and I won't comment. But please don't get me into this. Everything about Lee Bo should be based upon what Lee Bo himself says."

    He added: "I was doing quite well recently. But the last two days have been very vexing. I hope that you will spare me and let me have a little bit of freedom. Otherwise I am like sitting in jail." He said that he is not saying that Lam Wing-kee is lying. "I never said that. He can tell his story. I don't want to appear in his story." "Mr. Lam's story is his story. I don't have any friendship with him." Lee declined to answer the other questions.

    (Oriental Daily) June 18, 2016.

    Former Causeway Bay Books part-time employee Woo Chih-wai was interviewed last night and quoted Lee Bo as saying that he went to mainland China by land, as opposed to sea or air. Today Lee Bo responded on Facebook:

    Woo Chih-wai totally put his own words into my mouth based upon an imaginary Q&A with himself. I know about this "unlimited imagination" of his, and that is why I won't discuss any sensitive topic with him. Please don't believe him! I plead with everybody: You can say anything you want, but please don't attribute what you want to say to me. Please!

    (Sing Tao) June 18, 2016

    Causeway Bay Books manager Lui Por was interviewed by Sing Tao today. Lui said that Lam was lying and that Lam was being manipulated by somebody behind the scene. Lui said that he was arrested on October 24, 2015 and taken to Ningbo city. Lui did not go anywhere else. During this time, he had to sign legal papers addressed to the Ningbo City Public Security Bureau. He said that the public security bureau allowed him to contact his family by telephone and Weixin. Lui was asked if he was willing to do media interviews, so he presented the facts and his thoughts in front of the camera. Lui Por said that he was definitely not coerced or led to follow any direction or script. He said that he met with Lee Bo, Lam Wing Kee and Cheung Chiping in Shenzen in March this year. At the time, Lam Wing-kee told him that the public security bureau treated him very well. He also met with Lee Bo in Hong Kong. He has never heard Lee Bo say that he was involuntarily taken back to mainland China. Lui said that he never imagined that Lam Wing-kee is such a dishonest person. Lui Por said that Lam is distorting the facts because he is being manipulated by certain persons with ulterior motives behind the scene. Lui said that Lam is shameless for doing this, and he would have the minimal conscience of a Hongkonger.

    Cheung Chiping was also interviewed by Sing Tao Daily. He said that the four booksellers met in mainland China, and he heard Lam Wing-kee said that he didn't want to return to Hong Kong because of poor family relations over a long term and therefore he wanted the Public Security Bureau to help him with making a living in mainland China. He did not hear Lam Wing-kee talk about being forced to do anything.

    - (Sing Tao) June 19, 2016. Shaoguan library director Chen Weiqing was interviewed by Sing Tao. He said that Lam claimed to under house arrest between April and June this year, but in fact Lam was working at the Shaoguan Library. It was around the Qing Ming Festival when Chen took in Lam: "I thought that he was alone in an unfamiliar place and I took pity on this jobless old man. I took him in to help me at the library." Lam said that the other library workers can testify that Lam was in good shape and had actually gained weight. Chen also showed some photos of outings with Lam. Chen said that Lam even had a girlfriend in Shaoguan. Chen would like to confront Lam about how he was treated during this three months in Shaoguan.

    Phoenix TV video: https://www.facebook.com/HKDiscussForum/videos/1001628893219509/

    Chen Weiqing said that the Shaoguan Library is equipped with closed-circuit television and he can show the videos of how Lam Wing-kee was treated at work. Chen said that Lam was very happy in Shaoguan and even spoke about buying a home and living there. Chen said that Lam never told him that he was out on bail after committing crimes. In retrospect, Chen thought Lam was very frightening and hypocritical, especially because Lam went to tell lies at the Hong Kong Legislative Council.

    - (Apple Daily) June 18, 2016. According to an informed source, Beijing went after the five booksellers in order to see which author leaked the plans of Xi Jinping to purge the People's Liberation Army. Unfortunately, this has turned in a debacle. Right now, Beijing's solution to defuse the ticking bomb is to escalate the smearing campaign against Lam Wing-kee. According to one individual in politics, "the smear campaign will go full force, using character assassination to make the citizens and the foreign media not trust him. At the very least, they want to make people suspect Lam of political motives." However, this individual did not think that the people of Hong Kong would believe this.

    - Fuck! Please stop changing the script! Several months ago, Apple Daily swore that Beijing went after the five booksellers because of the book on the Six Romances In The Life of Xi Jinping. Even you must have forgotten about what you wrote before, because you are now talking about Xi Jinping vs. People's Liberation Army.

    - "An informed source"? "One individual involved in politics"? This means that the report is fictional.

    (Oriental Daily) June 19, 2016.

    Today Lam Wing-kee said that Lee Bo never said that he was taken away outside the Mighty Current warehouse in Chai Wan, nor did he say that he was taken away against his will to the mainland. But he remembered that Lee Bo said that "someone from up there went with him." Based upon the tone, Lam Wing-kee determined Lee Bo was taken away against his will.

    Lam Win-kee also said that he did not know if there is any other equipment in the office. When asked what office and what equipment he was asking about, Lam said that he doesn't know.

    As to how he learned that he was detained by the central investigation team, he said that he encountered a national security agent whom he met previously when stopped in Shenzhen and this time the person said: "This is the second time. The central investigation unit will not hold back on you."

    (Wen Wei Po) June 19, 2016.

    Earlier Lam Wing-kee said that Causeway Bay Books shareholder Lee Bo told him about "being taken away against his will." Lee Bo came out and emphasized that he never said anything of the sort. Yesterday, Lam Wing-kee changed his statement and said that he only determined from Lee's tone of voice that he must have been "involuntarily" taken away. Lam admitted that Lee did not use those words.

    Yesterday, Lam Wing-kee was asked by a Hong Kong news agency about the circumstances under which Lee Bo told Lam about "being taken away against his will." Lam said that he met Lee Bo and his wife. During the discussion, Lee Bo said that someone wanted him to go to mainland China. The reporter asked about the specific details. Lam replied: "It was not specific. Lee said that someone went with him. I can't remember what he said afterwards."

    The reporter reminded Lam Wing-kee that he said during the initial press conference that "Lee Bo was taken back against his will by somebody." Lam said: "Very clearly, I heard it from his tone of voice." The reporter wondered: "Tone of voice? He didn't say it directly?" Lam admitted: "Tone of voice. He did not say it directly."

    - Fuck! I can tell from the tone of your voice that you are ______________ (fill in as you wish).

    Several months ago, the League in Defense of Hong Kong's Freedoms held a demonstration march holding a banner:
    We are all Lee Bo
    Today Lee Bo, tomorrow you and I

    This week, the Democratic Party held a demonstration march holding a banner:
    We are all Lam Wing-kee.

    - Holding out a "We are all Lee Bo" today would be highly inappropriate because he is now a pariah and a Hong Kong traitor.

    - Is there anyway to recycle these banners? It seems such a waste to discard them after using them once (and they don't appear to be re-useable because of the changing realities).

    - On the matter of the customer database, Lam Wing-kee's statements are very confusing. The critical issue is whether the Chinese government knows who the Causeway Bay Books customers are and hence take action.

    Lam Wing-kee said that Lee Bo copied a hard drive of customer records in March to give to the Chinese government. The records include some 600 people, mostly mainlanders, and some 4,000 book titles. So this means that the Chinese government already has the information.

    Lam said that he was asked to look through the records to identify customers. Is Lam Wing-kee the only person in the whole bookstore who can read and understand computer records? Or are certain details (real names, addresses, etc) stored only inside Lam's brain? So if Lam Wing-kee drops dead from a cardiac arrest, everything would be lost and the bookstore can cease all operations?

    Normally, a customer database will contain: name, mailing address, telephone number, email, billing information, past transactions (ISBN, title, date, sales amount). If that is what the customer database looks like, the Chinese government knows everything already.

    Lam also said that Causeway Bay Books is currently being operated by a mysterious Mr. Chan. Given that his known background is in operating saunas/spas, it is speculated that he is acting at the behest of some unknown mainland Chinese party. This means that the Chinese government has access to everything still there.

    From SCMP:

    I was afraid my readers would be affected, that they would think Hong Kong people or I sold them out, he said. But I did not do so Now they were doing something even worse asking me to bring them a hard drive as evidence.

    Lam said he was supposed to return to the mainland on Thursday and hand over the hard drive to a central special unit. However, after seeing the support from Hongkongers, he hesitated at the Kowloon Tong MTR station en route to the border.

    What is on the hard drive that is not already copied by Lee Bo? Why is turning over the actual hard disk "something even worse"? What, if anything, is on the hard drive that Lee Bo hadn't copied?

    If the hard drive belongs to Causeway Bay Books, it should be located inside the bookstore which has been closed and under the control of the mysterious Mr. Chan. Why do they need Lam Wing-kee to travel to Hong Kong and retrieve it himself? Lee Bo could have done so himself. This press conference only generated a ton of questions.

    It just makes you wonder how much Lam Wing-kee understands operations.

    - (Initium) Lam Wing-kee siad that the mainland authorities demanded that he bring the computer hard disk containing customer information to them. In January this year, Initium published an exclusive report about the mysterious Mr. Chan who took over the bookstore in November in order to obtain the customer information. We have now learned that Mr. Chan came back to Hong Kong  on the night of June 15 after vacationing in Pushan (South Korea). Mr. Chan then went to Causeway Bay Books, took the computer hard disk, handed it to Lee Bo who handed it to Lam Wing-kee to bring back to mainland China.

    With due respect, this is making less and less sense. Why can't they just hand it over to any agent (of the central investigation team)? What is the point of specifically requiring Lam Wing-kee and only him to bring it?

    - (Apple Daily) June 20, 2016.

    Lam said that he was permitted to go back to Hong Kong to do two things. Firstly, he has to go see Lee Bo and fetch the hard disk that contains the customer records. "Because I was the person who entered the information and I personally mailed the books, so the evidence is more reliable if I brought it over personally." Secondly, he wants to meet with his elder sister. Lam wanted to gain more time to stay in Hong Kong. On June 15 when he met with Lee Bo, he brought the wrong hard disk. He waited until late night before telling Lee. This let him stay in Hong Kong for an extra day.

    On that day, he took the subway to Kowloon Tong in order to switch to East Rail to go to mainland China. "The pressure was very great. I knew it was wrong. I thought that I needed to stop." He wanted to smoke a cigarette. He ended up smoking three cigarettes. He thought for 30 minutes and decided to go home and think some more. He realized that he was being followed. He recognized that the person had been to the bookstore and has been following him. As soon as the person realized that Lam knew, he left. Lam decided to contact Democratic Party legislator Albert Ho. He held a press conference that evening.

    Lam said that once he decided not to return to mainland China, he threw away the mobile phone that the mainland agents gave him because he was afraid of being tracked. His worries are not unfounded. Last November, his wife filed a missing person report with the Hong Kong Police. Still detained in Ningbo, Lam was told that "your son has just contacted a Legislative Councilor." Lam said that he was angry that his son was being followed and monitored on telephone.

    - Tom Clancy is a better writer than this Apple Daily 'reporter.' This is not about the style, but the homework done to come up with seemingly convincing details.

    - Did Lam Wing-kee actually say that "Because I was the person who entered the information and I personally mailed the books, so the evidence is more reliable if I brought it over personally"? How about familiarizing yourself with the rules of evidence first?

    - Who has ever heard of the investigators in a case tell the defendant to go fetch a key piece of evidence himself? What if Lam Wing-kee just tossed the hard disk into Victoria Harbor? Then the agents can't prove that he committed any crimes, rights?

    - On one hand, the Chinese Communists are lawless thugs. On the other hand, they want the evidence in a court trial to be reliable such that they asked the defendant to personally fetch it himself. Which is it?

    - (Headline Daily) June 21, 2016.  Based upon the various pieces of information that Lam Wing-kee provided about the surveillance on him, we concluded (1) the mainland agents are lousy; (2) he was not under close surveillance. Here are the details.

    Lam Wing-kee believed that he was allowed to come back to Hong Kong because he was compliant during his time in mainland China. Two agents named Chan and Shi accompanied him on this trip.

    He said that Chan and Shi used different passageways to enter Hong Kong, and they arranged to meet at the convenience store on the Hong Kong side after passing through. However, the two agents did not show up. But Chan and Shi continued to keep contact with Lam by mobile phone. They told him not to contact anyone; to tell them about any telephone calls he made. Lam said that these demands "obviously meant that they want to control me."

    So according to Lam, these two Central Investigation Team agents actually believed that they can run remote control on Lam because they can count on him to provide all the details of all the contacts that he made. Aren't they being too simple and naive? Do they really believe that they can control someone by telephone? Did they ever consider the possibility that Lam may discard the phone and flee?

    If Lam was tasked with bringing the all-important customer list back to mainland China, then these agents are even more incompetent than characters in a Stephen Chow comedy.

    And if these agents are really as lousy as Lam described, the people of Hong Kong have nothing to fear from this 'powerful' government department from the 'powerful' nation.

    - But previously, this is what Lam said: (Apple Daily) June 20, 2016. Lam said that his case was one of cross-border law enforcement. If the government is willing to air the closed-circuit videos at the border, he is willing to identify the people who cross over with him. "The problem is whether the Hong Kong government is willing to do that."

    - Lam Wing-kee used the Immigration Department passage for Hong Kong residents whereas Mr. Chan and Mr. Shi would have to use the passage for mainlanders. They didn't come in at the same time down the same passage. What is the point of looking at the videos? Is Lam not even aware of this?

    - (Wen Wei Po) June 22, 2016.

    Yesterday Lam Wing-kee was on radio to overturn what he said at the initial press conference about tossing the mobile phone away in Kowloon Tong. He is now saying that he turned the mobile phone off in Kowloon Tong but kept it with him. After the press conference, he was worried that the mobile phone might still be tracked, so he destroyed it. "At the time, I was under a great deal of pressure. I was afraid that they may locate me. So I turned it off. But I am not very good with mobile phones, and I must have touched some control or the other because the mobile phone was on again. I turned it off once again. I put it in my pocket and I did not think about it. That evening, I saw that the mobile phone was still in pocket. When I got home, I got afraid of being tracked. So I immersed it under water in the bathroom. Later I got a relative to come and dismantle it."

    Lam also claimed that the hard disk from the bookstore is still in his hands. The data stored included the personal information (name, address, mailing information) of the book buyers. He said that he was afraid that the hard disk may fall into the hands of the other side and becomes court evidence. The other side can also cause trouble for the buyers, or obtain information about the authors and sources from the database.

    Lam Wing-kee admitted that his case is not cross-border law enforcement, because he was detained after he crossed into Lohu. But he said that when he came back to Hong Kong, he was accompanied by two members of the Central Investigation Team who used text messages to monitor him and attempted to control his actions in a way that is beyond their authority. "The people of Hong Kong can decide for themselves whether this is cross-border law enforcement."

    - (Oriental Daily) June 22, 2016. Lam Wing-kee admitted that the sole piece of evidence against the "Central Investigation Team" has been destroyed by him. He explained that the mobile phone contained the records of how the team leader Mr. Chan and team member Mr. Shi were communicating with him. He was afraid of being tracked, so he submersed the phone under water and then got a relative to dismantle it. In retrospect, he destroyed the most important piece of information.

    Lam Wing-kee said that he determined from Lee Bo's tone of voice that Lee was taken away against his will. However, only the principals can confirm this. He said that Lee Bo has relatives in Fujian and is being forced to tell lies. He called on the media once more not to interview Lee Bo and others.

    (Silentmajority.hk) June 22, 2016.

    Yesterday on radio, Lam Wing-kee admitted that after he was arrested for personally carrying banned books into China, he changed the mode of operation by letting mainlanders purchase online and then mailing the books to them. The online platform and the bank account for receiving payments are both located inside China, so he may have broken mainland laws. Lam admitted that his own case was not that of cross-border law enforcement.

    - Moral hazard occurs when one person takes more risks because someone else bears the cost of those risks.

    Lam said that, on the day he was accosted on the mainland last October, he was originally planning to visit his girlfriend, whom he met after living away from his family. She was also detained on the mainland as she had helped him with sending banned books into China. She was released on bail. I am sorry for my girlfriend, he said. But I dont consider this a personal matter anymore, rather a matter for the whole of society Hong Kong people were forced without any way out. Hong Kong has rule of law I am not afraid for my personal safety, and I do not plan to go to the mainland again.

    Lam took the risk and his girlfriend bears the costs of those risks.

    - It has been speculated that the reason why Lee Bo went to China was because someone from a "central special unit" told him: "You are the owner of Causeway Bay Books. Four of your colleagues have been detained in mainland China on matters related to Causeway Bay Books. Will you come with us to clarify matters?" Lee went because he was a man with a sense of responsibility. This is much more than can be said about Lam Wing-kee.

    - Lam Wing-kee received $100,000 in severance pay from Lee Bo. How much of that did he give to his girlfriend and other accomplices who were detained by the Chinese police? Enquiring minds want to know.

    (HK01) June 16, 2016.

    At around 5pm this afternoon our reporter went to visit Lam Wing-kee at home to ask him questions. Before we even pressed the door bell, we heard a loud female voice talking about a sex scandal. Her voice could be clearly heard in the corridor outside the apartment. The woman spoke in Cantonese and mentioned a person and a woman in bed. "The photo was taken in December. Did you really just got to know her?" "Where did  you take the money? You keep saying that you have to go out on business trips. I told you to take me with you. You said no. Were you really working? Why couldn't you take me with you? I knew that you were up to something." "She must already be related to you before she let you ... it is a video of the entire process." No other voice could be heard during this time.

    While the woman was talking, our reporter pressed the door bell around ten times. We said aloud: "Is Mr. Lam home?" This indicated to whoever was inside that someone was outside the door. But nobody came to the door. The woman continued to talk for about half an hour. She said: "I don't know him ... he was with a woman? I don't know about it." "When you don't care about the child, why should the child care about you?" "You teach by example. You don't even know what you are doing, so how can you make demands of a child? Do you know how to? Did you teach him? Right or not?" After the woman finished talking, our reporter pressed the door bell again. But nobody responded. So our reporter left.

    At around 7pm, our reporter went to Lam Wing-kee's apartment again. We identified ourselves again. We pressed the door bell many times and asked the woman whether she is Mrs. Lam. We asked the woman to respond to the involvement in the sex scandal. But nobody answered the door. We heard the woman call up the security guard, who came up shortly afterwards to evict our reporter.

    We also received information that Lam Wing-kee came back three months later than the other three booksellers for cause. Lam was granted bail in March, but he needed a guarantor. His wife and his son did not go to the mainland to be his guarantor. Between March and June, he was given a temporary job at a Shenzhen library to make a living while he waited.

    [Transcription of audio recording (5pm, June 14, 2016)

    Female voice: The photo was taken in December. If the woman was a recent acquaintance, there is no reason to go to bed as soon as you got to know her. She already has a relationship with you and that was why you were caught. The video recorded the entire process. It was not filmed with the clothes on. Where was your money spent? I have already asked him. He goes on business trips frequently. I said, "You take me with you. If you are really going on a business trip, why not bring me with you?" I already know that there was a problem. He has a bank account in mainland China. There should be several tens of thousands of RMB. I don't know if he spent all the money after he got together with that woman. In terms of Hong Kong dollars, there should be $100,000, or at least $80,000.  He wanted to save face. That was pointless. I really can't help him. If he really needed money, I could have brought the money to him overnight.]

    (HK01) June 16, 2016.

    Lam Wing-kee said that the female in the audio recording is his wife. "That is my woman. As to whether there was a sex scandal, it depends on what evidence she has. I didn't." Lam continued: "I got acquainted with the mainland girlfriend after I separated from my wife. She helped me to mail books. Right now she is being investigated. I hope that the Chinese government won't make trouble for my friends on my account."

    - Now we see why by the time that the train got to Kowloon Tong station, Lam Wing-kee changed his mind. He did not want to go to Shenzhen and see that woman anymore because his wife was giving him hell over the extramarital affair.

    - We can foresee that in the next few days, Lam Wing-kee will be hounded about the purported sex scandal. If he says "No such thing", his wife may really blow up and spill everything to the press? If he says "No comment", everyone will assume this to be true.

    - I see that someone is complaining that such scurrilous reportage should not be allowed. Well, what the fuck did you think "pro-democracy" Apple Daily has been doing over these years?

    Sample: Bosco Wong-Myolie Wu in Sudden Weekly (defunct Next Media Group magazine)

    - Mrs. Lam has made things very clear. She received a video dated December 2015 of Lam Wing-kee and a woman naked together in bed. Lam must know that his wife knows everything. Therefore he would rather stay in mainland China than come back to Hong Kong and confront his wife. But how was he going to make a living for himself and his mistress? Therefore he asked the public security bureau to arrange a librarian job for him in Shenzhen. As time went on, his mistress realized that there is no future in this sixty-something-year-old librarian who got her into all sorts of legal trouble. So now mainland China was also becoming unbearable to Lam Wing-kee. This means that Lam Wing-kee had to come back to Hong Kong.

    So who can help him in Hong Kong in terms of money? Well, Albert Ho would surely want Lam to help him 'support patriotic democratic movements in China' which had just raised $1.7 million on June 4th. There is also Jimmy Lai (Next Media) and the US Consulate/National Democratic Institute too. What is Lam Wing-kee's most valuable contribution? He can attack Lee Bo, who issued a denial immediately. But Lam has gotten on the train and he cannot get off now. So Lam will continue have to continue with his shtick now.

    But the show isn't over, because there are potential developments. For one thing, if Lam Wing-kee provokes his wife, she may release the December 2015 video. As another example. That video will be worth a lot of the paparazzi media (even including "pro-democracy" Next Media). For another thing, the mistress on mainland China may give an interview to describe her life and times with Lam Wing-kee. That would be another major scoop.

    Historical case study:

    (August 17, 2004)  The Headline News In Hong Kong - Part 2 Hong Kong Legislative Council candidate Alex Ho was caught stark naked in a mainland hotel bed with a prostitute ("兩條肉蟲").  Was it a frame-up?

    (September 1, 2004)  The Verdict On Alex Ho  Simply put, Alex Ho's comrades-in-arms have dumped him by purging his name and face from their Hong Kong Legco campaign.  This is as good as those air-brushed photos of Chinese Politburo membership, but it is a little bit too late.

    (September 9, 2004)  The Headline News In Hong Kong - Part 4  The Dongguan Public Security Bureau held its second press conference during they showed photos of a naked Alex Ho, a condom wrapper, menstrual blood stains, scattered underwear, etc, plus further references to a pattern of patronizing prostitutes in Shenzhen dating back some years.

    (February 5, 2005)  Alex Ho Meets The Press  Full coverage of one of the most bizarre press conferences in recent times. The shorter summary: "I did not have sex with that woman. That is all I have to say. After today, I will never respond on this issue ever again. I will not address or refute any evidence. You'll just have to trust me. My wife trusts me.  P.S.  Yes, I know that woman, she did knock on my hotel door at 3 am that night I did let her into my room and I was naked when the police entered the room. But I don't have to tell you what we were doing because I just told you that I did not have sex with her and that should be enough for you.  P.P.S.  I am resigning from the Democratic Party this very minute, which means that their disciplinary committee won't have to conduct an internal investigation about the facts of the case.  P.P.P.S.  I am going to remain being a District Councilor because my personal morals is none of your business.  And the fact that the position pays tens of thousands of dollars per month has nothing to do with it."

    (Oriental Daily) June 19, 2016.

    Lam said that he has contacted his separated wife many times after he returned to Hong Kong. With the assistance of Albert Ho (Democratic Party legislator), he spoke to her by telephone. She opposed him going  public in a big quarrel. Lam that she cut off the telephone line as soon as they started to argue. After the initial press conference, his ex-wife contacted him. But they quarreled immediately. Lam said that he finds it insufferable.

    Lam also said that his wife has something to do with the decision to sell Causeway Bay Books to Gui Min-hai. His wife wanted Lam to come home and not work anymore, so they sold the bookstore. During the separation period, his wife asked him to come home. Apart from this, the sale had to do with the economy going sour. Lam does not exclude the possibility of restarting the bookstore some day.

    Lam said that he contacted his two sons after the press conference and warn them not to travel to mainland China. The elder son supported him going public, and the younger son said he was concerned.

    (Wen Wei Po) June 17, 2016.

    A Sing Tao reporter called up the Ningbo Public Security Bureau and spoke to a police officer in charge of the case. The police officer said that Hong Kong resident Lam Wing-kee and others knowingly violated mainland laws by bringing in unauthorized books over a long period of time. In September 2012, Lam Wing-kee was subject to administrative penalty by the Lohu Customs Department for bringing in unauthorized books.

    On October 24, 2015, Lam Wing-kee entered the Lohu border crossing to meet with another person named Hu involved in the case (aka Lam Wing-kee's 'girlfriend') and was detained by the public security bureau. Because Lam and Hu were personally involved, they volunteered to sign letters not to hire lawyers and not to meet with their relatives.

    According to the police investigation, Lam used disguised book covers and other methods to mail unauthorized books directly or use Hu and others to mail indirectly to mainland Chinese customers between October 2013 and October 2016. Furthermore, he used a mainland Chinese bank card to accept payments for those books.

    The police officer said that Lam Wing-kee admitted to the crime of illegal sales and wrote a confession. Because of Lam's attitude, the public security bureau allowed him to post bail while awaiting trial. During this period, Lam said that he did not get along with his wife and son and would find it hard to live in Hong Kong. Therefore, he asked the public security bureau to help him. The public security bureau made certain arrangements for him.

    Recently Lam applied (see letter below) to go to Hong Kong to take care of personal matters. The public security bureau granted him permission.

    "I am presently separated from my wife, so it will be inconvenient to stay with her during the probation period. It would also be inconvenient to go back to live and work at the bookstore. The only option is my sister, but she is living in a congested public housing estate unit and it would be inconvenient. Therefore it can be said that I don't any place to stay in.

    Furthermore, certain Hong Kong media are hyping up this affair. During my bail term, I can avoid interviews if I stay in mainland China so that things can calm down ... Based upon the above, I want to stay in mainland China for now. In consideration of my personal hardships, I am not applying to the government to arrange a residence and a job (ideally as a librarian) for me in some city. I hope that you can help me. Many thanks!

    Applicant: Lam Wing-kee."

    Blogger Yip Yat-chee: Lam Wing-kee said something fearful on behalf of the people of Hong Kong. You can imagine how great his sacrifice is. His sacrifice was made only to protect the core values of the people of Hong Kong. Even for a group of Hong Kong pigs who never care about politics, Lam has still sacrificed a lot of protect the freedom that you are not even aware of. Lam is a justice fighters and martyr."

    - Lam Wing-kee is a martyr? So what are the requirements to become a martyr:
    (1) You double-cross your wife by cheating with another woman
    (2) You double-cross your girlfriend by getting her to participate in criminal activities and abandoning her now
    (3) You double-cross your bookstore workers (Lui Por and Cheung Jiping)
    (4) You double-cross your boss (Lee Bo) who invested money to save your bankrupt bookstore

    Oh, I forgot: "You double-cross your country." Did I miss anything?

    - Let us assume that Lee Bo was under threat not to tell how he went from Hong Kong to mainland China. Lam knows that his friend is being threatened, but he nevertheless puts his friend in peril. What a friend!!! Why is Lam doing this? There can only be one purpose: Lam does not want to return to mainland China and face the legal consequences of his crime. Therefore he must create a political shield for himself in Hong Kong. What shield? He has to say that Hongkongers are being taken across the border by mainland police! The living proof of that is the Lee Bo case as described by Lam Wing-kee. Once that happens, Hong Kong will never turn Lam over to the mainland for his trial.

    (Kinliu) By Chris Wat Wing-yin. June 18, 2016.

    A certain person was arrested in mainland China for selling banned books. He was detained for several months. When he came back, he said: "This is not just my personal issue. This is not just the issue of the bookstore. It is an issue for the people of Hong Kong." And now he is a hero.

    "It concerns the people of Hong Kong" is a panacea. Whenever the phrase is invoked, it becomes a public issue for justice. A lot of people will rush in to support you blindly irrespective of the facts and reasons. Such was the case of Denise Ho, and such was the case of Causeway Bay Books.

    "If we don't speak up, then Hong Kong will be beyond rescue ..." Thus spoke Causeway Bay Books manager Lam Wing-kee at the press conference the other day. This sounds familiar. During Occupy Central, the anti-national education campaign, the Mong Kok brick riot, etc, the people on high moral grounds spoke in this manner with megaphones in hand.

    There are many Facebook posts with Mr. Lam's photo and the word "Hero" underneath. I would like to ask just in what way or manner is Mr. Lam a hero?

    Everybody knows that those books are banned. If you bring them across the border, you are committing a crime. If you want to take the risk to make money and then you get caught, who else can you blame except yourself?

    Twenty years ago, I worked in Jimmy Lai's Next Media. At the time, tension was high between Taiwan and China. I was dispatched to gather information about the Fujian province military sites. Since Next Media has always been anti-Communist, our reporters could never get press passes. Each trip is therefore illegal news gathering. Every reporter knew that.

    Normally I covered livelihood issues. So the authorities tended to turn a blind eye. But this time, I was going into a military zone to cover national security. We knew that this was very dangerous. Indeed, I and my photographer were arrested while filming in a small fishing harbor across from Matsu Islands (Taiwan). We knew that we had crossed the red line this time. So we were detained for a week by the National Security Bureau for illegal news gathering and endangering national security. We were eventually expelled. Our Home Visit Permits were confiscated and we could not enter China for two years.

    Afterwards, our boss offered to give us compensation for our troubles. I rejected the offer. I told the boss. "As the Chinese saying goes, if you eat salted fish, you must be prepared to suffer the thirst. You pay higher salaries than other newspapers because of the risks. If I take your salary, it means that I am ready to accept the risks."

    So, on the first day that Mr. Lam, Mr. Lee and Mr. Gui decided to get into this business, they have stepped into a minefield. When you libel people to make money, you must be prepared that it will get back to you some day. You cannot say that I have been hurting you so many years in order to make money, so why are you hurting me now?

    Causes lead to effects. You deserved the consequences of your actions. You decided to sell banned books about other people by plagiarism and creative writing, and you make $200 to $300 per book. If the business is so profitable, then why aren't other writers and publishers rushing in? That's because these other people have considered the risks to be too high and/or they have moral scruples.


    Demosisto: Signature campaign to demand the Hong Kong government make a thorough investigation of the Causeway Bay Books incident.

    - The year is 2016 now. Demosisto wants to have a signature campaign to petition the Hong Kong SAR Government (of all people) to conduct an investigation? I am afraid that I can no longer tell the difference between genuine and play-act navet.


    Demosisto marched today with Siu Lai's Democracy Classroom, Chu Hoi-dick (Pat Heung) and Edward Yiu to demonstrate at the China Liaison Office. When they got there, they threw newspapers that reported on the Lam Wingkee affair at the entrance gate.

    - After their unique contributions to social activism of (1) the relay hunger strike of a relay team with each person fasting for four hours followed by another person; (2) jumping into the harbor while wearing life vests; (3) setting up a complex chain of dominoes to topple; they have now come up with throwing newspapers.

    - I recently checked Urban Dictionary and I was amazed to see that nobody has come up with a definition for "leftist retard" yet. I think "throwing newspaper reports at the authorities" may easily qualify.

    (Headline Daily) June 19, 2016.

    Recently Lam Wing-kee's Shenzhen 37-year-old girlfriend named Hu was interviewed by mainland media. The year before last, she got acquainted over the Internet with Lam Wing-kee, who is almost 60 yars old. One month later, Lam Wing-kee came to Shenzhen and they went to a hotel and established a relationship.

    Hu said that she only realized that everything that Lam told her was lies. She said: "He got me involved in his bookstore business. He repeatedly brainwashed me. His goal was to get me to forward books for him. But Lam never explained to her that it is illegal in mainland China to mail these books."

    Hu had carefully asked Lam whether this was legal. Lam said that there was no problem. Later on, Hu found out that Lam had been penalized for precisely this sort of thing before and so he had to know that this was against the law.

    Eight or nine months after they got acquainted, Lam began to ask her to help mail the books. Each time, he would mail the books to Hu and tell her to ship them out by courier service to the names/addresses that he provided. Each time that they met, Lam would pay her a fee for forwarding the books.

    At first Hu was suspicious. She asked Lam why he needed her to do this instead of doing it yourself. Lam told her that since she was getting paid, she should not ask any more questions. Hu felt that Lam was exploiting people to do something that he knew was against the law. The receipts showed Hu's address, and that was how the public security bureau eventually tracked her down.

    She remembered that Lam once scolded her. "He sent a big parcel of books for me at the post office. The sun was particularly vicious that day, and the  post office is not far from my home. So I didn't go to the post office. He telephoned me and scolded me. He said that he is paying me a fee but I did not do my job. He said that I was too lazy."

    Last October, Lam and Hu were both detained by the public security bureau. The investigators told them that they have the right to hire lawyers. But Hu considered that Lam had a family (his parents are in their 70's and there is a son) and did not want them to know about their relationship. So they did not hire lawyers and they did not notify their families either. They only wanted to resolve this matter as soon as possible. So when Lam Wing-kee went back to Hong Kong and said at the press conference that he was forced to sign papers not to inform the family and not to hire a lawyer, he was lying.

    In March this year, Hu was allowed to post bail. On the morning of June 17, Hu saw Lam's press conference. Hu said that Lam mentioned her and divulged their relationship. Hu did not want her friends and relatives to know about this. She felt that Lam was being very selfish, wanting only to do the best for himself without worrying whether other people will live or die. Hu will not be to able to lead a serene life from now on.

    Hu said repeatedly that if she ever get a chance to see Lam Wing-kee again, she is going to ask him what he did this to her. He used fancy talk to persuade her to mail illegal books in order to make money for him. He only cared about his political interests. He was not a man, he was not a Hong Kong man. Normal Hong Kong men will stick to their promises and principles. But this incident has completely destroyed the image of the Hong Kong man.

    Hu now considered that knowing Lam Wing-kee has been a nightmare that she really wants to end. She wants to erase the painful memories so that she can live a new life.

    Hu said that she is a divorced woman bringing up a child by herself. She has seen some female friends married to Hong Kong, and so she also hoped to marry a Hong Kong man so that she and her child can live better lives. When she first got acquainted with Lam Wing-kee, he gave her a wonderful dream. Hu said: "Lam Wing-kee told me that he has a wife in Hong Kong but they don't get along. He wants to wait a couple of years to get a divorce, and then he will marry me. He also promised to get my son to go to live in Hong Kong."

    - Lam Wing-kee is practicing One Country Two Wives like some many other Hong Kong men.

    - Well, the mainland Public Security Bureau apparently has all the mailing and financial records of this Hu woman. This is even more reliable and definitive than any computer file in Causeway Bay Books.

    - What are Lam Wing-kee's options right now?

    Option 1: Completely ignore the existence of the Hu woman and refuse to answer anything about her. Lam will need to have very thick skin.

    Option 2: Attack her for being a gold digger, police informant and/or mental patient. But if you study the case of Alex Ho, there is a good chance that she will counter-attack with all sorts of other evidence (transaction records, photos, videos, etc) so that it becomes a long slow death.

    Option 3: Apologize to her in public and promise to make amends.

    - Fatal Attraction: "I'm not going to be ignored." Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.

    - The detractors of the Hu woman said that mainlanders cannot watch television news of Lam Wing-kee's press conference, so she must be fake. Well, the detractors are still living in the Chinese Internet world of twenty years ago. I suggest that they go and visit mainland China some time and actually see what Chinese Internet users actually do nowadays.

    Besides, even if she hadn't seen a news broadcast, the Sing Tao reporter must usually have brought the video clip of the relevant section to show her and ask for her reaction.

    (Apple Daily) June 19, 2016.

    Before our reporter even asked, Lam Wing-kee immediately said: "Of course, I am a man." In 1994, he founded Causeway Bay Books. In 2013, he decided to sell the store to Mighty Current. One one hand, the rent was expensive and he anticipated that the economy would be even worse in 2014. Besides he said that he did not get along with his wife and she wants to sell the bookstore.

    Lam said that he got to know this girlfriend two years after he separated from his wife. He said that he has not read the Sing Tao report itself, just the title. "It is for normal for her to talk like that. I am sad that I cannot help her. I know that she would say that. Surely." He said that he was sorry for his girlfriend. "I am rueful. Nothing that I say will make a difference, because she cannot hear me. So I might as well as save my breath."

    As for the rebuttals from the other principals at Causeway Bay Books, Lam sighed: "If I confront them each time, it will damage them because they will have to betray their conscience. Therefore I don't want any confrontation. That is not because I am lying, but because it will damage them and make them feel bad. So why do it?"

    He said that the business manager Cheung Jiping lives in Dongguan with his wife, so Cheung is unlikely to be allowed to return to Hong Kong. General manager Lui Por was processing the corporate accounts a few days ago. "Lee Bo wants to finish the matters related to the company. He was going to go to mainland China on June 27. My guess is that he won't be going because the Communists don't people to know their agenda. If he doesn't go on June 27, it will prove that what I say is true."

    (SCMP) June 19, 2016.

    Lee Pos entry to mainland

    Lam: Lee admitted he was abducted to the mainland. He entered the mainland involuntarily, as he told me when I met him after I returned to Hong Kong. He had to say what he said because his relatives are in Fujian

    Lee: When I was chatting with Lam Wing-kee, I did not talk about how I returned to the mainland, and so I didnt say I went to the mainland involuntarily or anything similar.

    Lee Pos handling of customer details

    Lam: Lee passed a list of 400 to 500 customers to mainland authorities.

    Lee: I never used the computer at Causeway Bay Books and had never printed out any lists of customers, much less passing any lists to mainland police.

    Mainland girlfriend on relationship

    Hu: [Lam] lied about the legality of mailing banned books on the mainland and paid me every time I helped him deliver the books through mail.

    Lam: I do not want to confront her as she would not be able to hear what I say on the mainland. She could not say things voluntarily there, so I dont want to bring further trouble to her. I hope she would be treated leniently on the mainland.

    Business partner Lui Por on televised confession

    Lam: [Some officers] gave me a script to read to confess on mainland TV. I had to follow the script. If I did not follow it strictly, they would ask for a re-take.

    Lui Por: There was absolutely no such thing as coerced confessions or pre-arranged media interviews with a script. I never imagined Lam Wing-kee was such a dishonest person. He should bravely admit his guilt and shoulder the legal responsibility.

    Lam: He was forced to say that as his wife was from the northeastern part of China.

    Cheung Chi-ping: Lams press conference was premeditated and an attack on the one country, two systems principle

    Lam: His wife is in Dongguan city, Guangdong province so he had to say so

    Confrontation with Ningbo authorities

    Lam: I wanted to commit suicide in Ningbo as the solitary confinement and interrogation was so stressful.

    Ningbo authorities: He stayed there voluntarily as he had family disputes in Hong Kong.

    Lam: I had separated from my wife for some years already.

    (SpeakoutHK)

    Legislator Michael Tien: Lam Wing-kee held a press conference and it was like throwing a rock into a lake. But he kept changing his tune afterwards. First it is this, then it is that. He should get points deducted.

    You admit that you have a girlfriend in mainland China. The whole thing is that you admit that you mailed books to mainland China and then they are remailed. You knew the law and you broke the law.

    At the press conference, he said that two mainland agents came to Hong Kong with him. I got the impression that the two men were holding you by both arms. But now he is saying that the two men disappeared before he even reached the Lohu border crossing? At first, he said that the two men came with him and this made people think that this was cross-border law enforcement. But now those two persons were not seen after crossing the border. So this is another version, back and forth.

    At the time, he gave me the clear impression that Lee Bo told him: "I was kidnapped to the mainland." I don't understand why Lam Wing-kee changed his statement yesterday. After being questioned a few times, he now said that it was a feeling that he had. At the press conference, he said that Lee Bo was taken to the mainland against his will. But now it boils down to the tone of voice. It was just the tone of voice, and Lee Bo did not say it directly. Then why didn't he make it clear at the press conference? Frankly he gets many points deducted over this.

    Former legislator Ronny Tong Ka-wah: We must admit that as soon as he crossed the border into Hong Kong, he is protected by Hong Kong Basic Law and other laws. Frankly, Lam held this press conference and he said a lot of things. He only indirectly proved that everything that he wanted from One Country Two Systems is already working. One Country Two Systems is working.

    (Oriental Daily) June 19, 2016.

    Eight members of the Hong Kong-UK Reunification Campaign went to the British Consulate-General to petition. They said that mainlanders coming to Hong Kong to enforce the law are seriously violating the Sino-British Joint Declaration. So they want Hong Kong to be be handed back to the United Kingdom. The group is also starting an online petition and they want to gather 10,000 to 20,000 signatures, so that the United Kingdom can act with public opinion on their side.

    (Channel News Asia) June 20, 2016.

    The Hong Kong bookseller who broke silence on Thursday about being interrogated in detention in China, said he had weighed the pros and cons before deciding to speak. His decision to break his silence sparked public furore in the process.

    In a one-on-one interview with Channel NewsAsia's Wei Du on Sunday (Jun 19), Lam Wing-kee said he was not surprised to hear that his girlfriend and associates had spoke out against him. He also spoke of Hong Kongs political future.

    WEI DU: After you gave the interview on Thursday, your associates and girlfriend have told the media that you were not telling the truth. They used some strong words. Are you surprised?

    LAM WING-KEE: They were speaking in an abnormal environment. You know what that means? They were not acting on free will. If I refute them point by point, itll do them harm, because everything theyve said is against their own will. They have a lot on the line, I dont want to refute them anymore.

    WEI: Do you worry the damage is already done?

    LAM: I expected this. When I decided to speak out, I weighed the pros and cons. Its harmed them, its harmed me. My girlfriend is still there, but Ill never see her again in future. The other ones, their cases are pretty much decided on, so the damage is not so great, probably not greater than the harm to myself. But its a different case for the people of Hong Kong. Its important that someone stands up and fights, because many people are too afraid to say anything. I had to make the compromise.

    WEI: You said you expect not to see your girlfriend again?

    LAM: Thats right. I cant go back anymore, and she will never be able to come here. I hope the Chinese government treats them better. Dont treat them badly because of me.

    WEI: You said Lee Bo (one of the other booksellers) told you he was abducted in Hong Kong. If that could happen to him, are you worried about your safety in Hong Kong now?

    LAM: When he was abducted in Hong Kong, maybe it was because mainland authorities didnt expect the reaction in Hong Kong to be so strong. It crossed the line for Hong Kongers, so the reaction was strong. Maybe they didnt see that.

    WEI: So you think its different now?

    LAM: It is different. They werent too smart.

    WEI: You think you are safe in Hong Kong?

    LAM: Yes. After Lee Bo, they wont be so blatant.

    WEI: You were interrogated for eight months. During that time, did you find out what they wanted to know the most?

    LAM: Sources for the books. Where the information came from. Thats what they wanted to know.

    WEI: What are we supposed to make of the books by Mighty Current (the publishing house)?

    LAM: Mighty Current published books to make money. You dont have to understand why. If there was a profit to be made in a book, itd be published. Its all business. The books are often plagiarised. Sometimes they are truthful, sometimes not.

    WEI: Many young people in Hong Kong think the "One Country, Two Systems" wont work out. What do you think is the best way forward?

    LAM: Independence. My personal opinion, and I am not afraid to say, is that its doable.

    In a marriage, if the man treats the woman badly, the woman will leave. Its normal. She wants her happiness too. The Communist party wants to control everyone, but its not elected, it has no legitimacy. It has no respect for human rights. So when people demand independence, they have a reason. Its the same for Hong Kong.

    Video: https://www.facebook.com/SinManSing/videos/625192654306981/

    - The key comment  is about Hong Kong independence as the best way forward. Lam says "it's doable." That's going to upset the pan-democrats (e.g. Democratic Party) who think that the best way forward is communication/negotiations with the Central Government.

    - Very quickly Lam is brought out to reverse course! (TVB) Lam Wing-kee said: "You cannot say that I support Hong Kong independence. I merely support democratic elections." How does he support democratic elections? He said: "So-called Hong Kong independence also goes through democratic elections." He also said that Hong Kong independence is one way forward with democratic elections, but not the only way.

    - (Hong Kong Free Press) Im not saying [I] support independence. I just think that it can be up for discussion, said Lam during a D100 Radio interview on Monday night. At least give it a space [for discussion], he added. Hong Kong is a free society, everyone has different views, and are promoting different views. The best way to go about it is to host a referendum like a free society, Lam added.

    When asked how he would envision an independent Hong Kong, Lam provided a Chinese proverb from ancient philosopher Lao Tzu to illustrate his view.

    To not interact with each other until death, but to hear the sounds of chickens and dogs in your surroundings, Lam explained. If it is a place with freedom, someone has the right to not interact with people from another place they can. This is their freedom.

    If you, as a powerful regime, force people to interact with you, is this considered tyrannical? he added. You took away peoples freedom, and this applies to Hong Kong too. If Hong Kong has freedom to decide its own future, you can give Hong Kong an election [referendum].

    Lam said that it is not about whether people support independence or not.

    You have to first give people a free space, [China] does not have the right to decide, [China] hasnt given anything to the people, right? he said.

    Lam said that Hong Kong can only hope that China will truly implement the One Country, Two Systems principle, otherwise Hong Kong people will have to fight for it.

    - (Wen Wei Po) June 22, 2016. On June 21, Lam Wing-kee was interviewed by Taiwan television channel PTS on telephone. He said that if the central government oppresses Hong Kong too much, then what is wrong with a referendum on independence? He said that while he does not necessarily advocate Hong Kong independence, the central government is a violent organization which is destroying One Country Two Systems. Therefore the people of Hong Kong must find their own way out.

    When the PTS host asked about the feasibility of Hong Kong independence, Lam said that no matter whether there is any likelihood for Hong Kong independence, "you should do it first" and that "it should be done even if it is not likely." At the same time, he admitted that he has no idea what the consequences are. He said that Taiwan is more likely to become independent than Hong Kong. Therefore Taiwan should become independent so that Hong Kong can observe how things turn out.

    (Ta Kung Pao) June 20, 2016.

    After arranging Lam Wing-kee's press conference at the Legislative Council building last Thursday, the Democratic Party against arranged for Lam to be interviewed at the Legislative Council yesterday afternoon. When the Ta Kung Pao reporter arrived, he was told the press conference was restricted to "certain invited media." So our reporter had to stay outside and wait for information.

    Lam Wing-kee said that he was once arrested and punished by Chinese Customs for bringing books into China. Then he told others to bring books or mail books in China. So is this an intentional violation of mainland laws? Yesterday our reporter asked lawyer-legislator Albert Ho (Democratic Party) whether selling unauthorized books in mainland China is breaking mainland laws. Ho said: "Let mainland explain everything clearly to him. Based upon what he learned when he was in mainland China, nobody ever told him what his crimes were. Ok? Everything that he did was done in Hong Kong. That is the case according to what I know."

    With respect to why all the others at Causeway Bay Books reject Lam's position, Ho said: "I think many Hongkongers are using common sense to judge."

    When asked whether assisting Lam Wing-kee is part of the Democratic Party's Legco campaign, Ho said that this was risible. "If a citizen asks you help, can you ignore him because you are in an election? That is a joke."

    But almost 1,000 citizens demonstrated outside the Legislative Council building against Albert Ho. Love Hong Kong chairman Ko Tato-bin said that Lam Wing-kee admitted that he had violated the law in mainland China for which he was arrested inside mainland China. One Country Two Systems was not violated in any way. Ko said that Lam was hijacked by the pan-democrats to deceive the people of Hong Kong and smear the central government.

    - Albert Ho said that Lam Wing-kee has no intention of filing a report to the police. Lam believes that it was more effective to communicate with Security Bureau through the Legislative Council. Ho said that there is no conclusive evidence that cross-border law enforcement took place.

    In the case of Lee Bo, Lam Wing-kee said at first that Lee Bo told him about being taken away against his will. Lee Bo issued a denial. The third person Mrs. Lee Bo present at the meeting can also step in. Lam now agrees that Lee did not say so directly but Lam says that he can tell from Lee's tone of voice that this is what happened. Lee repeated that he has nothing to say and he does not need the services of the Hong Kong Police.

    In the case of Lam Wing-kee, the original crimes were committed in mainland China and he was arrested in mainland China. So there was no cross-border enforcement. Lam said at first that when he came back to Hong Kong this time, he was escorted by two Central Investigation Team members to take back a computer hard disk. This may be cross-border law enforcement, depending on what the two persons did. Lam is now saying that he lost sight of the two persons before he crossed over to Hong Kong. So there is no cross-border law enforcement.

    Given this is what is on the table now, what case is there for cross-border law enforcement in violation of One Country Two Systems?

    - Well, just a few days ago, Albert Ho organized the press conference for Lam Wing-kee and the "6,000-person demonstration march" for "We are all Lam Wing-kee." Today, he is saying that there is no conclusive evidence fro cross-border law enforcement. In gambling, once you place your bet, you cannot pull it back because you realized that you are making the wrong bet. You have to wait for the result. Several hundred cameras caught you in the act before as  you making, doubling and tripling the bet. Let us see you squirm and wiggle now.

    - A print newspaper Ta Kung Pao (founded in 1902) reporter was refused entry into a press conference held inside the Legislative Council building by a Legislative Council. What (if anything) did the Journalists Association have to say? Nothing, of course. Why? FREEDOM DEMOCRACY HUMAN RIGHTS UNIVERSAL VALUES YELLOW UMBRELLA.

    - (Lau Nai-keung) June 21, 2016.

    If behind a great man there is always a great woman, then behind a despicable man is always one or more crooked men.

    Behind the disloyal, unfair, unjust and untrustworthy man Law Wing-kee is the legislator Albert Ho, who does nothing at the Legislative Council except watch adult videos.

    Albert Ho is as lusty and exploitative as Lam Wing-kee. When Edward Snowden came to Hong Kong to seek refuse, Ho appeared like the Magnet Man at the press conference. But if you have seen the Snowden documentary, you know that "AV Ho" had nothing to do with anything.

    This time, "AV Ho" probably had a director/scriptwriter role, because the Ming Pao depiction that Lam WIng-kee smoked three cigarettes, tossed away the mobile phone given to him by mainland agents, left the Kowloon Tong station to seek help from Albert Ho is too melodramatic and unrealistic to be true.

    But if Lam said that his activities in Hong Kong were monitored by mainland agents Mr Chan and Mr Shi of the Central Investigation Team, why didn't they do anything? Why didn't "enforce the law across the border" as they have been accused of doing previously?

    In any case, we get to see "AV Ho" meet the press and this time he was using Lam Wing-kee.

    The opposition thought that they had found a treasure. After the June 16 press conference, they organized a demonstration march two days later. No matter whether the figure was the police estimate of 1,800 or the organizers' claim of 6,000, the number was pretty good. For the sake of getting more votes, there is no such thing as most despicable; there is only being more despicable than ever.

    The  problem is that all the bookstore colleagues of Lam Wing-kee have come out to call him a liar. On June 19, Lam told the media that Lee Bo did not tell him directly about being taken away against his will, but Lam said so because he "clearly heard from the tone of voice."

    In addition, the media reported on his wife's accusations against him and the tearful interview with his girlfriend. Yesterday the Shaoguan librarian was reported in the media calling Lam a liar and a womanizer.

    All of a sudden, Lam Wing-kee has gone from the killer weapon for the opposition to become a negative asset. For elections, lying may be acceptable but womanizing/betrayal upsets female voters.

    At this time, "AV Ho" has resurfaced on radio, saying that there is no conclusive evidence on cross-border law enforcement. Well, it that was the case, then what were they demonstrating/marching about?

    In one sentence, there is no such thing as most despicable; there is only being more despicable than ever.

    Lam Wing-kee's son Phoenix Lam announced on Facebook today: "I want to see a place with no publishing industry and no way to mail books will detain an ordinary Hongkongers for no apparent reason." He said that he will update his post on his post on Friday. But he dies, he wants people to burn some joss money for him.

    - Yes, if Phoenix Lam actually goes to mainland China, he will be accompanied by an Apple Daily/Next Magazine team to record his arrest. This will be a replay of the Chan Kin-hong incident, a landmark event in Hong Kong media history.

    - Let us suppose that Phoenix Lam actually goes to mainland China (and that is a big IF).

    If he commits no crime and he gets arrested, then it proves the thesis that the Chinese Communists are bad.

    If he commits no crime and he does not get arrested, then it proves that rule of law exists in China.

    If he commits a crime and he gets arrested, then it proves that rule of law exists in China.

    If he commits a crime and he does not get arrested, it proves that there is no justice under heaven.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) June 21, 2016.

    Phoenix Lam, the son of recently returned bookseller Lam Wing-kee, has denied that he crossed the border into the mainland to challenge or test any authority. He said that he visits China regularly for legal business and the fact he entered without trouble shows that China is civilised and open and One Country Two System is intact.

    He said he mentioned testing the border on Facebook in an effort to seek part-time work. Lets see whether a Hong Kong person who is not involved in the book business, and did not send books anywhere will be detained unreasonably, he wrote on Monday. He then announced through a friend that he had successfully crossed the border at around 6pm the same day.

    However, Phoenix published a statement on Tuesday saying that media outlets had used provocative words or did not report the truth about his trip and that he felt that it was necessary to clarify immediately. He said that he talked about entering China because he would only be available for interviews for part-time job offers when he returns on Friday.

    He said that his success in returning to the mainland showed that the Chinese government rules according to the law and is civilised and open. It will not detain anyone unrelated to the [Causeway Bay Bookstore] incident. [It] shows the improvement of Chinese law and the effective implementation of One Country, Two Systems. He added that he was not stalked or placed under surveillance inside the mainland [and] was not harassed.

    He also said that he runs a design business which does not sell nor mail books, and that the medias inaccurate reporting may destroy his good country-loving, Hong Kong-loving image and affect his business.

    Lam Wing-kee said to HKFP last week that he had a separate life to his son.

    In a D100 interview on Monday, Lam said that his son had always been rebellious. Phoenix is still immature and his attempt to go to the mainland was unwise and he was playing with fire, Lam said. However, he also said that he was not worried about his sons safety.

    - (Bastille Post) The initial Facebook post by Phoenix Lam misled Apple Daily into thinking that he was going to mainland China to challenge the government. Apple Daily contacted him through Facebook but did not interview him directly. Yesterday Phoenix Lam said that the "media" destroyed his "good image of loving China and Hong Kong." This is such an anti-climax that some people think that the initial post was designed to entrap Apple Daily.

    (Oriental Daily) June 20, 2016.

    At around 5am, somebody hung out a yellow banner saying that "LSD: We are all Lam Wing-kee" on the mountainside by Lung Yan Road. At 940am, the fire department removed the banner. The League of Social Democrats claimed credit for the act.

    - The most frequent Internet comments were: "We all want to be Lam Wing-kee -- we want one wife in Hong Kong and one wife in mainland China!" and "We don't want One Country Two Systems -- we want One Country Two Wives!"

    (Oriental Daily) June 20, 2016.

    The emergence of Lam Wing-kee has suddenly become rain during a drought for the pan-democrats. The pan-democratic political parties and the Alliance to Support Patriotic Democratic Movements in China immediately rushed out to hold a demonstration with the "Golden 72 Hours" period. In so doing, they took the sail away from the Civil Human Rights Front which wanted Lam Wing-kee to be the theme of the July 1st march. On June 17 (Friday), the Civic Human Rights Front held a meeting to discuss whether the theme for the July 1st march should be changed from "The Final Battle Against 689" to "We are all Lam Wing-kee." But since the pan-democrats had already done this, a second round on the same theme may not be a good draw. So they will keep the original theme unless things change.

    (Apple Daily) June 18, 2016.

    Our newspaper received information that TVB News had invited Lam Wing-kee to appear on the programme On The Record. Lam accepted the invitation. But TVB News has now canceled. According to information, the decision "came from the highest level." Our reporter called TVB News general manager Yuan Chi-wai. Upon learning that our reporter is from Apple Daily, Yuan said: "Sorry, I am not in Hong Kong right now." Then Yuan hung up.

    (Headline Daily) June 20, 2016.

    A TVB spokesperson that the Apple Daily report was inaccurate. TVB had not decided whether to invite Lam or not, so there is no issue of "cancellation."

    According to an informed source, television news programs are required to be fair and balanced. Many of those involved in the affair have already come out to rebut Lam Wing-kee. So if Lam is invited as the sole interviewee, he will only repeat his one-sided story and then TVB will be getting a lot of complaints (to the Broadcasting Authority).

    (Kinliu) June 20, 2016.

    ... Over the past few decades, I have interrogated countless number of criminals. I know that every criminal will exaggerate things that are favorable to their cases and gloss over their own misdeeds. At the June 14 press conference that Lam Wing-kee held under the aegis of legislator Albert Ho, he made all sorts of slips and errors. He may be able to fool some politicians driven by ulterior motives, but he can't expect to fool all of the citizens. Among the most ludicrous slips is the Central Investigation Team that Lam said was in charge of his case. Why is it ludicrous? Let us answer these two questions first: How big is Hong Kong? What is the population of Hong Kong?

    Hong Kong has an area of more than 1,100 square kilometers. China has an area of 9.6 million square kilometers. So they don't even bother to discuss any place less than 10,000 square kilometers. Hong Kong has a population of 7.2 million. China has a population of 1.3 million. So they don't even bother to mention any place less than 10 million people. China is the second largest economic power in the world, more than twice as much as number three Japan. Hong Kong's economy is just over 2% of China's economy.

    If a foreign government leader or a business mogul sees these numbers, what would they think? If you are Chairman Xi Jinping, how much attention will you give Hong Kong? Stop kidding yourself! Hongkongers are megalomaniacs who think that the world has to revolve around them. The truth is that world leaders and the Central governments rarely think about Hong Kong. Americans are interested in Hong Kong only to the extent that it is the only part of China that is defenseless against their machinations.

    Based upon my decades of contact with the mainland public security, Lam's crime is relatively light. That is why he was released back to Hong Kong after several months of "education." Lam is just making it up by saying that his case was handled by a "central investigation team" in order to con Albert Ho and his ilk. He might as well as said "the special investigation team sent by the state chairman/president."

    (SCMP) June 23, 2016.

    The man at the centre of the bookseller storm stated he would report his case to Hong Kong police in the next few days, putting his account on official record for the citys law enforcement to follow up.

    Causeway Bay Books store manager Lam Wing-kee, 61, made explosive claims last week about his abduction and eight months of detention on the mainland. He said he returned to Hong Kong on June 14 after agreeing to hand a hard disk of client information to mainland authorities, but changed his mind at the last minute and instead contacted lawmaker Albert Ho Chun-yan for help.

    Lam had said it was not urgent for him to report to the police, explaining he did not have high hopes that local law enforcement would be helpful. But speaking on a DBC radio programme on Thursday, Lam clarified he would indeed contact the police.

    Ill contact them in the next few days, he said. Theres no problem with my personal safety now, so Ill arrange it after meeting media. He added he had media interviews to conduct on Thursday and Friday.

    The bookseller did not explain why he had changed his mind.

    Hong Kong police said they had been trying to contact Lam for more information about what happened to him.

    Lam revealed on Thursday that when he was detained for months in Ningbo in Zhejiang province he had to wear an orange uniform and his hair was shorn.

    - Lam Wing-kee is too busy doing media interviews to bother with providing evidence to the police. He knows what the priorities are.

    (Radio Free Asia) Interview: 'My Plans to Move Freely Have Come to Nothing'. February 8, 2017.

    Lam Wing-kee spoke to RFA after arriving in Taiwan this week to speak publicly about his experiences under the "one country, two systems" arrangement that Beijing also hopes to extend to Taiwan. He was immediately offered 24-hour police protection.

     RFA: So what are the security arrangements like around you?

     Lam: I am in someone else's home right now, and there are four or five police officers stationed in the alleyway out back. There were more than 10 of them following our car. I feel sorry, as a guest, that I am causing them so much trouble, and that things have gotten this way whenever Hong Kong and Taiwan try to have such exchanges.

     RFA: Why so much security?

     Lam: I think the Taiwan authorities are really worried about anything untoward happening. Ultimately, this is all because of the [ruling] Chinese Communist Party. Even if [all this security] isn't necessary, [my hosts] would still feel unsettled. It's not good for me, either. All my plans to move around freely have come to nothing. How can I move around anywhere freely?

     RFA: What kind of a visa do you have?

     Lam: Initially they told me I could get a month, but that was cut to just two weeks, then they must have started to worry, and they said I could only have a week. I had planned just to come here and then extend it, and I asked them about that, but the Taiwan authorities said I couldn't do that. I have been cleared for a single return trip. It used to be that you got a little booklet that was good for several trips, but now there are security concerns, because of [the attacks on pro-democracy leader] Joshua Wong [last month].

     I heard that this means there's a lot of pressure on the chief of police here, who could lose his job if anything happens to me on this trip.

     RFA: What do your hosts, the Taiwan Foundation for Democracy, and Independent PEN have to say about this?

     Lam: The Taiwan Foundation for Democracy said to me that perhaps I could limit the number of media interviews I give. I said that would be very difficult, because everyone knows I am here; it's public knowledge. Anyway, I'm not doing anything illegal. How about if I only speak to the media if they ask me something? But I will take their concerns into consideration. I can't just act as I please as if I were in Hong Kong.

     RFA: Are you going to avoid the topic of Hong Kong independence too?

     Lam: If I'm asked about it, I will speak about it, but I will be careful what I say.

     RFA: What is the state of freedom of publication in Hong Kong right now, would you say?

     Lam: It's very clear that there are some things you can't publish. For example, a couple of months ago a Malaysian woman wrote a book, but no publishing house in Hong Kong or Taiwan dared to publish it, because they were too worried about the impact in mainland China. To put it another way, they were afraid of annoying Beijing. They had a book that they wanted to publish, and they could have done so before the Causeway Bay Books incident. But they don't dare, now that this has happened. So this shows us that of course things have changed.

    (The Standard) June 14, 2016.

    A group of secondary school students in Shek Kip Mei began a signature campaign to protest new policies by their principal, including an earlier start to school and threatening to cancel their talent contest. The students at Church of Christ in China Ming Yin College launched a petition on Facebook criticizing principal Anne Chan Yee-man for "carrying out tyranny" and demanding she review the new policies. The petition had 242 signatures by 8.30pm last night.

    In an open letter, the group said Chan required teachers to set up tutorial classes regardless of their teaching progress and forced teachers and staff to read specified books. "Teaching work is heavy enough. Why did principal Chan add to their burden?" the letter read. "After principal Chan took office, [she] has threatened to cancel [talent show] New Top Idol, and the student union also needs to take down the uploaded singing contest videos."

    The group said Chan changed the school schedule, advancing the start of school by 15 minutes. "Principal Chan claimed that this is one of the ways for self-learning but this cannot lead to self-learning, and has affected students' learning interest." The students said they raised their demands with Chan but were ignored. A black banner stating "face students' demands and petition to call for a dialog" was unfurled outside the campus on Wai Chi Street. Some students were seen distributing leaflets.

    The Standard asked for an interview with Chan, but a school employee said there were many media inquiries and they would release a press statement instead. However, The Standard had not received a statement by press time.

    (EJ Insight) June 14, 2016.

    Students of CCC Ming Yin College (MYC) in Shek Kip Mei are protesting some decisions taken by the secondary schools management recently, particularly with regard to the issue of class timings. The pupils are upset that classes will start at 8.15 am everyday under a new rule, rather than the previous schedule of 8.30 am. Also, there are concerns about a move to increase the number of hours for mandatory tutorial classes and additional mock examinations for DSE students. Angered at the decisions, students are urging the school authorities to reconsider their plans, the Hong Kong Economic Journal reported. 

    On Monday, a banner was hung outside the school, calling on the management to enter into a dialogue with the students. Meanwhile, some former and existing students of the institution published an open letter to the school principal, Anne Chan Yee-man, urging her to sit down with student representatives and listen to their grievances.


    Look at the student demands
    Signature campaign to request dialogue

    Questioned about the revision in class timings, Chan said the 8:15 am start was aimed at standardizing the school hours. Under the previous system, classes used to begin at different times during the summer term and in the winter months. Class timetable is an internal school policy and should not be a matter of public discussion, the principal said, according to Apple Daily. Students are welcome for a dialogue but they would be wrong to think that they can vote on decisions like these, she said.

    A former student named Yip Ka-yu, who showed up at a protest outside the school, said Chan was acting like a tyrant and forcing her decisions on the students.

    Chan agreed to be interviewed by Apple Daily, but demanded that the transcripts be submitted to her for approval before publication. But she relented after reporters explained that such action would be deemed as censorship and interference in press freedom.

    Chris Wat Wing-yin. Where is the tyranny?

    Several students and alumni at CCC Ming Yin College in Shek Kip Mei set up a banner for a signature petition against "tyranny" at the school and demanded the school principal meet publicly with the student representatives.

    The black banner had the words "Look at the student demands, Signature campaign to request dialogue." This was led by the "Protest Against Tyranny At CCC Ming Yin College Concern Group." They also had a plan to ambush the school principal at the front gate in conjunction with the Apple Daily reporter.

    I am curious as to what tyrannical rule was imposed upon the students. Why did the children apply such Red Guard tactics to 'treat' their school principal?

    So it happens that one of the tyrannical actions was to start class 15 minutes earlier. The school used to start at 830am. Now it will start at 815am. The extra 15 minutes becomes a reading period, so that students will develop the habit of reading for 15 minutes each day. But a student who signed the petition said: "We are forced to read. I feel so bad (in English)." "This is inconvenient for students who live faraway. Not much reading can be done in 15 minutes."

    Actually many schools are already running this type of morning reading period. Usually it is 20 to 30 minutes. I remember that my first class in secondary school was to read the newspaper. At the time, I thought that it was boring. Eventually I developed the habit of reading the news every morning. When I read the news, I keep up with the world; if I can't read the news, I feel as if I am missing something.

    Thus the principal answered the reporter in that ambush interview: "This is tyranny? May I ask which part of this is tyrannical?" Yes, those 15 minutes are very important. If the students can read some more, maybe they will find out what tyranny is in history and then they will know what tyranny is.

    An Internet user wrote: "Is it truly tyrannical to force you to come to school earlier and make you read books! You should be able to play with computer games, watch movies, eat and sleep all day; you should get full marks without taking any exams; you should be able to graduate from university automatically; you should be able to get a house and a car automatically; you should be able to have lots of money without working ..."

    I have said that something has gone wrong with education. Every school has some cancerous political cells who want to turn educational issues into political strife in the manner of the Cultural Revolution. The person who started this is Yip Ka-yu, who studied for the DSE at CCC Ming Yin this year and who is a follower of Joshua Wong at Scholarism and Demosisto.

    What happened at CCC Ming Yin College should be an example for all schools in Hong Kong. A few cancerous cells may take down the entire body, just as a few cancerous students and alumni may take down an entire school. So principals should be wary and prepare yourselves for the coming battle.

    Internet comments:

    - (Apple Daily) Yip Ka-yu who graduated this year said that the sixth-year students have to take a pre-mock test, a mock test and a post-mock test in order to deal with the Diploma of Secondary Education (DSE) exams. This increased the pressure on students greatly.

    - In order to run a mock test, the teachers have to prepare a test, administer the test, grade the test and review the results with each student. This is a lot of work. Why do this? Because the DSE is the exam that is the culmination of six years of hard work and the results can literally change your life. If you do well, you get to attend university; if not, you get to attend trade school or just get a job as a kitchen apprentice.

    - Yes, some schools don't even give any mock tests. But parents get nervous and enroll their children in tutoring schools that run the mock tests. The cost may be several thousand dollars per test. In this case, CCC Ming Yin College is offering a pre-mock test, a mock test and a post-mock test for free. What more can you ask for?

    - What pressure on students? If the students don't like doing these mock tests, they don't have to do it. In Hong Kong, compulsory education is only for nine years. A 12-th year student sitting for the DSE can always drop out.

    - (Apple Daily) Yip Ka-yu said that the school extended school hours by almost one hour, including adding 15 minutes of reading time and making students show up earlier for school.

    - Here are some famous quotations from the students themselves:

    - Yip Ka-yu explained why this is so bad. She said that showing up earlier will affect the 精神 (mental concentration, vitality, spirit, liveliness) of the students and teachers.

    - A student with surname Wong: This is a huge problem because the school did not consult the students. Also the action means that the students cannot go home earlier to rest and study.

    -- A student with surname Lai: What is the effectiveness of 15 minutes of reading time? "It is inconvenient for students who live far away, and how much can you read in 15 minutes?"

    -- A student with surname Yiu: Reading should be a matter of personal interest for students. Extending the school hours will reduce rest time. "They are forcing us to read. I feel so bad (in English)."

    Here are some points:

    - Yip Ka-yu attended the CCC Ming Yin College in Sham Shui Po district. Last year she joined Scholarism and became a member of the Standing Committee. So that explains everything.

    - Meanwhile Dr. Anne Chan is a member of the pro-establishment Hong Kong Federation of Education Workers. So she must be targeted for extinction.

    - No, that isn't everything. The remaining piece of the puzzle is how to get Secretary of Education Eddie Ng into all this.

    - Well, all these other issues are peripheral because the main point is to decide the question of "Who is the boss?" So is it the school principal Dr. Anne Chan? Or the students? Or the politicized  alumni (such as Yip Ka-yu). The issues could be school hours but it could also also have been many other issues (e.g. extracurricular activities, teachers' pay, busing, class sizes, etc). So who gets to decide on these issues?

    - If the students are the decision-makers on school hours, then they will demand the power to hire/fire staff/teachers, setting school curriculum, etc.

    - CCC Ming Yin College is a Band 1B school. But there are plenty of other Band 2 and Band 3 schools where students come in every day to have fun and never to study. That is why CCC Ming Yin College students are upset. They want equality, justice and fairness so that they can also come in every day to have fun and never to study.

    - If these CCC Ming Yin College students are not happy, they can always transfer to Band 2 and Band 3 schools where it is party time all the time.

    - By comparison, mainland Chinese students could only wish that they can be in class every hour of the day to better prepare themselves.

    - If you don't want to read, you can just sit there and stare at the book and think about something else. In this case, you are preparing yourself for your future low-end/dead-end job (such as security guard) which involves serving a certain number of hours each day.

    - When I was a student, I studied five to six hours a day on my own. When the school bell rang, the teachers rushed out the door. What do they care about giving me the extra minutes that I wanted? Today students are different. When the principal and teachers want you to do better, you call them tyrants! Why don't you just drop out of school already!? Do you think that the principal/teachers have nothing better to do with their time?

    - When I was a student, all the teachers were Division 430 soldiers. When 430pm came around, they got off the job. They wouldn't respond to anything that you ask them. So if they should ever volunteered to give us extra tutoring, we would have been elated to the high heavens! I am not saying that they were lousy teachers; they stuck to their duties, they did what they were supposed to do and then they went home and led their own lives per contract.

    - If the students don't perform well at DSE, the fault lies with the school. The school needs to come up with a way to let students perform well in DSE without having to study. That is the reason of existence for the schools.

    - The students always have the choice. They can choose to study diligently and obtain good results at the DSE. Or they can choose to abandon all hope and choose failure for themselves. Nobody is forcing them. In fact, the students don't even have to stay in school for one more day -- they can drop out right now!

    - Compare CCC Ming Yin College against an elite school such as LaSalle College. Why do LSC students work so hard? Is it because their principal and the teachers are oppressive tyrants? Or is it because the students want to study hard and do well? It is clear that the students are elites who know what they want and who do what they have to do to get there.

    - These students don't want to go to the additional tutorials, but they are afraid that their fellow students may go and thus gain an advantage over them. So the solution is to make sure that nobody gets anything!

    - This is a new world of labor/student thinking. Not only do workers want maximum working hours, but students want maximum study hours.

    - If the students are excellent in academically, the principal couldn't care less. But the situation is that the student performances are sliding. What is the principal going to tell the board of directors? Should the principal say that "sleeping in the streets at Occupy Central" is more valuable than "four years of schooling"?

    - I don't think that the school should make it compulsory for the students to do one thing or the other. They should offer the students the choice. If the students don't want to take the pre-mock, mock and post-mock tests, then so be it.

    - If you think that your whole person will be wasted without getting that 15 minutes of extra sleep, then maybe you shouldn't have stayed up all night playing computer games.

    - What is the difference between waking up at 700am and getting to school at 830am, versus waking up 645am and getting to school at 815am? Is it really a matter of life and death?

    - What is the 15 minutes for? For example, you have English dictation in your fourth class of the day. You memorized the passage last night (or at least you thought that you did). Why not go over the passage one more time this morning?

    - If a student has 15 minutes to spend, would it be for reading books? Or for Facebook? And is Facebook really going to help him/her do better on DSE?

    - When the mission is to overthrow tyranny, how can a signature campaign be sufficient? We need student class strikes, labor strikes, sabotage, takeovers, fire bombs, hunger strikes, self-immolations, etc.

    - (YouTube) From the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, "Revolution is no crime, to rebel is justified."

    - (YouTube) Sam Hui's classical song about student life. But that was a long time ago.

    - This is the first time anywhere in the world that providing education is TYRANNY because the students say that they don't want it.

    - There is a school in Ho Man Tin district where the school principal imposes compulsory extra lessons, compulsory summer classes, compulsory outdoor singing lessons, compulsory religious activities, and compulsory handover of mobile phones. However, the classrooms are in disgraceful shape. How about that for TYRANNY?

    - We can eliminate tyranny by banning the following undemocratic rules and regulations:

    - Attending school on time
    - Wearing school uniforms
    - Handing in homework
    - No sleeping in class
    - Taking exams to assess achievement
    - Attending physical education classes
    - Forbidding private chats during teaching ...

    - The Revolution never stops. After you are done with tyranny at school, you are going to find tyranny at work:

    - You must show up for work on time
    - You must adhere to company dress codes
    - You must do your assigned work
    - You must not sleep at work
    - You must be subjected to job performance appraisals to determine your wages
    - You are not allowed to use Facebook for personal purposes

    - CCC Ming Yin College is a Band 1B school. It is a decent school, though not great. If the students take over, it is guaranteed to be a great school for students to attend, but they will be non-competitive against other schools.

    - Where is the Professional Teachers Union? Where is the Civic Party/Democratic Party/League of Social Democrats/People Power/Civic Passion/Hong Kong Indigenous? Everybody knows that the case is so ludicrous that it is drawing huge media attention around the world. So why aren't they jumping in already to get some media exposure? Or is this too embarrassing even for them?

    - Soaphk.hk

    CCC Ming Yin College students leave angry words at Soaphk.hk to say that they are stakeholders at their school and that they are being nice by not using obscene curses already.

    - (Bastille Post) Here is another case. A City University Electronics and Communications Engineering dropout applied for a judicial review because a professor gave him poor marks and persuaded other examiners to do the same, such that the student received a failing grade on his thesis. Today the High Court issued its judgment. Firstly, the incident occurred three years ago and beyond the statute of limitations. Furthermore, the High Court has no reason to interfere with school grades. Thus, the application was rejected.

    - Who is paying for the legal bills? Don't tell me that the loser of a student was approved for legal aid!

    (EJ Insight) June 13, 2016.

    Stanley Lau Chin-ho (劉展灝), one of Hong Kongs prominent businessmen, died on Sunday after suffering a heart attack at the age of 66.

    Lau, an employer representative on the Labour Advisory Board, attended a public consultation of the Standard Working Hours Committee on Saturday after returning from a business trip to Japan. In the evening, he went to the residence of Eddy Li, the president of the Chinese Manufacturers Association of Hong Kong, for dinner. Later, he complained of chest pain and was taken to the Hong Kong Baptist Hospital. He was sent home but was asked to come again on Monday for another check-up. However, he passed away during sleep in the early hours of Sunday.

    The businessmans family expressed shock and sadness at the sudden death. Laus elder son, Gary Lau, said his father was in good health and that he had been exercising regularly, the Hong Kong Economic Journal reported. Following the patriarchs death, Gary said that he and his brother will now jointly take care of the family business.

    Lau, who proposed contractual working hours last year, has faced strong criticism and protests from labor representatives. In a protest on Saturday, Tam Leung-ying of the Neighbourhood and Workers Services Centre threw a wig at Lau and mocked him for suggesting a fake standard working hours proposal, according to RTHK. The wig missed Lau. The public consultation ended earlier than scheduled. Tam said he was shocked by Laus death but he said his protest was not personal at all.

    Leung Chau-ting, an employee representative on Labour Advisory Board, said that although he had some differences with Lau, he will readily admit that Lau had a deep understanding of labor issues.

    Irons Sze Wing-wai, a permanent honorary president of the Chinese Manufacturers Association of Hong Kong and an employer representative on the Labour Advisory Board, said Saturdays protest was not good, even though he acknowledged that the incident cant be linked to Laus heart attack. 

    (The Standard) June 13, 2016.

    Leading industrialist Stanley Lau Chin- ho, a former chairman of the Federation of Hong Kong Industries who opposed standard working hours, has died of a heart attack. He was 66.

    Police said they received a report at 5.13am from a 61-year-old woman, saying her husband was in a coma in their home at Kowloon City. The man, who was later confirmed as Lau, was sent to Kwong Wah Hospital in Yau Ma Tei, where he was certified dead at 5.40am.

    Lau, who was managing director of Renley Watch Group and an employers' representative on the Standard Working Hours Committee, made his last public appearance on Saturday during a public consultation on working hours in Tai Po, where a protester threw a wig at him, criticizing the employers' representatives for refusing to regulate working hours. Lau was supposed to attend the RTHK program City Forum yesterday to debate issues on Mandatory Provident Fund and retirement protection.

    His sons, Gary Lau Sun-tao and Ronald Lau Sun-ting, released a statement through the Productivity Council. "It is with great sadness we announce that our beloved father passed away suddenly at home in his sleep this morning with our mother and family members by his side. It is difficult to put into words our loss," they said. "We wish to thank everyone for the love and care towards our father. The funeral arrangements will be announced in due course."

    Lau apparently had his last dinner when he attended a reception hosted by Eddy Li Sau-hung, president of the Chinese Manufacturers' Association of Hong Kong, at his home on Saturday evening. He then went home but felt uncomfortable at about 10pm. Lau went to Baptist Hospital where his family doctor gave him an electrocardiogram and he went home.

    Lau had opposed legislation on standard working hours as he believed it would create labor shortages and hurt Hong Kong's competitiveness.

    Hong Kong Trade Unions chairman Stanley Ng Chau-pei, who quit the committee with five other employees' representatives, said yesterday: "Although our stances are completely opposite, both of us keep the public interest in mind instead of personal grudges."

    (SCMP) June 13, 2016.

    Stanley Lau Chin-ho, one of the citys most prominent industrialists, has died of a heart attack. He was 66. Lau, an honorary president of the Federation of Hong Kong Industries, passed away at Kwong Wah Hospital in Yau Ma Tei on Sunday morning. He recently told the Post that he was in good health and ran every morning before work even participating in the occasional marathon. Laus two sons, Gary Lau Sun-tao and Ronald Lau Sun-ting, said their father died in his sleep with their mother and family members by his bedside.

    Lau, the federations former chairman and the current Productivity Council chairman, was due to appear on the RTHK programme City Forum on Sunday to discuss Hong Kongs MPF system and retirement protection issues. He had received intense criticism in recent years for voicing the concerns of the industrial and business communities over issues such as standard working hours

    Federation chairman Professor Daniel Cheng Man-chung called Lau's death a sad loss to Hong Kong and the local industry. Mr Lau had made invaluable contribution to the FHKI, the Hong Kong industry as well Hong Kong's economic and social development as a whole. He is an outstanding industrial leader and our dearest friend," Cheng said.

    Chief Secretary Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor praised Lau as an outstanding industrialist and being passionate for Hong Kong. She expressed condolences to his wife and sons, and said it was totally unfair to criticise Lau for giving his views to the government. Im shocked and saddened by the sudden news, said Lam. All those who know him will sorely miss him. Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying, who was out of the city on holiday, also expressed his sadness and condolences.

    Lau, who was also an employees representative on the Standard Working Hours Committee, attended the committees first community consultation meeting on Saturday in Tai Po. Only about 30 citizens attended the consultation, and Lau had a wig thrown at him by a protestor.

    Lawmaker Leung Yiu-chung, of the Neighbourhood and Workers Services Centre, said: Although we had different stances [over the standard working hours issue], we felt shocked and sad at [Laus] sudden passing away.

    Lau had previously openly opposed legislation on minimum wage and standard working hours.

    Standard Working Hours Committee member Leung Chau-ting said that while he and Lau never saw eye to eye, the industrialist was a straight talking man who was easy to get along with. He stood for industry and we stood for the labour sector. On camera, we were at loggerheads. But after meetings we were still friends, Leung said. He was a person who was very easy to get along with. He was very upfront with everything, very frank and never beating around the bush. He would tell us very straight up that certain issues would have an impact on industry.

    A watch manufacturer by trade, Lau was a member of the Sichuan Provincial Committee of the Chinese Peoples Political Consultative Conference. He was awarded the Young Industrialist Award in 1994 and had a long record of public and community service in industry and labour circles. He also received a bronze Bauhinia Star in 2009 and a silver one in 2014.

    He was chairman of the Vetting Committee of the General Support Programme under the Innovation and Technology Fund, and a member of the Economic Development Commission, Hong Kong Trade Development Council and the Labour Advisory Board, among other public roles.

    That's what you read in English. Now see what you read in Chinese.

    (Oriental Daily including video) June 12, 2016.

    In the first round of public consultations on Standard Working Hours in Tai Po, only about 30 citizens and organizations took part because the labor representatives had quit the commission already. The meeting was over by 530pm, more than 1 hour ahead of time. Many members of the Neighbourhood and Workers Services Centre members protested.

    Neighbourhood and Workers Services Centre member Tam Leung-ying pulled the wig from his head and threw it at Standard Working Hours Committee member Stanley Lau, hitting the chair on which Lau was sitting on. Lau did not react. Afterwards, Tam and a dozen others left the meeting room in protest. Tam said that throwing the wig was meant to take a dig at the the employers for having no intention to legislate standard working hours ("no wig" sounds like "no law" in Cantonese).

    Before the meeting began, the Civic Alliance To Fight For Standard Working Hours protested against committee chairman Edward Leung. They chanted slogans and demanded the establishment of standard working hours. At one point, they surrounded Leung and demanded the cessation of any further discussion of contractual working hours. Leung said: "I heard you. I heard everything that you are saying." The demonstrators dispersed after five minutes.

    (Oriental Daily) June 12, 2016.

    After Stanley Lau passed away, Neighbourhood and Workers Services Centre member Tam Leung-ying said that Lau might be unhappy over Tam's action. However, Tam said that this was the consequence of Lau's poor performance as a member of the Standard Working Hours committee. He said that Lau's previous comments such as saying that "the boss is the dealer and the worker is the dealer" made people feel that he disrespected workers.

    - How can Stanley Lau say that "the boss is the dealer and the worker is the dealer"? He has obviously no idea who is in charge. When the workers go out on strike, the boss is finished. Without the workers, the boss is nothing.

    - Please fill in: Without the boss, the workers are _____________ .

    (Kinliu) June 15, 2016.

    On June 13, our reporter reached Tam Leung-ying at the office of Neighbourhood and Workers Services Centre legislative councilor Leung Yiu-chung in Kwai Fong Estate. Tam said: "I find this is ... quite funny ... to accuse me of throwing the wig that caused his death." Tam admitted that he wore a wig in order to skirt around the security check. "Throwing a wig will clearly not cause personal injury." He did not think that Stanley Lau was scared by a wig being thrown at him. Tam said that Neighbourhood and Workers Services Centre was trying to cause trouble at the public consultation, so that the public won't think things were going smoothly. Tam said that, if necessary, they may initiate a labor strike.

    Tam said that if events rewind back to the same moment, he would still not hesitate to throw the wig. He exhibited no remorse. He said that Stanley Lau's death had nothing to do with him. "I have seen an Internet photo which accused me of being the murdering. I didn't think that matters to me."


    "Murderer"

    (Ming Pao) June 13, 2016.

    Shortly after the news came that Stanley Lau had passed away, Neighbourhood and Workers Services Centre member Wong Yun-tat posted on his Facebook: "If standard working hours become fact, not just workers but I guess that even bosses will have lower chances of cardiac conditions." He added: "Will the government please enact standard working hours legislation in order to protect the health of citizens?" This post drew massive criticisms and was soon deleted.

    Yesterday Wong Yun-tat responded to our reporter. He admitted that he deleted his post because it was like throwing salt on other people's wounds. If the family of Stanley Lau is uncomfortable about those comments, Wong was willing to apologize. Lau said that he made those comments because many bosses and not just workers have to work overtime. Lau said that his comments were directed at the social system and not at specific individuals. Wong said that his expression may have been imperfect and he did not intend to be disrespectful to the deceased.

    - Standard working hours legislation is going to help the boss stop working too many hours? Do you know what the boss has to do? And the consequence of those things not getting done?

    - Mr. Lau clearly died from exhaustion due to overworking. Let us hope that his death will cause him to seriously reflect on his priorities in life.

    - I hope that all young people are as wise and humane as you are.

    (Sky Post) The First Death. By Chris Wat Wing-yin. June 14, 2016.

    Starting two years ago, Hong Kong became strange. The string of political incidents and the nonstop acts of rage gave the feeling that someone is waiting for the first blood, even the first death, in order to call the emotional Hongkongers to lose their minds and break into rage.

    When we looked at the reaction from the Admiralty tear gas and the ecstasy over the shots into the air in Mong Kok on Lunar New Years Day, we begin to sense that the opposition camp do not care at all about the lives of citizens. All they want to see is blood and deaths, because that would be the basis for their emotional appeal. Hongkongers are bleeding hearts. If there are any casualties, then the incident becomes another June 4th and their enemies will never be able to stand up. That is why political confrontations are getting angrier and the words are becoming more vicious.

    But the opposition never figured that the first death would take place on the other side. Recently Standard Working Hours Committee member Stanley Lau passed away due to cardiac problems. Earlier he had attended a local consultation meeting in which someone threw a wig at him in insult.

    The two facts do not seem to have a direct connection. But Stanley Lau had just returned that day from a business trip to Japan and went immediately to Tai Po to participate in the consultation meeting. Lau receives no compensation for his work on behalf of the people of Hong Kong, but he was insulted in public. One can imagine how hurt it must be. That evening, Lau felt ill and went to Baptist Hospital for treatment. When he got home, he went to sleep and passed away.

    According to committee chairman Edward Leung, the committee has held 50 consultation meetings. Lau was absent only once. That means he attended 49 meetings, and he might have encountered similar insults for 49 times. Anyone with common knowledge knows that cardiac problems arise out of excitement.

    If a death occurred among the opposition, this would have been a political incident already. But Mr. Lau's family are magnanimous and has not condemned anyone with a single sentence. All those opposition members who think that it is their duty to insult others while veins pop up on their foreheads, should you reflect on whether this type of behavior is necessary?

    - In total, Stanley Lau held positions in seven public commissions. He doesn't get paid for any of these positions. He will have to replaced. It is a food's errand.

    How does Civic Passion valiant resist the Chinese Communist Party? They do it by valiant doling out free glutinous rice dumplings!

    And when September comes, they will be doling out moon cakes.

    Reference: 2015 District Council Elections - Part 4 (Snake banquets, vegetarian meals, moon cakes and rice dumplings)


    June 19, 2016 1pm-3pm, ClubOne, Kowloon, Wong Yeung-tat and Raymond Wong Yuk-man comedy show, ticket prices: $1000/$600/$500 all other tickets sold out.
    All proceeds will go to the Legislative Council campaign whereupon their candidates will resign immediately upon being elected in order to use the by-election as a public referendum for a new constitution.


    2016 Plan for young people to experience politics
    Let students have the opportunity to participate in Legislative Council elections, experience and learn about Hong Kong politics. The students will assist in the Legco election campaigns, including local matters, administrative support, election propaganda, etc.
    Qualifications: Students at tertiary institutions of education; DSE graduates this year
    Time period: July-September 2016
    Requirements: Full time, five- to six-working days per week (Saturday and Sunday required), at least 8 hours per day.
    Salary: HK$5,000 in subsidies per month.

    Please send your C.V. before June 20, 2016 to ymwonghelp@gmail.com, or call 2309-2809.

    - Six working days per week at 8 hours per day is 48 hours per week. At the minimum wage level of $35 and four weeks per month, the minimum salary should be 48 x 4 x $35 = $6,720. But they are only paying $5,000.

    - Raymond Wong Yuk-man's organization is the Proletariat Political Institute. Proletariats are not born knowing that they are proletariats who are exploited by the capitalists, especially students who have never worked before. So this is their first chance of experiencing exploitative working conditions. Hopefully they will develop the working-class consciousness after this experience and become working-class hero resisters.

    - (silentmajority.hk) In 2010, Raymond Wong Yuk-man supported the minimum wage of $33. However, his beef noodle shop was paying employees as low as $25 per hour. He blamed his wife "because she said that if the minimum wage ever reached $33, the business would be impossible to run." But also he blamed rent increase for causing the beef noodle shop to go out of business. If it is the rent, then why won't he raise wages? Also in 2010, during the second reading of the minimum wage bill, Raymond Wong spoke about intern students. He said that university students have special skills, so they deserve to have dignity. "If this minimum wage bill covers all workers, then why don't university students get the same protection for summer internships?"

    (Wen Wei Po) June 13, 2016.

    Recently, League of Social Democrats chairman Avery Ng and vice-chairman Raphael Wong have been distributed pamphlets about themselves.

    In the case of Avery Ng, he said that he graduated from Melbourne University majoring in engineering and actuarial science and worked as strategic consultant for a multinational corporation. He returned from New Zealand to Hong Kong and joined the League of Social Democrats because he felt that society was unfair. During the Umbrella Movement, he stayed to defend Mong Kok and was nicknamed "The Great General" for chasing after triad thugs. He believes firmly that the people will defeat the tyrants by popular resistance.

    In the case of Raphael Wong, he is nicknamed "The Village Mayor." He graduated with a degree in social policies at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. He has participated many times in civil disobedience, and has been arrested/charged uncountable number of times. He is accustomed to defending himself in court. He said "I am not afraid of going to jail; I am only afraid that there is silence." He does not care to be understood by others; he only wants justice to be done.

    About these depictions, one Internet users wrote: "This is so shameless that I don't even know how to characterize it!" Here are the facts. Avery Ng's full nickname was "The Grand General of the Pedestrian Sidewalk." During Occupy Mong Kok, Ng smeared Civic Passion leader Wong Yeung-tat for being absent when in fact photos showed that Wong was present. Meanwhile it was Ng who stood on the sidewalk watching the battle. That was how Ng came to be sarcastically called the "The Grand General of the Pedestrian Sidewalk."

    Raphael Wong's nickname came during the Legislative Council debates about preliminary funding of the New Territories North East development. Raphael Wong stopped others from charging at the Legislative Council and uttered the famous words: "The villagers do not think this way." At the time, there were no villagers present but Wong said that he "represented" them because he knows them best. That was when people made fun of him by calling him the "Village Mayor."

    But even as Civic Passion made fun of these two League of Social Democrats candidates, other Internet users pointed out that Civic Passion members are called "Hot Dogs" because they say that they are valiant but they are in fact all talk and no action.

    So everybody treats 「噓聲當掌聲，柴台當站台」(= they treated the booing as applause; they treated the heckling as support).

    (Wen Wei Po) June 13, 2016.

    Ever since the rise of the Localist factions, the two old radical parties People Power and League of Social Democrats are expected to lose a lot of votes. So the two parties have just announced that they will join together for the Legislative Council elections in September. Supporters of the two parties say that this alliance will be the death knell for organizations just as Civic Passion-Proletariat Political Institute-City State, Hong Kong Indigenous, Youngspiration, etc. They said that they will even take over the votes of the Labour Party, ADPL and Neighbourhood and Workers Service Centre.

    Civic Passion struck back as say that their liaison is more of a lonely man with a lonely woman. Others said that they more like "dumb and dumber" except it is hard to say that who is dumber. But in the end the only thing that matters is winning. If they lose their Legco seats (currently LSD has League Kwok-hung and PP has Chan Wai-yip and Chan Chi-chuen), they are extinct.

    - This must be the anti-Raymond Wong Yuk-man alliance, right? I actively wait for "Big Guy" Chan Wai-yip to fail in his effort to life up "Village Mayor" Raphael Wong; for "Roadside General" Avery Ng to continue as spectator; Chan Chi-chuen and Tam Tak-chi both defeated; and "141" (former PP chairman Lau Ka-hung supported by current PP chairwoman Erica Yuen) to lose again.

    - (Silentmajority.hk) In the New Territories East Legco-election, Edward Leung received 66,000 votes. Polls showed that 25% of these were People Power/League of Social Democrats supporters, 19% were Civic Party supporters and 38% supported other political parties.

    - (Wen Wei Po) Chan Wai-yip (People Power) is going to give up his incumbent position to make way for Raphael Wong (League of Social Democrats) not because he is generous but because he stands no chance of re-election. By yielding his own slot in New Territories West and also supporting Avery Ng (League of Social Democrats) in Kowloon West, Chan Wai-yip will secure the support of League of Social Democrats for three People Power candidates: Chan Chi-chuen (New Territories East), Tam Tak-chi (Kowloon East) and Lau Ka-hung (Hong Kong Island). Without this deal, neither party won't be able to field strong enough candidates in all five districts.

    (Wen Wei Po) June 12, 2016.

    The Civil Human Rights Front recently held a press conference about the July 1st demonstration march. They plan to set off from Victoria Park at 3pm and arrive on the east side of Government Headquarters to demand the resignation of Chief Executive CY Leung, implement a universal retirement plan, etc. They estimated that 100,000 will attend.

    However, it is common knowledge that the point is not about the number of marchers but the amount of donations to be raised.

    Youngspiration convenor Baggio Wong said that they disagree with the themes of the July 1st march. So they won't participate in the march. However, they will set up booths along the march route "in order to reach more citizens who want freedom and democracy." Youngspiration had made the decision not to apply to the Civil Human Rights Front to set up these booths.

    Traditionally, the pan-democratic groups that solicit donations at the July 1st demonstration automatically hand over a portion of their proceeds to the organizer Civil Human Rights Front. Since Youngspiration has stated that they won't apply, it naturally means that they won't share any of their proceeds. Civil Human Rights Front convener Jimmy Sham said: "If you don't agree with the Front's demands or platforms, why do you still want to set up street booths during the march? I find this incomprehensible."

    - Youngspiration is telling people not to participate, but they are nevertheless trying to rake in money along the march route.

    - In the past, the older people who want to rake in money also participate in the march. Now the younger people don't even want to pretend to march. They just set up a booth to take your money!

    - Youngspiration will talk about youth and aspiration, but in the final analysis all they want is $$$$$$$!!!

    - The Civil Human Rights Front is being petty-minded! Look, there's plenty of money out there to be shared by everyone. There is no need to attack each other.

    (Wen Wei Po) June 17, 2016.

    Yesterday the Electoral Affairs Commission held a public forum  in Quarry Bay on the proposed guidelines on election-related activities in respect of the Chief Executive election. For the first 90 minutes, the meeting was conducted on an orderly basis.

    Then "Supersonic Mouse" Cheng Kam-kun (Civic Passion) said during the question session that this forum was just a show because at most 1,200 can vote in this Chief Executive election. "You feel very good, don't you?" Cheng said that he will be pushing for a de facto referendum in the Legislative Council in order to come up with a people's constitution. Cheng attempted to get on stage and charge at EAC chairman Barnabas Fung but he was intercepted by security guards. Cheng continued the shouting and said that this public forum must be terminated because the people of Hong Kong cannot vote in the Chief Executive election. He called on others to leave. He and his Civic Passion colleagues led the way by removing the chairs. However, nobody else listened to their call. Eventually the security guards removed the Civic Passion, who tried many times to charge back into the meeting hall. Some citizens left because it was too chaotic and disorderly. Barnabas Fung said that the commission deplored those who disrupted the meeting and deprived other citizens their right to express their opinions.

    Oscar Lai Man Lok

    Please circulate broadly: We do not want a 'time bomb' by our side!

    Hong Kong does not want another building collapse in the manner of City University.

    In 2008, the Transportation and Housing Bureau reported that Block 22 of the Tung Tau Estate on Ngai Chin Wai Road requires a large-scale maintenance work. However, the effectiveness of maintenance/repair is less than rebuilding, so the Bureau decided to demolish the Estate.

    During the construction period, I went with our Kowloon East team to the construction site. As soon we stepped into Tung Tau Estate, the sound of the pile drivers were deafening. We walked along the path that Estate residents must travel through every day, and the sound of the pile drivers was even more stunning. As we approached the construction side, we felt the mountains shake and earth move while the trees were shaking. We put a key on a railing outside the construction site and attempted to gauge how the construction work is impacting local residents. The video showed that the key vibrating each time that the pile was driven. This demonstrated how much noise the Tung Tau Estate residents have to endure every day. Although the key is small, the construction activity must affect the nearby buildings and the foundation of the entire Tung Tau Estate. We don't want to see Hong Kong have any building collapse in the manner of City University. Besides, the Po Yan Oblate Primary School is located less than one meter away from the construction site, so it will have a huge impact on primary school students. Who can ensure attending class eight hours a day next to a construction site?

    We want every resident to monitor the construction activity with us, and minimize the impact of the construction work on residents. If you have any questions or complaints, you can call the company.

    Sze Tat Chau

    You blokes can make people laugh to death! Brother, how detached are you from reality? Have you never seen pile drivers before? Do you need to place a key on a railing to see if it vibrates or not? How can pile driving affect the foundation of other buildings? Professional experts are monitoring everything, stupid dick! Besides, the building collapse at City University had nothing to do with the foundation. Somehow you mix it up as the same thing. Please, if you don't know something, go ask somebody who does. You just expose your own shortcomings all the time and rant!

    Oscar Lai Man Lok went and deleted his post without explanation.

    Sze Tat Chau

    Oscar Lai, it won't do you any good to delete your post. Stupid things should be remembered forever, and this screen capture will be kept forever. You will never escape from my grasp.

    (Wen Wei Po) June 10, 2016.

    Oscar Lai Man Lok removed his Tung Tau Estate (I) post shortly afterwards. Then he posted another one:

    During the hot Dragon Boat Festival, apart from the dragon boats that are dancing in the water and congratulating each other for happiness during the Dragon Boat Festival, the traditional food of glutinous rice dumpling should not be omitted. This dumpling is not the dumpling as in "snake banquet, vegetarian meal, moon cake and glutinous rice dumpling," but it is a homemade glutinous rice dumpling made by ordinary people.

    Once again, Internet user Sze Tat Chau jumped to make fun of him.

    If Demosisto screwed up again, they should have taken it. However, they are beyond reasoning and they made innumerable denunciations to Facebook which removed Sze Tat Chau's post and banned him for 24 hours.

    Sze Tat Chau posted at an alternate Facebook account: "This is not the first time that Facebook favored Demosisto. First, Facebook helped them merge all their pages. This is highly suspicious. Now for the past two days they have been continuously removing information that is critical of Demosisto, even banning Sze Tat Chau. This is just violent action that represents online hegemony, suppression of freedom of expression and violation of democratic principles. Demosisto, do not be proud because your chance of success is zero!"

    Sze Tat Chau added: "What use is it to suppress freedom of expression? If I don't fucking ambush you until you fold, I might as well as adopt your family name." The Demosisto denounced that post, which was also removed by Facebook.

    Sze Tat Chau continued: "Demosisto claimed to be fighting for a city of self-determination, but they use violent methods (banning, censorship, deprivation of freedom of expression) to suppress all dissent. You may be able to co-opt the Facebook administrator but you will never win public support because you don't deserve it! During normal times, you say 'Although I disagree with your viewpoints, I will defend your right to say it to my death!" All that is fake! Once I got you in your weak spot, you immediately got me banned. You can't ban me forever. I will be back in 22 hours. You fucking bastards can forget it!"

    Comments:

    So what was funny about the Magnet Man's post on the Dragon Boat Festival. Everything!

    「炎炎熱熱的端午節」(The scorching blazing searing hot Dragon Boat Festival) Isn't it enough to say 'this hot Dragon Boat Festival'? Writing out "scorching blazing searing hot" only appears in essays composed by primary school students.

    - No, Oscar Lai is extending what the poetess Li Qingzhao (1081-1151?) wrote: 「尋尋覓覓， 冷冷清清， 淒淒慘慘戚戚」(I seek and seek, I search and search -- in vain! It's cold, it's cold! Am so lonely, lonely! I am in pain, in pain! ) into  「炎炎熱熱，尋尋覓覓， 冷冷清清， 淒淒慘慘戚戚」. In this case, Oscar Lai is suffering from 炎 (infection) and 熱(fever), so he is feeling cold, lonely and in pain.

    「水中起舞的龍舟」(The dragon boats which were dancing in the waters) Do you see the dragon boats dancing in the waters? Has Oscar Lai ever seen a dragon boat competition (live or televised)? Do they dance when they race?

    「互相祝福端午節快樂」(Wishing each other a happy Dragon Boat Festival) For as long as I have lived, I have never wished anyone a happy Dragon Boat Festival nor have I ever heard anyone ever say that to me. You wish each other Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. And Happy Birthday too. You do not wish people a happy Dragon Boat Festival, Mid-Autumn Festival, Ching Ming Festival, Chung Yeung Festival, Buddha's Birthday, etc.

    「糉這個傳統食物也總會令人透心涼」(The traditional food of glutinous rice dumpling generally makes people cool down inside) Hey brother, you store the dumping in the refrigerator first because it may rot in hot weather. When you want to eat it, you take it out the refrigerator and put it into a pot of boiling water for several minutes. If you serve it immediately, it will be hot. If you lay it on the table and wait a while before eating it, it will be at room temperature. Either way, it won't "cool you down inside."

    P.S. 「透心涼」has many other meanings none of which you really want to apply here.
    (Baike.Baidu.com) (1) A fruit drink concocted from egg yolk, orange juice, lemon and cherries; (2) a bottled drink concocted from water, sugar and dye materials favored by school children in smaller Chinese cities during the 1990's; (3) to become thoroughly disheartened; (4) Schadenfreude, taking delight in the misfortune of others; (5) using a sharp knife to make a clear and precise stab through the heart.

    P.P.S. Even Oscar Lai knew that this was indefensible, so he quietly edited this post into saying "the traditional glutinous rice dumpling is an indispensable part of this festival." No acknowledgement about the previous problems, of course.

    Other comments:

    - ("Four-eyed Brother" Cheng Kam-mun (Civic Passion) I support Sze Tat Chau and I support freedom of speech! ... If you have something to say, send me a personal message (pm) and I will post it for you. Defend freedom of speech!

    - ("Four-eyed Brother" Cheng Kam-mun (Civic Passion) I support Sze Tat Chau and I support freedom of speech! ... If you have something to say, send me a personal message (pm) and I will post it for you. Defend freedom of speech!

    - Demosisto, give up. This is really appalling. If you want to come out and run for election, you ought to have some tolerance for criticisms.

    - So Demosisto defends freedom of speech while they report their critics to silence them. Freedom and democracy are so wonderful. Civic society is so wonderful. Marvelous! I have learned something.

    - If you can't tolerate dissidence, how can you fight for democracy?

    - We must circulate the stories about their dirty tricks so that more people will know. Whenever Joshua Wong, Oscar Lai, Agnes Chow and Nathan Law lose an argument, they resort to dirty tricks. They should go and eat shit!

    - Demosisto ... they suppress dissidents.

    - They are not in charge yet and they are already like this. What will happen if they ever take charge?

    - Whenever they don't like something that they hear, they immediately stop people. What happens if they ever become Legislators? They will be the only ones allowed to speak.

    - I detest the bum Joshua Wong. He is only interested in finding ways to take in more money. As soon as he hears something that he dislikes, he files a complaint to the authorities. This is not a person who can be entrusted to achieve great things! He is an enemy of Democracy.

    - The Demosisto people are feebleminded. They screw up with what they do, they screw up with what they write. But when they screw up and someone else point this out, they immediately fucking rush to complain to the Facebook administrator! This is suppression of freedom! They can all go and eat shit!

    - A better strategy for Demosisto is to get Oscar Lai to screw up fucking less often! That will mean less opportunity for Sze Tat Chau to make fun of him.

    - If they delete one post, we will re-post it ten more times. Let us see how many Facebook accounts can Demosisto complain against?

    - Demosisto hoists the banner of democracy high ... but when someone makes a screen capture and makes a comment, they immediately launch a campaign to complain. You guys can go and eat shit! Double fucking standards!

    (Wen Wei Po) June 11, 2016.

    According to the Demosisto web page, they received donations of almost $390,000 coming from 354 persons on June 4th outside Victoria Park. But earlier Demosisto president Nathan Law said that they received $450,000. It is possible that they have got even more when people sent checks care of Wong Chi Fung. So Internet user Sze Tat Chau wanted to know: "How much money did you receive in total?"

    Sze Tat Chau noted that Demosisto promised on Facebook that they will normally reply within 10 minutes. But many 10 minutes later, Demosisto still has no response. Other Internet users went to the personal Facebooks of Nathan Law, Oscar Lai and Joshua Wong. But they didn't get any response either, with some of those comments being deleted too.

    Internet comments:

    - Oscar Lai's Magnet Man gig is wearing thin, so he needs something more substantive for his Legislative Council campaign. This debacle isn't going to help.

    - Hard-impact pile driving has been fucking banned a long time ago already. Nowadays, they drill holes first and then insert the piles. How can the mountains fucking shake and the earth fucking move? All construction projects have permits that allow them to drill only certain hours of the day. All data (noise levels, settlement displacement, groundwater level, etc) goes to the independent project consultant every day. So it goes to fucking show that you are fucking ignorant!

    It is fucking alright for you not to fucking know something. But the City University case was one in which they build a green garden on a roof that was not designed to handle the extra load. It had fucking nothing to do any foundation problem. If you want to stop the next City University incident, you should be checking all the green rooftops around Hong Kong for safety. You are fucking wasting your time if you want to fucking check all the building foundations!

    That is why I say that trash tend to get together -- Joshua Wong, Agnes Chow, Nathan Law, Oscar Lai. These people fucking know nothing but they are still full of confidence enough to spout all sorts of nonsense. The only reason why people were tolerant before was that they saw that you were only middle school students.

    So please don't go around now saying The People of Hong  Kong this, or The People of Hong Kong that. Will you fucking wake up already!?

    - Hong Kong buildings can withstand earthquakes of Richter scale 5 or 6. How is construction activity going to be more intense than an earthquake?

    - Oscar Lai said that he and his entire Kowloon East team went down to Tung Tau Estate (I). This shows that there is not a single person with commonsense in Demosisto Kowloon East. What is commonsense? All you have to do is walk up to the entrance of the construction site and you will find all the required permits posted publicly (including the hours of operations, number of accidents, etc).

    Here is one of those permits:

    ... Hard-impact pile driving can be conducted 1230pm-115pm and 430pm-645pm on days other than public holidays. So please stop this nonsense about primary school children putting up with 8 hours of mountain-moving, earth-shaking piling driving each day!

    - Maybe a construction permit is too complicated for Oscar Lai to understand, but how about this press release dated January 14, 2008?

    (Hong Kong Government) Tung Tau (I) Estate Block 22 to be cleared in 2012. January 15, 2008.

    The Housing Authority's (HA) Strategic Planning Committee (SPC) today (January 15) approved a proposal to clear the 43-year-old Tung Tau (I) Estate Block 22 in Wong Tai Sin in 2012.

         The decision was made after carefully weighing up the structural conditions and the financial viability of further extending the lifespan of the block.

         Although a comprehensive recently completed structural investigation concludes that the Tung Tau (I) Estate Block 22 is structurally safe, large-scale repair works are required in order to sustain the serviceable lifespan of the building for the next 15 years," an authority spokesman said. "The necessary repair works, estimated at about $46 million, are not cost effective, not to mention the extensive nuisance and disturbance to be borne by the affected tenants.

    ...

          He said the Po Yan Catholic Primary School which is connected to Tung Tau (I) Estate Block 22 would be retained. The school is structurally sound and the school as well as parents welcomed the proposed retention arrangement.

         To ensure that the school is operated under a safe and less-disturbing environment during the redevelopment period, a liaison group consisting of representatives from the school, Education Bureau and Housing Department will be formed. Hydraulic concrete crusher demolition method and non-percussive piling method will be used to mitigate noise emissions.  Dust suppression devices will also be adopted to minimise air pollution at the school.

    - Oscar Lai scored the lowest possible Level 1 in English language during the Diploma of Secondary Education exam. In his defense, people say that he is simply not good with languages. The problem being revealed now is that his problem is not language learning, but commonsense thinking!

    - It is true that you don't need to have pilings in order to erect a tall building. They do it right next door to Hong Kong. Remember this?

    - Of course, the Demosisto folks are still in their early 20's, so they have never seen what real pile drivers can do back in the 1960's and 1970's.

    - Other Demosisto inanity:

    (1) Support Denise Ho
    (2) Support elimination of animal testing
    (3) Decide to quit using Lanme
    WHY NOT ALL?
    Demosisto

    I am fine with (1) and (2)  because it is just some harmless clicking on Facebook as opposed to real action or you asking me for even more money. (3) is really easy for me, because I have never heard of Lanme before and I solemnly promise that I won't use it in the future.

    By the way, you bastards can't even type a few words without mistakes!

    - Even more Demosisto inanity:

    Nathan Law

    Chinese University of Hong Kong student needs a heart transplant urgently.

    The degree of civilization for a society is a function of how its people value life. There is a young person who loves life but urgently needs a heart transplant. He has at most six months left to wait. If within these six months, another person sends it a donor card, he will have one more chance. Are you willing to lend a helping hand?

    Sze Tat Chau

    Is he actually crazy? Each person has one and only one heart. One cannot donate one's heart and still live. "If within these six months, another person sends in a donor card, he will have one more chance." What does that mean? Does he want the registered person to die within six months?

    P.S. The CUHK student found a donor and Joshua Wong applauded the good news. This drew another round of criticisms for lack of sensitivity because this is surely not good news for the donor and her family.

    - (Wen Wei Po) June 11, 2016.

    Demosisto has just updated their Facebook with this portrait of Nathan Law and Oscar Lai singing to "Determine Our Future." This is ripped straight off Sonic Youth's <Goo> album cover. A media consultant said: "I know that many people have done spoofs of this cover, but Demosisto is a political party. So what is the point? Is this a spoof, tribute or ripoff?" An Internet user wrote: "Certain idealistic young people often talk about grand things on stage, but they actually carry out all manners of sneaky things. Character is important, but it takes time to discern it. I hope that people won't be conned by their appearances."

    - This is Standard Operating Procedure to Demosisto. Their logo comes straight from the Barcelona Gallery Weekend.

    - (Kinliu) June 17, 2016

    Yesterday around 3pm, Joshua Wong posted a photo taken of a notice posted in the restroom of Demosisto.

    <Warning>

    To all those people with penises, you have three choices:

    (1) You lift up the toilet seat when you urinate
    (2) You sit down first and then you urinate
    (3) If you wet the toilet seat, you lick it clean

    WHY NOT ALL

    - Why not all? Just imagine: (1) You lift up the toilet seat; (2) you sit down on the ceramic base and then you urinate; (Hey, that's kind of harsh (especially in winter), isn't it?); (3) you lick the toilet seat clean (but not the ceramic base which you soiled).

    - (Kinliu) After a fireman died in the Ngau Tau Kok fire, Oscar Lai (Demosisto) tried to find ammunition for his Kowloon East Legislative Council election campaign. He wrote: "According to the Fire Department, there are 650 industrial buildings older than 30 years of which 120 are in the Kwun Tong area. In 2007 Fire Saftey (Buildings) Ordinance, all buildings built before 1987 had to be upgraded in terms of firefighting equipment, but not the industrial buildings older than 30 years. In fact, tragedies have occurred before. In March 2010, one fireman was killed and three more were injured in a Cheung Sha Wan industrial building fire; in 2007, seven firemen were injured in a Tsuen Wan factory fire. ... Isn't it government indifference that killed our heroes?"

    Hundreds of critical comments poured in, such as "Oscar Lai, you political thug! You only know how to blame the government but you never offer a single constructive idea!" "You go eat shit, you only know how to exploit a situation!" Oscar Lai immediately deleted this post and replaced it with the Demosisto "Salute to the firemen"!

    - Oscar Lai is either too stupid or too deceptive about the two cases that he cited to support his presentation. In the 2007 Tsuen Wan fire, the factory had a sprinkler system installed, but it did not function. The fireman was killed by a flash burn. In the 2010 Cheung Sha Wan fire, the ceiling and the shelves collapsed on the fireman. The cause of death this time will be determined during the inquest. It is no wonder that Oscar Lai has drawn the ire of citizens.

    - Apart from Demosisto, a number of pan-democratic legislators (Chan Chi-chuen, Leung Kwok-hung and Lee Cheuk-yan) found themselves being reminded of their filibustering tactics during the budget debate. This included proposals to cut the entire budget of the Fire Department!

    - (Wen Wei Po) June 23, 2016. Oscar Lai replaced his Facebook post with another post saying that his Kowloon East election campaign team had just learned that the Lam Tin Community Centre was opened for those who are displaced by the Ngau Tau Kok fire. He even provided instructions on how to proceed from Tak Po (Kowloon Bay) by foot to Lam Tin.

    From Tak Po through the Choi Ying Estate pedestrian bridge to Kai Tin Community Centre? That would be four MTR stations! Does anyone over at Demosisto know how to read a map?

    Oscar "Magnet Man" Lai chose to run in the Kowloon East district. But he has not done his homework about local geography. Besides, there is a closer community center in Kwun Tong.

    - More good stuff from Demosisto (August 24, 2016) Nathan Law advocates that the government should repurchase the Eastern Harbour Corssing in order to improve traffic.

    On August 7, the government took back the Eastern Harbour Crossing franchise from the private consortium. So why in the world does Demosisto want the government to purchase something that it already owns and operates?


    Demosisto: We apologize for writing "buy back Eastern Harbour Crossing" instead of "buy back Western Harbour Crossing" in the leaflets containing our policy platform. We have no excuse for such an error. We admit that we are inadequate. Demosisto apologizes to all citizens and supporters.

    [537] Anna Chan Didn't Do It This Time (2016/06/06) Reference: Entertaining In China

    (HK01) June 5, 2016.

    Recently mainland media reported that Denise Ho was invited by the cosmetics brand Lancme and the mouthwash brand Listerine to do commercials and promotions. Mainland media said that Denise Ho is publicly supporting Hong Kong independence and carries a photo of her with the Dalai Lama at her Facebook. Mainland media said that the commercials and promotions are done for Hong Kong only, but Lancme and Listerine are also operating in mainland China. So this becomes a case of the companies making money off mainland consumers to give to an entertainer to support Hong Kong independence!

    So far Lancme has issued an official statement that Denise Ho is not their spokesperson and they apologize for any misunderstanding. Listerine said that Denise Ho is only participating in promotions in Hong Kong. Meanwhile mainland Internet users say: "Chinese traitors usually betray their country for economic reasons" and "There should be a civil organization to mobilize everybody to denounce those businesses and entertainers who take our money and use it against us."

    (Global Times) June 6, 2016.

    Net users from the Chinese mainland began an online boycott of L'Oral and Listerine products on Saturday over the two companies' alleged commercial ties with controversial Hong Kong singer Denise Ho Wan-see.

    Lancme, a brand of beauty products manufactured by L'Oral, met with substantial criticism on the mainland's social media on Saturday after Ho posted Thursday on Facebook that she would attend a promotional event for the brand in Hong Kong on June 19.

    Many Sina Weibo netizens voiced their anger over the company's commercial connection with Ho, who they claim constantly makes "inappropriate and unpleasant" remarks about the mainland on Facebook.

    On Saturday evening, Lancme issued a statement on Weibo that Ho is not a spokesperson for the brand. The statement had received over 550,000 page views as of press time. Netizens urged Lancme to issue the statement on Facebook in addition to Sina Weibo and requested that the brand ask Ho not to attend the promotion.

    A similar statement made on the official Facebook account of the brand's Hong Kong branch on Sunday clarified that Ho was simply invited to share her music at the event.

    Listerine, a maker of mouthwash and other dental hygiene products, also came under fire for its relationship with Ho after a Listerine ad featuring the singer went viral Saturday.

    It is not the first time that the Hong Kong singer has triggered controversy in the mainland.

    On May 13, Ho posted pictures of her meeting with the 14th Dalai Lama in Japan on Facebook, calling it a "happy moment," a move that incurred widespread criticism on the mainland's social media. Ho also announced in January that she would close her online shop on Chinese e-commerce platform taobao.com, claiming to follow the actions of Hong Kong tycoon Li Ka-shing, who reportedly began pulling investment funds out of the Chinese mainland in September 2015. Li's company denied the divestment accusations later that month, the Xinhua News Agency reported.

    Several other Hong Kong celebrities have been the subject of recent boycotts by Chinese Net users for remarks and actions deemed politically "inappropriate" after the Occupy Central movement. In January, Wong Hei, former star of several TV series produced by Hong Kong's TVB, irritated mainland Net users for reportedly posting "inappropriate" content on Hong Kong-mainland ties on Facebook. Wong's face was later blurred out in a reality TV show aired by State-run broadcaster China Central Television. Later that month, a Facebook sticker fight flared up between Net users from the mainland and Taiwan over the former's boycott of reportedly pro-Taiwan-independence singer Chou Tzu-yu. Both Wong and Chou later apologized for their actions.

    In February, L'Oral said that China had outstripped the brand's home base, France, to become its second-largest market in 2015, up from third in 2010.

    (SCMP) June 4, 2016.

    The cosmetics giant Lancme has cancelled the promotional concert that would have featured Canto-pop star Denise Ho Wan-see. The firm had moved to distance itself from the singer, prompting an internet backlash.

    A short statement posted on Lancmes Facebook page on Sunday afternoon read: Hong Kong actress Denise Ho is not a spokesperson of Lancme. We are sorry for the confusion caused. Thank you for your continuous support to Lancme.

    The company had invited Ho to host a mini-concert at a promotion event in Sheung Wan on June 19. The event, which was free of charge, was fully booked. The promotions website only confirmed there would be a concert that afternoon, without naming any singer. It is not known whether Ho sought the companys consent before announcing that she was the performer.

    The statement drew a huge backlash on Facebook, with more than 10,000 angry reactions received after just five hours, compared with fewer than 500 likes. Many called on others to boycott Lancme products, while others questioned if the company ever had the Hong Kong market in mind.

    Some felt the move was prompted by a Weibo post by Beijing newspaper Global Times on Saturday. We have received tip-offs from netizens that Listerine and Lancme, both popular brands on the mainland, have recently invited Denise Ho a Hong Kong and Tibet independence advocate to promote their products in Hong Kong. What do you guys think? the post read. Most comments on Weibo condemned the brands. A comment which read There have been precedents either you apologise and replace the spokesperson, or you can quit the mainland market drew more than 1,200 likes.

    Lancme announced at 10pm on Sunday night that the event had been cancelled, citing possible safety reasons, and apologised to its supporters. However, the announcement failed to please internet users, with more than 1,000 angry reactions being posted in less than half an hour.

    Ho, who is well-known for her pro-democracy stance, could not be reached for comment.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) June 6, 2016.

    International cosmetic giant Lancme cancelled a mini-concert that was to be performed by outspoken pro-democracy Canto-pop celebrity Denise Ho Wan-see on Sunday night. The company said that it was due to possible safety reasons. Prior to the announcement, Chinese netizens called for a boycott of Lancme, as well as popular mouthwash brand Listerine, for allowing Ho to represent their products.

    Lancme also issued a statement saying that Hong Kong actress Denise Ho is not a spokesperson of LANCME on Sunday afternoon before the cancellation.

    The boycott campaign was sparked by Chinese state media outlet Global Times, which posted a Weibo post on Saturday morning saying that according to a source, Listerine and Lancme had hired Denise Ho, who was pro-Hong Kong independence and pro-Tibetan independence, for promotional events. You pick your own spokesperson, get out of the Chinese market crying yourself, read one of the most liked comments on the Weibo post.

    Lancmes announcement of the decision to cancel the event has attracted 17,000 angry likes as of Monday morning. Netizen Winnie Leung commented on the post, saying The event was cancelled due to safety issues? Are you kidding me? Being a marketing professional, I would say this incidence is definitely a good example of what we called PR disaster.

    Listerine continued with Ho as their official face and some commentators noted the difference in approach between the two firms. Grateful thanks to you guys. You are not like the other brand, which has no courage, no guts and no stance, wrote Joel Chow. Ho told Ming Pao through her assistant on Sunday that as she was not in Hong Kong she had not understood the beginnings and ends of the incident. She will release a statement on Monday. The concert was to be performed on June 19 and details of the event remain on Hos personal page on Facebook as of Monday morning.

    Ho was a prominent supporter of the pro-democracy Occupy movement in 2014. She was allegedly banned from performing in the mainland after voicing support for protesters in the movement.

    (Quartz) Lancme is self-censoring outside mainland China to keep Beijing happy. June 6, 2016.

    Lancme, the global cosmetic brand owned by LOreal, canceled a Hong Kong event with a pro-democracy singer, after a Chinese state newspaper complained online. The company is now facing a boycott in Hong Kong.

    On late Sunday night (June 5), Lancme abruptly decided to cancel a musical performance by Denise Ho and others it was sponsoring in the neighborhood of Sheung Wan, citing safety reasons. Ho is one of a handful of outspoken Hong Kong celebrities who openly supports democracyand was the first to be arrested during the 2014 Umbrella Movement protests.

    ...

    As of Monday morning, nearly 25,000 Hong Kong supporters had posted angry emoticons on Lancmes Facebook page, and left a rich variety of comments and photos. Many also called for a boycott of the brandHong Kong musician Ivana Wong wrote Lancme Bye Bye on her social media page.

    Sales in China are a huge part of LOreals business. According to LOreals 2015 annual report (pdf), sales in the Asia-Pacific region were up 19.7% and accounted for nearly 23% of the total. It did not break down mainland Chinas contribution, but said the Consumer Products Division is benefiting from good performances in India, Australia and Thailand, and from LOral Paris, particularly in China. What about Hong Kong? The report described it as a difficult market.

    Meanwhile, Listerine has yet to respond to the Global Times post and continues to use Ho in its Facebook cover photo. Many netizens in Hong Kong have vowed to include Listerine mouthwash in their daily dental cleansing routine.

    (SCMP) June 6, 2016.

    Canto-pop star Denise Ho Wan-sze has urged cosmetics giant Lancme to explain why a promotional concert was cancelled after mainland internet users criticised her for her political stance. The company had invited Ho to host a mini-concert at a promotion event in Sheung Wan on June 19. The event, which was free of charge, was fully booked.

    But a day after Beijing newspaper Global Times accused Lancme on Weibo for inviting Ho a Hong Kong and Tibet independence advocate to promote their products, Lancme clarified on Sunday that Ho was not the brands spokeswoman and called off the concert, citing possible safety reasons.

    The incident highlighted the Hong Kong markets relative insignificance in the cosmetics industry compared with the mainland. A pro-business lawmaker also said it showed international investors could be discouraged from doing business in Hong Kong if it remained politically divided.

    Ho is well-known for her pro-democracy stance. She was blacklisted by mainland media along with singer Anthony Wong Yiu-ming and actor Anthony Wong Chau-sang, who also support democracy.

    Ho issued a statement on Facebook on Monday afternoon, criticising Lancme for seriously misleading the public and tarnishing my personal reputation with their statements on Sunday. I understood that the decision was made by the brands head office in France, and I urge it to come clean on the decision, to clear my name and give the public a reasonable explanation, she said. The worlds values have been seriously twisted when we face punishment for seeking freedom, justice and equality, and we must face the problem when an international brand like Lancme is kneeling down in the face of this bullying hegemony, she said.

    A spokeswoman for LOreal Hong Kong, which supervises the Lancme brand as well as Shu Uemura, Kiehls and the Body Shop , said the company has nothing to add. Listerine, of whom Ho is a spokeswoman, did not respond to the Posts inquiries on Monday.

    Joseph Ho Shiu-chung, president of the Cosmetic and Perfumery Association of Hong Kong, said that mainland tourists usually accounted for 60 per cent of business for cosmetics brands in Hong Kong in recent years, while local customers took 40 per cent. The incident showed that many mainland people misunderstood the views of some Hongkongers ... and businesspeople have to be cautious, especially on social media, he said.

    Felix Chung Kwok-pan, chairman of the pro-business Liberal Party, said the controversy showed that foreign investors could be discouraged from doing business in Hong Kong if their decisions could be slammed by critics from both sides of the political spectrum. When companies think of where to invest ... they could go to Singapore or stay on the mainland, as it could be more stable there, Chung said.

    According to LOreals annual report last year, the Asia-Pacific region accounted for 36 per cent of the global cosmetics market. LOreal described Hong Kong as a difficult market, and while China was a new market that experienced a slowdown last year, the groups e-commerce platform and Lancme performed strongly there. The group also runs a research and innovation centre in Shanghai. LOreals spokesman in Paris could not be reached for comment.

    The storm surrounding Lancme and Ho erupted on Saturday after mainland newspaper Global Times said on Weibo: We have received tip-offs from netizens that Listerine and Lancme, both popular brands on the mainland, have recently invited Denise Ho a Hong Kong and Tibet independence advocate to promote their products. It was referring to Hos meeting with the Dalai Lama on her birthday last month. On May 13, Ho posted pictures of herself and Tibets exiled spiritual leader on her Facebook page, writing: He is a sublime venerable; a loving grandpa, she wrote.

    The newspapers post prompted a barrage of criticism against Lancme, while some internet users from the mainland criticised Ho on her Facebook page. One of them, Luo Xuan, said: I dont want to spend a dime on separating my country. On Sunday, Lancme clarified on Facebook that Ho was not the brands spokesperson, and announced that the concert had been cancelled, citing possible safety reasons.

    Many internet users, apparently from Hong Kong, called on others to boycott Lancme products. Internet user Maria Wong wrote: If u think there is an issue about the safety in HK. Go merchandise somewhere else but HK. Leave Hong Kong market.

    (Global Times) June 7, 2017.

    Hong Kong entertainer Denise Ho has hit the headlines recently. After she announced last week that she would be performing at a concert organized by French cosmetics giant Lancme, mainland netizens launched a boycott of the brand.

    Ho was one of the most prominent activists during the 2014 Hong Kong Occupy Central Movement. Mainland netizens then began to boycott her and her harsh response further enraged the mainland public. Last month, she posted her photos with the Dalai Lama on Facebook, writing "I could feel the blessing and energy rushing through my body just by holding his hands." The disagreement between her and mainland opinion is deepening.

    Lancme responded fast by releasing a statement saying Ho was not a spokesperson for the brand and canceled the planned concert, citing "safety reasons." But the real reason is self-explanatory.

    Some Hongkongers slammed Lancme for groveling to the mainland and vowed to resist the products of Lancme and parent company L'Oral. It seems that Ho has pushed Lancme into a dilemma. Apparently Lancme has given more consideration to the sentiment of the mainland public, because the mainland boasts a much larger market than Hong Kong. As a commercial company, it is bound to seek commercial gains, a wisdom it is supposed to have under complex situations. No big companies would like to step into politics as the high stakes have already been proved by previous cases.

    Entertainers often stay away from politics. The more successful they are, the more they are mindful not to cross the line. But there are a few who want to seek the spotlight by touching politically sensitive issues.

    Ho's high-profile stance in the Occupy Central protests won her some support within Hong Kong. However, she has lost virtually all of her work on the mainland and became the target of censure by mainland netizens of celebrities who support Hong Kong independence or Taiwan independence.

    But some Hongkongers also called for a boycott of pro-mainland entertainers such as Jackie Chan. Such incidents now often occur on the mainland Internet. Ho's fierce political stance makes her an unavoidable target of netizens. Perhaps she has prepared for it or even calculated the losses and gains.

    The mainland public has realized that they are an influential market force. They will be picky about external celebrities who count on China for business while tarnishing China's image. If they want to gain from the market of the Chinese mainland, they must not harm China's national interests, no matter if they are in or outside China.

    (EJ Insight) What the Lancme-Denise Ho controversy tells us. By SC Yeung. June 7, 2016.

    Lancmes move to cancel a Hong Kong promotional event featuring Canto-pop star Denise Ho is another example of how foreign brands cave in easily to perceived pressures from Beijing.

    The French cosmetics brand announced Sunday that it has scrapped an event scheduled for June 19 due to possible safety reasons.

    The statement gave no details, but it is not difficult to fathom the motive behind the decision the company just doesnt want to put its mainland China business at any risk.

    As Ho is a pro-democracy sympathizer and had in 2014 voiced support for the Occupy movement, there had been calls in the mainland for a boycott of brands that she was associated with.

    Over the weekend, Chinas Global Times lashed out at Lancme, saying that it was patronizing an artist who was known for pro-Hong Kong and Tibetan independence leanings.

    The company is using the money it earns from mainland consumers to give a platform to someone who acts against the interests of China, the newspaper suggested in a Weibo post.

    Following the criticism and several adverse comments in mainland online forums, Lancme stressed on its Facebook page Sunday that Ho is not its spokesperson.

    The remarks and the event cancellation make it clear that the French brand and its parent firm LOral are trying to distance themselves from Ho as they doesnt want to antagonize mainland consumers.

    Also, that will help it stay on the right side of Beijing, something that is crucial if the group wants to grow its business in China.

    Ho is among a handful of Hong Kong celebrities who have openly supported the citys democracy movement. During the 2014 Umbrella Movement, the pop star courted arrest for a while.

    In Global Times Weibo post Saturday, Ho was described as poison of Hong Kong.

    The post drew thousands of likes from mainland netizens and triggered fresh calls for boycott of the brands the unpatriotic artist was promoting.

    This obviously rattled Lancme, prompting it to issue a statement quickly.

    On Monday, Ho called on the French firm to provide a clear explanation on the reason for the event cancellation.

    This is not only about me. This is about those who believe in freedom, justice and equality. This is about those precious universal values that every individual yearns for, she said in a statement.

    This is about what kind of a world we want to live in. It is unjust when people have to be punished for speaking out, standing up and seeking for these rights we consider to be basic human rights.

    Accusing the French firm of kneeling down in the face of a bullying hegemony, Ho urged the group to come clean on its decision and to clear her name.

    From an outsiders perspective, the latest incident is further proof of Chinas growing intolerance against creative artists who stand up against Beijing on issues such as democracy and human rights.

    Ho is the latest in a long line of overseas celebrities who have faced bullying from the Communist regime across the border due to political reasons.

    Some artists have been informally blacklisted by Beijing, while some have seen their concerts in the mainland drastically limited often after complaints by Beijing loyalists in Hong Kong.

    If you want to make money in China, refrain from speaking about sensitive political issues this is the message going out to performing artists like singers and actors.

    Commercial entities or brands that associate themselves with problematic artists will also face the heat, as Lancme has discovered.

    In the end, it is up to individual firms to decide how to respond to any threats and intimidation from China.

    Are you willing to stand up for what you believe is right, or would you let commercial considerations override everything else? This is the choice facing overseas brands.

    It is worth noting that while Lancme has backtracked on its association with Ho, another foreign brand with which the artist is associated Listerine has shown spine despite also facing boycott calls in China.

    The mouthwash product launched its latest Bring out the bold global branding campaign in late May, with Ho as its spokesperson.

    Despite being called out by Global Times, Listerine is continuing its promotional campaigns featuring Ho.

    The courage shown by the Johnson & Johnson brand has been applauded by many netizens, going by the comments in online forums.

    Ho is, in fact, a good ambassador for the Bring out the bold campaign, given the singers track record of courage which saw her come out and declare her homosexuality in the past, as well as stand up and be counted among the pro-democracy sympathizers in Hong Kong.

    Amid the controversy surrounding Lancme, the artist has raised some important issues for brands operating in the Greater China market.

    If we stop self-censoring out of fear and start respecting ourselves and others based on good honest work, we could all be freer, Ho said.

    It is about freedom and justice. Because the reality is that if we opt to stay mute and do nothing, the freedoms would all be stripped away from us before we notice.

    It is a message that most Hong Kong people would agree with.

    (SCMP) June 8, 2016.

    Several cosmetic brands under the LOreal group have closed their stores in shopping malls and department stores across the city, hours before a planned protest against Lancmes decision to cancel a concert amid criticism from mainland China.

    Lancmes booth at Lane Crawford, Times Square was the target of the Wednesday afternoon protest initiated by the League of Social Democrats and seven other groups, after the brand cancelled a concert involving Canto-pop star Denise Ho Wan-sze.

    The Post found that the Lancme, Yves Saint Laurent Beaut and Helena Rubinsteins booths, as well as Shu Uemuras store at Times Square were all closed on Wednesday. All four brands are under the Paris-based LOreal group. A note was posted outside the Shu Uemura store, saying: Our store will be closed on 8 June. Sorry for any inconvenience caused.

    Lancme counters in Sogo and Hysan Place in Causeway Bay were both closed, while those for other brands under LOreal, as Shu Uemura, were open. The Sogo information desk said the Lancme counter would not open on Wednesday, but they had no knowledge of the reason for this. Other closed Lancme locations included the shop at Harbour City, Tsim Sha Tsui, and the store at Cityplaza, Taikoo Shing.

    Lancme had invited the singer to host a mini-concert in Hong Kong on June 19, but abruptly called off the event on Sunday after Beijing newspaper Global Times accused it of inviting a Hong Kong and Tibet independence advocate to promote products while mainland internet users threatened to boycott the brand.

    However, after Lancme cancelled the concert citing possible safety reasons, Hong Kong internet users and political activists also vowed to boycott all brands under the LOreal group, including Lancme, Shu Uemura, Kiehls and the Body Shop.

    Meanwhile, Ho said Lancme should stand firm on its core values and moral standards.

    The singer was speaking up for the first time in a live interview with the BBC on Tuesday night, hours after Global Times argued in its editorial that people should not do things that jeopardise Chinas interest if they were to take part in and benefit from the Chinese market.

    Ho was among more than 200 people arrested as the pro-democracy Occupy protests ended in December 2014. She was blacklisted by mainland media along with singer Anthony Wong Yiu-ming. Last month, Ho met the Dalai Lama, Tibets exiled spiritual leader, on her 39th birthday.

    There have been at least two petitions launched to raise concerns about Lancmes controversial decision, including one initiated by the eight groups planning the protest and eight other local groups.

    Another petition was launched on the change.com website by Beatrice Desgranges, believed to be a French citizen, for LOreal Hong Kongs president and managing director Stephen Mosely to reconsider the cancellation. By 10am on Wednesday, it had drawn about 4,200 supporters, 800 away from its target of 5,000.

    Speaking to a BBC interviewer on Tuesday, Ho said she was shocked and saddened by Lancmes decision. As an international brand, it should stand firm on its core values and moral standards ... It is not just about making money, Ho said.

    She had issued a statement on Monday urging Lancmes office in Paris to come clean on the decision.

    LOreal Hong Kong and Paris could not be reached for comment.

    (SCMP) Lancme has only itself to blame for public relations fiasco. By Alex Lo. June 8, 2016.

    Lancme should have stuck with Kate Winslet, Julia Roberts and Emma Watson. Even Zhang Ziyi, Fan Bingbing and Gong Li would do. Sure, they all cost a lot more than Canto-pop singer and democracy activist Denise Ho Wan-sze. But the public backlash over the cosmetics giants cancellation of a free concert with Ho has probably inflicted far greater cost than jetting one of those superstars to Hong Kong.

    The reputational damage is incalculable. Not only has the company suffered a backlash from Hong Kong netizens angry over its apparent kowtowing to Beijing, but the furore has become international news, covered even by The New York Times, the BBC and Le Monde.

    There is no right or wrong answer as to whether a multinational like Lancme should have hired, or stayed away from, politically active stars like Ho, who also recently visited the Dalai Lama. If you want to be edgy and appeal to younger locals, you can probably do that. But if you want to stay on Beijings good side, you should definitely stay away.

    Whats a definite no-no is to hire someone like Ho and then promptly ditch her after an official mainland newspaper complains. That not only makes you look spineless and unprincipled, it shows you are incompetent, which is more unforgivable in the corporate world.

    Listerine has also hired Ho for some of its promotional campaigns, and it is sticking with her. Its been praised for showing courage in standing up to Beijing. I just think they know what they are doing.

    The Lancme fiasco has created the perfect opportunity for Ho and her pan-democratic friends to raise hell.

    Fourteen local political groups are campaigning against Lancme and its parent company, LOreal.

    Ho has accused the French firm of kneeling down in the face of a bullying hegemony.

    This is not only about me. This is about those who believe in freedom, justice and equality. This is about those precious universal values that every individual yearns for, she said in a statement.

    This is about what kind of a world we want to live in. It is unjust when people have to be punished for speaking out, standing up and seeking for these rights we consider to be basic human rights.

    Fine words and just about every international corporations nightmare.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) June 16, 2016.

    International cosmetic brand Lancme has asked shops at Po Hing Fong, Sheung Wan, to return collaboration deposits after they controversially cancelled a concert in the area, Apple Daily has reported. The event scheduled for Sunday, which was to feature pro-democracy Canto-pop singer Denise Ho Wan-see, was axed in to safety reasons on June 5.

    Prior to the controversial cancellation, state-backed Global Times linked Ho with Hong Kong and Tibetan independence movements on Weibo. The post led to netizens in the mainland calling for a boycott of the French brand. After the concert was scrapped, Lancme faced protests and boycotts in Hong Kong.

    The manager of La Glaise Pottery surnamed Chan told the newspaper that Lancme had invited shops to participate in the event, asking them to place a sticker associated with the brand on shop windows. It paid a deposit for the collaboration prior to the concert, and Chan said she had also ordered 30 cups for a workshop related to the event. She said that Lancme called the shop to request a refund of the deposit but she refused because she found it unreasonable.

    Alice, store owner of coffee shop 3rd Space also said she had already ordered a lot of food.

    Pro-democracy Canto-pop singer Denise Ho Wan-see announced on Wednesday that she will hold a concert at the same location and on the same day. In her announcement, Ho said that the concert will be very safe: without politics, slogans, banners, no catchphrases, organisations, nor big companies and asked Hongkongers to use [their] own hands to open a path for themselves.

    - "Alice, store owner of coffee shop 3rd Space also said she had already ordered a lot of food." Well, the event was scheduled to take place June 19. Lancme announced on June 6 that they are canceling the event. So when did 3rd Space order the food?

    If they ordered on or before June 6, then they are not ordering fresh food that may spoil. They are ordering Brazilian frozen chicken wings, frozen green peas, canned SPAM, etc for use two weeks later.

    If they ordered after June 6, then all of Hong Kong knew that the event has been canceled. Nevertheless 3rd Space owner Alice went ahead and ordered a lot of food.

    (EJ Insight) June 16, 2016.

    Its now more than ten days since Lancme announced the cancellation of a promotional event featuring Cantopop artist and pro-democracy supporter Denise Ho, sparking a controversy. The French cosmetics brand cited security reasons for the abandoned Hong Kong gig, but most people believe the company chickened out due to perceived pressure from Beijing. The speculation is not off the mark, given that Ho was dumped soon after a mainland newspaper warned foreign firms against patronizing artists who may be supporting pro-independence groups.

    As Lancme was deemed to have buckled under pressure, it came under much criticism and ridicule in Hong Kong and also faced some boycott calls. While is no escape from the negative press and unfavorable social media comments, the French brand has been hoping that the controversy will die down and that things will get back to normal.

    Well, that may indeed happen, going by signs that peoples focus is shifting to other matters. After a few protests outside Lancme outlets last week, there has not been any follow-up action by citizens groups or political figures to demand a formal response from Lancme management. We need not be surprised if the whole matter fades from the publics mind in the coming weeks.

    With the Legislative Council election just about three months away, people will turn their attention to the campaign issues and a debate over whether Leung Chun-ying should be allowed a second term in Hong Kongs top job next year. Also, we must bear in mind that the so-called localist groups in Hong Kong have remained largely indifferent to the Lancme-Denise Ho controversy. 

    No localist group leader has come out in support of Ho, even though the singer has faced retribution from Beijing for supporting the 2014 Occupy pro-democracy protests. There seems to be strange ambivalence among some groups on what matters they will take up.

    Meanwhile, political parties have been accused of trying to use the Ho issue for their own ends, rather than stand with the artist and help her get an official apology from Lancme. The sad truth is that most politicians have narrow agendas, focused only on issues that will yield electoral dividends and career benefits. As for the public, they have short attention spans, taking their mind from one issue to the other.

    With Lancme staying mum and the company receding from newspaper headlines, peoples interest in the Denise Ho affair is already beginning to wane. 

    That comes even as the Cantopop singer has reminded the public that she is still owed an apology from the French firm. On Tuesday, Ho announced that she will hold a concert and community event on June 19, the same date when she had been scheduled to perform for Lancme. The event, which will have freedom as its theme, will take place at the same location and time as the cancelled show.

    In a statement on her official Facebook page, Ho invited people to respond to oppression and fear in Hong Kong using music and culture at the event which has been titled The Beauty of We. But she added that the show will feature no politics, no slogans, no banners, no catchphrases, no organizations, or big companies.

    That suggests that even the singer wants to keep her problem with Lancme from getting politicized further. Given the realities in Hong Kong, we can only say that Ho is just being pragmatic.

    Internet comments:

    - Denise Ho made the announcement that she has gotten a job assignment for the first time since Occupy Central. Global Times mis-characterized her as being a spokesperson capacity for Lancme and Listerine. Lancme issued a correction and said that Ho is not a spokesperson. However, the mainland Chinese are not quibbling about being spokesperson or not; instead they don't want their money go to a separatist. Therefore Lancme canceled the event altogether.

    - How significant was this 'concert' event? The cafe has a capacity of 50. Even if the organizers were to charge a HK$1,000 per head, the total receipts would only be HK$50,000. In this case, the organizers don't charge for this neighborhood event. So how much does Denise Ho expect to be paid? $10,000? $20,000?

    - "Ho was a prominent supporter of the pro-democracy Occupy movement in 2014. She was allegedly banned from performing in the mainland after voicing support for protesters in the movement." Wrong on two counts.

    Firstly, the Occupy movement in 2014 was not 'pro-democracy.' What kind of 'pro-democracy' movement is opposed by the majority of the population? If you are 'pro-democracy,' you should leave when 80% of the population tells you to go.

    Secondly, there is no evidence that any Chinese government department (such as the Ministry of Culture) has ever issued bans against any of the so-called Yellow Ribbon entertainers (Denise Ho, Anthony Wong Yiu-ming, Anthony Wong Chau-sang, Chapman To, etc). Whenever these entertainers are invited to some event, there is a spontaneous consumer backlash that caused the event to be canceled. The Chinese consumers are exercising their individual freedom and that is what you want to see in a free society. After a while, the Yellow Ribbon entertainers don't get invited anymore because of the foreseeable consequences.

    - Some Q&A's:

    Q1. Do the mainland people have the right to like a singer or not?
    A1. Yes

    Q2. Do the mainland people have the right to like a product or not?
    A2. Yes

    Q3. Should the mainland people have the freedom of expression?
    A3. Yes

    So the mainland people disliked singer Denise Ho because she supports separatism, they won't buy any products that pay Ho and they are saying that this is what they are doing. What is wrong with this?

    - Your answers are wrong in many ways. Here are the correct answers:

    A1. The mainland people have the relative right to like a singer or not, but they are absolutely required to like those singers who support freedom/democracy/human rights/justice/universal values.

    A2. The mainland people have the relative right to buy a product or not, but they are absolutely required to buy products which support freedom/democracy/human rights/justice/universal values.

    A3. The mainland people have the relative freedom of expression, but they are forbidden to criticize anyone who supports freedom/democracy/human rights/justice/universal values.

    - (Quartz) Musician Anthony Wong Yiu-ming, who lost all his mainland gigs, last year described the way corporations have capitulated to Beijing as no different from spreading the white terror.

    (SCMP) Wong, who was reportedly banned from the mainland along with Ho, said he was prepared to lose job opportunities across the border. Previously scheduled performances were cancelled. "But not getting even one job in Hong Kong is strange, and it is worrying," he said. Wong suspects that those who have business interests in the mainland are not hiring performers who had high-profile associations with the Occupy protests.

    Same misleading statements here. Beijing did not force corporations to capitulate. No ministry is threatening to ban the corporations otherwise. The corporations listened to their customers.

    LOral is a listed company with 78,600 employees in 2014. The company is a component of the Euro Stoxx 500 stock market index and has total revenue of 25.257 billion in 2015. It is in the business of making money (and possibly looking after its employees); it does not exist to promote freedom/democracy/human rights/rule of law/civil nomination/universal suffrage/universal values.

    - Denise Ho demanded #Justice because her concert was canceled. What about the companies that went out of business or lost money because of the Occupy Movement? Who is going to give them #Justice?

    - Hong Kong is a capitalist society and all commercial disputes can be settled by contract law in civil court. When one side cancels a contract, the other side can sue for damages. But Denise Ho is not interested in any lawsuit; she wants a 'reasonable explanation' for what happened. When she says that the explanation must be reasonable, it means that it must match her pre-defined position or else it is not reasonable.

    - Speaking of unreasonable explanations for terminating a business deal, how about this one? (Reuters) XpressWest, the private U.S. firm proposing to build a high-speed rail link between Las Vegas and Los Angeles, terminated a joint venture with Chinese companies ... the biggest challenge has been a federal funding requirement that high-speed trains be manufactured in the United States, even though no such trains are produced in the country.

    - This is a huge public relations disaster for LOral. It all started because someone in Lancme Hong Kong booked Denise Ho for the Energizing Factory Event on June 19th. There are two theories about this decision. One theory is that the decision-maker is a Yellow Ribbon who wanted to continue the Umbrella Revolution using company resources. The other theory is that the decision-maker was truly ignorant of the foreseeable consequences, or thought that a Hong Kong music concert would have no impact elsewhere. Instead here is the mainland Chinese boycott list of all the brands of the LOral group:

    - (HK01) June 9, 2016.

    Is Denise Ho pro-Hong Kong independence? That depends on your definition of Hong Kong independence.

    To some people, this means expressing and/or acting in support of Hong Kong independence, as in the case of Hong Kong Indigenous and the Hong Kong National Party. Based upon this definition, Denise Ho would not be such because she has never publicly expressed or acted in support of Hong Kong independence. Furthermore, the genuine pro-Hong Kong independence people ostracize Denise Ho because she is regarded as a "leftist retard" and "Greater China chauvinist."  For example, on the issue of June 4th, she supports the responsibility of the people of Hong Kong to promote democracy in China. So when Global Times called her pro-Hong Kong independence, both Denise Ho and the genuine supporters find it objectionable.

    Yet, mainland Chinese standards are different. Some Chinese think that pro-Occupy Central means pro-independence; others think that all Hong Kong localists are pro-independence; still others think that saying "I am a Hongkonger" is sufficient to be pro-independence. Based upon these standards, Denise Ho would be pro-independence because she took part in Occupy Central in a high-profiled manner and she emphasized local values.

    - It wouldn't matter. The point here is to make Denise Ho make an unequivocal statement to denounce Hong Kong independence. If she can't come out and say it, then she'll have to bear the consequences.

    - Photo of Denise Ho being arrested during the clearance of Occupy Central and photo of Denise Ho with the Dalai Lama. Pictures are better than words.

    - This is far from the first time that this sort of thing has happened. Here are two examples:

    (July 8, 2009) The Body Shop Foundation announced funding of the International Tibet Support Network which is dedicated to campaigning non-violently to restore the rights that Tibetans lost when China occupied Tibet sixty years ago.

    Note: Shortly after June 6, 2016, the above link was disappeared into an Error 404 message.

    With the Chinese consumer backlash, the Body Shop International issued a statement of plausible deniability:

    (China.com) May 1, 2008. I was strolling down Robson Street (Vancouver) and I wanted to buy some eye cream. The salesperson was very enthusiastic and recommended several. I went up to the cashier to pay. Suddenly my husband came up and told me to look at the wall on the left. I turned and saw this photo:

    A man is holding the Tibetan flag of independence with the comments: To Kiehl's, Thanks you for your support, 1st Tibetan flag on the summit of Mt. Everest. With Best Wishes.

    I looked at the photo for a while and I felt very upset. It was more than mere anger. I did not even respond to the salesperson. My husband asked me, "Do you really need this?" Of course not. Even if I never wear eye cream again, I would not use my money to support Tibetan independence! I turned around and told the salesperson that I didn't want the merchandise anymore. Then I left the shop.

    The Body Shop and Kiehl's are both subsidiaries of L'Oral, which is why the Lancme Hong Kong incident was so surprising. It is as if they have no inkling that this was going to happen.

    - Everybody is waiting for the inside story of what happened at Lancme Hong Kong. How many people were fired?

    - Denise Ho is callling out Lancme Hong Kong president Stephen Mosely to give an explanation to her and to the public. According to information, Mosely is on vacation. When he returns, he is scheduled to retire. So Denise Ho is targeting the wrong person.

    - (HKG Pao) There is a timing issue that should be sorted out.

    There are two events: (1) Lancme Hong Kong signed Denise Ho for the Energizing Factory Event; (2) Denise Ho visits the Dalai Lama on May 10, 2016. Which happened first?

    If Lancme Hong Kong signed Denise Ho before she went to visit the Dalai Lama, then Ho engaged in what she must know is risky behavior after the contract signing. Did she do this deliberately to cause a PR crisis at Lancme and gain public sympathy for herself?

    If Lancme Hong Kong signed Denise Ho after she posted the photo of her with the Dalai Lama saying that "He tamed me", then this brand manager is suicidal.

    - (HKG Pao) Lancme Hong Kong tried to give Denise Ho a job. Ho will now get the full payment without having to do the concert. However, Ho said that she had to go after L'Oral headquarters as a matter of principle. In Chinese, there is a saying: 落井下石 (=drop a stone down on the man who has fallen into a well). Whoever was responsible for getting her the job is screwed, so is the whole PR/marketing team plus maybe the Hong Kong brand manager. Even the Asia-Pacific regional manager may be at risk. Basically anyone who had anything direct contact with this matter plus anyone else who knew about it will be axed. At this time, L'Oral is only saying that they have nothing to add. We'll let you if we find out more.

    - Listerine's strategy consists of maintaining total silence and letting Lancme take the heat. But how long can this last?

    - Whoever at Listerine decided to make this advertisement https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WdEryGrht7Q must also be trembling about if and when they get axed.

    - The Listerine ad talks about being BOLD. Here is a spoof: Is this called being BOLD? If you are bold, you should do more than talking. You said that you will surrender yourself (after Occupy), then you ought to surrender yourself.

    - Listerine is manufactured and distributed by Johnson & Johnson. Johnson & Johnson sells these products in China: Listerine, Neutrogena, Johnson's body care, Johnson's baby care, o.b., Tylenol, Motrin, Livostin, Imodium, Band-Aid, etc.

    - (Wall Street Journal) April 3, 2016.

    With 2014 revenue of $74 billion and net profit of $16 billion, Johnson & Johnson is among the worlds largest health-care companies. In an interview in Tokyo following a stop in Beijing, the companys chairman and chief executive, Alex Gorsky, 54 years old, was interviewed.

    WSJ: Whats your view of China?

    Mr. Gorsky: I think theres tremendous opportunity in China.

    Weve recently opened up an innovation center in Shanghai. The way that science is conducted today is much more virtual, is much more ubiquitous versus simply having a large number of scientists in a classic brick-and-mortar setting. Its rather, how can you quickly identify and how can you build relationships with the early startups, with academic centers, with thought leaders, with the venture community, and establish a network and an ecosystem?

    We see this as a way to move from bringing great products to China to actually discovering and developing things in China. So one of the areas were looking at right now, for example, is lung disease. I think Chinas got about 50% of the cases of lung disease in the world today. Heres a great opportunity to put a dedicated team of people with pharmacology backgrounds, people with medical-device backgrounds, even people with consumer backgrounds in things like smoking cessation and have them work together. Because so often, if you go to a pharmacologist and ask for a solution, it tends to be a pill. If you go to a medical-device person, it tends to be an engineering approach.

    And so by having these people work together, its our hope that we can bring really very innovative, transformational kinds of solutions to bear. And ultimately what we would love to do is then be able to take those from markets like China and take them to other markets around the world.

    There goes everything because some PR flack in J&J Hong Kong wants Denise Ho to promote Listerine.

    - Wong Wing-ping holding a bottle of Listerine mouthwash: "It is time to buy more."

    - You are buying a whole box of Listerine? Wait till Listerine comes out tonight and dumps Denise Ho as well. Then you're going to have a lifetime supply of toilet cleanser.

    - (Apple Daily) June 16, 2016. Our reporter visited Watsons, Mannings, ParknShop, Wellcome and other dispensaries in Tiu Keng Leng and Hang Hau districts to check out the shelves containing Listerine products. We found that only Watsons in Tiu King Leng still had any Denise Ho promotional materials on display. When we asked Listerine whether they had sent their promoters to remove those materials, the company did not deny this. The company only said: "This week Listerine will be entering the next phase of our promotion plans for the properties and functions of the new products. Just like any marketing plan, we have various stages emphasizing various themes to market our products."

    On the previous evening when we went to Watsons, we saw the Denise Ho promotional material still there. We asked the worker whether the box was going to be returned. The worker thought that our reporter was the person in charge of removing the material and began to dismantle the box for removal. This confirmed the rumor for us. The worker also said that the box was due to be removed either today or tomorrow, but no reason was offered.

    - Time to boycott Listerine ...

    - Time to roll out the scientific evidence about the ill effects of Listerine, such as alcoholic addiction, bladder damage, oral cancer, etc. Previous these truths were inconvenient and therefore covered up. Now the world can know the truth about Listerine.

    - The pan-democrats (Civic Party, Democratic Party, League of Social Democrats, etc) wouldn't dare go after J&J. L'Oreal is fair game because it is a French company, but J&J is an American company. You wouldn't want the US consulate and the American Chamber of Commerce to come out against you, would you?  You would be losing your UNIVERSAL VALUE (CAPTAIN AMERICA) shield!

    - Time for Denise Ho to come out and demand Listerine never ever to remove her photos from the display shelves. Why? Because FREEDOM DEMOCRACY HUMAN RIGHTS JUSTICE EQUALITY UNIVERSAL VALUES DALAI LAMA.

    - The good thing is that the research efforts do not go to waste. When Lancme hired Denise Ho, mainland Internet users came up with a list of L'Oreal products to boycott. After Lancme fired Denise Ho, Hong Kong Internet users found the list to be very useful for their boycott. Somebody had done all the homework for them. The same thing happens with Listerine. Hong Kong Internet users can now use the J&J product lists for their boycott now.

    - The lesson to Lancme and all other corporations: Do not hire Denise Ho or any other Yellow Ribbon entertainer because you lose both ways.

    - Worse yet, they are going to snap back and bite you when things go wrong.

    - Please note that Yellow Ribbons cannot never be trusted. One day, after Denise Ho boasted about her first post-Occupy job, the Yellow Ribbons praised Lancme to the high heavens. The second day, after Lancme changed its mind, the Yellow Ribbons think Lancme products are scum. So do not think that appeasing them for one moment will buy their eternal loyalty.

    - At first, Denise Ho happily accepted the job and her supporters applauded this breakthrough. Now she is launching a public relations campaign against Lancme as her supporters point out that Lancme uses animal testing to develop their products. Gee, why wasn't that an issue before?

    - When you first date a girl, you say that she is the most beautiful woman in the world. After you break up, you say that she is the ugliest bitch in the world. Your opinion is completely shaped by the state of your relationship. So what else is new?

    - In this case, Denise Ho is saying that Lancme needs to fight for freedom, justice and equality. That means specifically to oppose both the government and the people of mainland China.

    - (Wen Wei Po) Lancme has the freedom to hire Denise Ho and to praise her. They do not have the freedom to terminate the contract with Denise Ho and they do not have the freedom to criticize her. Why? Because this is a universal value.

    - Denise Ho has effectively ended any possibility of working with mainstream companies from here on.

    - But that doesn't mean everything stops for her, because fools rush in where angels fear to tread.

    (Ming Pao) The eco-friendly disinfectant and deodorant house product manufacturer Hyginova said that they are honored to be associated with Denise Ho and hope to invite her to sing some songs. Hyginova said that theirs is the first brand in Asia not to use animal testing. "We promise that we will not conduct animal testing in order to enter the neighboring market of 7 billion persons and we have no intentions to going there until the market regulations have been improved."

    - Hyginova is merely jumping in to get free media exposure.

    - It seems to be a step down from Lancme cosmetics to Hyginova household products ...

    - Thanks to Denise Ho's reaction this time, no other Yellow Ribbon entertainer will get any work as spokesperson now.

    - Not true. Fairwood continues to have Chapman To as their spokesperson.

    - (Liberty Times (Taiwan)) June 7, 2016. Online music MOOV stated on their Facebook: "Denise Ho, we will hire her forever." MOOV is a PCCW company headed by Richard Li, son of Li Ka-shing.

    - (Apple Daily) After MOOV was reported to say on Facebook that they will support Denise Ho forever, mainland Internet users began to organize to boycott all the companies under the Li family. This includes Watsons, ParknShop, etc.

    - (Sina.com.hk) Richard Li and PCCW issued a response:

    Recently, there was some talk on the Internet about the political position of PCCW's MOOV.

    Richard Li and the company have a clear position, namely Hong Kong independence is an impossibility so that any discussion is a waste of social resources. But the company and him respects freedom of expression.

    MOOV has always supported the creation of music and has no intention of engaging politics.

    According to our understanding, the colleague in charge of the webpage said that "hire forever" was posted before the Internet linked the matter with the politics of Hong Kong independence.

    PCCW and Richard Li has never before, now or in future supported any person or thing in support of Hong Kong independence.

    - Clearly some PR/marketing flack at MOOV came up with the idea of exploiting the case to get some publicity for a music service that nobody uses, got some Facebook comments such as "Thanks, MOOV! Although I will be laughed at for still paying for music, I think it is worth it! I didn't want to use MOOV but now I will support you forever!" And now the top brasses are pissed.

    - Time to start a global boycott campaign of PCCW brands.

    - (Weixin) There were several things coming out of PCCW/MOOV/Richard Li. The timing is intriguing.

    (1) On June 4th, mainland Internet users learned about the Denise Ho concert and began a campaign against Lancme.

    (2) On June 5th, Lancme canceled the concert.

    (3) On June 6th at 12:30pm, MOOV stated on its Facebook that "Denise Ho, we will hire her forever! She is a courageous person, she only loves to work and stick to every single one of her beliefs. MOOV loves courageous music." If the PCCW believes that it was wrong, it should have been removed. As of June 8th 7pm, this post is still there.

    (4) On June 8th, PCCW/Richard Li issued a statement to say that "Hong Kong independence is an impossibility so that any discussion is a waste of social resources." This statement is worded such that you don't know whether they support or oppose Hong Kong independence; they only said that it is an impossibility.

    (5) On June 8th, PCCW/Richard Li sent a statement to a number media outlets that added two paragraphs: "According to our understanding, the colleague in charge of the webpage said that "hire forever" was posted before the Internet linked the matter with the politics of Hong Kong independence. PCCW and Richard Li has never before, now or in future supported any person or thing in support of Hong Kong independence." This was probably added to address the ambiguity caused by the previous statement.

    Actually, what does PCCW/Richard Li care about mainland Internet opinion? Several years ago, Richard Li had given up on running business in mainland China. The mainland boycotts being organized right now are directed at Watsons, ParknShop and other properties owned and operated by his father Li Ka-shing and his brother Victor Li, with whom he is not particularly close.

    - The MOOV case provides an interesting comparison with Lancme. In the case of Lancme, they hired Denise Ho for a concert but she went ahead and co-branded the brand with her own politics. So Lancme had to back out. In the case of the paid music service MOOV, they have always carried her music and continue to do so. But she is treated no differently than any other musician, nobody thinks that MOOV supports or opposes her political views, and there has never been any demands from any group to ban her from MOOV. PCCW/Richard Li are forced to issue those pseudo-denial statements only because certain people are co-branding MOOV with Denise Ho's politics.

    - It is true that Denise Ho did not say on Facebook that she thanks MOOV for their support of her politics. But here is what is in Apple Daily: 電訊盈科主席李澤楷旗下網上音樂串流供應商MOOV最近力挺何韻詩 (PCCW chairman Richard Li and the online music service MOOV recently gave strong support to Denise Ho ...). That is what forced PCCW/Richard Li to issue those statements. You may want to avoid politics, but politics has a way of finding you.

    - (Apple Daily) June 6, 2016. Denise Ho issued a statement at around 230pm. There were four points:
    (1) Lancme unilaterally terminated the cooperation without cause and also used inexplicable terms in its statement;
    (2) It is understand that the decision to terminate was made by Lancme headquarters in France;
    (3) Lancme headquarters in France must explain the decision in order to give justice back to Denise Ho and to offer a reasonable explanation to the public;
    (4) It is regrettable that Lancme's statement has seriously misled the public and damaged Denise Ho's reputation.

    - Companies hire and fire spokespersons all the time, and different people have different reactions to such decisions. No company has to explain their decisions. They might say, "We decide to head in a different direction." It is your personal opinion whether the decision was right or wrong. So why does Denise Ho think that Lancme have to give her and the general public an explanation that has to be "reasonable" to her?

    - Companies hire famous spokespersons and promoters because they hope to co-brand each other. For example, Bawang shampoo hired popular actor Jackie Chan as their spokesperson, while Tang Wei speaks for SK II. After Occupy Central, Denise Ho has become a toxic brand. The fact that she couldn't get any job assignments since then means that everybody in advertising/public relations knows this. In this case, someone at Lancme Hong Kong made the stupid decision to hire her and Lancme headquarters had to step in to stop the losses.

    - Besides, you are not really going to listen to the answer -- either it is going to match the answer that you have already settled upon or else it is not 'reasonable'. Reference: Lee Bo on The Missing Booksellers.

    - Denise Ho has many open options at this time. Most obviously, she can apply for legal aid (because she is unemployed) to file a judicial review at the High Court to obtain an injunction to make the Energizing Factor Event take place as scheduled. She can also go to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights to complain that her freedom of expression has been unreasonably deprived.

    - But here is the mirror symmetry. On one hand, Hong Kong Internet users are deploring the mainland Internet users for boycotting Lancme because such tactics represent bullying hegemony. On the other hand, Hong Kong Internet users are organizing their own boycott of Lancme. Did anyone say "Bullying hegemony"?

    - In mainland China, 100% of consumer expenditure on cosmetics is made by mainlanders. In Hong Kong, 60% of consumer expenditure on cosmetics is made by mainland tourists and 40% by Hongkongers themselves. And not all Hongkongers are 'pro-democracy.' So the choice for Lancme should have been obvious.

    - Singer/actress Ivana Wong wrote on Facebook: "Lancme Bye Bye". Wong is known to dislike any and all politics, so this statement is consistent with her past views. In Eileen Chang's novel <Eighteen Springs>, a character said: "Politics decides everything. You may not seek politics, but politics will seek you out."

    -Statement from Denise Ho, June 6th, 2016.

    - Comments in English by a citizen (Ms. Hei-lo):

    I'm rather pissed to read your statement when you claim that you are (though you didn't obviously say it) safeguarding Hong Kong people's freedom! Freedom is not the first priority in businesses and pls ask any CEO on earth whether they'd place "Freedom" as their top priority in their business vision and mission statement!!

    My reply to her statement:

    "It sounds and looks intelligent in terms of your English but if you ask any CEO of any corporate companies if "Freedom" is their first priority in their business vision and mission, many of them may say "NO" because their positive image is always the first priority in any companies.

    Public Relations is all about establishing and securing a positive image but if anyone, whether it is the spokesperson or anyone in the company, has done something wrong that would bring disastrous impact to negatively influence the company's image, then that person will either be fired or penalized.

    For the spokesperson's case, I reckon most CEOs will simply cease the working relationship with the spokesperson. It's just a business decision and pls don't self-create such an image that HOCC is such a great person to safeguard HK's / HK people's freedom. You are not the spokesperson of Freedom!! Your statement makes me feel very sick! I'm sorry!"

    - Denise Ho thus wrote:

    This is not only about me. This is about those who believe in freedom, justice and equality. This is about these precious universal values that every individual yearn for. This is about what kind of a world we want to live in. It is unjust when people have to be punished for speaking out, standing up and seeking for these rights we consider to be human rights.

    (Wen Wei Po) Hong Kong has the freest economy in the world. A company can legally terminate contracts and cancel projects, and any disputes can be resolved according to the terms of the contracts. This is the essence of freedom of business. But when this happens to Denise Ho, it becomes an unforgivable crime. If you don't hire Denise Ho, then you are assaulting freedom, justice and equality in Hong Kong and even the precious universal values of every single individual in the whole world. Who does Denise Ho think she is? Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, Mother Teresa?

    - (Chapman To's Facebook)

    Chapman To:
    Actually life is basically what is the so-called censoring of entertainers.
    Whenever a job opportunity arises, it is gone because the boss, competitor or peer is afraid.
    People in the street look at you as if you are a monster.
    Your family and friends receive well-meaning reminders or malicious criticisms, usually in the manner of: "Tell your son not to do this" or "Your husband hasn't considered you.!"
    It is common in the entertainment industry to kick you while you are done!
    But I am not a dog. You are.
    "Even if I bang my head until I bleed, I will continue to fight on until the last round." This is my motto for over forty years!
    Try hard! Fight hard!

    - Hey, fella, how about making some money yourself to contribute to your family instead of living off your wife?

    - Wang Jing's last movie <From Vegas to Macau III> made $1 billion RMB in mainland China. Your last movie <Aberdeen> made $2 million RMB in mainland China. You must have tried hard and fought hard.

    - It is telling that Chapman To is the only known entertainer to come out with a supportive statement. No other actor, actress, singer, musician, director or producer of note has done so.

    - Sai Kung District Councilor Christine Fong: "I used Lancme cleaning liquid to wash my toilet! Then I flushed the toilet. That's all."

    Video: https://www.facebook.com/christinefks.page/videos/1042796882467650/

    - Dump all Lancme products? Who owns Lancme?  LOral. So you should dump all LOral products as well. But who owns LOral? Would you believe that its second biggest shareholder is Nestl? So you should dump all Nestl products as well. You can locate their brands here (partial listing: Nestl, NESCAF, Dairy Farm, Carnation, Gerber, Purina, Milo, Pak Fook, Maggi, Dreyer's, Crunch, KitKat).

    - And did you know that NESCAF runs a Leon Lai commercial on TV Most? Now do you realize that you have to boycott NESCAF coffee, Leon Lai and TV Most?

    - Does anyone still remember the boycott spreadsheet from Occupy Central?


    Boycott all the     LOral products
    We will never yield to money
    Tomorrow at 1pm we will march to the     Lancme outlet in Lane Crawford
    Participating organizations: League of Social Democrats, People Power, Demosisto, Labour Party, Hong Kong Shield, Democratic Party, Neo Democrats, Chu Hoi-dick (more being added)
    Date: June 8, 2016
    Time: 1pm
    Assembly location: Public space at Times Square, Causeway Bay.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) June 8, 2016.

    Dozens gathered outside Lancme store in Times Square, Causeway Bay on Wednesday in protest of the companys decision to cancel a concert featuring pro-democracy star Denise Ho Wan-see.

    The French cosmetics giant cancelled the June 19 concert after Chinese state mouthpiece Global Times accused Ho of being a supporter of Hong Kong and Tibetan independence movements. The move sparked controversy among netizens and customers. Ho supported the 2014 pro-democracy Occupy protests but has rarely spoken about the independence debate.

    The protesters urged an international boycott of the brand, as well as other brands under its parent group LOral, until a full explanation and an apology are given. They urged to company to promise not to carry out further political censorship.

    What shocks the society is that an international brand, emphasising social responsibility and women[s] empowerment like Lancme, also kneeled down to the bullying government, said Avery Ng Man-yuen, chairman of the pro-democracy League of Social Democrats party. Ng said the incident was a great contradiction to LOrals mission. Lancme not only insulted Denise Ho, but also insulted Hong Kong citizens who fought for democracy for years, and all global citizens embracing democracy and liberty, Ng added.

    Several lawmakers of pro-democracy parties attended the protest, namely Helena Wong Pik-wan of the Democratic Party, Gary Fan Kwok-wai of the Neo Democrats, Cyd Ho Sau-lan and Fernando Cheung Chiu-hung of the Labour Party.

    Citing a Whatsapp message from Denise Ho, lawmaker Long Hair Leung Kwok-hung said although Ho could not come due to her busy schedule, she thanked participants at the protest. [She said] this matter is not her not her personal matter, and not the companys matter anymore it is white terror, he said. She hopes everyone will keep fighting, otherwise people will all live in fear. The protesters produced a large banner with Hos face that said We are all Denise Ho say no to mainland tyranny. Other banners read No kowtow to Beijing and Protecting Hong Kongs core values.

    Civic Party lawmaker Claudia Mo Man-ching said Hos treatment by the firm was simply blatant, naked and despicable. We need to ask, whatever happened to the French qualities liberty, equality, fraternity  are they telling us these days, today, that money talks? Profits come first? she asked.

    People Power party representative Tam Tak-chi questioned Lancmes decision to pull Ho from the event. He said that brand ambassadors who opposed animal testing for cosmetic products have not been dropped. LOreal is accused of using animal testing. Does that mean Hong Kong people are easier targets to suppression? he asked.

    The Lancme booth at Lane Crawford in Times Square was closed ahead of the protest. The protesters pasted props criticising the company onto the booth, including one saying Lancme Lanout Hong Kong demanding the brand leave the city.

    Ng said that they will allow a week for LOral to apologise, and will not rule out any further actions.

    - Why was Denise Ho herself absent? She says that she is unemployed but claims to have "a busy schedule." Let me tell you why -- she couldn't control who might show up. For example, if Andy "Captain America" Yung showed up waving his British dragon-lion flag for Hong Kong independence, what will she do? She says that she is not pro-Hong Kong independence, but now someone is advocating it at her event. What can she do? As another example, the event is backed by the pan-democratic political parties, both traditional (Democratic Party, Civic Party) and so-called radical (League of Social Democrats, People Power). But what if the radical localists (Civic Passion, Hong Kong Indigenous) showed up and start a clash either with the pan-democrats or the police? She would own the consequences.

    - That is the same calculation for Johannes Chan, who never shows up at any demonstrations on his behalf.

    - Why do they do this type of thing? They are going to the LOral booths in the Lane Crawford department store. They are not numerous, being only "dozens" but enough to surround the booths and disrupt business. Who is at the booth? The sales people. Did the sale people have anything to do with the decision to hire/fire Denise Ho? Absolutely not. Why harass them that? Because you can. The people who are really responsible are sitting in an office somewhere and absolutely unreachable. Therefore you reach the people who can be conveniently reached. What do the sales people think? About one-third of their income is derived from sales commission. When their booths get surrounded and customers stay away, they lose money. Well, that's tough shit because their sacrifice is needed for the sake of freedom/democracy/human rights/universal values.

    - Also, everything is for a media show. Going to an office and not being admitted is not a good media show. Charging into Lane Crawford and stopping business at the LOral booths as well as all other booths makes for a good media show (see video). That is why this has to be done.

    - It was the same thing with Occupy Central. Your beef is with CY Leung, the Hong Kong SAR Government, the Central Government and the Chinese Communist Party. But you can't reach them. Therefore you Occupy Central, Causeway Bay and Mong Kok and make it hell for ordinary citizens.

    - The report says "dozens." Let me count them ...

    Video: Resistance Live Media https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFODcOXkZcc League of Social Democrats chanting "Global boycott of LOral," "Shame on self-censorship", etc. Looks like many more photographers than demonstrators.

    - I look at the photo of Leung Kwok-hung in this "Global boycott of LOral," and I find it impossible to believe that Leung is a past user who intends to boycott now. If Leung boycotts, the net loss to LOral is zero.

    - Actually, if Leung Kwok-hung had used some LOral skincare products, he would be less ugly.

    - (HKG Pao) The pan-democrats (Democratic Party, Civic Party, Labour Party, Neo Democrats, League of Social Democrats, People Power and Demosisto) must have pretty good reasons to hold demonstrations at the LOral booths at Lane Crawford. After all, there were so many photographers out there. What they don't realize is that they have effectively ended the economic prospects for Yellow Ribbon entertainers. As the saying goes, you are never afraid of powerful enemies; you should be afraid of allies who are even stupider than pigs.

    - (HKG Pao) On the day after the demonstration, the Lancme store inside Lane Crawford was re-opened for business. A worker said that they were instructed by the company to report if more demonstrations take place and "our personal safety is of the utmost concern to the company."

    - The Energizing Factory Event was canceled by Lancme due to concerns for personal safety. What does that mean? Look at what happened. You don't know which political factions are going to show up at the concert, do you?

    - (HKG  Pao) There is a lesson for public relations specialists from all this. On one side, the Hong Kong demonstration against Lancme came with media coverage in the Yellow Ribbon press. LOral closed its booths in anticipation of the demonstration. But when the time came, the media saw just the usual array of the dozens of pan-democratic professional demonstrators (Leung Kwok-hung, Avery Ng, Raphael Wong, etc). Meanwhile on the other side, the Global Times Weibo posts drew tens of thousands of comments against Lancme at first. LOral is present in 80 cities in China at this time. Do they want to see all their booths in China shut down in the face of demonstrations? But apart from sheer numbers, it is also about intensity. In Hong Kong, the thunder is loud but the raindrops are few.

    - (SCMP) June 23, 2016.

    Five pan-democratic parties are planning to protest at LOrals Hong Kong office on Friday morning, as they say the cosmetics giant has refused to apologise and come clean on its decision to cancel a concert by Canto-pop star Denise Ho Wan-sze.

    League of Social Democrats chairman Avery Ng Ma-yuen told the Post on Thursday that the matter was not over.

    We want LOral to know that many people around the world are upset about their decision, Ng said. We want LOral to apologise, explain how the decision was made, and promise that there will be no more self-censorship ... If they refuse to come clean [on Friday], we will not rule out taking further action.

    Ng said the League, Labour Party, Democratic Party, Civic Party and NeoDemocrats would gather outside Times Square at 11am on Friday, before protesting at LOrals office on the 45th floor.

    It is unclear if LOral will close its office and stores on Friday. A spokeswoman said the group had nothing further to add to what it said on June 5.

    - (Hong Kong Free Press) June 7, 2016.

    A petition demanding that the cosmetic giant Lancme reverse its decision to cancel a concert featuring pro-democracy singer Denise Ho Wan-see has gained traction online. Prior to the announcement, Chinese netizens had called for a boycott of Lancme products and also of its Listerine mouthwash brand. The company dropped Ho, who is known for her outspoken pro-democracy stance, on Sunday.

    The French petition has garnered over 2,200 signatures, and includes a letter directed at the President and Managing Director of LOrals Hong Kong branch, Stephen Mosely. LOral owns the Lancme brand. The petition called for a boycott of Lancme should it not allow Hos concert to proceed. We cannot accept Lancme as an ambassador of France a country of human rights to Hong Kong, while it sacrifices freedom of thought and freedom of expression in its trade policy. We cannot accept that French companies bend to the dictates of the Chinese Communist Party, the petition said.

    - There are 7 billion people in the world. This petition has garnered over 2,200 signatures so far with a goal of 5,000 signatures eventually. Should LOral be trembling at the might of the masses?

    - To put this into context, there are 7,000,000,000 people in the world. Let us suppose that 100,000 'real' persons signed this petition. There are 7,000,000 people in Hong Kong.

    By ratio, this is equivalent to 7,000,000 x (100,000 / 7,000,000,000) = 100 persons signing in Hong Kong.

    100 people sign a petition in Hong Kong and therefore we must obey their wishes? Let's say that this is no persuasive.

    Even if you get 1,000,000 real persons around the world to sign, this is equivalent to 1,000 persons signing in Hong Kong. This is still not persuasive.

    - This is being positioned as a disaster for L'Oral. How disastrous? In 2015, the company had 25.257 billion in revenue. How many billions will it lose as a result of this 'global boycott'?

    - France is 'a country of human rights'? Can you imagine something like in these videos from France happening in Hong Kong now? And this is not some piece of ancient history (like the Reign of Terror); it is happening at this moment in France.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UVAsLghXacM
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kac5W62hcXM
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8TDaA_4tR-U
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fckCuucHXg
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=stoGzuko_u0

    In Hong Kong, they observed an 87-second silence to mark one month since police 87 rounds of tear gas at demonstrators. How many thousands of rounds of tear gas have the French police fired over this past month? Why don't you solve your own human rights problems first? Or should we adopt the 'universal values' that you are using?

    - Or this just in: (RT) Euro 2016: French police teargas England fans clashing with Marseilles residents

    - The impact of an online petition drive is even less than a loud fart.

    - (SCMP) June 10, 2016.

    When Lancme cancelled Canto-pop star Denise Ho Wan-szes concert in Hong Kong, it seemed unlikely that a retired philosophy teacher in Paris would be leading the calls for the cosmetics giant to reconsider its decision.

    But there she is. Beatrice Desgranges started a petition on change.org on Monday after learning about the incident from a tweet from a French expatriate in Hong Kong. By 3pm on Friday, Desgranges petition had been signed by more than 50,000 people. A separate petition endorsed by 17 Hong Kong political parties and activist groups was supported by more than 4,300 on Facebook and signed by about 450.

    In an exclusive interview conducted via email, Desgranges, 65, said she didnt know much about Hong Kong.

    I only spent one day and one night there [in 1995], but it is not the problem for me. I think my duty is to stand up for freedom wherever freedom is violated, she wrote.

    Desgranges studied philosophy in Paris in the 1970s and taught it in a school in Eastern France before retiring. She now mostly lives in Paris.

    As a philosopher, I always remember Socrates, who said he was like [a] horsefly who keeps people awake, she said. I used to [tell] my pupils: Well, you cant change the world by yourself but you can do what depends on you, you can speak out and tell what is wrong.

    Desgranges also suggested that her petition was partly inspired by French writer Emile Zola, who spoke up for Jewish officer Alfred Dreyfus when he was accused by the French government for being a spy in 1894.

    Liu Xiaobo, whom I admire, says he has drawn inspiration from Zolas principles, Desgranges wrote.

    Liu was sentenced to 11 years in jail in 2009 for inciting subversion of state power through Charter 08, co-signed by more than 300 signatories, which called for freedom of expression, free elections and human rights. But a year later, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to push for greater freedom in mainland China.

    Desgranges also told the Post about her love for Chinese culture and history.

    She said she once had a 10-day journey in mainland China, during which she remembered Tiananmen, or the crackdown of the 1989 pro-democracy movement in Beijing.

    I thought my duty was to learn the Chinese language to be able to talk with Chinese people without any interpreter, she said. I read Chinese novels, see Chinese films ... and created my [online] forum to share what I read or see with others.

    Earlier, she wrote in her petition that it was unacceptable for Lancme, as an ambassador of France in Hong Kong, to sacrifice the freedom of thought and expression to their commercial policy.

    Denise Ho was vilified and blacklisted by mainland media for taking part in the Occupy movement protests in 2014.

    The trouble began after Lancme invited the singer to host a mini-concert in Hong Kong on June 19, then abruptly called it off after Beijing newspaper Global Times accused the brand of inviting a Hong Kong independence advocate. With mainland internet users calling for a boycott of the brands products, an angry backlash ensued from Hongkongers, who accused LOreal, Lancmes parent company, of kowtowing to Beijing.

    With more than 56,000 people supporting her petition as of Friday afternoon, Desgranges told the Post that we can wait a little more before sending the petition to Lancmes office.

    - (HKG Pao) June 10, 2016. Yesterday Denise Ho shared the link Apple Daily columnist Li Yi's essay <Something that couldn't happen>. The essay said that all the accusations against Denise Ho are baseless, that these are labeling without evidence and "what else is this but the Cultural Revolution?" At the same time, Denise Ho took a dig at Justice Alliance founder Leticia Lee for coming out in support of Lancme, accusing her of acting as if she is the new spokesperson. Ho said: "So I admit defeat!! What more do you want from me?!!! (throwing bottles and cans around)."

    Li Yi said that he does not remember Denise Ho ever mentioning Hong Kong independence or voicing support of Tibet independence. Unless you think that all those Hong Kong people who have participated or supported Occupy Central are independence advocates, then she might be. Ho has never mentioned Tibet independence. She met the Dalai Lama in Japan "in order to learn the wisdom to become a person" etc.

    However Internet users pointed out, "It is mainstream public opinion that thinks Denise Ho is pro Hong Kong independence and Tibet independence. After all, they mind very much about the Dalai Lama. From the very start, it was the mainland Internet users spontaneously organizing their boycotts. If it was just Global Times making some noise, Lancme would not have to take such drastic actions." Other Internet users said: "If Denise Ho does not support separatism (in Hong Kong and Tibet), all she has to do is come out and say so loudly and clearly. PCCW/Richard Li did just that. Once the news get around, the mainland Internet users will stop going after Denise Ho."

    - Now that things have been blown up, Denise Ho is out of a living now and in the future. So she is immediately saying that she has never ever said anything in support of Hong Kong and Tibet independence. She is accusing people of smearing her ... This is risible! ... She wants a whitewash at this moment in time? Too late!!!"

    - Can Denise Ho really come out and declare: "Mainland Chinese people misunderstood me. I do not support Hong Kong independence and I do not support Tibet independence. PERIOD. I hope this message gets to everybody who misunderstood me before." Of course she is incapable of saying it in this loud and clear manner, because it will make her a "leftist retard" and "Chinese chauvinist pig" among her (now former) base of support.

    - Another problem is that Denise Ho went too far initially, for she positioned this fight as the final battle of principles. How can she back off now in what seems to be a surrender? She cannot do this herself, nor can her surrogates (e.g. Li Yi) do it for her.

    - (Sing Tao) June 10, 2016.

    Denise Ho revealed that she had communicated with the persons in charge at Lancme and L'Oral many times in order to find a solution. She understands that they are under pressure. But they have so far only handled the matter by just informing her. "Our side pleaded with them, but they ignored us. There is nothing to discuss. We find this very regrettable." So far, L'Oral has said that they will pay compensation but they have ignored everything else. "We keep asking them about what explanation they will offer me or the public. But they refused to answer to any of this. I don't have the sense that they want to face up to this."

    Denise Ho emphasized that this is not personal, not about money and not about the cooperative relationship. This is about how the company handled the matter. "Apart from the inexplicable reasons behind, it gives you a feeling that they are respectful. Not just disrespectful of me, but disrespectful of the people of Hong Kong."

    "Certain choice of words created misunderstanding and speculations. Why not explain to the public just what the so-called safety issues are?" When the company contacted Denise Ho at first, they must know about her background and view. But they unilaterally terminated the cooperation brusquely due to pressure from mainland official media. To a certain degree, this communicates a certain terror to Hong Kong society, and it also encourages political oppression in the business area."

    Finally Denise Ho called on everyone to support the online petition campaign. She would like Lancme Hong Kong person-in-charge Stephen Mosely to make an explanation: "Over the past two years, the people of Hong Kong has had enough of this kind of 'this is how it is.' It is not a choice. It is 'this is how it is' which is increasing the terror and anger in Hong Kong society. This is a responsibility not just to me, but to the entire society."

    - I find the story very amusing. The first sentence said that "she communicated with Lancme/L'Oral many times." Fine. Then its goes on to explain that this so-called communication consists of Denise Ho sending many messages which drew no response. Do you call that communication?

    - Communication, noun, the imparting or exchanging of information or news. Denise Ho is talking about imparting information from her to them, not about exchanging information between two sides. So this is within the definition of communication.

    - There is no chance that Lancme/L'Oral will communicate any further with Denise Ho. That's what any PR consultant will advise. So far, they know for sure that anything that they might say will wind up being released and distorted outside.

    - More head scratching required here! Since when did disrespecting Denise Ho = disrespecting the people of Hong Kong? Why does she raise discussion of herself to discussion of the people of Hong Kong? Isn't that presumptuous?

    - (The Stand News) When Lancme cut off Denise Ho, the focus shouldn't be about any public relations crisis. The real point is that when Lancme had to choose between China and Hong Kong, it chose China because it is a much, much larger market than Hong Kong. That is the brutal reality.

    To date, Lancme has not offered any excuse, explanation, justification or apology. Absolutely nothing. Do Lancme and L'Oral not know about the public clamor in Hong Kong over the past several days? Of course, they know. But so what? The demonstrators can chant their slogans out loud, but can Hongkongers stop buying Lancme forever? And Armani, YSL, Body Shop, BioTherm, etc? When the demonstration stops, it will be business as usual. This is how Hongkongers feel. They don't give a shit. They won't even want any explanations.

    - (Post852) June 11, 2016. Post 852 quotes Denise Ho: "The fact is that before Lancme Hong Kong issued its first statement, a person in charge informed us that this was an irresistible order from a certain mainland Chinese department. Indeed, it was a business decision. But it was a business decision influenced by political factors."

    - There is no WHO WHEN WHERE WHY and HOW to verify any bit of it. And why is it only coming out one week later?

    - 「大陸部門」(mainland Chinese department)? When you read that phrase, you immediately think of a government department? Zhang Dejiang? The State Council? Central Propaganda Department? Ministry of Culture? But if there were so, they would have nailed it by spelling out "mainland Chinese government department"! Right? But they didn't. So it is not a mainland Chinese government department. More likely, it was a L'Oral department to which Lancme Hong Kong reports. When the matter involves both Hong Kong and mainland China, Lancme Hong Kong has to seek instructions from their supervisor right? L'Oral is structured hierarchically as the L'Oral executive committee, of which Alexis Perakis-Valat is the member in charge of L'Oral Asia Pacific which oversees L'Oral China (also headed by Perakis-Valat) which oversees L'Oral Hong Kong which oversees Lancme Hong Kong.

    - There hasn't been many cases of government departments applying political pressures on commercial corporations. In the case of fashion store chain Giordano which was owned by Next Media boss Jimmy Lai at the time, the company kept having problems with license renewals and safety inspections (fire department, labor department, etc) so that Lai decided to sell his shares more than two decades ago. Google left China on its own with great fanfare but is crawling back in quietly. So what order can a mainland government department issue to L'Oral? Cancel the Hong Kong concert or else we are going to close down all L'Oral outlets in 80 mainland cities?

    - (Apple Daily) June 9, 2016.

    Anna Chan proposed this theory about the entire affair. "Why would an international brand work with an over-the-hill singer such as Denise Ho?" "There is reason to believe that they are deliberately trying to touch on the nerves of mainland Internet users" by crossing the bottom line and "then pretending to be innocent and severing relations, but having provided Denise Ho the chance to gain international sympathy and decry Chinese Communist oppression etc." She said that the American brand Listerine also hired Denise Ho as spokesperson. "Can there be so many coincidences?" She wondered if Lancme is making these moves just before the Hong Kong Legco elections in September. "Although I rarely use cosmetic products, I will firmly remind all my friends to boycott L'Oral products!"

    - Under normal circumstances, it would be logical to assume that Denise Ho set Lancme up because she wants to use the media publicity to launch a Legislative Council election campaign. This is not true. According to Cap 542 Legislative Council Ordinance S7, a Legco candidate must be a Chinese citizen who is a permanent resident of Hong Kong with no right of abode in any country other than the People's Republic of China. But according to Wikipedia, Denise Ho was born in Hong Kong and emigrated with her family to Montreal at the age of 11. If Denise Ho wants to run for the Hong Kong Legislative Council, she would have to renounce her Canadian citizenship like Albert Cheng did.

    ... unless, of course, Denise Ho has already quietly renounced her Canadian citizenship in preparation for this election ...

    - (HKG Pao) June 11, 2016. National People's Congress Standing Committee member Rita Fan said that the Lancme affair was purely a business decision, and she does not see Global Times as suppressing freedom of expression in Hong Kong. Just because you don't like what someone is saying, you can't accuse them of suppression. If Hong Kong has freedom of expression, then it should respect the freedom of expression of others.

    Rita Fan also said that there are many people who express certain opinions under freedom of expression, and then they claim that they represent the people of Hong Kong.

    - How have Hong Kong media handled this news story? Among newspapers, the Yellow Ribbon Apple Daily and Ming Pao do not appear to be as rabid as expected. Maybe this is because their advertising revenues have been taking deep dives such to cause staff cuts. And L'Oral would be a big-time spender on print advertising. I know that the editorial department acts independently of the advertising department, but the publisher knows who is putting the bread on the table.

    Among Internet media, HK01 is taking the lead. Everybody knows that HK01 is bankrolled by mainland money and is losing tens of millions a month. HK01 went ahead and hired away hundreds of workers away from Apple Daily and Ming Pao. How can this be? One conspiracy theory is that the Chinese Communists are hiring away the Apple Daily/Ming Pao workers and then HK01 will declare bankruptcy soon and leave all these Yellow Ribbon people jobless. How is this for a worst-case analysis?

    - (Apple Daily) D100 radio host Jess says that his mainland factory had been producing packaging for LOral/Lancme to the tune of several million dollars per year. However, he has decided that he will no longer accept any jobs from them in the future. He tells the people of Hong Kong that they can also help by boycotting products made with mainland Chinese capital. Denise Ho expressed thanks to Jess via Facebook.

    - Well, that's fucking great! But Jess, can you please explain why your fucking factory is located in mainland China? Why oh why isn't it fucking located in Hong Kong? Are you another one of those people like Denise Ho who wants to make money in mainland China while criticizing everything there? If you have the courage, you should fold up your mainland factory and set one up in Hong Kong!

    - Why can't Jess set up a factory in Hong Kong? Rent and labor. If Lancme sends out a request for proposal for 200,000 packages, the Hong Kong factory's bid will be several times costlier than the bids from Dongguan/Panyu-based Hong Kong-owned factories for the same assured quality. What should Lancme do? Please tell us, Jess.

    - This fucking bastard Jess went to set up a factory in mainland China after what happened on Tiananmen Square, June 4th 1989. His fucking conscience must have been eaten by a dog.

    - That's fucking fantastic news. When Jess turned down the multimillion business, LOral/Lancme is going to go out of business because they can't find any packaging for their products! NOT! Hundreds of other factories are ready to jump in to take this business for better quality and lower price! This is Jess's loss, not the loss of LOral/Lancme. It will contribute to greater profitability to LOral!

    - PLEASE! If Jess is truly a businessman with a conscience, he would not have set up a blood-and-sweat factory in China to exploit workers with inhumane wages and working conditions. And if you say that Jess is different from other factory owners because he pays good wages and provides working conditions, then he wouldn't be getting any contracts (unless the client happens to be a business with a conscience and a sense of social responsibility).

    - This Jess guy just turned down a job for Lancme? I am going to call Lancme at 9am on Monday morning to put in a bid. I am sure that I can do a better job.

    - Well, timing is an issue here.
    If Jess never got the contract and now says he rejected it, this is rubbish.
    If Jess got the contract and refuses to carry it out, he will have to pay a penalty. Then he is truly courageous.
    Which do you think happened?

    - We need to publicize the name of Jess's company. This is a company that puts in a tender offer; when it doesn't get the job, it goes around badmouthing the potential client. Everybody should know about this company and avoid it in future.

    - Yes, I remember this Jess guy. He started his career by offering online information on where to find prostitutes in mainland China. So it is hilarious that he is being presented by Apple Daily and Denise Ho as a businessman with a conscience.

    - A low-end printing factory rejects a recurrent job from a transnational company? Hahahaha! This is like a Golden Forum lad rejecting a proposal from Miss Hong Kong!

    - Many Internet users feel elation whenever foreign media begin reporting on something about Hong Kong. The same thing happens in Taiwan. People in Hong Kong and Taiwan look down on their own media and they think that something becomes more important when written up in English. So they rush to tell each other that CNN, BBC or NHK is reporting on something or the other. Right now some Hong Kong Internet users are congratulating each other because BBC has interviewed Denise Ho and the story has appeared in Daily Mail. Unfortunately, this is a superficial reading. A friend remarked: "You don't realize that BBC was only interested in teaching people how to conduct business in China. They couldn't care less about Denise Ho, Hong Kong or democracy." But do Hongkongers get this?

    - (AM 730) By Shih Wing-ching. June 22, 2016.

    The French cosmestic company Lancme canceled a promotional concert by Denise Ho, who demanded an explanation.

    The business community has not made any public comments on the incident, but they have privately been discussing the matter. The common reaction of the business community is that they feel helpless and they resent any political involvement.

    The business community only want to do their business. They don't want to see interference from any political force. The business community want to made free choices based upon business considerations. They want to find popular entertainers to promote their brands; they want to advertise in newspapers with more loyal readers. If they have to consider whether certain people are going to be satisfied or not, they will feel that their space is being restricted and unfavorable to their business.

    Lancme's French headquarters did not realize what Denise Ho's political stance is. The decision to hire Denise Ho for the promotional activity was probably made by the Hong Kong branch. It was also likely to be made by the recommendation of a public relations/advertising company instead of the managers. When the mainland media covered the event and mainland Internet users reacted, Lancme headquarters started to pay attention. Due to the size of the mainland market and its commercial implications, Lancme headquarters had to made a choice. Thus, they canceled the Denise Ho concert.

    It is understandable that Denise Ho is not happy. She can demand Lancme to pay compensation according to the contract, or she can even sue Lancme in court. But she chose to magnify the affair into a social incident and demand Lancme to come out and explain to the public. Some political groups even organized people to demonstrate at the Lancme sales counters. They accused Lancme of surrendering to the Chinese Communists, engaging in self-censorship and suppressing Hong Kong democracy. They called on citizens to boycott Lancme products.

    The business community is feeling the pressure from China already. Now they are facing direct pressure from the opposition. They didn't know how to respond.

    The Chinese market is huge and carries a lot of economic interests. When the business community chooses, they have to consider the interests of the shareholders and the well-being of their employees. Sometimes they will have to make compromises. For example, Google abandoned the Chinese market as a matter of principle.

    But Google had to stick to its principles because its main attraction is the availability of information. Without freedom of information, Google won't be competitive. By analogy, if China imposes restrictions on Lancme's perfume (e.g. no smell), Lancme would have quit the Chinese market as a matter of principle. But when Lancme gives up Denise Ho, it has plenty of other options. So it is no wonder that Lancme chose to compromise.

    To force the business community to make the inevitable choice and then to continue to hound them means that the business community will be very cautious when they choose their spokespersons in the future. Many entertainers whose pro-China positions are unclear will not be used. Nobody is demanding that the business community must use certain entertainers only. But if they somehow have to switch, they will draw speculations and accusations.

    I am worried that more pressure on the business community will only magnify the objective consequences of pressure from mainland China. The business community does not want any form of political pressure because it degrades the business environment. I hope that the wishes of the business community will be respected.

    - (Oriental Daily) June 4, 2016. Crowd estimates by source.
     
    Year Alliance Police
    2007 55,000 27,000
    2008 48,000 15,700
    2009 200,000 62,000
    2010 150,000 113,000
    2011 150,000 77,000
    2012 180,000 85,000
    2013 150,000 54,000
    2014 180,000 99,500
    2015 135,000 46,600
    2016 125,000 21,800


    2016 photo


    2015 photo

    (HKU POP)

    1. Soccer pitches (six in total, parallel to each other). Each soccer pitch is 72.75 meters long and 46.5 meters wide.

    Total length = 72.75 meters plus boundaries of 5 meters at one end and 7.5 metes on the other end = 85.25 meters

    Total width = [6 x (46.5 metes)] + [6 x 6 meters boundaries] + [passageways of 6 meters + 6 meters + 24 meters] = 351 meters

    Total area = 85.25 meters x 351 meters - [size of grand stage 846 meters] = 29,077 meters

    2. Central Lawn. 206 meters long and 108 meters wide for a total area of 22,248 square meters. At 67% usage, the total area is 9800 square meters.

    3. Pavilion: 2870 square areas. At 50% usage, the total area is 1435 square meters.

    4. Basketball courts. Each basketball court is 28 meters long and 15 meters wide. Total area is 1050 square meters for 2-1/2 courts.

    5. Pathway around the soccer pitches. Southern passage is 351 meters long and 6 meters wide. Northern passage is 351 meters long and 5 meters wide. At 50% usage, the total area is 1931 square meters.

    Grand total area = 43293 square meters.

    At a density of 2.8 persons per square meter, total number of persons = 121,220
    At a density of 2.5 persons per square meter, total number of persons = 108,223

    - What is 2.8 persons per square meter? In each square meter box (which is 3 feet by 3 feet), 2.8 persons are present. Since the proceedings go on for more than 2 hours, people have to sit. Once they sit down, they cannot move within the box anymore.

    - In 2009, the Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China announced that 200,000 persons attended. That means there were 200,000 / 43292 = 4.6 persons per square meter.

    - An alternate calculation is based upon there being 12 rectangular blocks in the soccer pitches in the 2016 aerial photo above. Counting the number of candles, each block is about 50 times 20 = 1,000 candles. Therefore the total is 1,000 x 12 = 12,000. Add some for the Central Lawn and you get the police estimate. Now who do you trust? The Alliance or your own lying eyes?

    - (Oriental Daily) June 4, 2016.

    Before the assembly began, many demonstrators carrying "Hong Kong independence", "Hong Kong is not China", "Breakaway from the Chinks and build our own nation, One Country One Side" charged in. One demonstrator got on stage and yelled: "Support Hong Kong independence" before being escorted away by workers. One demonstrator punched the monitors, but was subdued. The police handcuffed one demonstrator and took him away. When they reached the Tin Hau exit of Victoria Park, the demonstrator took off onto the street. Fortunately the cars braked just in time.

    - Recruitment notice from the Hong Kong National Front

    The Hong Kong National Front was established to gather dedicated persons to use all feasible methods to defend the interests of our people, ultimately achieving self-determination and independence. On June 4th, our action to charge at the grand stage had little effect because we did not have enough people. Our organization is recruiting warriors to join our path of resistance and advance the historical wheel of self-determination for the people of Hong Kong!

    - (Hong Kong Free Press) June 5, 2016.

    A stage invasion by Hong Kong independence activists at Saturdays Victoria Park Tiananmen massacre vigil received mixed reactions from different localist political groups.

    Several minutes before the commencement of the vigil at 8pm, around a dozen activists, wielding colonial Hong Kong flags and banners, attempted to storm the main stage. One activist seized the microphone, shouting we dont want a democratic China, we want Hong Kong independence we need to take care of ourselves before being removed by event organisers amid scuffles. Others continued to speak to the public behind the stage for around an hour, surrounded by a large contingent of police.

    The activist who successfully mounted the stage was named as Simon Sin, a 23 year-old former member of Internet-based group Hong Kong Localism Power, according to Stand News. Sin later alleged that he was assaulted by event staff, saying he was pinched on his arm, seized by his neck, and received blows to his rear.

    Hong Kong Localism Power, however, condemned the incident. Everyone has the right to choose to identify with a country, and we will not force Hong Kongers to deny they are Chinese, said Chairman Jonathan Ho Chi-kwong in a statement. We believe that this was a malicious attempt to instigate conflict, Ho concluded.

    Last year, the group attempted to disrupt a forum held at Victoria Park on the afternoon of June 4, prior to the vigil. In the same Facebook post, Ho apologised for the groups past actions.

    Following the stage invasion, a 24 year-old man was arrested by police on charges of obstructing public officers, and was released on bail shortly before midnight. Members of localist political organisation Civic Passion demonstrated outside North Point Police Station, where he was held. They criticised the event staff for their violent removal of the stage invaders, and questioned the vigil organisers commitment to peaceful forms of protest.

    - For this one day of the year, we swear solidarity with our compatriots in China to support patriotic democratic movements there. Now that it is past midnight, we are back to our regular program of "We are Hong Kong", "Hong Kong is not China" and "Mainland locusts, go back where you come from!"

    - (The Stand News) June 4, 2016. Video: https://www.facebook.com/standnewshk/videos/999217053497248/
    Simon Sin has frequently propounded on Hong Kong independence before at his street booth. He has more than 1,000 followers on Facebook. At around 745pm, he declared on Facebook that there would be a duel between Reunification versus Independence as he intends to ambush the Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China. Afterwards, reporters and citizens asked him (see video) if he was being rough and impolite. When asked if he applied to speak, Simon said: "We didn't do anything wrong. We only want to express our opinions. We are not on the same side." Afterwards he chanted "Hong Kong independence" with his comrades. He said that those by his side are his brothers and "we will not let the Communist Party rule us."

    Kyle is the person holding the "HK is not CHINA" banner. He is a student. He said that it means nothing to him if one or two hundred thousand people attend the assembly tonight. It is more important to let people know that twenty to thirty people oppose the Alliance to Support Patriotic Democratic Movements in China. He said that in the 1980's, the people of Hong Kong wanted to continue to be be ruled by the British. After June 4th, the Alliance exploited the feelings of the people of Hong Kong and helped the Chinese Communists colonize Hong Kong. Kyle said that the Alliance and Szeto Wah were co-opted to deceive the people of Hong Kong. So should June 4th be commemorated? Kyle said no, because "the dead were Chinese students and not us."

    (Apple Daily video) https://www.facebook.com/832553626780002/videos/1007475699287793/

    (Video) https://www.facebook.com/HKDiscussForum/videos/994196780629387/

    - Definition of dog-eat-dog: Complete egotism; action based on utter cynicism; marked by destructive or ruthless competition; without self-restraint, ethics, etc. Because how can you think that 120,000 persons at an event is less important than 20 persons who hold the opposite view? It is the definition of "egotism" --- it's all about ME and the rest of the world be damned.

    Definition of egotism: the practice of talking and thinking about oneself excessively because of an undue sense of self-importance.

    - What is the use of seizing the microphone on the grand stage of the Alliance? How does that get Hong Kong independence any closer? Why don't you take over Government Headquarters or Government House, or better yet, Zhongnanhai?

    - You hear that someone is holding a vegetarian banquet at the restaurant. So you decide to crash the gate and you take up a table to eat the chicken thigh that you brought along with you. Why? Because you say that you have the freedom to eat meat. And why won't you just eat your chicken thigh in your own home? Because you can't get media exposure for doing that. This sums it up. Back to our regular programming ...

    - Video https://www.facebook.com/679614048818777/videos/977426052370907/ Post-incident interview of a demonstrator speaking to reporters. Although bigotry is a serious matter, this comes though comedic all the same.

    "We did indeed barge in, but they have no right to beat us.  They support universal values. They support democracy. They support freedom. Why won't they allow pluralistic voices?"

    "Someone was just escorted out."

    (Megaphone) "Hong Kong is not a part of China. The Chinese people are the enemy. They invaded our Hong Kong. They are robbing us of our resources."

    "I want to tell formally that we ostracize the Chinese people! We are not talking about rationality, we are not about welcoming anyone, we are not talking about the quality of the Chinese tourists. Right now we are talking about the water level reaching our eyelids. We are being colonized by China. We are now saying formally and properly. We want a Hong Kong without any Chinese people. There is no need to give any more reasons. In summary, Hong Kong is not China.

    - (The Stand News) June 4, 2016. The VTC Political Reform Concern Group and other groups marched towards the China Liaison Office after the Victoria Park candlelight vigil. The police raised the yellow flag to warn them that the march had not received permission. But almost 300 people continued to push on. The police said that they should go back on the sidewalk. The marchers said that the police should give them a car lane. So traffic comes to a halt by the Wan Chai Fire Station.

    - (Oriental Daily) June 4, 2016. After the Victoria Park candlelight vigil, the League of Social Democrats called on citizens to march to the China Liaison Office. As they gathered outside Victoria Park, the police stopped them. They argued for about 30 minutes before they were allowed to proceed. They said that they don't need police permission to march in the streets. At around 1030am, the demonstrators reached Hennessey Road and some of them jumped on the vehicular lane. The police raised the yellow warning banner to ask them to move back on tto the pedestrian sidewalk. League of Social Democrats' Leung Kwok-hung told the demonstrators that occupying one vehicular lane was sufficient. The police gave them one slow lane on Hennesey Road to march.

    - Why did the police object? Look at this photo -- the point of the marchers is to obstruct westbound vehicular traffic and maximize inconvenience to regular citizens. Why should the police go along with this?

    - Recently, there is a campaign to issue instant fines to enforce traffic laws (such as loading/unloading passengers/goods in restricted zones, jaywalking, etc). So it turns out that traffic rules are not applicable when you are breaking them in the name of freedom/democracy/human rights/June 4th/etc?

    - The whole point summarized by one banner in one photo:  "Suport Long Hair, Support League of Social Democrats. Please donate money."

    - Video: Beggars' alley
    https://www.facebook.com/368513580020590/videos/559859970885949/
    https://www.facebook.com/368513580020590/videos/559856327552980/
    Give as much as possible, as soon as possible and as often as possible for the sake of freedom/democracy/human rights/patriotism/rule of law.
    You must donate because we need the money to sustain ourselves until next year's candlelight vigil.
    If you don't donate, there won't be another candlelight vigil, and then the Chinese Communists/Li Peng will have won. We can't let that happen, so you must donate as much as possible, as soon as possible and as often as possible for the sake of freedom/democracy/human rights/patriotism/rule of law.

    - (Oriental Daily) June 4, 2016.

    About 20 members of Voice of Loving Hong Kong demonstrated outside the Tin Hau MTR statoin. They criticized the assembly tonight is the "Alliance Alms-begging Evening Gathering." They got into a quarrel with several members of Demosisto and there was a clash (see video). Several dozen policemen were at the scene. Lui "Female Long Hair" Yuk-lin tossed joss paper at the Voice of Loving Hong Kong people and yelled "Vindicate June 4th." Lui was arrested for disorderly conduct in public.

    Several other patriotic organizations (including Defend Hong Kong Movement) set up a street booth on Patterson Street "to commemorate the dead soldiers and citizens during the June 4th riot." They chanted "Learn the truth about June 4th," "The pan-democrats have no conscience" and "Albert Ho, you lied by hiding the truth of the bloodshed", "The Alliance is immoral for denying that soldiers were killed." Several other citizens confronted them, and the police intervened.

    - (FEHD) "Anyone who commits such offences as littering, spitting, fouling of streets by dog feces, or unauthorised display of bills and posters in public places in Hong Kong is liable to a fixed penalty of HK$1,500."

    - (RTHK) June 4, 2016.

    At the Tsim Sha Tsui assembly, Civic Passion member "Four-eyed Brother" Cheng Kam-mun said that he doesn't want to vindicate June 4th, because he only wants the Chinese Communists to fall. He quoted a citizen who said, "The Umbrella Movement is the June 4th event for the young people of Hong Kong."

    - If you want to bring down the Chinese Communists to fall, you should try to cross the Lohu border. For 27 years, neither the Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China nor Civic Passion nor anyone else have tried. They resolutely stayed in Hong Kong to beg for alms. In this regard, Civic Passion is no different.

    - Well, they don't need to go to Lohu. The China Liaison Office officially represents the Central Government/the Chinese Communist Party in Hong Kong, and it is located in Sai Wan, Hong Kong Island. Why don't you go and bring them down?

    P.S. The People's Liberation Army has a garrison in Admiralty, Hong Kong Island, a marine base on Stonecutter's Island and an airbase in Shek Kong. Why don't you take them over?

    - (Oriental Daily) June 4, 2016.

    Today is the 27th anniversary of the June 4th incident. Several members of the Hong Kong-UK Reunification Campaign (including a masked Andy "Captain America" Yung) went to the British Consulate in Hong Kong to protest. They said that the Joint Sino-British Declaration stipulated that Hong Kong be handed over to China in 1997 without ever consulting the wishes of the broad masses in Hong Kong. After the handover, the freedom of speech and the freedom of assembly of the people of Hong Kong were deprived, the democratic system was destroyed, corruption is worsening and Hong Kong language is being tampered with. Since China failed to keep the promises in the Joint Sino-British Declaration, they demand that the United Kingdom proclaim it null and void and take back sovereignty over Hong Kong! The British Consulate took the petitions seriously and sent out a security guard to take their letter.

    - (SCMP) June 5, 2016.

    Donations to organisers of the June 4 candlelight vigil to commemorate the Tiananmen Square crackdown have surged 30 per cent to HK$1.74 million despite a lower turnout at last nights Victoria Park event.

    Attendance at the worlds biggest commemoration to the 1989 protests was down by 10,000 from the previous year to 125,000 the lowest since the 20th anniversary vigil in 2009. Police put the figures at a mere 21,800, one of the biggest discrepancies in years compared with the organisers estimate.

    - Total amount of donations = $1.74 million.
    Number of participants = 125,000
    Average amount of donations per person = $13.2.
    Cheap bastards!

    - (Oriental Daily) June 5, 2016. As for the other pan-democratic political parties, the Labour Party got around $90,000 which is about the same as last year; the League of Social Democrats got $226,000 just slightly less than the $250,000 last year; the Civic Party got $287,000 just slightly less than the $300,000 last year; the Neo Democrats got $60,000 which is about the same as last year; Siu Lai's Democracy Classroom got $87,000 as a first-timer.

    - Demosisto led everybody with $450,000 in donations. It should be remembered that they are not registered either as a company or a society, that they don't have a bank account, that they accept checks signed to "Wong Chi Fung" and that they will gladly take checks. This is such an inspiration! Come next June 4th, everybody should show up with a foldable table and a Demosisto banner to collect donations. Who is to say that you are the real thing or not?

    - When the League of Social Democrats counted their money, they found that someone had stuffed joss money worth $1,000,000. That was probably reimbursement for the joss money that they burnt outside the China Liaison Office later that night. (video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DaI2BxZtK9Y )

    - (Local Press) June 5, 2016. A synopsis of the June 4th Forum held at the Chinese University of Hong Kong on the evening of June 4th as an alternative to the Alliance's candlelight vigil in Victoria Park. There were about 500 at the start, and the organizers claimed that 1,500 tickets were handed out.

    Session 2: The future of Hong Kong

    Fong Chi-hung: Hong Kong has to establish an awareness of an independent identity. We must recognize that we are different from China. We have our own uniqueness (such as our language, culture and independent constitutional system). The Localist movement is more than seeking universal suffrage. With respect to China, we must be autonomous in various domains (politics, economics, culture, energy, etc). Faced with the reification of various domains, we must be ready to resist and join up with the civil movements in South East Asia (such as Singapore, Malaysia, Taiwan) and establish a unique Hongkonger identity and culture.

    Ray Wong (Hong Kong Indigenous): The preceding generation or generations came as refugees to Hong Kong, so they have strong emotion feelings for China, including a sense of guilt. It would be hard for them to separate from China. But our generation is not close to China. We do no inherit those emotions. We only want to have free, stable lives and retain our own lifestyles, culture and language. If we recognize our own power, then Hong Kong independence is the way to protect our race.

    Chan Ho-tin (Hong Kong National Party): The June 4th incident gave us two revelations. Firstly, the Hunan Trio advocated the overthrow of the Communist Party in order to establish a democratic society. They threw ink at the Mao Zedong portrait at Tiananmen Square. The Beijing students immediately held a press conference and said that the trio is not connected to the patriotic democratic movement. Their action was just like the pan-democrats today. They regard the Communists as the overlords and they say "We won't overthrow you."

    Secondly, the Beijing students advocated non-violent tactics. Liu Xiaobo smashed a gun to pieces. The Hunan Trio were also non-violent. Nevertheless, the People's Liberation Army came out ... We advocate that the people of Hong Kong must get clear what their racial identity is -- that is to say, we are the Hong Kong race, we are the people of Hong Kong and we are not Chinese. Otherwise, it is useless to have Hong Kong independence, because the new government formed by the coalition of the Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China and the pro-establishment political parties will only lean towards China, and Hong Kong will die.

    We want to negotiate with the Chinese Communists. If they refuse to negotiate, we will use our fists and bricks to pound them until they agree to negotiate ... We will infiltrate into the various sectors (such as medical care, finance, business, education, culture, etc). For example, if we take over the trade, transportation and logistics sectors, we will be able to prepare Hong Kong to deal with food imports.

    Tommy Cheung (former Chinese University of Hong Kong Student Union president): Our opponent is the Chinese Communists which is a combination of party-state rule and Chinese chauvinism. We must get self-determination, we must gain autonomy in military and political matters. We must obtain the conditions for self-determination. We must obtain bargaining chips to realize this vision. We must establish our strengths in economics, academics and culture in order to help Hong Kong.

    To get self-determination, we must link up with the histories of resistance in Macau, Taiwan Japan, South Korea and South East Asia. We exchange with their civil groups so that the voices of the people of Hong Kong will get supported. We must stand in the world and seek out Localists everywhere.

    Baggio Leung (Youngspiration convener): When Hong Kong first faced the issue of its future, the people of Hong Kong were not aware of sovereignty. At the negotiations between the United Kingdom and China, the people of Hong Kong were absent. 27 years ago after the Chinese Communist murdered its people, a group of Democratic Handover Terrorist appeared. The Chinese Communists need Hong Kong but they don't need its people. This explained why so many absurd things occur in Hong Kong. Now Hong Kong faced the issue of its future for the second time. Hong Kong must establish its racial identity and awareness of sovereignty. Therefore we are advocating a racial self-determination movement ... we must find ways to increase our soft power in order to prepare ourselves for taking over governance and building our own race.

    Ray Wong (Hong Kong Indigenous): The Chinese Communist Party does not believe in the spirit of contracts. Therefore, they wouldn't keep their promise if we negotiate with them. We must increase our own strengths, and link up with Xinjiang and Tibet which are also trying to get independence. Compared to these other places, Hong Kong is the strongest to become independent. Therefore we don't need to negotiate with the Chinese Communists. We have the ability to become independent. Negotiating with them is a regional government negotiating with the sovereign power. It would be an unequal negotiation.

    Fong Chi-hung: It is not morally wrong to negotiate with the Chinese Communists. We need to preserve our strengths in order to restrain them.

    Baggio Leung: It is not a problem to negotiate. The problem is who gets to negotiate? For example, we wouldn't be getting the Alliance's Choi Yiu-cheung to negotiate. We don't want to repeat the mistake. In 1982, the Reform Society conducted a public opinion poll and only 4% of the people wanted Hong Kong to be handed over to China. So how could these salespersons use the data to sell a democratic handover? The previous generation used such undemocratic methods to sell the democratic handover.

    Chan Ho-tin: I am not going to fight for negotiations. I advocate Hong Kong independence. I advocate the use of force, but not violence. Violence gives the impression that you are irrationally and arbitrarily attacking others. I don't lean towards the establishment of an army. Ireland established the Republic Army but that was quickly destroyed. I think that guerilla warfare is better suited for Hong Kong. Will force hurt innocent bystanders? If we don't do anything, the innocent bystanders will suffer even worse fates. For example, many young people are committing suicide due to social pressure.

    Right now, 14% (which is 1 million) Hong Kong persons support independence. We must figure out our identities. We are not Chinese, so why should we be governed by the Chinese? Right now, many people are talking about self-determination. That is just a cover, because they are afraid to say out Hong Kong independence. I think that more and more Hongkongers will support independence. This is inevitably going to happen.

    Ray Wong: Do we need the United Kingdom to help Hong Kong? No. If your democracy and freedom were given to you by other persons, it won't last. You have to do it yourself.

    Chan Ho-tin: We won't ask the United Kingdom to get democracy for us. We must do it ourselves. But we must gain international recognition, so we need the United Kingdom to support us.

    Baggio Leung: Pragmatic politics involve interests. If we want the United Kingdom to help, then it must touch upon their interests. It depends on the objective conditions whether to seek the help of the United Kingdom. If it should happen that everybody in Hong Kong will die unless the United Kingdom supports us, then we want the United Kingdom to help us.

    Tommy Cheung: Democracy always depends on oneself, or else the democracy won't last long ...

    Fong Chi-hung: Establishing a localist movement is not in conflict with international support. As a cosmopolitan city, Hong Kong needs to gain the recognition of other place in order to gain space for self-determination. It is an objective fact that China is right next door. We need to move among different forces.

    47%: The Beijing students did the right thing
    17%: The Beijing students did the wrong thing

    11%: The Chinese government did the right thing
    66%: The Chinese government did the wrong thing

    59%: There should be a reversion of the official stand on the incident
    20%: There should not be reversion of the official stand on the incident

    46%: China's human rights condition has improved since 1989
    24%: China's human rights condition has worsened since 1989

    32%: China's human rights condition would improve after 3 years
    25%: China's human rights condition would worsen after 3 years

    62%: HK people have a responsibility to instigate the development of democracy in China
    27%: HK people have no responsibility to instigate the development of democracy in China

    57%: HK people have a responsibility to instigate economic development in China
    34%: HK people have no responsibility to instigate economic development in China

    29%: HK people should put more effort on instigating economic than democratic development in China
    37%: HK people should put more effort on instigating democratic than economic development in China

    28%: China should emphasize more on economic development
    41%: China should emphasize more on democratic development

    Internet comments:

    - (Ivan Kushnir) In 1990, the Gross Domestic Product of Hong Kong was USD 76.9 billion compared to China's USD 396.6. The ratio was 76.9/396.6 = 0.19.
    In 2014, the Gross Domestic Product of Hong Kong was USD 290.9 billion compared to China's USD 10,430.6. The ratio was  290.9/10420.6 = 0.03.
    In 1990, the Hong Kong people can still think that they can instigate economic development in China. In 2014, Hong Kong is economically heading towards becoming a second-tier Chinese city.
    Therefore the questions about Hong Kong's preferences about instigating economic vs. democratic development in China are anachronistic. Hongkongers may think that they own the responsibility, but they no longer have the ability.

    - If once upon a time, China was often at the receiving end of western media barbs, things are very different now.

    (New York Times)

    Canadians, apart perhaps from hockey players, seem to pride themselves on being affable people averse to confrontation. But China's  foreign minister, Wang Yi, clearly decided that being in Canada was no reason to hold his temper. Especially when it comes to questions on his countrys human rights record.

    A Canadian journalist learned that on Wednesday when she asked about the Chinese governments detention of human rights advocates and a Canadian couple accused of espionage. The question was directed at the Canadian foreign minister, Stphane Dion, during a joint news conference in Ottawa. But Mr. Wang then stepped in with a withering lecture, delivered with operatic dudgeon, in which he called the journalist arrogant and prejudiced.

    Chinese officials often bristle at questions about human rights and other contentious subjects. But their reactions vary. Sometimes they stick, coolly but adamantly, to the governments stock response that China respects the rule of law and that the countrys stability and economic growth have been a boon to citizens rights.

    But sometimes, like Mr. Wang this time, they strike back with their own accusations. In 2000, Jiang Zemin, who was Chinas president at the time, chastised a journalist from Hong Kong for what he considered an impertinent question.

    You go everywhere to follow the big news, but the questions you ask are too simple, sometimes nave, Mr. Jiang said. I feel the need to impart to you some real-life experience.

    Below is a transcript of the question from the Canadian journalist and Mr. Wangs answer. Ive translated Mr. Wangs original Chinese response. The English-language translation given by the interpreter at the news conference was a little less blunt. The question partly concerned a Canadian couple, Kevin Garratt and Julia Dawn Garratt, who were detained in China in 2014. Mrs. Garratt was later released on bail, but last January, Mr. Garratt was charged with espionage and stealing state secrets while he lived near the border with North Korea accusations that his family has rejected. The question also raised the issue of Hong Kong book publishers detained in mainland China.

    Question: There are no shortage of concerns about Chinas treatment of human rights advocates, such as the Hong Kong booksellers and its detention of the Garratts, not to mention the destabilizing effects of its territorial ambitions in the South China Sea. Given these concerns, why is Canada pursuing closer ties with China, how do you plan to use that relationship to improve human rights and security in the region, and did you specifically raise the case of the Garratts during your discussions with the foreign minister today?

    Answer: I want to make a response to the questions that the journalist has just raised concerning China. Your question was full of prejudice against China and an arrogance that comes from I dont know where. This is totally unacceptable to me. Do you understand China? Have you been to China? Do you know that China has come from a poor and backward state and lifted more than 600 million people from poverty? Do you know that China is now the worlds second biggest economy with $8,000 per capita? If we werent able to properly protect human rights, would China have achieved such great development? Do you know that China has incorporated protecting human rights into its Constitution? I want to tell you that its the Chinese people who most understand Chinas human rights record not you, but the Chinese people themselves. You have no right to speak on this. The Chinese people have the right to speak. So please dont raise such irresponsible questions again. China welcomes all well-meaning suggestions, but we reject all groundless accusations.

    The Canadian Press news agency reported that the offending question, which was asked by a reporter for iPolitics, a news website, was devised through an agreement by several different news outlets, including itself.

    Video: Chinese Foreign Minister berates Canadian journalist

    - Westerners won't get it until as such time as Chinese journalists get to be just as offensive, ignorant and prejudicial. For example, what if a Global Times reporter were to ask Wang Yi:

    There are no shortage of concerns about Canada's contempt of the Chinese. First of all, Canada refuses to extradite Chinese criminals. Even in the case of Lai Changxing, it took Canada 12 years to extradite Lai in spite of incontrovertible evidence. And Canada has never made a sincere apology about the exclusion of Chinese immigrants, beginning with the head tax from 1885 to 1923 (at $500 per head) and then an outright ban. Given these issues, why should you bother to meet with the Canadians at all? Or perhaps do you plan to use these meetings to press these issues which are of great concern to the people of China?

    (Silent Majority for HK) June 3, 2016.

    On the Internet, businesses are infinitely creative in using spoofs and jokes to draw attention. Yesterday, Fortune Pharmacal's Facebook made a post with colors similar to Demosisto, whose secretary-general Joshua Wong commented that they choose very good colors. Immediately, the Fortune Pharmacal replied "U no like? Yes like?" in imitation of Wong's internationally famous English.

    Joshua Wong immediately made a screen capture of his own icon: Joshua Wong, public figure, 300,690 LIKE's.

    This drew in plenty of other Internet comments:

    - Please don't fucking jump out like this! Sometimes I cannot help but laugh ...
    - Joshua Wong is getting so fucking anxious about being forgotten. How low can his existential values go?
    - Wow! 300,690 LIKE's. That would have gotten him easily elected into the Legislative Council, except that he is not old enough to run.
    - The photo shows that Fortune Pharmacal has used that color a long time before Demosisto ever came into existence.

    - You can't even tell the difference between someone making fun of your English and competing for more likes? Do you have a reading impediment? Do you really think that they are competing with you for more LIKE's? They are not student chicklets like you! Go and study some more, or else you won't be able to graduate!

    - (Hong Kong Democracy Online): "We are envious. 300,690 LIKE's! So awesome! So overwhelming! We are not as good as you are? What should we do? Do we have to become grass on the wall falling whichever way the wind blows at the moment too?"

    (Wen Wei Po) June 4, 2016.

    When it comes to getting LIKE's, how thick can Demosisto's skin get? Answer: Unlimited! At Ma Shi Po village, so-called villagers are ignoring the court injunction and stopping the land owner Henderson Land Development Company from taking the land back. Demosisto did not respond to earlier Internet calls to defend the land. But once Henderson Land Development Company sent in security guards, Demosisto deputy secretary-general Agnes Chow Ting made an appearance and posted photos to prove that she was there.

    Why did Demosisto not send in chairman Nathan Law or secretary-general Joshua Wong? Maybe it was because those two haven't acquired any combat skills and can be subdued too easily. However Agnes Chow Ting is a woman, so if you touch her, she can scream "Sexual molestation!"

    In any case, Agnes Chow Ting was there. On her Facebook, Chow said that she was there for six hours. In the end, she was removed forcibly by security guards. She claimed to have personally witnessed a security guard using a lighter to set fire to a piece of canvas at the village entrance. Another security guard even threw a walkie-talkie at the demonstrators. However, even though Agnes Chow brought a professional photographer with her, there were no video recordings of these incidents. On the Internet, the converse of "Video=truth" is "No video=no truth." There were numerous other photographers present too. So how come nobody recorded these violent incidents?

    Actually, the attraction of Chow's Facebook post was not her creative writing, but the almost ten photos. Each photo was taken from the correct angle and the colors were finally tuned. In the past, people make fun of her greasy hair. These photos managed to remove even any reflections under the noontime sun. These photos were taken the day before, and it took one day's professional handling before they got posted yesterday.

    Ironically, the Ma Shi Po incident is not over yet. But Agnes Chow's involvement was over once she got her photos taken. She had those photos taken in order to enhance her image. But she got blasted by Internet users instead for insincerity. This is in line with the nickname for Demosisto: "Hong Kong gets shot by arrow (香港中箭).

    The original TVB report is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LvsrEF3gp-U. Enhanced version is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oGwVXBEvPcs

    (SCMP) June 2, 2016.

    The defence counsel for seven policemen accused of maliciously assaulting activist Ken Tsang Kin-chiu during the 2014 Occupy protests, officially raised an objection in court against prosecutors attempt to submit news footage as court evidence.

    The four pieces of footage - from television stations TVB, ATV, Now TV, and newspaper Apple Daily - purportedly captured the chain of events leading to the moment the seven allegedly assaulted Tsang, deputy director of public prosecutions David Leung Cheuk-yin told the District Court on Thursday.

    The seven policemen are Chief Inspector Wong Cho-shing, 48, Senior Inspector Lau Cheuk-ngai, 29, Detective Sergeant Pak Wing-bun, 42, and constables Lau Hing-pui, 38, Chan Siu-tan, 31, Kwan Ka-ho, 32, and Wong Wai-ho, 36, who face one joint count of causing grievous bodily harm with intent on Tsang. Chan faces one extra count of common assault for allegedly assaulting Tsang in the interview room of a police station on a separate occasion. They pleaded not guilty to all charges.

    Prosecuting, Leung alleged the ATV and Now TV news footage showed how Tsang was arrested and passed along among a number of police officers. That started the various involvement of the seven defendants, he said. He then said TVB footage showed Tsang being escorted by six officers. Another TVB clip, he alleged, shows how the seven took Tsang to the alleged location of his offence and also assaulted him.

    Senior counsel Lawrence Lok Ying-kam, for Wong, said the prosecutors failed to prove the originality of the videos and that they had not been tampered with, thereby asking the court not to admit the footage as evidence. But Leung argued that some of the footage was timestamped by the news reporter. The witnesses, including TVB staff, will be called to testify to the chain of events, he said.

    It is alleged that the seven unlawfully and maliciously caused grievous bodily harm to Tsang with intent, outside a pump station near Lung Wui Road in Admiralty on October 15 last year.

    (SCMP) June 3, 2016.

    Witnesses in the case of seven police officers charged with assaulting activist Ken Tsang Kin-chiu during the Occupy protests in 2014 conceded on Friday that news footage didnt tell the full story of what happened that night.

    Two police officers, testifying for the prosecution against their colleagues, made the concession to the District Court, where prosecutors have tried to submit a series of videos from different sources leading up to the alleged attack as evidence.

    But defence lawyers objected, saying the authenticity of the footage from TVB, ATV, Now TV and Apple Daily could not be verified and that it could have been tampered with.

    But despite the concessions, the witnesses confirmed that the news footage matched their recollections of events. Staff from the TV stations also testified that the footage in question was free from tampering.

    Chief inspector Wong Cho-shing, 48, senior inspector Lau Cheuk-ngai, 29, detective sergeant Pak Wing-bun, 42, and constables Lau Hing-pui, 38, Chan Siu-tan, 31, Kwan Ka-ho, 32, and Wong Wai-ho, 36, deny one joint count of causing grievous bodily harm with intent against Tsang on October 15, 2014. They allegedly assaulted Tsang at a pump station near Lung Wui Road. Chan also denies one lesser charge of common assault.

    The seven have been wearing identical ties and suits to court over the past three days, in an apparent attempt to make them harder to distinguish. The court heard earlier that identity would be a key issue in the trial.

    In court on Friday, when a piece of ATV footage of Tsangs arrest was shown to senior inspector Wat Chin-cheuk, he identified himself in it and said it was consistent with his recollection. Defence counsel Cheng Huan SC asked him if the footage gave an incomplete picture of what happened. He said: I agree.

    Station sergeant Cheng Ho-cheung also identified himself in the video, but conceded that his participation in subduing Tsang, who he described as a man in his black upper garment, lasted about five minutes, while the shown footage ran only about a minute. The sergeant went on and said the subdued man was handed to other officers from a crime team.

    Former ATV senior video editor Chim Yat-kin, who explained how videos were backed up by the network, said the device used for conversion had no other function. He also said his team would only process footage, not produce new footage.

    Shum Ka-hung, a senior technician at TVB, recalled the signal was normal when real-time footage was transmitted from two cameramen on the ground to his control room. His colleague Lam Ka-yu, senior staff at the stations footage library, said he believed footage had not been tampered with before he burned it onto a disc from a server.

    The case continues before judge David Dufton on Monday, when Tsang is expected to testify.

    Resistance Live Media: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0as_ObTefYU Outside the courthouse on June 3rd.

    (SCMP) June 6, 2016.

    Pro-democracy activist Ken Tsang Kin-chiu was in court for the first time on Monday morning, for the trial of seven policemen accused of assaulting him. But Tsang, having been jeered by a scattered, placard-waving crowd, left shortly after his arrival as the District Court needed more time before calling him to the witness stand.

    Tsang was allegedly unlawfully and maliciously assaulted by Chief Inspector Wong Cho-shing, 48, Senior Inspector Lau Cheuk-ngai, 29, Detective Sergeant Pak Wing-bun, 42, and constables Lau Hing-pui, 38, Chan Siu-tan, 31, Kwan Ka-ho, 32, and Wong Wai-ho, 36, outside a pump station near Lung Wui Road in Admiralty during the Occupy protests on October 15, 2014. It is alleged that Chan also assaulted Tsang later on, in the interview room of Central Police Station. All the men deny one joint count of causing grievous bodily harm with intent, while Chan denies a further charge of common assault.

    The pro-democracy activist turned up at the court building in Wan Chai at about 10:15am amid jeering by a small group of police supporters, who had not been seen since they staged a demonstration on the first day of the trial on Wednesday last week. But the crowd of dozens thinned as soon as it started raining. When Tsang arrived, one demonstrator rushed at him, but was stopped by police officers. Another hurled verbal abuse as Tsang as he went through the door.

    The court had heard since Wednesday the prosecutors application to have a string of news footage admitted as evidence. The videos are from television stations TVB, ATV and Now TV and newspaper Apple Daily, the court heard earlier. Prosecutors argued the footage showed events leading to the alleged assault on Tsang, but defence lawyers contested that, saying the footage lacked traces of origin and proof that it had not been tampered with.

    Testifying on Monday, news production manager of TVB David Wong Kwong-hoi was asked about his findings after he compared the footage the police downloaded from TVBs website with the one the station kept in its database. Apart from some scenes which were cut because the camera was blocked, he said: Basically its not edited at all. But he had not compared their audio tracks, the court heard.

    The trial continues before Judge David Dufton on Monday afternoon.

    (SCMP) June 8, 2016.

    Occupy protester Ken Tsang Kin-chiu today told the trial of seven policemen accused of maliciously assaulting him that he was in pain so great that he could not tell for how long he had been assaulted.

    Taking the witness stand for the first time, Tsang offered his personal account of the alleged assault at the District Court. I was in great pain at that moment ... I didnt know [for how long] because the pain lasted for a long time, he said of the alleged assault that took place on October 15, 2014, during the Occupy movement protests.

    Testifying today, Tsang said he was carried to a pump station from a flower bed near the Legislative Council, where he was arrested, by four or five persons on that night. He said the pump station was the dark corner referred to by everyone and the media.

    I was dumped to the ground, and then I was kicked and punched, he testified, adding that he felt he was being assaulted with hard objects. Someone stepped on me and hit my face, he continued. He then curled up to face a wall, the court heard. He recalled the group said: Demonstrating, huh?

    After watching the news, he realised the assault lasted four minutes, the court heard. He said he was subsequently taken to a private car, which went to Waterfront Police Station, where he stayed for about 30 minutes. He was escorted by seven individuals, including the driver, and eventually taken to the Police College in Wong Chuk Hang.

    The court also heard that when Tsang was moved to the pump station, those carrying him allegedly assaulted him as well. They held my arms, one on the left and one on the right, and dragged me along, he recalled, saying that his whole body was eventually elevated. One of them twisted my left thumb and left wrist, he recalled. The others, he said, were leading the way and dispersing reporters.

    Tsang was also shown news footage the prosecution tried to submit to the court, claiming that it captured events leading up to the alleged assault. Lawyers for the defence objected. Tsang identified himself in the footage and said it was consistent with his recollection of what happened. He was also shown several segments of CCTV footage from Central Police Station. He confirmed it showed him being escorted from a car park to an interview room by two men.

    The trial continues before Judge David Dufton.

    Video: https://www.facebook.com/832553626780002/videos/1009703105731719/ Ken Tsang supporters on display

    (RTHK) June 8, 2016.

    Civic Party member, Ken Tsang, on Wednesday made an about-turn admission in the District Court saying he did splash liquid on police officers during the Occupy pro-democracy protests in Admiralty nearly two years ago.

    He made the admission while testifying at the trial of seven policemen accused of causing grievous bodily harm to him with intent. One of them is further accused of assaulting Tsang in the report room of the Central Police Station.

    Tsang was shown video footage of a man who was wearing a pair of googles and a mask pouring liquid from a large plastic bottle from the embankment of the underpass at Lung Wo Road on to a group of policemen below. He was then asked whether he was the man in the video.

    After being told by Judge David Dufton that he can refrain from answering questions that may incriminate him, Tsang confirmed that he was the man in the video.

    Tsang had earlier denied, in a separate trial, charges of assaulting police officers by splashing liquid on them. His lawyer argued at the time that the man who was filmed splashing the liquid was not Tsang, and that his client would not have done such an immoral and illegal act.

    But Tsang was later convicted and sentenced to five weeks in prison. However, the magistrate released him on bail after he said he will appeal against the conviction.

    Earlier in the day, the lawyer representing the police officer accused of assaulting Tsang in the report room of the Central Police Station questioned the authenticity of the closed-circuit television video footage inside the station.

    Counsel said the recording system was not functioning properly at the time, and one could not say whether the video was accurate. He said it should not be presented as evidence because there was "insufficient evidence to establish its authenticity".

    (TVB) June 8, 2016.

    Senior barrister Lawrence Lok Ying-kam showed a video of a man dressed in black tossing liquid (see video). He asked Ken Tsang whether he was that individual. The judge reminded the witness that he has the right not to respond to any question that may incriminate himself, so the witness will have to decide. Ken Tsang then admitted that he was that individual. Lok followed up and asked whether Tsang or his lawyer denied that he toss the liquid. Tsang responded that he did not testify in court, but agreed that his lawyer took the position that he did not toss the liquid.

    (SCMP) June 10, 2016.

    Prosecution witness Ken Tsang Kin-chiu told a court on Friday that when asked to give statements against seven police officers accused of assaulting him during the 2014 Occupy movement he feared being asked leading questions.

    Tsang was responding to defence counsel Cheng Huan SCs questions under cross-examination on the seventh day of the District Court trial in which his testimony on the authenticity of videos that prosecutors sought to submit to court had been challenged.

    Cheng told the court that Tsang was invited to the Complaints Against Police Office, better known as CAPO, on October 16 last year to identify himself in a series of videos. On October 20, four days after the invitation, Tsang went to view 20 videos but refused to make an immediate statement, the court heard. Some of the videos were among those shown in court. The prosecutors had argued the recorded events led to the alleged assault on Tsang. But the defence was trying to block their admission.

    When asked why he refused to make a statement, Tsang replied: The legal advice I obtained was to prepare further before I was to give a statement. But Cheng persisted. You were asked to simply identify yourself, he told Tsang. Whats so difficult about that? My worry was that during the process police would try to put to me a lot of pre-set questions, Tsang replied.

    On Friday, Cheng suggested that Tsang was being deliberately uncooperative and complicated the police investigation by refusing to make a statement at CAPO. Tsang said he tried to fully cooperate, but said problems arose in the course of his being asked to make a statement. He disagreed with Chengs suggestion that he was concerned about possibly incriminating himself.

    He declined to answer the questions at that time, he testified on Friday, based on legal advice he was given. Yet Tsang conceded that in a different statement made on October 19, 2014, four days after the alleged assault, he had not mentioned that the number of individuals assaulting him was seven. However, he told the court he had not made the evidence up as he went along, as Cheng suggested.

    Earlier Tsang told the court that those who used force on him had to be police officers because protesters would not do so. Defence counsel Edwin Choy Wai-bond SC, accused Tsang of political posturing in court as the pro-democracy protester had previously expressed interest in making himself a candidate for the upcoming Legislative Council elections.

    The trial continues before Judge David Dufton.

    (SCMP) December 6, 2016.

    Activist Ken Tsang Kin-chiu may not have been the person seen being assaulted by a group of apparent police officers in widely viewed footage that captured one of the most controversial scenes of the Occupy protests two years ago, a court heard on Tuesday.

    That argument was deployed by six of the defence teams representing the seven policemen on trial at the District Court for seriously harming the social worker outside a pump station in Admiralty on October 15, 2014. They said prosecutors failed to prove that Tsang was the victim shown in the TVB news footage, or that he was assaulted at the pump station to start with.

    They reasoned that even if Tsang had been assaulted after his arrest, the injuries were inflicted by officers other than the defendants, because none of the accused had been equipped with the specific baton that allegedly left 15 red bruises on Tsang.

    Lawrence Lok Ying-kam SC, for Chief Inspector Wong Cho-shing, said prosecutors could not explain those marks.

    And Cheng Huan SC, for Senior Inspector Lau Cheuk-ngai, added: The only plausible explanation is that [Tsang] was not assaulted by the defendants.

    They also argued that Tsang could have been injured during his arrest, as he had put up a struggle, and that the poor quality of the footage meant no positive identification can safely be made.

    Prosecutors had relied on Tsangs claim that there was no change of guard to place all of them at the pump station.

    But Lok said the segmented clip showed a different formation of people escorting and carrying a person between shots. Counsel Edwin Choy said it would be wholly unsafe to rely on Tsang, whom he described as an opportunistic witness.

    Cheng said the prosecution case rested almost entirely on Tsangs credibility and reliability. The other evidence ... is in itself incapable of supporting a conviction, he told Judge David Dufton.

    (SCMP) February 14, 2017.

    Seven police officers were on Tuesday convicted of kicking, punching and stepping on activist Ken Tsang Kin-chiu after he was arrested and handcuffed for assaulting police during an Occupy protest more than two years ago.

    The seven accused are Chief Inspector Wong Cho-shing, 50; Senior Inspector Lau Cheuk-ngai, 31; Detective Sergeant Pak Wing-bun, 43; police constable Lau Hing-pui, 39; and detective police constables Wong Wai-ho, 38; Chan Siu-tan, 33; and Kwan Ka-ho, 33.

    All seven originally faced one joint count of causing grievous bodily harm with intent, of which they were found not guilty. They were instead convicted of a lesser charge of assault occasioning actual bodily harm.

    Chan was also convicted of an additional charge of common assault.

    The seven have been remanded.

    Dozens of the policemens supporters watching a live broadcast in an adjacent courtroom clapped their hands in delight when they heard an interpreter say that the seven were acquitted of the first charge.

    But their joy proved fleeting as they learned of the guilty verdicts on the second and third charges and they immediately lapsed into silence.

    Judge David Duftons verdict concludes one of the most controversial cases arising from the pro-democracy civil disobedience movement in 2014, when thousands took over major thoroughfares for up to 79 days following Beijings announcement of a restrictive political reform framework.

    ozens of the policemens supporters watching a live broadcast in an adjacent courtroom clapped their hands in delight when they heard an interpreter say that the seven were acquitted of the first charge.

    But their joy proved fleeting as they learned of the guilty verdicts on the second and third charges and they immediately lapsed into silence.

    Judge David Duftons verdict concludes one of the most controversial cases arising from the pro-democracy civil disobedience movement in 2014, when thousands took over major thoroughfares for up to 79 days following Beijings announcement of a restrictive political reform framework.

    Part of what happened that night was captured on camera by TVB, Apple Daily, ATV, Now TV and police video teams, whose footage was found authentic despite defence objection.

    Dufton noted that Wong and senior inspector Lau did not take part in the assault and merely watched as it happened.

    But he pointed out: The court was satisfied that every police officer has a duty to prevent the commission of a crime, even by fellow officers.

    Dufton said that such behaviour carrying Tsang to the substation and watching their colleagues beat up the social worker amounted to encouraging and supporting the other officers assault.

    (EJ Insight) How young people will shape the Legco elections. By SC Yeung. June 2, 2016.

    If the recent voter registration is anything to go by, people born between 1960 and 1980 will dictate the results of the Legislative Council elections in September. And when public sentiment is factored in, we would be seeing opposition lawmakers in greater numbers in Legco.

    In theory, this election is a contest to reshape the chamber before Hong Kongs next leader is chosen next year. But in reality, its a referendum on Leung Chun-ying and his deeply unpopular policies.

    This is where voter demographic comes in.

    Voters born between 1956 and 1998 account for 71 percent of the electorate, about a third of whom are young people or first-time voters. The latter is the most disaffected with Leungs government. Their older peers are no less dissatisfied, potentially making these two age groups a potent force for the opposition. Those older than 60 make up a small minority and are likely to go either way.

    Which is why candidates and their parties are drawing up strategies with these factors in mind. They will be looking back on the district council elections in November, in which pro-establishment candidates won the lions share of seats, for signs of the way forward. Also, they will be keen to know how Edward Leung of the radical localist group Hong Kong Indigenous managed to shake up New Territories East by winning 15 percent of the vote in a by-election.

    There are about 3.77 million registered voters for geographical constituencies, up from 3.47 million in 2012. About 3.47 million are registered in the district council (second) functional constituency, which elects five lawmakers. Traditional functional constituencies have 239,000 registered electors.

    A 50 percent surge in voter registration among first-time voters and young people shows they are keen to influence the results. And with their sentiment driven by disenchantment with this government, they are likely to reject pro-establishment candidates.

    - (SCMP) June 1, 2016.

    The lawmaker for information technology has expressed shock at a sharp rise in the number of registered voters in his functional constituency and questioned whether pro-Beijing forces were getting people to sign up.

    The information technology constituency saw the biggest expansion in voter numbers from 6,716 in 2012 to 12,046 this year a rise of 79.4 per cent, according to provisional voter statistics released by the Registration and Electoral Office yesterday.

    The provisional data also showed those who plan to contest Legislative Council seats in the September elections will face more older voters.

    For the 28 traditional trade-based functional constituencies, there are about 239,195 registered voters, a slight drop from about 240,735 in 2012. The accountancy sector has 25,970 voters, 796 more compared with the 2012 figure.

    Incumbent IT sector lawmaker Charles Mok described the sharp rise as shocking and claimed it added weight to a conspiracy theory that Beijing was orchestrating it behind the scene.

    This proves media reports that various trade organisations have tried to attract voters by reducing membership fees It also proves that some functional constituencies, especially the professional sectors, are strongholds that Beijings liaison office wants to take [from pan-democrats], Mok said.

    Controversially, Mok and his fellow pan-democrats, who had in the past called for abolishing functional constituencies because they saw the system as undemocratic, have mobilised supporters to sign up as voters to secure sufficient seats to block government policy.

    Mok said he had expected the voter number for his sector to rise to about 8,000.

    Internet comments:

    - Here are the 2011 versus 2016 voter registration data by age-sex.

    There are two angles to look at this.

    First  of all,  you can look at the data by the year of birth:

    Birth year 2011 2016 %change
    80's/90's 597872 901093 151%
    70's 553595 576007 104%
    60's 721707 753061 104%
    50's 789025 782211 99%
    Pre-50's 898336 756660 84%
     Total 3,560,535 3,769,032 106%

    Everybody knows that you cannot cheat death. Therefore as time goes by, there will be fewer and fewer persons in the population who were born before 1950.

    But if you think that the population is getting younger, then you are wrong! After all, all that talk about the universal retirement protection scheme is premised upon a problem faced by an ageing population!

    So the alternate view is to look at the data by age:

    Age 2011 2016 %change
    18-20 144,724 122,947 85%
    21-25 213,243 266,301 125%
    26-30 239,905 251,858 105%
    31-35 262,173 259,987 99%
    36-40 291,422 271,102 93%
    41-45 308,541 304,905 99%
    46-50 413,166 326,141 79%
    51-55 437,073 426,920 98%
    56-60 351,952 433,731 123%
    61-65 273,678 348,480 127%
    66-70 162,142 265,116 164%
    71+ 462,516 491,544 106%
      3,560,535 3,769,032 106%

    So if you say "Don't trust anyone over 30," you are effectively dooming yourself to a minority role. When the population is ageing, your role will in fact diminish over time.

    In SC Yeung's article, he chose to look at the birth year and therefore he will get the result that there are fewer people born during or before the 1950's over time. He drew the conclusions as he saw from this. If he had chosen to look at the age distribution instead, he would be looking at an ageing population. What are the old folks' views?

    Here is an example: (Ming Pao, Ming Pao, Ming Pao) The newspaper Ming Pao commissioned the Hong Kong University Public Opinion Programme to conduct a survey. From October 31 to November 5 2014, 1005 Hong Kong residents aged 18 or over were interviewed by telephone.

    Q3. Have you participated in the recent assemblies of the Occupy movement?

    18% said that they have participated in the recent assemblies of the Occupy movement, for an average of 3.8 times.
    The remaining 82% said that they have never participated.

    By age group:
    18-29: 44% yes, 55% no
    30-49: 17% yes, 83% no
    50 or over: 8% yes, 92% no

    The big issue is whether the old folks will come out to vote. They can be motivated by more talk on "The Hong Kong race is a completely different race from the Chinese race," "you old people are just pimps at the brothel", etc.

    - (Oriental Daily) The confusing thing about the IT sector is that there is no single way of establishing credentials. Most people go though various professional organizations to establish their credentials. In particular, it is easy for university graduates who majored in computer science or information technology to apply to the IEEE  (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers), pay an annual fee of about $900 and become a voter. About 3,500 of the new electors qualified by this method. Charles Mok is a senior member of IEEE, but he denies that the organization is friendly to the pan-democrats. He said that he merely encouraged IT workers to register as voters and that more voters mean it would be harder to manipulate.

    (Shanghaiist) WATCH: This completely racist ad for washing detergent just aired on Chinese TV and at cinemas. May 26, 2016.

    As any foreigner who has ever lived in China can attest, attitudes regarding race and skin color are often quite different here from back home. Still even with prior experience, sometimes this country can leave you completely and utterly dumbfounded.

    Such is the case with a recent incredibly racist advertisement for Qiaobi-brand laundry detergent that has been making the rounds on WeChat. According to one young lady on Weibo the ad appeared on television and before movies at Wanda Cinemas this month.

    In the video, a paint-splattered black man confidently approaches a young Chinese woman, only to have detergent placed in his mouth and his body shoved into a washing machine for a thorough rinsing. Once the wash cycle is done, out pops a pristine young Chinese man, as clean as can be.

    40-second version of Qiaobi ad
    60-second version of Qiaobi ad

    Wow! Those spots on the shirt came right off!

    It turns out that the video is actually a blatant ripoff (even using the exact same music and sound effects) of a series of Italian laundry detergent ads (ad1 and ad2) that were aired about 9 years ago. Containing similar racist overtones, the original ads argue that in fact "Coloured is better."

    The Chinese ad would seem to disagree.

    Thanks to traditional beauty standards valuing white skin, many Chinese people have a well-established phobia of dark skin which unfortunately also breeds racist attitudes towards people of African descent, who are viewed by some as "dirty" simply because of their skin tone.

    (Shanghaiist) May 28, 2016.

    The Chinese company behind the shockingly racist laundry detergent ad that everybody is talking about has responded to the global backlash against their ad, calling foreign media "too sensitive."

    In an interview over the phone with Party mouthpiece the Global Times, a spokesperson surnamed Wang from the Shanghai-based Leishang cosmetics company, which produces the Qiaobi-brand detergent, said that the commercial had been filmed at the beginning of 2015. "We meant nothing but to promote the product, and we had never thought about the issue of racism," Wang said. "The foreign media might be too sensitive about the ad. Instead of using the full version of the commercial, we actually aired a 5-second version which does not have the black character. We have no idea why the full version went viral online."

    Wang's comments would seem to contradict reports on Weibo that the full ads had been aired on Chinese television and during previews at Wanda Cinemas earlier this month. Wang refused to reveal any more information about the commercial's production or cost to Global Times.

    He also did not address the fact that the video is actually a blatant ripoff (even using the exact same music and sound effects) of a series of Italian laundry detergent ads that were aired about 9 years ago. Containing similar racist overtones, the original ads argue that in fact "Coloured is better."

    Internet comments:

    - (SCMP) US media outrage over detergent ad is pot calling the kettle black. By Alex Lo. May 30, 2016.

    The Qiaobi detergent TV commercial on the mainland is indeed racist and offensive. Yet, even more interesting, is why it seems to provoke outrage only in the US media and not anywhere else in the world.

    US and English-language news media have been quick to report on the commercial, yet few bother to tell their audiences that the long version with the black actor that went viral online was never broadcast; only the shorter version was shown without him.

    Americans are quick to condemn.

    The popular Vox.com waxed indignant: This ad is blatantly racist... its also a reminder that attitudes over race and skin colour in China can be very bad.

    CNN editorialised along a similar vein.

    By now, you have probably seen the viral version. A muscular black man whistles and winks at an attractive young Chinese woman. She calls him over, puts a detergent packet in his mouth, and pushes him headfirst into a washing machine. She then sits on the lid while the man shrieks and the washing machine spins. Moments later a young, Asian-looking man emerges in clean clothes, and the woman grins.

    I dont know about you but I find the Idris Elba-lookalike black actor far sexier and attractive than the effeminate lady boy that came out of the washer.

    Still, whats intriguing is the US news media blasting China for being racist towards blacks, and the commercial is being offered as Exhibit A.

    Thats a bit rich coming from a country that was founded on black slavery, whose devastating legacy still haunts the current generation. Thirty-seven per cent of prison inmates in the US are African-Americans, though they make up only 13 per cent of the total population. Blacks on average live five years less than whites. A typical white family has a net worth of US$134,200, while a black one scrapes by with slightly more than US$11,000. US police killed at least 102 unarmed black people last year; unarmed blacks are five times more likely to be killed by police than unarmed whites. Such awful statistics roll on and on.

    What you have is a politically correct media that helps to hide the underlying racism running deep in American society and projects it on to other countries.

    China has racial problems. But murderous racism against blacks is not one of them.

    - Of course, each situation is absolute and you should never resort to using the excuse that things are worse elsewhere. For example, in the case of Ken Tsang, you shouldn't say: "In the United States, if you dump urine on a group of policemen, they would have pumped thirty bullets into you right there and then."

    - That's right. In the United States, it is acceptable to have the police kill black people; in Hong Kong, it is acceptable to have demonstrators dump urine on policemen. Moral relativism rules everywhere and there are no international standards as such that hold everywhere.

    - (Vox) An analysis of the available FBI data by Vox's Dara Lind shows that US police kill black people at disproportionate rates: black people accounted for 31 percent of police shooting victims in 2012, even though they made up just 13 percent of the US population.

    -Look at the horrible things that were done to black people ...

    (SCMP) May 26, 2016.

    Pro-democracy activist Ken Tsang Kin-chiu has been convicted by the Kowloon City Court of one count of police assault and two of resisting arrest during the Occupy movement in 2014. But he was acquitted of two other charges of resisting arrest.

    Principal magistrate Peter Law Tak-chuen said on Thursday that he was convinced beyond reasonable doubt that Tsang was the one who poured an unknown liquid over 11 police officers and subsequently resisted arrest by two others who were undoubtedly executing their duties. He explained that the act of splashing liquid no doubt amounted to an assault given the hostility involved, and that Tsang must have known he would be arrested in the aftermath, yet resisted the arrest. But Law accepted that his resistance may in part have been due to a natural reaction towards pepper spray and hence acquitted him on two counts of resisting arrest.

    Sentencing is scheduled for Monday afternoon. Three letters have been submitted in mitigation. Tsang previously had a clean criminal record.

    The case centred on one of the most controversial nights of the 79-day civil disobedience protests, when thousands of Hongkongers occupied thoroughfares in Admiralty, Central, Causeway Bay, Mong Kok and Tsim Sha Tsui to demand universal suffrage.

    The verdict was delivered a week ahead of that for a sister case at the District Court, where seven police officers will stand trial next Wednesday for allegedly assaulting Tsang on the same night.

    Eleven police officers had told the court that liquid that smelled like urine was spilled on them as they were clearing protestors from Lung Wo Road underpass in Admiralty on October 15.

    A statement from police sergeant Wong Hoi-man said: We were moving forward when I suddenly felt my head was wet ... I looked up to see a man wearing goggles and [a] face mask pouring an unknown liquid. But Wong did not identify his attacker, except to say that it was a man in black wearing goggles and [a] face mask.

    The court also heard from sergeant Butt Wang-tat, who testified that he immediately tackled a man in black after seeing him pour liquid from a one-litre bottle onto the underpass below, but said he struggled to bring the man down to the pavement. Sergeant Ching Ying-wai added that he needed to pepper-spray the mans face in order to restrain and handcuff him.

    Tsang did not take the stand or call witnesses in his defence after denying one count of police assault and four of resisting arrest.

    His identification was a major point of contention during the trial as the defence argued that Tsang was not the man in videos filmed by police which showed a man in black T-shirt, goggles and mask splashing liquid or ATV footage of a man in a black T-shirt being arrested. Also at issue was the authenticity of the ATV videos admitted after a trial within a trial, as the defence contended that the court must be sure beyond a reasonable doubt that the footage had not been tampered with.

    Police assault and resisting arrest are both punishable by two years imprisonment, under the Offences Against the Person Ordinance.

    Tsang was earlier swarmed by a hundred supporters and journalists as he arrived at Kowloon City Court. Sporting his usual navy suit with a bright yellow ribbon pinned to his lapel, the social worker greeted cameramen and photographers while his Civic Party vice-chairwoman Tanya Chan and lawmaker Kwok Ka-ki stood next to him in support.

    Civic Party lawmaker Alvin Yeung Ngok-kiu, League of Social Democrats lawmaker Long Hair Leung Kwok-hung and activist Tsang Kin-shing were also among those who stood by his side. Before he entered the building, Tsang shook hands with his supporters, who raised yellow umbrellas and a banner that read: Plaintiff turned defendant, prosecuted after he was beaten. Some also chanted: Civil disobedience. Shame on political prosecution.

    Those who wished to hear the verdict in person were given stickers at 1.30pm to reserve a seat in courtroom number 13, where the press had been allocated 28 spots and the public, 74. Others occupied the benches at the floor lobby to await news of the anticipated court ruling.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) May 26, 2016.

    A court has found Civic Party member Ken Tsang Kin-chiu guilty of three counts of assaulting police and resisting arrest in relation to events that took place during the pro-democracy Occupy protests in 2014. He has been cleared of the other two counts of resisting arrest.

    Tsang, 40, was accused of attacking police officers with liquid from the embankment of the underpass at Lung Wo Road and then resisting arrest during the Umbrella Movement demonstrations. He was charged with one count of police assault and four of resisting arrest. He will be sentenced on May 30.

    Tsang arrived at the Kowloon City Magistrates Court on Thursday afternoon to a crowd of supporters holding yellow umbrellas. The courtrooms spectator stand was also filled to the brim with members of the public and journalists.

    Magistrate Peter Law ruled that the footage relating to the incident was admissible, stating that it showed a continuous chain of events and was of a clear quality. Law said that each witness, and each time frame during the incident, had to be independently evaluated. He stressed that it was important for testimonies to be based on the witnesses own memories rather than the footage, according to the updates on Tsangs official page.

    Law questioned how two police officers could mistake each other for themselves and noted that their signatures appeared on the others witness statements. Law said that the court would not accept their testimony.

    However, he said he believed the accounts of police sergeant Ching Ying-wai who earlier testified in court about the process of subduing the suspect and others were based on the witnesses memories as opposed to video evidence.

    Law said that the footage and the pictures taken at the police station show that the man who poured the liquid on the night of the incident, and the man who was arrested, shared the same facial features and similar shoes, and was therefore the same person.

    (SCMP) May 30, 2016.

    Activist Ken Tsang Kin-chiu was jailed five weeks by the Kowloon City Court on Monday for causing what the magistrate called a great insult to innocent police officers by splashing a foul-smelling liquid on them during an Occupy protest in October 2014. But he was soon freed on HK$300 cash bail after his counsel David Ma indicated that he would appeal.

    The sentence was greeted by an uproar in the public gallery, with many booing and shouting Justice is dead as soon as the magistrate began retreating to his chambers.

    Principal magistrate Peter Law Tak-chuen was told that the social worker splashed an unknown liquid that smelled like urine on 11 police officers before he resisted arrest by two others that night. He said imprisonment was absolutely appropriate and the sole sentencing option.

    Law compared the degree of insult and provocation invoked by the act of splashing liquid to spitting in the officers faces, and said Tsangs act turned innocent officers into scapegoats for his venting behaviour. The defendant on one hand was angry at police for losing restraint, the magistrate said. On the other hand, he had similarly lost restraint in splashing an unknown liquid and causing harm to innocent police offices ... It sounds ironic. Law also pointed out that Tsang showed no remorse, before he concluded that the potential loss of his social worker registration was not a mitigating factor.

    Assaulting police and resisting arrest are both punishable by up to two years imprisonment, under the Offences Against the Person Ordinance. Tsang was jailed five weeks for assaulting police and three weeks for each count of resisting arrest, all served concurrently.

    The afternoon hearing was attended by a full house in the public gallery, including Civic Party chairwoman Audrey Eu Yuet-mee, vice-chairwoman Tanya Chan and lawmaker Kwok Ka-ki, who were there to support their party member. Many also gathered at the court building entrance an hour before the scheduled hearing, with dozens queuing up to sign a placard showing their support for Tsang.

    The Hong Kong Social Workers General Union invited members to share experiences of social workers participation in political movements. But attention was instead drawn to a shouting match that erupted after a man in sunglasses began calling out with the help of a microphone: The many people youve harmed how could you be a social worker? He continued: Why do you guys always lead the breach of law? Meanwhile, Tsangs supporters brandished yellow umbrellas and retorted: Support Tsang Kin-chiu, support Tsang Kin-chiu. The man left the court area about five minutes later, under the escort of a handful of police officers and a pack of three dozen journalists.

    Internet comments:

    - Do you trust Ken Tsang's lawyer, or your own lying eyes? Here are the videos:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8iNf052V2Og (slow motion)
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NwPycc3ciRU

    - The two policemen who mistook each for the other.

    Because these two police officers misidentified themselves, the judge dismissed the two assault charges against them. Two other police officers testified, one having used pepper spray and the other helped Ken Tsang to stand up. The judge found those two credible and found Tsang guilty of the two assault charges against those two.

    - In theory, assaulting a police officer and resisting arrest are both punishable by two years imprisonment, under the Offences Against the Person Ordinance. In practice, Hong Kong is under common law which is law developed by judges, courts and similar tribunals, stated in decisions that nominally decide individual cases but that in addition have precedential effect on future case.

    Here is a recent precedent for reference: (SCMP, April 19, 2016) (SCMP, May 3, 2016)

    Two men, including a restaurant owner who claimed he hated the Occupy movement because of its effect on his teenage son, face jail time after they were convicted by Eastern Court of throwing animal entrails at media mogul Jimmy Lai Chee-ying at the Admiralty site in November 2014.

    Magistrate Lee Siu-ho said it was without question that such behaviour amounted to common assault. This case of common assault is different from simpler cases in which the victim was merely touched once or twice, the magistrate said. The court at this moment believes imprisonment is appropriate and will actively consider imprisoning the defendants.

    Sentencing was adjourned until May 3 pending background reports on the defendants.

    ...

    The animal entrails attack on Jimmy Lai Chee-ying during the Occupy movement in November 2014 was a premeditated plan to insult the media mogul, a magistrate said on Tuesday as he blasted three men for potentially destroying public peace.

    Eastern magistrate Lee Siu-hos comments came as he sentenced kitchen worker Chan Kwok-hung, 31, restaurant owner Yip Wing-chi, 44, and businessman Li Siu-lung, 46, to jail terms of between nine and 18 weeks each.

    The case centred on an attack at about 4.30pm on November 12, 2014 when Yip threw bags of animal entrails at Lai, who owns the Apple Daily newspaper, on Harcourt Road in Admiralty. Li filmed the attack. The magistrate said: The act of throwing the entrails, in courts view, was to insult the victim not only to dirty his clothes but also to leave a psychological impact.

    Lee also noted that it was obviously a premeditated plan to assault Lai as Yip delivered the entrails on a cart from the New Territories and was prepared to launch more attacks, had they not been discovered. The [nature of] common assault in this case was serious among its kind, he added.

    All except Yip, who admitted throwing animal entrails, were convicted on common assault charges after trial.

    - It is not going to help the image of Rule-of-law in Hong Kong if Magistrate Peter Law sentences Ken Tsang to 80 hours of community service.

    - The trick here is the attitude of the defendant. If the defendant is adamant that he is completely innocent, then the sentence will be on the high side. If the defendant expresses remorse (and thus implicitly acknowledges guilty), the sentence will be on the lenient side. What is Ken Tsang's position then?

    - Is Ken Tsang being too complacent here when because he thought that Yellow Ribbons will be treated leniently? Is that why he didn't even bother to testify himself?

    - The judge cannot hold the failure of the defendant to testify in person against him. That is a technicality inside the courtroom. Outside the courtroom, the public is skeptical -- if Ken Tsang was not the man who tossed the smelly liquid, he should have just gotten on the witness stand and say so.

    - If Ken Tsang gets a $100 fine for throwing smelly liquid at people, what should the Mong Kok Sai Yeung Choi Street South acid thrower get under this precedent?

    - If Ken Tsang is sentenced to jail, he will lose the social worker license as well as eligibility to run for elections. What will he do then? Ah, I know -- some Civic Party legislator can hire him as an aide.

    - The defense pleaded that the defendant is an experienced social worker who has worked in various government jobs as well as performed volunteer work. After this case, the defendant had stay home to nurse his injuries. Since April 1st this year, he is working as a research director on social welfare policies with a monthly salary of $3,000.

    I had to read this again to make sure that the $3,000 figure is not an error. The minimum wage is $32.5 per hour. At $32.5 per hour, he works 3,000 / 32.5 = 92 hours per month = 23 hours per week.

    Why did he start working only on April 1 this year? Because he was concerned about being characterized as a shiftless bum by the probation officer.

    - And what was Ken Tsang doing before April 1 this year? For about 18 months, he must be living off social welfare checks. He is a social worker and he surely knows how to navigate the system.

    - On one hand, if you can get fined $2,000 for jaywalking, assaulting a police officer should clearly draw a more severe penalty. On the other hand, Tsang makes only $3,000 a month. So a fine of $3,000 would equal his whole month's salary.

    - At least Ken Tsang didn't follow the other Umbrella Revolutionaries (such as Andy Yung, Eric Poon, Amy But, etc) to use mental retardation as the excuse.

    - The strong piece of evidence was the ATV video showing Ken Tsang being arrested by several police officers. The defense said that the video might have been tampered with. They forgot to add that ATV has previously false stories such as the death of Jiang Zemin, etc.

    - (Apple Daily)

    The defense said that 40-year-old Ken Tsang is a social worker. In 2014, he traveled to South America by himself. After hearing about the Occupy movement, he returned to Hong Kong in October and wanted to help those who are fighting for social justice. On that evening, Tsang saw on one side were peaceful demonstrators who only wanted to use umbrellas to block the pepper spray applied by the police. On the other side, the police used batons, pepper spray and excessive force to disperse citizens who are fighting for their rights.

    Peaceful? Defensive? Who should I believe? Ken Tsang's lawyer or my own lying eyes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gisNixIsJZk

    - By contrast, here are the international standards as set by the French police against protestors on May 17, 2016: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UwA3pRArFkg

    - Ken Tsang's lawyer also said that the act of tossing liquid was to relieve stress and express discontent. This statement is an admission to having committed the act. If Ken Tsang wants to file an appeal on the verdict/sentence, he would have to argue on technical grounds instead of claiming total innocence (e.g. mistaken identity).

    - There does not appear to be much public outcry against this guilty verdict. The first line of defense would be that Ken Tsang was completely innocent and did not commit the act. To do this, you will have to concoct some fantastically fantastic story to negate what your lying eyes saw. The second line of defense is that even if Ken Tsang committed the act, he should be freed because he is doing it for freedom/democracy/human rights/rule-of-law/universal suffrage. This means the end of Rule of Law in Hong Kong. But Ken Tsang hasn't personally resorted to this tactic, so why are you doing it for him against his wishes and the best interest of Rule of Law in Hong Kong?

    - After the sentencing, Ken Tsang said in English: "We gonna stand until the last minute，We gonna fight until the end. We never give up." He has not disclosed the approach, which would be either that he was completely innocent or that he is guilty but the sentence was too harsh.

    - The judge said that the fact that Ken Tsang is a social worker had no bearing in the sentencing. That had better be the case, because if occupation were a factor, then someone is going to file a complaint at the Equal Opportunities Commission.

    - Internet users have made this scorecard:

    18 weeks for three regular citizens throwing pig entrails at Jimmy Lai (Next Media boss)
    5 weeks for Ken Tsang (Civic Party) throwing urine at a group of police officers
    3 weeks for a League of Social Democrats member throwing an egg at Secretary of Finance John Tsang

    Now we know what the score is.

    - Given the above scores, what will Raymond Wong Yuk-man get for throwing a glass cup at Chief Executive CY Leung in the Legislative Council? 12 months probation?

    - As soon as the sentence was pronounced, the judge granted a $300 bail while the defendant contemplates an appeal? What is $300? A parking ticket is $450. A littering ticket is $600. A spitting ticket is $1,500. A jaywalking ticket is $2,000. This shows how serious the judge thinks the crime is.

    - (Sing Tao) After the judge pronounced the sentence, a member of the public said "Is there a mistake?" and somebody else used an obscenity. They said "Justice was unfair," "No reasoned basis" and "Damn dog official." After the recess, many supporters of Ken Tsang continued to boo and insult the judge. According to the relevant law, insulting the magistrate can lead to a jail term of 6 months and a fine of $10,000.

    - Civic Party's Audrey Eu and Tanya Chan were present. They are both lawyers and they did nothing to restrain this contempt of court behavior.

    - (SCMP) Ken Tsang and his supporters make a mockery of the rule of law. By Alex Lo. May 31, 2016.

    For many political activists these days, press freedom is only for those who share their viewpoints. Likewise, those who speak loudest for judicial independence feel no compunction openly denouncing judges who deliver judgments contrary to their demands and expectations.

    The behaviour of the supporters of Civic Party activist Ken Tsang Kin-chiu at his court sentencing this week was an utter disgrace. On hearing their hero being jailed for five weeks, the dozens of supporters and activists booed and shouted at principal magistrate Peter Law Tak-chuen.

    The guy was convicted for assaulting police officers during the Occupy protests in October 2014 by splashing a foul-smelling liquid on them and for resisting arrest. These are serious offences that usually carry mandatory jail sentences upon conviction. So the magistrate actually didnt have much of a choice. But he immediately granted Tsang bail of HK$300 pending an appeal.

    All things considered, this is an extremely lenient and considerate judge. Still, Tsangs supporters screamed and insulted the judge and other police officers inside the court. There were shouts of no justice, drop dead you dog judge (as in a corrupt judge), maladministration of justice, and drop dead, your whole family. The last was apparently directed at the families of police officers at the scene.

    These people clearly showed a deep contempt of court, but were allowed to walk away. As I said, this judge and other law officers at the court were really lenient.

    As the magistrate observed, Tsang showed no remorse throughout the trial. In fact, Tsang clearly delighted in the show being put on and the high turnout of supporters each time he appeared in court. He even thanked his supporters for making him feel strong and powerful after the trial. Some people seem to confuse having many supporters for being in the right.

    The fact that Tsang was filmed being beaten after his arrest, allegedly by a group of police officers, does not excuse his prior assaults against the police. The trial has started for the seven officers alleged to have beaten him. If convicted, they deserve to be severely punished.

    But their guilt, even if proven in a court of law, does not make Tsang innocent.

    - Eyewitness report from the courtroom

    After reading out the sentence, the judge thanked the prosecutor and the defense lawyer and quickly left to go back to his office. As soon as he got up, the supporters of Ken Tsang began yelling "Dog judge!" and so on. The judge acted as if he never heard them.

    At the time, there were only security guards in the court room. The court system only has a few court policemen to escort prisoners while overall security is outsourced to outside companies. So when the judge left, only the two prosecutors and some unarmed police representatives were left to face the curses from more than 30 Ken Tsang supporters.

    After some commotion the courtroom was cleared, leaving only the prosecutors and the police officers to wait in frustration. But the supporters of Ken Tsang stayed in the building.

    Apart from the front entrance, there are two other passageways. If the prosecutors left through the front entrance, their personal safety is not assured. After waiting for 30 minutes, the prosecutors asked the court clerk if she can ask Judge Peter Law to let them use the judge's passageway. The response? "Don't ask, because the judge has told me already that you may not use the judge's passageway!"

    So the prosecutors asked the court police whether they can use the prisoners' passageway. The response? "The supervisors won't permit this!"

    The prosecutors called the Kowloon City Police Station across the street for help. The response? "We have sufficient personnel to maintain order. But they are all outside the building, because we are not allowed to enter a building belonging to the judiciary branch!"

    Finally after 90 minutes, the court director made the necessary phone calls and helped the prosecutors and the police to leave through the prisoners' passageway. This was not an exercise of special privileges; it was the only want to prevent harm to the prosecutors!

    - (Kinliu) If Rule of Law still exists in Hong Kong, then this is its darkest day. On this day, a judge was cursed out by a mob inside the courtroom, and the prosecutors had to flee through the back. The people leading this action from the Civic Party, which is frequently known as the Party of the Senior Barristers.

    Several days later, this mob showed up again and cursed out every person who showed up in court. They cursed out every policeman. On that day, two police officers were cursed out by the Civic Party supporters as "Evil police", "trash" and "We support the police to jump off the roof and kill themselves" along with a lot of obscenities." These two police officers happened to be witnesses for the prosecution against the seven policemen charged with assaulting Ken Tsang.

    Video: https://www.facebook.com/hkjoesin/videos/10154159513987381/

    - (Oriental Daily) March 21, 2017.

    On March 20, Ken Tsang suddenly announced on Facebook that he has abandoned his appeal. He arrived at court at 9am this morning. He said that he wants to accept responsibility for his actions. He emphasized that the liquid that he poured on that day was water and not something else. "I can live with the Heavens, the Earth and my conscience." He said that one reason that he gave up his appeal was that the seven policemen have been convicted. He is now concerned that if his appeal succeeds, it may affect the sentence on the seven policemen. He said that he is not worried that his sentence may actually be increased as a result of the appeal.

    Ken Tsang is a social welfare sub-sector member of the Election Committee. He will vote from prison on March 26 in the Chief Executive election.

    - (Hong Kong Free Press) March 21, 2017.

    Activist Ken Tsang said Tuesday that he would not withdraw from the democracy movement, while appealing to the public to stand in solidarity with pro-democracy activists.

    I kept an honest and upright attitude throughout the trial. I decided to drop my appeal not because I am weak or because I have given up fighting against injustice, Tsang told reporters before he entered the High Court. We have tried our best and this is the best outcome, given that the government, police and the Department of Justice have been trying to shield each other.

    - (HKG Pao) May 1, 2017.

    In an interview with Ming Pao, Ken Tsang said that he dumped the liquid on the police "because he saw the police attacking the demonstrators." At the time, there were many "violent scenes." He said that the police were using pepper spray and batons and were "assaulting demonstrators on the other side of Lung Wo Road." So what Tsang did was to "buy time" for the demonstrators so that they can leave.

    Tsang said that he has to accept responsibility for what he did. He emphasized that that he never denied that he did it, and that he has no regrets. However, he does not believe that he should be jailed because he never assaulted any police officers.

    - (Hong Kong Free Press) May 29, 2017.

    How did you spend your time in prison?

    I spent a total of 31 days in prison.

    In Pik Uk, my duty was in carpentry. As a newcomer, the duty no matter which workshop I work in was cleaning. So I had to mop the floor in the morning and in the afternoon, and in the night I had to do some cleaning inside the dormitory. Thats it. If you stay longer, I think more than three months, they will train you to work with some machines.

    We woke up around 5am, and then we had our breakfast at 6:30am. Lunch was at 12pm, and dinner time was around 6pm. Each meal everyday was almost the same.

    How did the prison officers treat you?

    All the officers treated me really nicely I mean, they treated me just the way they should. Before prison, some people including myself were worried about them threatening me or treating me badly. But in the end, nothing happened.

    A lot of people tried to keep an eye on me. During those 31 days, six legislative councillors came to visit me, like Long Hair [Leung Kwok-hung]. He came to visit me three times. Not because I complained, but I think they wanted to give a message to the officers that people are keeping their eyes on me, and they should not treat me badly or let anything terrible happen to me accidentally.

    What I can say is that they carried out their services professionally. A lot of officers called me not by my inmate number, but by my name So I think there was a lot of respect.

    Of course, you never have a good time in prison, but I had a really peaceful time there. I did a lot of reviews about my life and career and what I should do in the future.

    Did you witness any injustices at Pik Uk?

    One of the aspects is food. Of course if you go to jail you cannot expect good food, but there are some unfair practices. It is not that equal between Chinese and Western prisoners, or between Indian and Pakistani prisoners. I know some people are doing a judicial review about the catering service in prisons.

    For Western-style food, they will have milk tea with every meal at breakfast, lunch or dinner. But for Chinese prisoners, you dont. And the volume of the meat, the size theres actually quite a big difference with Westerners getting more.

    The food of the prisoners has not changed for 30 years. Long Hair told me that the first time he was imprisoned was in 1978. At the time, the food was almost exactly the same.

    How do you view the pro-Beijing camps reaction to the jailing of the seven officers who beat you? (A rally of 30,000 police officers prompted massive fundraising for their families, and a proposal to criminalise insulting law enforcement personnel)

    I think its quite ridiculous, and I dont think they reflect the mainstream ideas of Hong Kong people. Its like Hong Kong is pushing to the other extreme, like Singapore or mainland China. Hong Kong people can always tell you what is wrong and what is right.

    When the policemen were fundraising, you can tell, a lot of the money came from the dirty side, the gangs, their representatives In the end, history will judge.

    Nowadays, a lot of people come out to confuse you to say something terrible and make it look like its normal. Thats not our standard and not what we want.

    You are a social worker, and used to work with young people. Have you witnessed other episodes of police aggression?

    I used to be an outreach social worker. I worked with young people, teenagers especially those who we think were at risk, or they were gangsters or triad members. So I always accompanied them to the police station or to court.

    It happened to me once when I hung around in a video game centre. Some policemen came to check peoples identity cards. After they checked and they called the young people back to the police station, the policemen didnt give back their cards. They just threw them on the floor and said: Pick it up yourself.

    I didnt expect policemen to carry out their duty in that way, so unprofessionally. Maybe it was because some of the young people, they didnt have a really nice attitude, but what can you expect? Youre a policeman.

    But not many of them in the end complain about the police Whatever they say, they think the court or the legal system in Hong Kong is not protecting them. Of course, they think they did something wrong themselves as well. So they dont think they have that right.

    I think its kind of a culture [within the police force]. In Hong Kong, most police officers think they have that power, and they will abuse that power.

    How do you think the Hong Kong public and the police can mend their relations?

    I dont think there is anything the public should do. The only things to do are from the polices side. They should earn back the respect and the expectations from the citizens. You didnt earn our respect so we dont respect you.

    Thats why after the Umbrella Movement in Hong Kong, lots of people are calling the cops, black cops. You will not see anybody call social workers, black social workers, or black teachers or whatever. But you always hear that word black cops after the Umbrella Movement.

    Since Occupy, youve quit the Civic Party and tried to run for the social welfare constituency in the 2016 legislative elections. What role do you see for yourself in politics in the future?

    I think Im a weird person, I was from the Civic Party. In normal Hong Kong peoples minds, the Civic Party is more blue-blood or middle class-representative. But Im quite grassroots, Im a social worker. In social movements I always stand at the front this is quite different from the Civic Party.

    But I dont think I should have a specific role. Ill just be myself. For 20 years since I was a university student I was nobody, until people knew me after that incident [the assault by seven officers]. I think if you do the right thing, youll always have people supporting you.

    In the short-term future I dont think I will join any political party yet.

    I believe in standing up for all Hongkongers. If you ask me whether I am a pan-democrat, or localist, or for self-determination Ive not thought about that much.

    What about your plans to run in the upcoming legislative by-elections after the disqualification of Yau Wai-ching and Baggio Leung?

    I told many media outlets I would consider running for the by-election, because I hope to be someone who can represent the largest breadth of the hopes and aspirations of the public.

    For example, you see in Kowloon West [a constituency in last years legislative elections with a total of six seats], Raymond Wong [a defeated localist candidate] received 20,000 votes, Yau Wai-ching [the elected localist candidate] received 20,000-something votes.

    These 40,000 votes are not traditional votes for pro-democracy candidates. Many are for radicals or localists, or against traditional leftard [idealistic left-wing] pan-democrats.

    But I have to still assess the hopes of the public. I have to see whether there is a preliminary round among the pro-democracy candidates.

    As this is a by-election, not a traditional election, we are looking at the largest camp versus the largest camp the establishment versus the non-establishment, not the establishment against just the pan-democrats. Apart from the pan-democrats there are many groups, like the localists.

    So I think maybe I have an advantage here as a non-traditional pro-democracy candidate.

    Its not just about my future, but about the fact that if we want to win the by-election, then the candidate with the largest reach has to come out.

    Who is the democracy figure in Hong Kong whom you respect the most?

    I respect Long Hair a lot. You can see he carries out lots of things that normal pan-democrats cannot do. As a poor or lower class person in Hong Kong, you will think Long Hair represents you, and works for you. He stands until the very last moment and hes really strong.

    In the last chief executive election, I think some democracy supporters were quite disappointed when the Democrats 300+ [coalition of 300 pro-democracy electors] said we should go all in for John Tsang. And Long Hair was the only one who stood until the last moment, even when he got lots of shouts or complaints from our camp.

    But in the end when John Tsang lost the election, you know, everything is set up by the Communist Party. Its fake, its a dream for Hong Kong people to think that John Tsang can do something to change Hong Kong, or to earn back peoples hearts. Its an illusion. And thats what Long Hair told people before the election.

    A lot of pro-democrats went to Long Hair and apologised. You can tell by the result that Long Hair was right.

    Your own social worker license is under threat after a pro-Beijing colleague filed a complaint against you. Whats the significance of this?

    I dont think its a personal matter. I was the first to receive a complaint after the Umbrella Movement, but I wont be the only case. You can foresee more and more social workers will get challenged.

    or me and for lots of Hong Kong people, the war nowadays the battle is everywhere. In the political side, in the professional side, everywhere, even in education in primary school, high school, universities.

    So I and lots of Hongkongers wont give up. Its not the time to give up.

    (EJ Insight) May 24, 2016.

    Hong Kong democracy activists trying to keep the June 4 vigil alive are pressing on with their campaign to vindicate the failed Beijing student movement despite their thinning ranks. This years theme will also feature calls for an end to arbitrary arrests and despotism, as well as a renewed fight for democracy, the Hong Kong Economic Journal reports.

    Albert Ho, chairman of the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China, said they expect attendance to top 100,000 people. However, they will not include the Hong Kong Federation of Students (HKFS), a key participant in past memorials which withdrew from the alliance, citing differences with the latters objectives. Students will take part in a torch relay ceremony as usual but will not be speaking on stage this time, Ho said. He said he regrets HKFSs decision to withdraw from the activities of the alliance but respects it. 

    Vice chairman Choi Yiu-cheong said a planned May 29 protest march will follow last years route, starting in Southorn Playground in Wan Chai and ending outside Beijings Liason Office in Western District. Ho said the June 4 memorials are a show of localism that has been taking place for the past 27 years. Candles are our weapons against killings by the communist regime, he said.

    The candlelight vigil was launched in 1990 to mark the first anniversary of a bloody crackdown on student protesters in Beijings Tiananmen Square. Organizers put attendance at 150,000 and the police at 80,000. In 2009, it hit a peak of about 200,000 participants after appearing to lose fervor in previous years. An estimated 135,000 turned out last year. 

    (HKG Pao) May 25, 2016.

    Hong Kong University Students Union president Althea Suen said that there will be an evening meeting at 7pm on June 4th at Sun Yat-sen Place, Hong Kong University. A student representation will read a statement followed by one minute of silence. This is followed by a 90-minute academic discussion on the future of Hong Kong. There won't be any candle lighting or singing. About 1,000 persons are expected to attend.

    Althea Suen emphasized that they are not "fighting for the customers." She criticized Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China chairman Albert Ho as "bullying" when he said that young people ought to be going to Victoria Park if they really want to memorialize the dead.

    (Oriental Daily) May 24, 2016.

    Last year, the Hong Kong Federation of Students withdrew from the Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China and held its own evening assembly. But there won't be one this year. Hong Kong University Student Union president Althea Suen announced that they have decided not to participate in any cross-varsity assembly for financial reasons.

    Althea Suen said that the cross-varsity assembly was scheduled to be held on the Million Boulevard of the Chinese University of Hong Kong. The costs are very high and unequally shared among the 13 institutions of higher learning. In Hong Kong University, the allocated costs exceeded its original budget. Therefore HKU is backing out. Instead, HKU will spend about $16,000 to hold its own evening assembly.

    Althea Suen said that she had proposed holding the assembly at Hong Kong University's Sun Yat-sen Place in order to reduce costs, but the other institutions thought that the location was too small. Suen said that Hong Kong students are not necessarily disunited if they hold more than one assembly and that as long as they share the same ideas, having more assemblies will surely provide more perspectives to the students.

    However, it is not plausible to say that HKU is not participating for financial reasons. The HKUSU has reserves. Earlier it had allocated $150,000 to develop a mobile phone app but that project was scrapped. So how could they not come up with $100,000 to $200,000 now? Was this just an excuse?

    Internet comments:

    - No, they are not fighting for bodies. They are fighting for money. If you go to X, then you can't be giving money at Y.

    - How much money were raised last year?
    $1,700,000 Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in Hong Kong
    $370,000 Scholarism
    $240,000 League of Social Democrats
    $210,000 Civic Party
    $60,000 Democratic Party
    $45,000 Labour Party

    - Famous Chinese saying to describe s chaotic scene: 餓狗搶屎 = hungry dogs fighting over a piece of excrement. In this case, the excrement is the filthy lucre.

    - It is a traditional custom  in Southern China to have a big roasted pig during the Ching Ming Festival or the Chung Yeung Festical to be divided among the family clan.

    The practice used to be known as 太公分豬肉, meaning that the clan leader makes the allocation according to his preferences. Today, we have rule-of-law in place of rule-of-man, so the rules are made explicit. For example, all males under 60 years old get one share; males aged 60-69 get two shares; males 70 years or older get four shares; women get nothing. Regardless of the variations, it is always true that women get nothing.

    So this year the June 4th assembly will adopt some rule changes on how to divide the roasted pig. That's all.

    - It is time that some woman lodge a complaint to the Equal Opportunities Commission to stop this discriminatory practice!

    - There is also a sales/marketing issue here. You keep selling a subscription to a product which hasn't demonstrated any effectiveness. For twenty-six years, the Hong Kong suckers have been pouring money into the coffers of the Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China. Great. Where are these so-called 'patriotic democratic movements'? What have they achieved on behalf of patriotic democracy?

    - These 'patriotic democratic movements' cannot be publicly identified because they will be oppressed by the Chinese Communists. But the truth is that they are everywhere.

    - Well, when Lee Cheuk-yan was the Alliance chairman a few years ago, he had the chance to register June 4th 1989 as a trademark. He didn't, otherwise all other evening assemblies would be in violation of his intellectual property rights.

    - Notice that Althea Suen is co-branding her actual product with June 4th. She entices 1,000 people to attend the HKU event. There will be a brief statement and one minute of silence. Then there will be 90 minutes of propaganda on Hong Kong self-determination/independence. I am sure that the dead souls of June 4th 1989 will be very pleased to be able to live on in people's memories in this way.

    - Music concerts have price tiers. So how much do they charge for front row seats? Handshakes? Photo ops? Etc?

    - It's not all about money. The fact is that many Hong Kong students don't think that they are the same race as the Chinese, so commemorating June 4th 1989 is as meaningless to them as Bloomsday.

    - June 4th 1989 took place 27 years ago. Most of the current university students were not born yet. (I say "most" because there are still sixth-year students such as Alex Chow and fifth-year students such as Edward Leung).

    - Well, if you can get money from them, you call them 'compatriots'. If you can't get money from them, you call them 'locusts.' It is up to the Chinese race to show what value they can offer to the Hong Kong race.

    - Please be aware that this is not a static situation. Instead, it is very dynamic. Thus, for 364 days of the year, mainlanders are locusts but on June 4th they are compatriots. After you get your money for the year, they can go to hell ... until next year.

    - It really isn't all about money. If it were, the Hong Kong Federation of Students would have demanded warehouse storage fees for the Statue of Liberty from the Alliance.

    - Before June 4th 1989, mainland China was very poor. When my mother took me to visit her family in China, we brought a lot of stuff to distribute around. The people of Hong Kong and China were very close to each other. In recent years, our poor relatives have become wealthy. The people of Hong Kong and China are estranged from each other. What happened?

    - It's very simple: 憎人富貴厭人貧 (= you hate people when they are wealthy, and you despise them when they are poor).

    - (The Stand News) The Students Unions of eleven tertiary institutions (including Chinese University of Hong Kong, University of Science and Technology, Baptist University) issued a Joint University Declaration on June 4th and advocated that the people of Hong Kong should breed localism and face up to June 4th. However, the declaration included the sentence: "Before the massacre, Deng Xiaoping met with the students." Deng Xiaoping did not meet with the students; Premier Li Peng met with the students.

    - This is a well-known fact to all those who were present at the time. But the students who were not even born in 1989 apparently don't know it. The declaration was written by someone and surely the 11 student unions read and approved it, but nobody knew this most basic historical fact.

    - The declaration said that June 4th made two points for Hong Kong students today. Firstly, there is no hope for building democracy in China, because the Chinese Communists are too brutal and powerful and the 1.4 billion Chinese citizens are abetting them. Therefore, democracy isn't coming to China even if the people of Hong Kong wants it.

    Secondly, the Chinese Communists cannot be trusted. Before the massacre, Deng Xiaoping met with the students; but the dawn of democracy in China turned into a dark night of bloody massacre. Therefore the people of Hong Kong must never believe in anything that Chinese Communists say. We want the people of Hong Kong to absorb the history lessons of June 4th and prepare themselves for the resistance.

    - If you can't trust the Communists, you shouldn't bother to negotiate because you can't trust anything they say. If the Communists know that you don't trust anything they say, they shouldn't bother to negotiate with you. Therefore negotiations are off the table. What is left on the table? Armed revolution. Let's roll.

    - Professional Teachers Union sells gifts designed for June 4th commodity fetishists:


    $120 t-shirts to vindicate June 4th


    $100 t-shirts for democratic movements


    $120 June 4th USB memory device, 16G capacity with 8.9G preloaded information on the democratic movement.

    - (Oriental Daily) In earlier years, pan-democrats introduced the motion of "Vindicate June 4th" for debate at the Legislative Council while reminding the people to attend the candlelight vigil. Since 2012, those motions were debated after June 4th due to scheduling issues and this has reduced the impact. Nevertheless, this was a good opportunity for the pan-democratic legislators to enunciate their political positions.

    This year, there is no hint of a "Vindicate June 4th" motion. Why? Because it was cleared that there is no opportunity for any legislator to introduce any motion until at least after the July recess. How did this come about? Well, it is the same pan-democrats who filibuster the various bills now stuck at the Legislative Council. They own the problem.

    - Lau Siu-wai offered an eyewitness testimony of the June 4th 1989 massacre:

    It is almost June 4th and many people are saying that what has something that happened in China decades ago have to with us? I would like to share a story.
    Back then I was a young child. I watched television. Every night I saw the students in danger. When the lights went out on Tiananmen Square that night and the gunshots rang out, the images stayed in the bottom of my heart. When I grow up, what can I give to society ...

    So there you have it -- Lau Siu-wai witnessed everything on television. P.S. Lau Siu-wai said that she needed to raise $750,000 before deciding whether to run in the legislative council elections. So send your money (preferably cash) as soon as possible and as often as possible. Thank you.

    - Strictly speaking, a young girl watching television in Hong Kong is not a true eyewitness to the June 4th massacre. Chinese University of Hong Kong student Lai Hung was present at the scene, and therefore a true eyewitness.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOa29HiEn5o

    [In 1989, Lai Hung was interviewed by a gathering of the Hong Kong press]

    0:14 Lai Hung: At first, the lights came on and the soldiers marched out in unison from the Great Hall. They got closer and closer. It was very ... the scene ... a bus caught fire ... it was to the other side ... I don't know who set off the fire ... I saw ... the soldiers approached. The people got chaotic. I told the people not to move, not to run. I found the tanks coming down the pedestrian path that we were on. They came at us students. About several tens of meters behind me, a dozen or so students were crushed to death. There were brain matters, arms, legs scattered all over ... that is, a lot of blood ...

    0:58 Interviewer: According to information from various sides, a lot of people died this time.

    1:01 Lai Hung: ... at least ten thousand (dead) ... more than ten thousand. Actually, if you count several tallies ... if you count two tallies, there were already more than five or six thousand. That is, almost three thousand people died in the rear. That is, at Tiananmen Square in the end. The other tally ... that is, the announcement from the Red Cross ... before 2am or 3am before the attack on Tiananmen Square, more than two thousand people were dead. These are conservative estimates. Also some student leaders visited six hospitals and they estimated more than 1,000. Ultimately, if you add everything up, it is more than 10,000.

    [In 1994, Lai Hung was interviewed by ATV]

    1:32 Lai Hung: Shooting ... not many people ... nobody was shot ... actually, nothing much happened inside ... in the end, after the lights came on, then things happened.

    2:24 Lai Hung: I was in the frontline. I was facing north. I saw a group of soldiers in camouflage uniforms coming up ... actually ... I saw them kicking people aside ... using their guns to force people aside ... they came up ... before I even reacted, another team of more than a dozen ... both teams had more than a dozen or so people ... they might have come from the west ... maybe from the east ... they got to the top level ... they got to the top level ... I was at the top level of the monument ... I saw them go to the top level and before I reacted, they were already shooting at the monument and telling people to leave. They stood at the top level of the monument and shot upwards ... above the heads of the people ... they shot upwards ... they fired shots ... nobody should have been ... nobody was shot. They began to chase people off. The people began to leave slowly.

    The true eyewitness Lai Hung said 10,000 were murdered. So you better send your money (preferably cash) to the Professional Teachers Union/Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China as soon as possible and as often as possible. Thank you.

    - (Ming Pao) Shue Yan University Student Union editorial committee chief editor Ng Kai-lung posted on the committee Facebook to criticize the Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China. He said that the older generation was wrong in how they dealt with the Chinese Communists. He said that they were like a raped girl who hated and loved her Chinese Communist rapist. Therefore she has lost her mind and "scolded other rape victims for fighting back." Ng said that the Alliance is the mama-san in a brothel and wanted the "rapist to change his heart after he satisfies his animal lust." Ng said that it is time to give up all illusions that the Chinese Communists will change their evil ways and take care of our own affairs first. The issue of whether the neighboring region will vindicate June 4th or not can be considered later.

    The Alliance's Lee Cheuk-yan said that he was angry at what Ng wrote. Lee said that Ng has insulted not just the Alliance but all those who have attended the June 4th memorial services. Lee said that students can have different ideas about how to commemorate June 4th and people can respect each other. However, Ng is only insulting fellow travelers without offering a single actionable proposal to fight against the Chinese Communist dictators.

    Ng Kai-lung said that there is nothing whatsoever wrong with what he wrote and he will not apologize. "When it comes to apologizing, why doesn't the Alliance apologize for making zero progress after all these years?" He said that he is not a fellow traveler with the traditional pan-democrats, whom he thinks only want to hijack democracy. "If your roads are different, you can't work together."

    Revision: The Shue Yan University Student Union editorial committee has revised their statement. Instead of "the mama-san in a brothel" which is sexist, the Alliance is now "the papa-san and mama-san in a brothel."

    - (HKG Pao) The Shue Yan University Student Union editorial committee said that the Alliance raked in $83,726,906 over the past 27 years. But they are against spending so much money on a project with no tangible results. It is proposed that Alliance be disbanded and the war chest be donated to organizations such as Civic Passion, Hong Kong Indigenous, Youngspiration, etc.

    - I donated $100 to the Alliance for the purpose of supporting democracy in China and now you tell me that my money has been forwarded to Hong Kong Indigenous which instigated the Mong Kok riot in order to advance Hong Kong independence? Did you ever consult me?

    - The Tiananmen Square incident was something that happened in Beijing and therefore has no meaning for Hong Kong localists. What other historical event should take its place in central memory? How about the 3 years 8 months of Japanese occupation, when the population went from 1.6 million in 1941 to 600,000 in 1945? Apart from the common fact that tens of thousands were murdered, it was also true that Japan and China have both failed to apologize for their respective massacres.

    - Of course, the Tiananmen Square incident was important to the people of Hong Kong at the time. Here was the Oriental Daily extra: 'Deng Xiaoping is dead! Total chaos in China! 27th Army responsible for the massacre reported to surrender noon today." The source of information? A New York-based dissident publication <Beijing Spring> person received a call from his younger brother who is studying at Peking University and who got the information from a doctor at the Beijing 301 General Hospital. Deng expired at 9:31am.

    Here is Ming Pao ("Number one in public trust") on June 6, 1989: "Li Peng shot: Young armed policeman take revenge for family and country; shot Li Peng dead inside Great Hall of the People's Congress of the People."

    - (Oriental Daily) June 4, 2016. Our reporter interviewed a number of young people in the streets and found out that their knowledge of June 4th 1989 is far shallower than you ever imagine! For example, a secondary school student had never seen the Tank Man photo before. When asked who the students gathered to commemorate, one person said "Li Peng" and another said "Zhao Ziyang." The correct answer was Hu Yaobang. When young people lack even basic knowledge, it would be tough to hold in-depth discussions and adopt positions.

    - You don't need to know anything beyond giving money to the Alliance as soon as possible and as frequently as possible.

    - (Oriental Daily) May 29, 2016. On the 27th anniversary of the June 4th incident, the Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China organized a march under the slogan: "Vindicate June 4th, stop arbitrary arrests, end dictatorship, fight for democracy." The demonstrators started at 3pm from Shelton Sports Ground in Wanchai and arrived at the China Liaison Office at 530pm. The organizers claimed 1,500 participants, while the police said that the peak participation was 780. The number is a new low since 2009. The Alliance said that they are satisfied with the participate.

    Outside the China Liaison Office, Lui Yuk-lin scattered joss money and was warned by the police; Leung Kwok-hung carried a paper coffin, kept three minutes of silence, tossed joss money and was warned by the police; "Captain America" Andy Yung waved the British Dragon-Lion flag for Hong Kong independence.

    When the procession went past the Western District Police Station, the police asked the demonstrators to walk back onto the sidewalk. The demonstrators refused. The police set up a human wall and impeded progress. There was some pushing and shoving. After ten minutes or so, the demonstrators walked back onto the sidewalk.

    - Whenever the Alliance In Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China or the Civil Human Rights Front hold a demonstration/assembly, there appears to be an inevitable discrepancy in numbers. Usually, the police give an estimate and the organization's estimate is X times as much, where X is 2, 3, 4, or even higher. On this occasion, the police said 780 and the organizations said 1500. So the X factor is actually on the low side.

    More interesting is the number of deaths in the June 4th incident.

    Here are the estimates:
    National People's Congress: over 200
    Mothers of Tiananmen Square: over 200
    Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China: over 7,000.

    - (SCMP) Advocating independence with a locked mindset. By Alex Lo. May 29, 2016.

    You give the lunatics and ignoramuses enough rope and they will hang themselves. That may be the best argument not to worry too much about the extreme localist fringe and those who advocate independence for Hong Kong.

    The latest: those who commemorate the June 4 crackdown in 1989 have been denounced as brothel keepers by university student leaders.

    The Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China has become pimps and bawds in a brothel after they themselves were raped, wrote Ng Kwai-lung, head of Shue Yan Universitys student union editorial board. Its task is to lure young girls to be tainted, before submitting them to the gangs and bandits.

    When asked to comment on his immoderate language, Ng hid behind Horace Chin Wan-kan, the father of the Hong Kong independence movement, saying Chin helped him write it.

    Its a bit sad that the head of a universitys student editorial board could not write a commentary by himself. But I believe Ng.

    The violent sex language is characteristic of Chin, who will leave his job at Lingnan University after his contract expires in August. His supporters have hinted at political persecution but anyone who reads up on campus politics knows what his departure is really about. Last year, the university president reprimanded Ng for posting a satirical message in which he advised Hong Kong women to let mainland men fondle their breasts and wash their private parts to provide better service, and Hong Kong men to keep quiet when being shouted at by mainland women. In an earlier incident, Chin posted a message making fun of Chinese University student activist Shek Pui-yins breasts by referring to her cup size.

    Independence-seeking youngsters like Ng dont seem to be terribly independent in any critical or intellectual sense. His and other universities student unions and the Federation of Students are all boycotting the June 4 commemorations this year.

    They say the quarter-of-a-century-old commemoration has achieved nothing, and that Hong Kong people need to think about their own city and not worry about the mainland and those nasty communists. Never mind that June 4 was the pivotal event that split local politics into the pan-democratic and pro-government camps. You know what they say about people who fail to learn from history.

    - (EJ Insight) June 2, 2016.

    A former student activist has questioned the decision of some youth groups in the city to stay away from the candlelight vigil to be held on June 4 in memory of the victims of Beijings 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre.

    Andrew To Kwan-hang, who had served as secretary-general of the Hong Kong Federation of Students (HKFS) in 1989, said it is absurd that people are seeking to boycott the June 4 event on the ground that matters related to China are of no concern to Hongkongers.

    Participation in the event should not be linked with the question of national identity, he said, arguing that broader principles are at stake. 

    The comments came after some student associations in Hong Kong said they will no longer take part in the annual June 4 event that is organized by the Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China.

    To said he is disappointed that HKFS has decided to quit the Alliance.

    Who else will care about June 4 if Hong Kong people dont care? he said, stressing that the students are sending a wrong message by boycotting the event.

    If young people remain indifferent about what goes on in the mainland, it could encourage more brazen acts by Communist authorities, To warned. 

    While student leaders are justified in saying that Hong Kong people should focus on local issues, it doesnt mean that we should ignore the events in China, he said.

    Spending just one day in a year to remember the June 4, 1989 victims should not be regarded as giving higher priority to Chinese democracy compared to Hong Kong issues, To added.

    In other comments, the former student leader admitted that relations between the HKFS and the pan-democratic camp may not be as close now as they had been in the past. 

    HKFS students waged a lot of battles before they chose to step back and let other groups take the lead in organizing activities in Hong Kong to support a democracy campaign in China.

    When HKFS stepped back, the goal was to bring together as many people as possible, To said.

    To said he understands that many young people were disappointed that the 2014 Umbrella Movement failed to yield any result.

    While that may have prompted some student groups to rethink their strategies, it still doesnt warrant a boycott of the June 4 vigil, he said.

    - (Cable TV) This morning somebody posted a banner "Don't forget June 4th, See you in Victoria Park" on Lion Rock. The fire department removed it shortly afterwards.

    - The League of Social Democrats has claimed credit. But they are getting cheaper every day. The banners used to be hung right from the face of Lion Rock peak. Now this one was hung much further down on Lung Cheung Road.

    - If you read more carefully, the banner was actually hung across the street from Phoenix House. Did a resident break curfew and sneak out in the middle of the night to hang this banner?

    (SCMP) May 23, 2016.

    Media tycoon Jimmy Lai Chee-yings Next Magazine was fined HK$3 million by the High Court yesterday for defaming a mainland manufacturer of a herbal shampoo that was once advertised by film star Jackie Chan. The fine was less than 0.5 per cent of the record HK$630 million in damages that BaWang International was seeking.

    Judge David Lok Kai-hong reduced the amount, saying the court had to ensure the damages awarded would not be an impediment to freedom of expression. He also said Next Digital, which owns the publication, could not be held responsible according to mainland law for the news spreading across the border, and that BaWang could not sue for losses in the city suffered by its two Hong Kong subsidiaries instead of the parent firm. But Lok criticised the magazine for its naive and unprofessional conduct in publishing the defamatory article, which claimed that BaWangs shampoo could cause cancer.

    Next Digital said it would consider filing an appeal.

    The article, published on July 14, 2010, claimed BaWangs shampoo contained 1,4-Dioxane, a liquid compound that causes cancer. The shampoo was popular in the city with Jackie Chan promoting its anti-hair-loss qualities in television commercials.

    In a 269-page judgment handed down yesterday, Lok noted that BaWangs shampoo, billed as a Chinese herbal product, had been quite successful in the market, although its sales growth had slowed before the publication of the article in question.

    The court heard earlier that BaWangs revenues hit 930.8 million yuan (HK$1.17 billion) in the first half of 2010, a year-on-year rise of 36.7 per cent, and its profits were up 47.1 per cent. But its share price slumped 14 per cent within a few hours after the Next Magazine article was published.

    Lok said the article had caused serious damage to the reputation of the shampoo manufacturer and made it more difficult for the firm to market its products or to launch new ones. The judge said the report had exaggerated, in a sensational manner, the health risks associated with use of BaWang shampoos. In short, the defendant had adopted a naive and unprofessional approach in reporting the story, he said.

    Lok said the defendant should have exercised greater responsibility and care in ensuring the contents of the article were accurate and unbiased. If they perform their work irresponsibly, which seriously affects the reputation of others, they cannot always put forward freedom of speech as an excuse, he said. But the judge did not find any sinister motive behind the report.

    Apart from paying HK$3 million in damages, Next Magazine will also have to foot 80 per cent of BaWangs legal bill. Next Digital, which also owns Apple Daily, said the court ruling would not have any material adverse impact on its operations or financial position.

    (EJ Insight) May 24, 2016.

    Phew. You could almost hear media maverick Jimmy Lai expressing relief, instead of tearing his hair out. The chairman of Next Digital Group (00282.HK) is still out for HK$3 million (US$386,214) but not the HK$630 million a plaintiff had sought in a defamation case against Next Magazine.

    A High Court judge handed down a HK$3 million penalty judgment for herbal shampoo maker Bawang International (01338.HK) over a Next Magazine report that its product caused cancer. The judgment, which defied expectations, took Next Digital and Bawang on a roller coaster ride.

    Lais flagship went up as much as 7.7 percent after the judgment and closed at 46 HK cents, taking its market capitalization above HK$1.09 billion. Bawang lost a 20 percent gain.

    It was a classic case of financial journalism in which an investigative report can make or break a company.

    Bawang was an investor darling and a direct play on Chinese consumers because it commanded a market share that dwarfed Rejoice at one time before the Next Magazine report. Bawang lost its halo faster than Cinderellas carriage turned back into a pumpkin after midnight. The stock fell more than 90 percent from about HK$6, losing HK$1.54 billion of its value over the next five years.

    Bawang sued Next Magazine six years ago. The trial went on for 39 days until August last year. Apparently, High Court Judge David Lok was not satisfied that Next Magazine produced enough evidence in its own defense.

    But before announcing the verdict, Lok cautioned that he would have to take press freedom into account in assessing the award. He said the size of the compensation might deter the media from doing investigative stories.

    As it turned out, what he had in mind was a small fraction of the consensus estimate of legal experts. The amount is probably not enough to cover Bawangs costs. It was also a less than the political penalty one might expect for a media group notorious for being a pain on the side of the government.

    Before the judgment, there was talk Next Magazine might close its Taiwan business because of deteriorating business environment and the shift to digital publishing. That came with rumors that the 26-year-old magazine could be forced to fold if it lost the case, not that it does not have financial challenges already. Jimmy Lai can thank his lucky stars.

    Now that Next Magazine has survived, he needs to find a way to convince readers to continue to pay HK$20 per copy with much weaker content after a round of newsroom firings. Thats nothing compared with Bawangs problem. It still needs to rebuild the brand even after the company was vindicated by no less than the High Court.

    Internet comments:

    - (Oriental Daily) Judge David Lok said that most of the losses incurred by Bawang were in mainland China where the media covered the Next Magazine report. According to mainland law, the originator of the information is not liable. That was why the judge imposed a trivial fine of only $3 million. People think that this is extremely unfair to the plaintiff.

    - (Oriental Daily) According to estimates by legal professionals, Next Magazine is expected to have to pay as much as HKD 80 million to cover its own legal fees plus 80% of Bawang's legal fees. Senior counsels charges as much as $300,000 to $400,000 per day. This trial lasted 39 days. Senior counsel David Pilbrow and his team will probably charge between $30 to $40 million for representing Bawang, and therefore Next Magazine's share will be $30 million or so. Senior counsel Benjamin Yu and his team defended Next Magazine, and will charge $40 to $50 million.

    - How to cover the $80 million hole? Fire more editors and reporters (preferably those with seniority because their have bigger paychecks). Then Next Weekly will become a $20 16-page advertisement-free pamphlet with these contents: 1 cover page; 2 pages of gourmet/politics from Jimmy Lai; 2 pages of Chip Tso in praise of the United Kingdom; 1 page of freedom/democracy from Martin Lee; 1 page of Cato Institute economics; and the rest being 'investigative reporting' copied from pro-freedom and pro-democracy Facebook pages.

    - I did the arithmetic. Bawang was the injured party. Bawang was awarded $3 million. Bawang incurred legal fees of $40 million, for which Next Weekly pays 80%, so Bawang has to pay $8 million out of pocket. This means that Bawang loses $5 million net as in the injured party in the whole affair. This is logic-defying!

    - (Oriental Daily) Taiwan media are reporting that Next Weekly will cease publication in Taiwan this June. Next Weekly has denied this, but it admitted that they are providing incentives for voluntary resignation. Apple Daily (Taiwan) has also offered the same and 76 employees have applied so far, including three deputy chief-editors.

    - Next Magazine (Hong Kong) is delivered as three books in one: Next Magazine, Eat & Travel Weekly and ME!. It is reported that ME! will cease publication as of June.

    - This trial lasted 39 days and there were many details about how Next Magazine conducts its journalism.

    - (Oriental Daily) The court criticisms of Next Magazine
    -- Next Magazine's reportage on safety standards was illogical, arbitrary and unscientific.
    -- Next Magazine forgot about the duty to be objective and failed to inform the readers that other expert scientists hold different views about safety standards and they thus forced the readers to accept the only safety standard that was quoted in the report.
    -- Next Magazine was suspicious about the complainant Mr. Chen but never verified whether the information provided by the complainant was true.
    -- Next Magazine said on one hand that Bawang was irresponsible, evasive and intransigent. On the other hand, it did not inform the readers that Bawang's position was supported by scientific evidence. This was irresponsible reportage.
    -- Next Magazine accused Bawang of using poor materials in order to maximize profit. This accusation was speculative, and not in the public interest.
    -- The court has reason to believe that no matter how Bawang responded, Next Magazine had made up its mind beforehand that it would call Bawang an irresponsible business organization anyway.
    -- Next Magazine's investigation was irresponsible and its conclusions were inaccurate, simple-minded and unprofessional.

    - (Oriental Daily) Next Media's senior counsel Benjamin Yu said that there is a great deal of controversy about chemicals in shampoo and therefore the court should protect freedom of expression even if the reporting included elements of exaggeration and inaccuracy. The judge questioned whether the media want the license to make inaccurate reports on matter of public interest.

    Bawang's senior counsel David Pilbrow complained that Next Magazine used the terms 'freedom of expression' and 'freedom of press' at least 67 times during its summation in order to divert attention. Pilbrow said that Bawang supports the principles of freedom of expression and freedom of press. However, this case is about the irresponsible reporting by Next Magazine that caused Bawang to suffer huge losses.

    - (Oriental Daily) According to the testimony of Bawang's Chief Financial Officer Huang Xianrong, he received an email inquiry from a Next Weekly reporter about the presence of 1,4-Dioxane in Bawang shampoo at 11am on the day before the article was published. The reporter gave Bawang 4 hours to respond. Huang provided a written response but Next Weekly went ahead to report selectively anyway. For example, Bawang, Rejoice and Acene all told Next Weekly that different countries have different safety standards for 1,4-Dioxane but the article did not mention this fact. Bawang Chief Executive Officer Wan Yuhua told the reporter that the state had analyzed Bawang products and found them to meet safety standards, but Next Weekly only quoted one sentence from Wan Yuhua followed by a rebuttal citing City University associate professor Lam Hon-wah.

    - (Oriental Daily)

    Next Magazine report Lam Yu-ting

    The court verdict document contained a detailed analysis of every step of the reporting process. Three months before publication, Next Weekly received a tip that Bawang shampoo contained 1,4-Dioxane together with a lab analysis report paid for by the tipster. Although there was evidence afterwards that the tipster was connected to another shampoo manufacturer, Next Weekly did not check this out.

    Reporter Lam Yu-ting conducted research on the nature of 1,4-Dioxane. She relied mostly on news reports and not scientific studies. The sole scientific data that she had were the Australian standard of 100ppm. Lam testified that there is no firm conclusion about whether 1,4-Dioxane is carcinogenic and what the safety level is. Lam could not explain why her report stated 10ppm is the safety level.

    The judge also criticized Next Magazine for not reporting Bawang's response at short notice. Furthermore, Next Magazine accused Bawang of using 1,4-Dioxane because it wants to use inferior materials in order to maximize profits. This was baseless. Finally, Next Magazine editors changed the report heading from "Bawang contains carcinogenic substances" to "Bawang causes cancer."

    In conclusion, Next Magazine's reporting methods were far short of the objectivity and responsibility required under the law.

    - (Oriental Daily) During the trial, Next Magazine called on then content advisor Cheung Kim-hung and then chief-editor Lee Chi-ho to testify. These two were the ultimate decision-makers but they held the reporter Lam Yu-ting responsible instead.

    Cheung said that he depended to a large extent on the information collected by Lam Yu-ting. Cheng said that he asked Lam to look up the 1,4-Dioxane safety levels in the European Union, United States, mainland China and Hong Kong. However, he only heard a verbal summary from Lam, he did not read the relevant details and he did not see Bawang's response. Cheung said that Lam did not inform him about many things, such as the opposing views within the scientific community about whether 1,4-Dioxane is carcinogenic or not, and the varying safety standards in the European Union, United States and Australia.

    Lee Chi-ho wrote in his written testimony that he had "carefully gone over the report and verified that the allegations were based upon facts." In court, he admitted that his 'verification' refers to his having read the final version of the report. Lee said that Lam did not show him the information that she had gathered, or the written response from Bawang, or the written responses of the other shampoo manufacturers, or the opinions of the experts. Lee admitted directly that he relied on Lam and Cheung to verify the veracity of the contents in the report.

    As to how "Bawang contains carcinogenic substances" became "Bawang causes cancer" after an editorial group meeting, both Cheung and Lee said that they cannot remember who recommended the title be changed that way. Lee said that the two headings are similar and the latter was chosen because it was simpler and "easier to read aloud." Cheung said that "Bawang causes cancer" does not mean that you will get cancer if you use Bawang products or else Next Magazine would have used "Bawang causes cancer with certainty." The plaintiff said that Cheung was engaging in word games in court.

    - (Oriental Daily) The tipster Mr. Chan provided Next Weekly with a lab analysis report which showed that Bawang shampoo contained 27ppm 1,4-Dioxane. Next Weekly commissioned its own lab analyses of many samples and found that the maximum level was 10ppm. Lam Yu-ting was suspicious of Mr. Chan at first, but she chose to cite 27ppm in her final report.

    According to United States standards, 10ppm or under of 1,4-Dioxane is safe, but an Australian organization NICNAS sets the safety level at 100ppm which is the basis for the European Union, mainland China and Taiwan. However, Next Weekly does not mention the different safety levels and only said that "10ppm is on the brink of danger."

    Lam Yu-ting interviewed doctor Lau Fei-lung who told her that "10ppm or less" is definitely not harmful. However, Lam's supervisor thought that Lau's statement was not good enough and directed her to locate other experts to see if someone would say that "10ppm is on the brink of danger." Lau said that danger does not have a border and it is preposterous to speak of "the brink of danger." Lau said that there is no conclusive evidence one way or the other that 1,4-Dioxane causes cancer in humans and he can only say that 1,4-Dioxane may (or may not) lead to cancer.

    - (Oriental Daily) Hong Kong Poison Information Centre chief executive Lau Fei-lung said that it was dangerous for the media to make partial quotations. Lau said that anything can cause cancer but none can lead to cancer immediately after intake. One can only say that it may increase the likelihood of cancer. Furthermore, the carcinogenic effects of 1,4-Dioxane on humans are unknown at this time. Lau Fei-lung said that he remembered telling the female Next Weekly reporter that 10ppm or less of 1,4-Dioxane is definitely safe, and long-term exposure to 20 to 30ppm should be avoided if possible.

    - (Oriental Daily) City University associate professor of biology Lam Hon-wah was reported to have told the Next Weekly reporter that "10ppm is on the brink of danger, and 20ppm or above is excessive." In court, Lam Hon-wah said that he remembered saying that 20ppm or above is high, but he does not recall or not whether he said "10ppm is on the brink of danger." However, he said that he rarely uses the term 'danger' to characterize such circumstances. Lam Hon-wah in previous press interviews had said that 1,4-Dioxane is safe unless ingested into the body (and not about being present in shampoos).

    Bawang's response to Next Weekly cites the Australian report which said that any shampoo with less than 100ppm 1,4-Dioxane is safe. Reporter Lam Yu-ting said that she does not believe this and therefore she could not put this into her report. Because space is limited, it would be impractical to put the entire Bawang response into the report. She interpreted that the main point of Bawang's response was that products had passed national safety tests and not about the 100ppm safety level.

    Lam Yu-ting said that she did not write the heading of "Bawang causes cancer." When she learned her supervisors chose this title, she checked similar reports from the past and found quite a few which says that certain products cause cancer (e.g. "Johnson's cancer-causing products" and "Brand X cancer-causing luncheon meat"). Therefore she did not object to this heading. She said that she has no dissatisfaction with the published report. She said that the sentence "Bawang used this as a shield and persisted in denying any wrongdoing" has room for improvement in the choice of words.

    - (Oriental Daily) Lam Yu-ting said that she thinks less harmful material should be better than more. While she has doubts about the scientific research, the magazine had only limited space and therefore she chose to write what she believed to be more important. Thus, she wrote about the standard that she personally agreed with and did not write about alternate standards.

    Bawang asked Lam why she spent 1/3 of her article on this background of Bawang but she wouldn't spend 50 words to give the scientific opinions on the other side. Did Lam not want the readers to know that Bawang had met the safety standards? Was her report biased for failing to provide a fair and balanced picture for the readers to decide for themselves? Lam agreed with this characterization of her report.

    Bawang said that Bawang's CEO Wan Yuhua was interviewed by Next Weekly and said that a 1,4-Dioxane level of under 100ppm was safe. But the report said that "Bawang used this as the shield and denied any wrongdoing." Bawang said that the reporter was inaccurate and unfair. Lam said that this was not necessarily inaccurate. However, in retrospect, she agreed that this was unfair. But she was adamant that "refused to admit to any wrongdoing" was not unfair. She said that she cannot remember whether she or some editor wrote those words.

    Lam said that she had some doubts when she received the tip from Mr. Chen. However Chen said that a family member had just died from cancer. She thought that no normal person would lie about the lives of family members, so she believed 100% in Chen. Only after it was revealed today in court that Chen was connected to a competitor of Bawang did she realize that she had been used. She said she was very careful. In retrospect, she should have been even more careful.

    (Oriental Daily) Two days after the Next Weekly report appeared, Bawang received an email from a "indignant person." This person said the complainant Chen Yukong who first contacted Next Weekly about 1,4-Dioxane in Bawang shampoo is the owner of a company that produces the O'Naomi brand for chain stores Watsons and Mannings. After the Next Weekly article appeared, O'Naomi took out an advertisement in Apple Daily that their products are "manufactured in Hong Kong" and therefore "trustworthy." Furthermore, their products do not contain 1,4-Dioxane.

    - Bawang asked for $600 million and got $3 million. This shows that Hong Kong laws will shield libel/defamation. With this precedent, how many companies would want to build products here in Hong Kong?

    - Rule-of-law is one of Hong Kong's core values. This case showed that the rule-of-law is worth (3 million) / (600 million) = 1/200 = 0.5%. You destroy someone's business and you only have to pay 0.5% of the destroyed value in compensation.

    - Hong Kong's big role in One Belt One Road is in providing professional services, especially in the financial and legal fields. When you have a judge rendering such a verdict, it is not clear that people want Hong Kong-style legal services.

    - The judge noted that most of Bawang's sales declines occurred in mainland China. The judge said that he checked mainland law and found out that the originator of inaccurate information is not accountable; only those secondary sources that were directly read by the consumers will be held accountable. Next Weekly is published in Hong Kong. When the article appeared, Next Magazine said that only 24 mainlanders read the article on their website. Therefore the direct damage of Next Magazine on mainland sales is negligible. That is why the judge could not come up with a huge fine.

    Meanwhile the hundreds of mainland newspapers and websites that reported on the Next Magazine article cannot be held accountable because they cannot possibly verify every news story that they repost or cite.

    All this means that it will be easy to commit libel in mainland China. Just use a Hong Kong media outlet to post a sensationalistic story and then the mainland media outlets will report or cite.

    - When the judge said that he checked mainland law before he made his decision, my heart skipped a beat. This is an egregious violation of One Country Two Systems! Hong Kong court decisions should be made based upon Hong Kong law, not mainland Chinese law!

    - Look at the key data points here.

    With respect to safety standards, one standard says 10ppm and another standard says 100ppm.

    With respect to Bawang shampoo's 1,4-Dioxane content, Bawang competitor submitted a lab analysis report of 27ppm while Next Magazine's own lab analysis reports were 10ppm or less.

    Decision #1: If Next Magazine chose to use their own lab analysis reports, there is no story. Therefore Next Magazine must chose Mr. Chen's report.

    Decision #2: If Next Magazine chose to use the 100pm safety standard, there is no story. Therefore Next Magazine must use the 10ppm safety standard while burying the other inconvenient facts.

    That is how those decisions got to be made.

    - Why was Next Magazine so keen on going after Bawang? Politics. Really.

    On one side, Next Magazine is pro-freedom and pro-democracy.

    On the other side, Bawang is a mainland Chinese company which hires actor Jackie Chan as their spokesperson (see Jackie Chan's Bawang television ad).  They hate freedom and democracy, so they must be destroyed.

    - (HKG Pao)

    Here are some strange things that happened after the verdict was announced:

    First of all, Apple Daily announced on its Facebook that Next Weekly chief editor Wong Lai-tong will file an appeal of the verdict.

    Several hours later, Apple Daily "revisited" its Facebook to say that Wong Lai-tong will consider filing an appeal.

    Did the Facebook editor commit a typographic error at first, or have senior management changed its mind?

    Next, we look at Wong Lai-tong's reason for filing an appeal. She thought that even the judge did not believe that Next Weekly maliciously libel Bawang. Later the parent company Next Media Group issued a press release, they said that they may appeal against the assignment of responsibility and the award amount. Next Media did not deny libel, but they thought that $3 million was too high. That was why they are considering an appeal. This is very different from Wong Lai-tong's insistence that they did nothing wrong.

    So this leads to some interesting question: Does not even the Next Media Group senior management believe in the nonsense spouted by the chief editor? Even they don't think that Next Weekly was 'innocent'?

    Even more interesting is the action over at Yellow Media newspaper Ming Pao. In the past, anything over at Next Media is known quickly over at Ming Pao and vice versa. That was why Apple Daily got live coverage of what was happening over at Ming Pao during the firing of Chief Editor Keung.

    After Next Weekly lost the case, Ming Pao immediately estimated that Next Weekly will be paying legal fees close to $100 million. Several hours later, the report was "revised" to say that "the estimated legal fees is close to several tens of thousands of dollars dollars." Please note the erratum: They typed in a corrected version that says "dollars dollars." Why was the editor so careless? Was there total panic at the time?

    No outsiders can know what really happened here. But let me present a fictional story for your entertainment.

    Once upon a time, a certain media organization was suffering from declining revenues and therefore resorted to austerity measures such as mass firings. Then came this libel lawsuit which could involve hundreds of millions in damages. So the senior management told the chief editor: "If you lose this case, you will have to fire more people. You can do the arithmetic yourself and calculate how many firings are needed to cover the costs."

    So after the verdict came out, the chief editor told the public that they intend to file an appeal and also told the ally newspaper: "The legal costs are almost $100 million! How can we not appeal?" She was calculating that it was worth the gamble to save a few jobs.

    But when senior management found out, they were shocked and angered: It was clear that the magazine had committed libel and they were very lucky to be fined only $3 million! The legal fees are huge, but they can only be bigger with an appeal. And is there any chance of winning an appeal!? You know very well what you did ...

    After having some sense slapped into her, the chief editor told the ally newspaper. And then what happened afterwards happened ...

    So do you think that there will be an appeal?

    - (Headline Daily) By Chris Wat Wing-yin. May 26, 2016.

    Three million dollars is a lot to an ordinary citizen such as myself. But it is small change to a large corporation. With three million dollars, Next Weekly boss Jimmy Lai can buy a car, or a part of a yacht. With three million dollars, Next Weekly managed to ruin Bawang's business. It is clear who the winner is.

    In the verdict, Judge David Lok said that Next Weekly was inaccurate and irresponsible, and the reporter was unprofessional and simple-minded in gathering information and writing the report, even intentionally ignoring data that favored Bawang. However, Judge Lok wrote, the monetary award in this case cannot be set too high because it could affect freedom of speech.

    Wow! In the name of freedom of speech, you can destroy someone's wealth and get off lightly. Judge Lok's summation was noteworth: "The law permits journalists to employ a certain degree of exaggeration during the exercise of freedom of speech, but this is not unlimited especially when it comes to investigative reports that involve science and technology."

    I have been working in the news industry for quite a while. It was only today that I learned that the law permits reporters to "employ a certain degree of exaggeration" during their reporting.

    Given that how precious freedom of expression is, I can surely express my personal views about this verdict in the name of freedom of expression, right?

    No. Several months ago, someone at the Hong Kong Bar Association informed the public that anyone who makes inappropriate comments about judges will be guilty of contempt of court. So is this easy going to be considered contempt of court? I am very worried!

    An exaggerated exercise of freedom of expression destroyed someone's business. In court, the judge punished the defendant lightly because of freedom of expression. I express my opinions but I do not have freedom of expression ...

    This is so confusing. So do we have freedom of expression or not? Or does the freedom belong solely in the hands of certain authorities such as judges and reporters?

    - (Oriental Daily) May 30, 2016. Bawang chairman Chen Kai-yuan said: "Next Media attacked us because of what they called the freedom of press or perhaps some other motive. Many consumers would rather believe them than not and they don't use our products anymore. This is what hurts us most." As for fighting a lawsuit in Hong Kong, Chen said that it all depends who can live longer and who has more money. Chen did not say that the monetary award was too small. He only expressed regret, helplessness and despair. The only part that he felt was 'unfair' was when the judge said that mainland media quoting what came out of Hong Kong bear no legal responsibility. Chen said that we now live in the Internet era and any news items can reach all over China in less than 30 minutes. In the present case, the libelous information was over China within one day and then traveled to South East Asia, North America, etc. "We are in the Internet era. It is not appropriate to cite precedents that were set decades ago."

    - Chen Kai-yuan pointed out that this was not just a listed company losing market value. The company had 20,000 employees before the news report, and now there are only 3,000 thanks to Next Magazine and Lam Yu-ting.

    - (Oriental Daily) June 2, 2016. In late 2013, actress Zhang Ziyi won a libel case against Next Media. In an unprecedented move, the High Court also removed the defendants' statement on the grounds that it had no merit whatsoever. The case has lingered on as the court proceedings had not reached the point of determining damages. Now Zhang Ziyi has applied to the court to have a jury to decide upon the award amount. The timing of this motion is clearly linked to what has been happening in Hong Kong courts -- simply put, you can't trust the Hong Kong judges to render an apolitical decision and you count on fellow citizens to exercise commonsense instead!

    (Oriental Daily) May 17, 2016.

    League of Social Democrats members hung up a large vertical banner to demand "the end of the dictatorship of the Chinese Communists" on the base of a bridge under construction in north Lantau Island. Four individuals were arrested, including chairman Avery Ng, vice-chairman Chan Tak-cheung and deputy secretary-general Chow Ka-fat and member Ma Won-ki. The police said that they found two vertical banners at around 1215pm. For the sake of public safety, the police removed the vertical banners. Three men interfered with their actions and were arrested for obstructing the police in the line of duty. One male policeman was injured in the elbow and taken to the hopsital.

    League of Social Democrats vice-chairman Raphael Wong, members Shi Shing-wai and Chow Kim-ho hung a vertical banner with the words "Rescind the August 31st resolution" on a hill slope near the Tsing Ma Bridge. The police arrested the three persons for obstruction of police business.

    League of Social Democrats member Tsang Kin-shing was stopped on the Tsing Yi-Lantau Island expressway and taken to the police station to assist in an investigation. Tsang was released, but his vehicle is being inspected.

    League of Social Democrats legislator Leung Kwok-hung called on all those pan-democratic legislators who attend tomorrow night's banquet to wear yellow clothes, bring yellow umbrellas and tie yellow ribbons at their homes in order to express the demand for genuine universal suffrage.

    Demosisto secretary-general Joshua Wong went to demonstrate outside the Hyatt Hotel. He was surrounded by 30 policemen and he was unable to take any action. Afterwards, Wong said that he did not bring any megaphone or banners and he did not intend to dash out onto the road. Therefore, he is not happy with the police action.

    Demosisto chairman Nathan Law and two others persons stood outside the Hong Kong Cultural Centre and raised three protest banners that said "I want genuine universal suffrage," "I don't want One Road One Belt" and "Self-determination of destiny." The three attempted to charge on the roadway but were quickly subdued by the police. Nathan Law said that the authorities wanted to create a peaceful image of Hong Kong in the name of anti-terrorism, and that was why they intentionally protested against Zhang Dejiang in a non-designated demonstration area to express their demands for democracy.

    Former Scholarism member Derek Lam and two other individuals raised banners and chanted slogans outside Shui On Centre which is within the security zone. The police asked them to leave.

    (AM 730) May 17, 2016

    Demosisto chairman Nathan "Law 37" Law, Lau Siulai and others charged out of the demonstration zone to express their demands. They were subdued by more than a dozen police officers. The police searched some of the demonstrators, recorded their identity information and released them.

    (Sing Tao) May 17, 2016.

    At around 8am, someone posted on Facebook a photo of a vertical banner with the words "I want genuine universal suffrage" hanging down by Mount Parker inside the Lion Rock Country Park. At 9am, a team of firemen arrived and one fireman climbed down to severe the ropes. By 1035am, the banner was removed. Displaying unauthorized advertisements within country parks is subject to a $2,000 fine and/or a 3 month jail term.

    Afterwards, the League of Social Democrats posted on Facebook that their volunteers climbed up Lion Rock this morning and hung down the "I want genuine universal suffrage" banner in order to express the determination of the people of Hong Kong to get freedom and democracy.

    (SCMP) Zhang Dejiang. May 20, 2016.

    I would like to take this opportunity to talk from the heart about my views on one country, two systems and issues related to Hong Kong. These could be summarised in three points. The first is: Do not forget the original intent so that we can achieve the ultimate goal. When Deng Xiaoping (鄧小平) first proposed the one country, two systems concept as a way to resolve the historic issues related to Hong Kong, what he meant was to resume the power to exercise sovereignty over Hong Kong yet retain its characteristics and advantages as much as possible so as to maintain a sustainable prosperity. Whenever we talk about Hong Kong and one country, two systems, we must adhere to the original intent and cannot go against it.

    Here, I would like to talk about a few issues concerning the original intent of one country, two systems, which Hong Kong society is particularly concerned about. One is localism. The moon is bright over my home town; everyone has special homeland feelings. I come from the northeast of China and I love my hometown. I am Chinese, and I love my country. Hong Kong compatriots should be respected for cherishing their characteristic way of life and values. As a matter of fact, some basic principles of one country, two systems include: maintaining Hong Kongs social and economic systems and way of life, Hong Kong people ruling Hong Kong and a high degree of autonomy. These are the best ways to take care of the actual circumstances of Hong Kong.

    Today, there is a very tiny minority of people who intend to defy one country and the central government. They even advocate the independence of Hong Kong. This is not localism, but separatism under the camouflage of localism, which is contrary to the original idea of one country, two systems. I believe the majority of Hong Kong people are aware of this and can judge whether this is a blessing or a curse for Hong Kong.

    The second is about the rule of law. Rule of law is one of the core values of Hong Kong society, and is the cornerstone of social stability. It is also the bottom line of freedom. When the cornerstone is shaken, the bottom line can be redrawn; if so, then how can we maintain the prosperity and stability of Hong Kong? Everyone is equal before the law, no one can act above the law, and no offenders can evade legal sanctions for any reason. We hope that the SAR government and the judiciary will effectively fulfil the sacred duty of maintaining the rule of law while strictly enforcing laws and ensuring fair administration of justice. We must not make concessions to law-violating behaviour. Society as a whole should also severely condemn such behaviour, which clearly touches on the bottom line of the rule of law.

    The third issue is about development, which is Hong Kongs top priority. Hong Kongs international status is determined by its economic status. The peoples quality of life is inseparable from the development of the territory. All walks of life in Hong Kong must have a sense of urgency, and understand that opportunities once lost are lost for good, and that if we stand still, we risk falling behind. Hong Kong people should focus their attention on economic development, on improving livelihoods and on enhancing across-the-board competitiveness. Disputes do Hong Kong no good and only harm the citys efficiency and economy. They waste time and can jeopardise the economy and thus peoples livelihood.

    The second point is about patience. The Hong Kong SAR government has been established for less than 19 years. There has been no precedent for the one country, two systems practice. All aspects of the system and institutional mechanisms need to be refined, and some deep-seated contradictions would gradually emerge after some time. There are objective reasons for this. Some problems have surfaced in recent years after remaining somewhat latent. Some problems are new, and can by no means be resolved overnight. We cannot become doubtful about, or lose confidence in or even deny one country, two systems. There are no obstacles that cannot be overcome. We have the wisdom and the abilities to resolve all problems that arise during the implementation of one country, two systems.

    Hong Kong is a pluralistic society, and there are different voices in society. This is normal. We respect the one country, two systems principle and the Basic Law, and we are willing to listen to opinions and suggestions from all sides in society as long as they are for the good of Hong Kong. We can also carry out exchanges through different channels. Rational and reasonable communication can reduce or even eliminate differences, and foster consensus.

    What is sure is that the three chief executives of the SAR government have done a lot of good work for the development of Hong Kong. Leung Chun-ying, the incumbent chief executive, and the SAR administration led by him have identified the problems. The policies and measures being implemented by them with the aim of promoting the citys economic and social development are taking effect, and have achieved some success. As long as all sectors of Hong Kong have the spirit to set aside disagreements in order to pursue our goals together to realise our dream [Editors note: a line taken from the song Below the Lion Rock], and jointly support the chief executive and the SAR government in their policy implementation according to law, working together, we will gain excellent results and enter a new stage of one country, two systems.

    The third point is to have confidence. First, we must have confidence in the undertaking of one country, two systems. There are three reasons for that. First, one country, two systems is the countrys primary national policy, and is a strategic choice rather than a short-term solution. It will not be changed. Second, one country, two systems has a solid public opinion foundation, and is the main common denominator connecting the mainland and Hong Kong, and thus should not be changed. Third, evidence obtained since the 1997 handover has proven that one country, two systems is feasible, and is a proven good system with no need to be changed. In future, we still need to adhere to the principle, so that Hong Kong can continue to play its unique role.

    The remarks that the mainland government intends to mainlandise Hong Kong and even turn one country, two systems into one country, one system are completely groundless. The majority of Hong Kong compatriots hope that one country, two system can continue as it is, and this is in the best interest of the nation. The central government will continue to steadfastly implement the system, and the Hong Kong community can rest assured of that.

    Videos:

    INT News Channel
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cwuH0hG-MAI

    Resistance Live Media
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0VDQCPlIsP8
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mpNp7LPa8-w
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=InpR-U_WPQg

    Epoch Times
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kmFeW2vni80
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TgyFNeAZBaU
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=muJEMJJY_mg
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2EmksTcGFwc
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ARVPpq0sBQ

    Internet comments:

    - After seven League of Social Democrats members were arrested, the party immediately boasted their actions on their Facebook and reminded people to support their brothers who will be facing prosecution. The localists heaped scorn upon the League of Social Democrats. Chan Sau-wai, the wife of Civic Passion leader Wong Yeung-tat wrote,, "Money is always very important, but we really couldn't ask for donations as soon as our members are arrested." Localist scholar Wan Chin said: "The reason why the government set up the water barricades is to invite those stupid pan-democratic social activist pigs to cooperate by pushing at those barricades and shout some slogans in order to demonstrate that the police defense was effective and necessary ..."

    Wan Chin added that the banner on Lion Rock is a joint project by the government with civilians. Nowadays, the government needs to have a suitable resistance in order to justify their jobs and overtime pay. The permanent pan-democratic social activism supports the soft oppression by the police. Both sides get to rake in a lot of money. By contrast, Wan Chin wrote: "We decided to hold no demonstrations whatsoever because the government has locked down the city. We will let the government embarrass itself."

    The Localists also criticized the League of Social Democrats for putting the initials LSD on their banners in order to gain election publicity. They scorned them for using the incidents to raise money. Meanwhile the League of Social Democrats scorned the Localists for claiming to be valiant compared to the traditional "Peace, reason and non-violence" but always cowering in the rear and eating sour grapes.

    - Hanging large banners in wilderness parks is the kind of juvenile behavior that is similar to writing bathroom graffiti.

    - No, it is not the same. There is no physical danger involved in writing bathroom graffiti, but those large banners pose risks to the people who have to hang them up and those who have to take them down.

    - I note that the banner is smaller than those banners that appeared during the Occupy Central period in 2014. The League of Social Democrats said that this banner was homemade and the characters were written by hand. The 2014 banners were professionally printed. The League of Social Democrats said that their volunteers took the banner up to Mount Parker and not Lion Rock which was patrolled by the police. The 2014 banners were hung down from the peak of Lion Rock by expert mountaineers. There must be an austerity issue here.

    So why is Big Money missing in action? One factor is that this action only has nostalgia going for it with the effectiveness proven to be non-existent.

    - These fucking incompetent nincompoops! The standard slogan is "I want genuine universal suffrage" (我要真普選) in five characters. In the Mount Parker banner, they managed to write the characters for "I", "want" and "genuine" incorrectly with missing or extra strokes.

    - From the League of Social Democrats' Raphael Wong

    I can be scolded for acting stupidly, but acting stupidly will always be better than just talking stupidly without acting. Action is always better than sitting still ... What we doing right now is to bring order out of the chaos and stop the Chinese Communists from causing trouble in Hong Kong and thus making all of us pay the bill!

    - So by hanging out a banner by the hillside, the League of Social Democrats will realize their stated objectives such as

    (1) Stopping the Express Rail Link that will link Hong Kong to the rest of the High Speed Rail in China
    (2) Stopping the completion of the Zhuhai-Macau-Hong Kong bridge
    (3) Stopping the construction of the third runway at the Hong Kong International Airport
    (4) Stopping the One Road One Belt initiative
    (5) Implementing a universal retirement protection scheme
    (6) Nationalizing Link REIT
    (7) Stopping the operation of the Daya Bay Nuclear Power Reactor
    etc etc

    - What has Zhang Dejiang seen before in his political career? He has gone through the Xinjiang riots, he has gone through the Tibet riots, he has seen self-immolations, he has seen attacks on the police and military, etc. So how is he going to be impressed by a hillside banner saying "Stop One Road One Belt"?

    - You don't understand, do you? The target of the demonstrations was never Zhang Dejiang. It is always about getting people to donate more money to the pan-democrats for the Hong Kong legislative council elections.

    - Pounding on your keyboards isn't going to impress Zhang Dejiang either. You aren't going to hurt him a bit with your daily thousand-word Facebook missives. You need to jump off the roof or set yourself on fire to create a stir. But you will have to surpass what has happened in Xinjiang/Tibet.

    - There has been a self-immolation in Hong Kong already. This was documented in the movie Ten Years.

    - You don't seem to realize that Ten Years is fictional. Nobody can make a real-time documentary about events ten years from now.

    - Yellow Ribbon wastrels live in their own fantasy world in which if they can cover the hillsides with banners, they will have won. In the real world, covering the hillsides with banners will only draw criticisms from environmentalists.

    - (TVB) The Civil Human Rights Front could not get near the Convention Centre. They met with a Civil Affairs Bureau official who said that she could try to forward their petition letter to Zhang Dejiang, but she cannot guarantee that the letter will reach him. So Civil Human Rights Front decided that they would rather burn the letter and tell Zhang Dejiang to receive the joss paper.

    - This is a typical manifestation of the symptom known as Leftist Retardism.

    - (Facebook) The Civil Human Rights Front say that they oppose the Chinese Communists, but they want to present a petition letter to a senior Chinese Communist official?

    - Even the police officer found the act of League of Social Democrats member Figo Chan to be amusing. But the police officer had better watch out for the kick to the groin?

    - How are you going to bring down the Chinese Communists? There are 87 million Chinese Communist Party members. If your only effort is to hang out banners and shout slogans every time that some Communist bigwig comes to town, you will never pull it off.

    - Do not be deceived by the 87 million figure. (Epoch Times) "More than 200 million people have quit the Communist Party," said Zhong Weiguang who is a Chinese dissident and scholar of totalitarianism residing in Germany.

    - If you want to go head on against the 87 million Chinese Communists, you can just go across the Shenzhen border post and then you can valiantly resist them. Do not use the fact that you don't have a Home Visit Permit to enter mainland China as an excuse. Causeway Bay Books' Lee Bo was able to enter China using his own method, and so can you. You are just too comfortable pounding on the keyboard from Hong Kong.

    - After watching this type of display for some years, I now find it very boring. I would have loved to see a real battle, with the valiant warriors attempting to breach Zhang Dejiang's defensive cordon by frogmen coming from the harbor, or skydivers jumping off helicopters, or whatever. Instead, I see the same old faces combing their hair first and then make an intentionally futile effort to charge at the largest concentration of police in front of the media cameras.

    - (Initium) May 18, 2016. Zhang Dejiang arrived on May 18 and will stay at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in Wanchai. Demosisto's Nathan Law, Agnes Chow and another student booked themselves into the Harbour View Hotel which is right across the street  from the Grand Hyatt Hotel. The three followed the television news closely. Agnes Chow told our reporter: "I think that we may not even get to take a look at what Zhang Dejiang ... Faced with the large-scale deployment, some people may think that we shouldn't even bother. But we will persist. We will do it even if we know that it is impossible. We want to let the whole world know that there are still many people fighting/resisting for democracy in Hong Kong.

    Zhang Dejiang arrived in Hong Kong at 11:45am on May 17. He was met by China Liaison Office director Zhang Xiaoming, HKSAR Chief Executive CY Leung and others. Meanwhile, Nathan Law, Agnes Chow met up Lau Siu-lai and four other Demisisto members who have checked in separately. At 12:25pm, Zhang Dejiang finished his speech and proceeded by car to the Grand Hyatt Hotel. The intercept action began. Because Nathan Law and Agnes Chow frequently appear in media reports, they assumed disguises this time. Nathan Law took off his glasses and wore a hat; Agnes Chow pulled up her hair, wore glasses and hat. Then they sent out into the lobby to look for opportunities.

    At 12:45pm, Zhang Dejiang's car arrived at the Grand Hyatt Hotel with four police motorcycles leading the way and another thirty to forty police vehicles following behind. When the car passed the road across the Harbour View Hotel, Nathan Law and two other male Demosisto squeezed through the police cordon holding banners that said "I want genuine universal suffrage," "I don't want One Road One Belt" and "Self-determination of destiny" and dashed onto the roadway.

    In less than 10 seconds, more than a dozen police officers tackled two of the Demosisto members onto the ground. Another Demosisto member was surrounded by more than a dozen police officers. The police pressed the three men against the glass door and searched them for weapons of assault.

    At 12:56pm, the motorcade has passed by. The Demosisto people were released after questioning and allowed to return to their hotel rooms. At 2pm, Nathan Law ate a takeout lunch while lifting up his shirt to reveal to our reporter the wounds caused by the police. There were two red marks underneath his chest and his wrists were scratched. Nathan Law said that the action was not a success, but they have successfully communicated a message to the whole world: "Even in the face of such a mass deployment and no matter how difficult it is, we will do everything possible to present a picture for the world to see that some people are still resisting in Hong Kong."

    - Nathan Law says that they want to send the message to the whole world that some people in Hong Kong are still resisting the Chinese Communists. How many are these 'some people'? The population of Hong Kong is 7.3 million. According to the Initium report, the resisters who checked into the hotel are Nathan Law, Agnes Chow, Lau Siu-lai and five unnamed Demosisto members. Three male Demosisto members (including Nathan Law) attempted to rush the motorcade. Eight out of 7.3 million people are 'resisting'. So should we listen to what they have to say?

    - Actually, the more pertinent question is, "Do we know what we want to say?" What is the substance behind the "Hong Kong doesn't want One Road One Belt" slogan"? Why don't you want it? Do you even know what it is? Have you done an economic analysis that suggests that the benefits are small or negative?

    - Did those people who donated money to Demosisto ever thought that their money would be spent on hotel rooms (about $3,000 for May 16-18), food and beverage? And is this effort going to stop One Road One Belt?

    - (Apple Daily) Today People Power member Tam Tak-chi drove around Hong Kong in a van with the sticker "The Hearse for Zhang Dejiang." He drove up to Government House to display banners to demand "Human waste Mr. and Mrs. Zhang Dejiang responsible for SARS deaths yo disclose your mistresses and corrupt fortune." Four police officers came and stopped him. Tam said that he decided to go to Government House instead of Wanchai where 10,000 police officers were deployed. "I want to show disrespect to the SARS murderer Zhang Dejiang!"

    -  The calligraphy for "Zhang Dejiang's hearse" is worse than what a primary school third-grade student can do.

    - Since Zhang Dejiang and CY Leung were both at the Convention Centre, what is the point of going to Government House? If Tam Tak-chi were by himself, he wouldn't have done it. Tam did it only because he got Apple Daily to send reporters to record the incident. Conversely, if Tam did not tell Apple Daily that something was going to take place, Apple Daily would see no need to station a reporter at Government House. So it is a symbiotic relationship between activists and journalists which violates the traditional stricture against journalists creating news themselves.

    - (Oriental Daily) April 10, 2017. On May 18, 2016, Tam Tak-chi (People Power) was driving around in a light van with banners saying that this is Zhang Dejiang's funeral hearse. Today three men pleaded guilty in court. 35-year-old Cheung Ka-kit tried to punch Tam Tak-chi but missed. He ripped the photo of Zhang Dejiang and a banner. The police arrested Cheung, who said: "I saw the photo of Zhang Dejiang on the van. I was upset and I ripped it up." Today Cheung pleaded guilty to common assault and criminal damage of property. Cheung and two other men also pleaded guilty to unlawful gathering. The defense pleaded that the three men were going to welcome Zhang Dejiang to Hong Kong, but they came across this insulting and provocative situation. They acted rashly out of patriotism. The court sentenced Cheung to a $5,500 fine and the other two men to a fine of $3,000 each.

    - Derek Lam (of the defunct Scholarism) said that he petitioned Zhang Dejiang in order to inform him that self-determination of destiny of Hong Kong does not need the approval of China.  If the approval of China is not required, then why are you petitioning Zhang Dejiang?

    - Derek Lam is a theology student at Chinese University of Hong Kong, so it makes sense that his thinking should be muddled.

    - Actually, Derek Lam's logic is very simple and straightforward -- he is petitioning Zhang Dejiang to approve the fact he doesn't need approval. Or something.

    - Here is Apple Daily report on May 18:

    Give me back my right to use the road, I oppose blocking people from going to work

    Well, well, well. Let me replay an episode from Occupy Central:

    (TVB https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1vxUt5QW-yk )

    0:01 (VO)  It's after 7am.  Citizens walk from Admiralty Centre across the pedestrian overpass to go to work at Government Headquarters.  Some demonstrators have used metal barricades and garbage cans to set up a road block to prevent entrance.  This those who have to get to work from there very unhappy.

    0:28 (Male)  I want to go to work one day at a time.  Don't talk to me about those things.  I didn't go to work for four days in order to avoid you people.  To avoid you people.

    0:38 (VO) A janitor had to go through here to work at Government Headquarters.

    0:42 (Elderly woman)  Hey, hey, don't pull.  I have to pass through.
    0:43 (Male)  Grandma, are you going to work?
    0:45 (Elderly woman)  I have to eat.  Make way. Don't hold.
    0:48 (Rico Lo)  Grandma, at this time, everybody ...
    0:50 (Elderly woman)  Do not call me Grandma.  Grandma has to eat.  You don't have to eat.  Yes.  You let me through.  I want to go to work.
    0:55 (Male)  The decision to let people leave but not to enter was made by everybody.
    0:58 (Elderly woman)  A person has to breathe.  A person lives between breaths.  Why don't you spend your time well each day?  Why do you have to cause chaos in Hong Kong?

    1:06 (VO) Ultimately, the demonstrators let Grandma go through by herself.  Afterwards someone else wanted to go through.
    1:13 (Female)  Everyday, I go down this road to go to work.  I am just going to work as usual.  This is a very small and humble request.  I want to man my job post.

    1:25 (VO)  The police showed up and wanted to remove the barricades.
    1:29 (Crowd)  Not allowed to remove!  Not allowed to remove!

    1:33 (VO)  A group of contract security guards also asked the demonstrators to let them pass through.
    1:34 (Male)  You give us a path to go through, alright?  Okay?
    1:38 (Rico Lo)  We really cannot do that.
    1:39 (Male)  Then there is no way.  We have to go to work.  [The security guards pushed the metal barricades back and forced their way through.]
    1:45 (Rico Lo)  Our goal is to paralyze Government Headquarters.  If one person gets in, it means that the Government Headquarters will be back in operation.  Whether we let someone through is another matter.  If you remove these metal barricades, then does it mean that you can also remove all the other metal barricades around Government Headquarters?  This is something that we cannot accept.

    Well, did Apple Daily ever report about these other people opposing being blocked from going to work?

    - Let me make a comparison. During Occupy Central, bus service was halted and I had to take the subway, which was more crowded than usual. So I had to allocate twenty more minutes each day in order to be on time. Today, I took the bus as usual. The Wanchai pedestrian overpass was blocked for a while, because some people wanted to raise "I want genuine universal suffrage" banners on the overpass between 8am and 10am. I entered the office building through the side entrance and I got to work on time. So there you have it.

    - Apple Daily interviewed a restaurant owner who said that his afternoon business had dropped to zero because Zhang Dejiang is in town. He said, "It would be better if Zhang Dejiang didn't come." Other office workers were late for work because the roads were blocked. "Can we sue the police for our lost time and money?"

    That's interesting, because many many more workers were late or lost time/money, and many many more businesses lost income or went out of business during the 79 days of Occupy Central. "Can the citizens and businesses sue the Occupy Central people?"

    - When Zhang Dejiang was in town, at least the subway was still running. During Occupy Central, here is what the subway entrance looked like.

    - League of Social Democrats posts an Apple Daily report that a patient nearly died after the ambulance was stuck in the Eastern Harbour Crossing.  The patient was struggling because his anesthetic was wearing off. Fortunately, the emergency workers brought more anesthetic than normal and was able to inject more. Otherwise if the patient yanks off his breathing tube, he could have died ...

    - Yet another piece of Apple Daily fiction because there is no WHO WHEN WHERE WHY HOW provided at all.

    - If this ambulance was stuck in Admiralty during the Occupy period, the patient would have to wait 79 days before getting to Queen Mary Hospital.

    - Apple Daily was reposting from the HA Secrets Facebook. The patient was originally in the Intensive Care Unit of a Hong Kong Island hospital for carbon monoxide poisoning. He was being transferred by ambulance to the decompression chamber at Stonecutters Island.

    - Please take out a map of Hong Kong. If you want to go from Hong Kong Island to Stonecutters Island, you would be taking the Western Harbour Crossing and not the Eastern Harbour Crossing. When the ambulance set out, it should have all the information of road closures as provided by the police. For large-scale road closures (such as the watching fireworks show by the harbor front), the police even have special car lanes reserved for emergency service vehicles.

    - 22 pan-democratic legislators have signed a petition to Zhang Dejiang with demands to (1) replace the Chief Executive and (2) restart the constitutional reform process.

    The petition to replace the Chief Executive is to ask the System of One Country to intervene and replace the leader of the other System. If the System of One Country can do that once, it will be able to do so again and again in the future. I don't think that this is a good precedent to set under Common Law. This is blowing up One Country Two Systems.

    The petition to restart the constitutional reform should begin where it ended. (#269) The Hong Kong University Public Opinion Programme cooperated with RTHK to interview 1,004 Cantonese-speaking Hong Kong adult residents on June 8-9. From the viewpoint of society as a whole, 50% of the respondents said that they support the Legislative Council passing the constitutional reform proposal while 33% opposed. Liberal Party's James Tien commissioned Hong Kong University Public Opinion Programme to interview 5,043 persons on June 5-14. When asked "Do you support or oppose the Legislative Council to pass the constitutional reform proposal?", 51% supported and 37% opposed.

    The people of Hong Kong (and the United States and the European Union) said "take the deal first because it is an improvement", but the pan-democrats voted against the constitutional reform proposal at the time and that was the end of it. The pan-democrats want to restart the constitutional reform now. What is the point of re-running the same movie? Will the same movie look different next time? The people of Hong Kong do not want to see Central occupied for 79 days again. PLEASE! If the pan-democrats seriously want to have constitutional reform, they should explain how and why it is different this time. Will they take the original deal? Will they insist that their way is the only way but that this time there is a ray of hope (because Zhang Dejiang looks like a nice guy or a steamed-dumpling-eating surrender-monkey or something)?

    - When the pan-democrats put the kibosh on the constitutional reform in June 2015, they promised that the five-step process will be re-started immediately. Nothing of the sort has happened. CY Leung's administration has said that they have no interest in so doing for the remainder of its term, and the next Chief Executive (if not the same CY Leung) will take some time to prepare for another constitutional reform proposal. So the optimistic estimate is 2022 or thereafter. They said so before and the pan-democrats heard them say it. When Zhang Dejiang came to town, it becomes the opportunity for the pan-democrats to make a perfunctory effort against a hopeless situation, as if they have been trying all along but the other side obstructed progress.

    - Only 22 pan-democratic legislators signed the petition? That means the Neo Democrats, the League of Social Democrats, People Power and Raymond Wong Yuk-man refused to join for various reasons (because they are not Chinese, or because they want to overthrow the Chinese Communist regime, or because they say that only armed insurrection will work, etc).

    - (Sing Tao) On radio, Demosisto secretary-general Joshua Wong said that he was uncomfortable with the pan-democrats making a demand to a Central Government official to replace the Hong Kong Chief Executive. He said that such an action would supersede the existing electoral system in Hong Kong.

    - Hong Kong Basic Law Article 45: The Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region shall be selected by election or through consultations held locally and be appointed by the Central People's Government.

    The Chief Executive is appointed by the Central People's Government. If the Central People's Government rescinds that appointment, that Chief Executive is 'fired.'

    - (Headline Daily) When I was in a primary school, there was a student who was very annoying. When the teacher was not around, he was more mischievous than anyone else. He threw the chalk eraser at others, he used foul language, etc. But when the teacher came in, he behaved an angel. He would also report against fellow students who caught his displeasure. The teacher adored him and trusted him, so the teacher punished the miscreants. I didn't like this student, but at least I learned that in order to become an expert on ratting on others, one must gain the trust of the person in charge.

    After the meeting with Zhang Dejiang, Alan Leong came out to say that they complained against CY Leung on behalf of the people of Hong Kong. This reminded me very much of my fellow student. It would seem that the little fellow was much smarter than the pan-democrats.

    At first, the pan-democrats refused to attend the banquet in honor of Zhang Dejiang. Then they agreed to meet with Zhang Dejiang. They stated that they wanted the Chief Executive be replaced. So they enumerated CY Leung's faults right in the presence of Leung and they asked the Central Government to find a replacement. Apart from the discussion of democratic principles, do you think that such action can be effective?

    Democratic Party's Emily Lau argued repeatedly on this point. Now senior Central Government officials are experienced in meeting with other important persons. Even if they meet with foreign leaders to discuss conflicts, they know that each side gets to articulate their own views and that repeated debating over the same views is futile. Instead, the two sides should find a common point to reach a compromise. Therefore Zhang Dejiang told Emily Lau that he did not come here to debate. Afterwards Zhang Dejiang was said to think that the pan-democrats are of poor quality.

    As for Alan Leong saying that nothing was accomplished in the 19 years after the handover, that is going to hurt people's feelings. Do you think that the Central Government will agree with Alan Leong and thus negate all their work over those 19 years? And was Alan Leong trying to criticize CY Leung or the Central Government?

    After Zhang Dejiang met with these pan-democrats, he should know that they are difficult to handle. But he is going to know that it was not CY Leung's personal problem that the pan-democrats are behaving badly. So the pan-democrats may have actually helped CY Leung in front of Zhang Dejiang.

    As I said about that fellow student, if you want your complaints to work, you better put on a good act and gain the trust of the teacher. The pan-democrats are clueless on this.

    Now you may say that the pan-democrats should speak their minds instead of being too calculating. I say that politics is always about pretense. If you want authenticity, you should get out of politics. As representatives of the pan-democrats to meet with the state leader, these four should not be just venting anger. They should have figured what they can gain for their supporters. If the goal was truly the removal of the Chief Executive, then they needed to act as if they have been nice and easy all along but CY Leung was the big bad wolf. If you insist on being authentic, you should have stayed outside and chant slogans for the cameras instead.

    - The Civic Party's Tenth Anniversary Declaration mentioned self-determination. The Democratic Party also wanted to talk about post-2047 self-determination. So how is it that they didn't dare broach the subject in front of Zhang Dejiang? This was their first, and maybe their last, opportunity to say it to a senior Central Government official.

    - A sideshow was that Democratic Party chairperson Emily Lau said that she lost her invitation and needed a replacement. She also said it was peculiar for the invitation to be addressed to Ms. Lau instead of Legislative Councilor Lau.

    - I find it perplexing too that the invitation was not addressed to "BITCH!".

    - Whereas its was unacceptable for CY Leung to tell the mythical Cathay Pacific ground crew member that he should properly be addressed as "Chief Executive Leung", it is unacceptable for Emily Lau to be addressed as anything except "the Honorable Legislative Councilor Lau."

    - P.S. Not to worry, because Emily Lau has retrieved the lost invitation letter from the recycling bin.

    - (TVB) May 18, 2016. Civic Human Rights Front and many pan-democratic parties set off from Southorn Sports Ground in Wanchai to demand a meeting with Zhang Dejiang. They said that the government arrangements have shut down the voices of the people. They demanded that the Central Government to form an independent commission to investigate the June 4th 1989 incident and offer apologies/compensation to the families of the victims. They also demanded to remove the Chief Executive and re-start the constitutional reform process. When the demonstrators reached the Fleming Road overpass to go to the Immigration Department building, the police warned them that the demonstration has to take place at the designated areas. The two sides faced off for about 30 minutes before the demonstrators proceeded to Fleming Road Park to continue their assembly.

    - (Oriental Daily) May 18, 2016. Remember that the Civil Human Rights Front refused to provide a crowd estimate beforehand? This news report said that there were about 30 demonstrators who were accompanied by 30 police officers. Both sides added together would be outnumbered by the journalists.

    Lui Yuk-lin ("Female Long Hair") showed up in a shirt with the snow mountain lion emblem of Tibetan independence, carried a snow mountain lion flag for Tibetan independence and attempted to race towards the Convention Centre. About 20 police officers surrounded her and took her back to the demonstration area. The police warned her that she would be charged with obstruction of police business if she didn't cooperate with them, but they did not take away her flag.

    The Civil Rights Human Front demonstration was outnumbered by 40 Pearl Horizon (Macau) property owners whose land lease is not being renewed by the Macau SAR government and therefore they have come to petition Zhang Dejiang to pay attention to their plight.

    - (HKG Pao) If you pay attention to China news, you will note that radical Xinjiang/Tibet independence persons often take action in crowded places to use knives, guns and bombs to inflict mass casualties so as to express their political demands and gain foreign media coverage. But in Hong Kong, the Demosisto members could only try to rush onto the roadway while holding banners in their hands and be subdued by the police within seconds. They did manage to let their cooperating media (Initium) take an iconic photograph of the Hong Kong police suppressing freedom of speech/assembly. But the subject in the photo is Nathan Law who managed to let the Hong Kong Federation of Students collapse under his leadership. How can Nathan Law be said to represent the people of Hong Kong to present their demands to Zhang Dejiang?

    The political parties were able to gain publicity by all sorts of methods. First of all, League of Social Democrats' Tsang Kin-shing managed to capture the headlines when he tried to get a mainlander criminal friend to buy an aerial drone in Shenzhen. Then fellow League of Social Democrats members hung up banners around Hong Kong. Then Demosisto members tried to rush Zhang Dejiang's motorcade. Then People Power's Tam Tak-chi raised banners outside Government House ...

    - (HKG Pao) Ming Pao ran a story with the heading: "Wanchai: a policeman every few steps, businesses and workers complain about the disruption: Can we get compensated?" The accompanying video showed a woman who spent almost a minute complaining about "the interests of the residents should be considered" and "what has mainland China contributed to Hong Kong?" as if she was reading from an Apple Daily column. If you look at the details of the video, it turned out the road was blocked for only a few minutes. More interesting is the photo illustration. Ming Pao chose a photo of the pedestrian overpass between World-wide House and Exchange Square on Pedder Street, Central District to show that there is one policeman every few steps in the Wanchai District. Central District is separated from Wanchai District by the Admiralty District. How can this be mixed up? What won't Ming Pao do to smear the Central Government?

    - Chris Wat Wing-yin on the causes and effects of a barricaded city.

    I went past the Convention Centre a few days ago and I saw the water barricades already surrounding the place. I went by Wanchai North and I saw the police standing on guard. Some people say that the police are carrying their anti-terrorism act too far. Internet users said that "the security for the Queen of England is more lax than for Zhang Dejiang." The most often conclusion is that "only dictators are afraid of the people" and therefore they used "5,000 police officers to build a high wall to defend against the eggs."

    Since when have Hongkongers become so unreasonable so as to invert cause with effect?

    For example, if thieves come into your shop every day to steal, will you enhance your security measures by installing more closed-circuit television cameras and introduce anti-theft electronic systems? Will your customer tell you that you are alienating them with these security measures? No. If the customer is not a thief, why would he/she mind those cameras?

    For the same reason, if the opposition camp does not use violence all the time to smash glass doors, set trash bins on fire, occupy roads, dig up bricks, seize iron barricades, surround police vehicles, assault policemen, throw spears, blockade roads, imprison people ... why would the police need to mobilize several thousand officers in defense? Over the past several years, how often have government officials not run into clamorous clashes? How often have they not run into people upturning the table and howling? How often have meetings ended violently? Most recently, Carrie Lam could not even finish her summation at a public hearing on the retirement scheme.

    When the opposition camp is increasingly out of control and they come not to express their views but to be destructive in order to gain media exposure, they have become political terrorists against whom the maximum security level is appropriate. Before you criticize the police for disturbing the people, you should ask what is the "cause" for this "effect."

    As for saying the Queen of England did not require this level of security when she came, you are being ignorant. Do you know why the British royalty didn't need water barricades? The colonial administration's Political Department had already arrested or disappeared all the dissidents already. However, the Hong Kong Police today do not have the ability to do that, so they have to erect water barricades instead.

    - (Hong Kong Free Press) May 25, 2016.

    Civil rights groups have urged the police force to apologise for the nuisance caused by the strict security measures implemented for the visiting Chinese state leader Zhang Dejiang last week.

    The groups said that the anti-terrorism-level security standards meant that Zhang was unable to hear the voices of Hongkongers. They called upon the police to review their procedures, saying that the measures seriously affected peoples daily lives and even hindered their rights.

    Some 8,000 police officers were mobilised during the official visit and some 200 water barricades were set up. Roads were blocked at places where Zhang visited and a nearby construction site halted all work. Glue was applied on pavements bricks to prevent them from being picked up and thrown whilst officers set up tents on Lion Rock to prevent protest banners from being hung.

    - (Sky Post) By Chris Wat Wing-yin. May 25, 2016.

    On television a passerby in Wanchai was shouting into the camera: "There are water barricades everywhere. I had to take a detour to get around them. It took me 3 to 4 minutes more than usual. Is this necessary to have the soldiers enter the city ..."

    This is remarkable. The two highlights are "the soldiers have entered the city" and "3 to 4 minutes." So the massive injection of soldiers ended up delaying people 3 to 4 minutes? How much time is that? The same time needed to wait for a pedestrian red light to change to green (or face a $2000 fine if you cross against that light), or wait for an elevator to arrive, or wait for a bus.

    I wonder if this person actually spent time at the scene. A friend who works in Wanchai said that the place was the least crowded during those three days when Zhang Dejiang was in town. Why? Because everybody thought it would be crowded so nobody drove in. I drove from Kwai Fong to Wanchai and it only took me 15 minutes. Even the perennially crowded Harbour Crossing Tunnel was not congested.

    Yes, some roads were blocked and some people have to take detours. But this went on for only 3 days, and the roads were blocked typically for just one hour when Zhang Dejiang was on the move. If you are going to whine about this, then why how did you put up with 79 days of total paralysis during Occupy Central?

    Compared to Admiralty, Mong Kok and Causeway Bay during the Occupy period in 2014, we should not be complaining about road blocking and detours. If you complain, you have no response to the counter-question: "So is this worse than the 79 days of Occupy Central?"

    - 79 days times 24 hours per day times 60 minutes per hour = 113,760 minutes. How would you like to be delayed 113,760 minutes, as compared to "3 to 4 minutes"?

    - (Wen Wei Po) May 19, 2016.

    For his meeting with Zhang Dejiang, Alan Leong (Civic Party) told everybody to check out his yellow tie.

    - Oh, Alan Leong, you are so brave and courageous for daring to wear a yellow tie!

    - Pardon me, but I think that this is too radical for me. When I saw the photo, I almost wet my pants because you really scared me. If it weren't for my superior bowel control, I would have lost it. You are truly powerful and you should start worrying about injuring someone's eyes when they see your yellow tie.

    - Dear Senior Counsel, can you please explain what your yellow tie is going to accomplish for us? Universal suffrage with civil nomination? Halting One Road One Belt? Dismissal of CY Leung as HKSAR Chief Executive and appointing you as his replacement?

    - Can you stop being so fucking stupid?

    - Is mental impairment a requirement to become a Senior Counsel? The whole Civic Party is like this!

    - If you want to go Yellow, then why not go all the way? Get yourself a yellow suit, yellow shirt, yellow belt, yellow handkerchief, yellow socks, yellow shoes and yellow underpants. P.S. Don't forget to dye your hair yellow, so you will look like a yellow banana (yellow outside, white inside).

    - (Oriental Daily) Former Chief Secretary Anson Fong showed up to meet with Zhang Dejiang wearing a yellow jacket. During the whole 20 minutes of Zhang's speech, she did not applaud.

    - Cyd Ho (Labour Party) wore a gold umbrella pendant to meet with Zhang Dejiang.

    - All things yellow: yellow kites, yellow ties, yellow pendants, yellow earrings, yellow bras, yellow panties. Resist all the way!

    - (SCMP) Hong Kongs pan-democrats need to decide if they want reform, or a revolution. By John Chan. June 7, 2016.

    During National Peoples Congress chairman Zhang Dejiangs (張德江) visit to Hong Kong, all legislators were invited to a welcome dinner. Pan-democratic lawmakers boycotted the event, claiming it did not offer sufficient opportunity for in-depth dialogue. This excuse is laughable.

    Such an occasion is not intended for dialogue. Pan-democrats were invited because of their constitutional status, not for what they have to say.

    During the colonial era, lawmakers invited to a formal dinner for a visiting British prime minster wouldnt use such a childish excuse; they would refuse to attend to signal disapproval of the administration. Thus, pan-democrats should have admitted they were boycotting the event.

    That aside, four pan-democrats did attend a cocktail reception held beforehand. One, Alan Leong Kah-kit, came out in high spirits, saying he had lodged a complaint with Zhang against Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying and requested that Leung be replaced.

    By openly asking the No 3 in the Chinese government to interfere in Hong Kongs affairs, Leong did something not even pro-Beijing politicians would try. One pro-democrat commentator said: To suggest to Zhang Dejiang to dismiss and replace the chief executive amounts to accepting that the central government has final say in the election of the chief executive. If this is the case, does this not mean one country, two systems exists only in name?

    This is the heart of the pan-democrats predicament. They are anti-communist (no big deal) and refuse to accept the reality that the communist government has a dominant role in local politics (again, no big deal) yet they are reluctant to give up their privileged position in the political order they so despise. With separatists now advocating cutting ties, pan-democrats cowardice has been exposed.

    Pan-democrats said their meeting with Zhang served to establish their constitutional status. This is naive. As it is, all lawmakers have a recognised constitutional status. Why did it take a meeting with a top Beijing official to confirm this? They seem reluctant to accept there are limits on what they can achieve under one country, two systems.

    They have yet to decide whether to be revolutionaries, like independence-seekers who denounce the existing order; or reformists, working within the existing structure. They should remember: if they want to start a revolution, they cannot be politicians. In any representative government, there can only be three outcomes: win, compromise or accept defeat with grace.

    It is a pity they forgot these rules last year, over the electoral reform package, and got dragged into following the lead of radical students. Since then, a small faction has embarked on the dangerous path to self-determination. Pan-democrats have yet to find a clear direction.

    - (Apple Daily) Actor Shiu Chung-han has been making Facebook posts to express his outrage at Zhang Dejiang. Yesterday Shiu told our reporter: "On the first day of his trip, my wife was going to work at Harbour Road. Even the parking garage was inaccessible so she had to pay for day parking elsewhere. It is not a matter of money. This is about inconveniencing people. Actually Zhang Dejiang may not be the problem, because they are not against inconveniencing people on the mainland too. But I don't understand what Hong Kong is worried about? The person who made this decision was narrow-minded and shortsighted. He fawned on on the wrong person and showed poor leadership to stage this show for the mainland to watch. The international media can see this, and this is an embarrassment for all of Hong Kong. As a Hongkonger, I am embarrassed. I am old enough not to be afraid of saying this." Shiu said that he loves Hong Kong and he loves China. But after these few days, he is thinking about leaving Hong Kong with his wife. "I like the Hong Kong of he past. I am a Hongkonger. That is, my name is Shiu and not Chen or Wang. After the past few days, I am thinking about immigrating after speaking to my wife."

    - During Occupy Central, people couldn't park in Admiralty for 79 days in a row. Some people had parked their cars in the CITIC parking garage and could  not use them for the next 79 days! According to Shiu's standards, anyone who gets 'inconvenienced' for three days is going to immigrate. Then there shouldn't be too many people left in Hong Kong by now.

    - (Bastille Post) At the meeting with Zhang Dejiang, the pan-democrats kept saying that CY Leung should not be re-elected. A pro-establishment legislator said that he is appalled by this kind of talk because they really should not be stopping someone from entering an election. Supposedly Zhang Dejiang enjoyed this riposte.

    After listening to Zhang Dejiang's speech, Democratic Party chairwoman Emily Lau said: "You say that you are satisfied with the performance of CY Leung and the Hong Kong SAR government, but many people outside are unhappy." Zhang Dejiang replied: "I am not here to debate you today. I am not interested in a war of saliva with you. I am not here to convince you. I will listen to what you say, and I will say something for you to listen to. Hong Kong is a diverse society." Zhang Dejiang added: "If there anything wrong in what I just said? Can you please tell me?" Lau did not respond.

    - Why do they talk about as if Zhang Dejiang has the right as well as the power to decide who becomes the Chief Executive? You can't possibly think that it is true? And if it is true, then shouldn't you be doing everything possible to eliminate his right and power for the sake of genuine democracy?

    - (Wen Wei Po) May 19, 2016.

    When National People's Congress Standing Committee chairman Zhang Dejiang came to Hong Kong, the various radical localists were busy criticizing the traditional pan-democrats as well as attacking each other. After all, this is a good time to get media attention.

    So the Localists attacked the traditional social activists of League of Social Democrats for "stupid" activities such as hanging out banners while the League of Social Democrats accused the radicals for being missing in action.

    Hong Kong Indigenous spokesperson said on his Internet program that because he does not want One Country Two Systems to work or to accept any Basic Law framework, his group will ignore the presence of Zhang Dejiang and hold no protests during this period.

    Meanwhile, Passion Times (the party organ for the Civic Passion party), posted: "According to secret information, Civic Passion stalwart Wong Yeung-tat is actively contacting people to form an Iron Blood team of 30 people to cause a bloody clash at the Convention Centre on May 18. Wong said that 'I will do this even if I get arrested.'"

    After the report appeared, the traditional social activists heaped scoren upon Civic Passion. They said that the presence of 'I will do this even if I get arrested' is proof that this was another piece of fake news because Wong Yeung-tat has always let others get arrested. They accused Civic Passion of 'leaking' a fake story and then announcing that the action was canceled due to the leak.

    Civic Passion attempted to divert attention by showing up in Sheung Shui to set up a street booth on Sun Kong Street. They claimed that the parallel traders disappeared when Civic Passion came. But Internet users thought that this was hilarious. They said that it was reported early in the morning that that the authorities were conducting a massive sweep of parallel trading activities in Sheung Shui and so the usual parallel traders had vanished already. So Civic Passion merely showed up in an empty space and claimed credit. At the same time, Wan Chin (part of the Civic Passion/Proletariat Political Institute/City-State alliance) had earlier said that the anti-parallel trade protests were a plot that their supporters should not take part in. So it is hilarious that Civic Passion would be doing just that.

    - (Passion Times) https://www.facebook.com/passiontimes/videos/1114397705290062/ Valiant resistance campaign in Sheung Shui

    - 'I will do this even if I get arrested' isn't Civic Passion practice. They've always told their people (1) not to get injured and (2) not to get arrested.

    - They typed up a Word document of the confidential report and posted a screen capture of that document. How did Passion Times ever got a copy of this confidential report?

    - If Civic Passion thinks that the League of Social Democrats is stupid, then why don't they come out and show us how to do it correctly? Instead, they stay inside their air-conditioned homes and pound on their keyboards to carry out their resistance campaign.

    - When the North District Parallel Imports Concern Group called their demonstration, Civic Passion was missing in action because they knew that 500 police officers were assigned. When Zhang Dejiang came, 6,000 police officers were assigned to the Wanchai area, so this was the moment for Civic Passion to protest in Sheung Shui because the police presence must be reduced up there.

    - On Lunar New Year's Day, the localists came out to support the fish ball vendors and chanted "Down with the Communists!" So now that the number 3 ranked Chinese Communist is in town, what do they do? They go and fight the absent parallel traders in Sheung Shui.

    - After the Lunar New Year riot, the radical localists say that they always stand on the side of the resisters. After the League of Social Democrats protested against Zhang Dejiang, all the radical localists did was to heap scorn and abuse upon LSD.

    - (NOW TV) A dozen of so Civic Passion members assembled on Sun Kong Street in Sheung Shui. They raised banners and demanded a crackdown on parallel traders. Before the demonstration started, the police stopped them because no application was made beforehand. There were quarrels and physical contacts. More police reinforcement arrived. The demonstrators were allowed to proceed after mediation. Some stores lowered their gates while the demonstration was in progress.

    - Here is a quiz: Which situation is likely to deter potential customers from entering your store? A policeman standing outside? Or Civic Passion members congregating outside?

    - (RTHK) Demosisto members Joshua Wong, Oscar Lai and two others were arrested for attempting to stop Zhang Dejiang's motorcade. They charged onto the roadway coming out of the Eastern Harbour Crossing, but they were immediately stopped by policemen at the scene.

    (SCMP)

    Five young activists, including Joshua Wong Chi-fung, were released on bail late Thursday night after getting arrested as they attempted to get close to state leader Zhang Dejiangs motorcade on Thursday, the last day of the state leaders visit to Hong Kong. The five Demosisto members said the arrests were clearly politically motivated, criticising also that the force had raided their homes to collect evidence.

    We think the arrests are political arrests. The police have abused their power, said Wong after his release outside Kwun Tong police station. The [police] did that when Zhang Dejiang was in Hong Kong because the government is afraid of the peoples voices. Demosisto will not give up and will continue to fight together with everyone.

    Wong and his fellow Demosisto members, Nathan Law Kwun-chung, Oscar Lai Man-lok, Benny Ng and Chow Cheuk-kiu, attempted to get near to Zhangs motorcade as the vehicles were exiting the Eastern Harbour Crossing on the way to an elderly centre in Tseung Kwan O. They were quickly subdued by police officers while chanting End one-party dictatorship and Self-determination for Hong Kong people

    The five were arrested on suspicion of disorderly conduct in a public place and obstructing police officers in execution of their duty. They were released late Thursday night about 12 hours after the arrests.

    Law said their actions were too minor to warrant being detained for so long. He said police had subdued the five in order to create an illusion to Zhang that the people of Hong Kong were satisfied with the performance of the citys government. Our powers are small. But we have done our best to try to stand in front of Zhang Dejiang to tell him [about] Hong Kong peoples pursuit of democracy, Law added.

    - Today the Kwun Tong Bypass was completely paralyzed because of one person. Here is the video of the congestion: https://www.facebook.com/ArmChannelTV/videos/871411186321623/

    - The video always tell the truth. But that one person is not Zhang Dejiang as you might suppose. The congestion was caused by Demosisto people running onto the roadway outside the Eastern Harbour Crossing! Now that would be completely consistent with their socio-pathological attitude of Occupy Central.

    - Best news photo of the year:

    - Joshua Wong objected to being accused of stopping traffic because he said that he was on the pedestrian walkway and never stepped on the roadway. Here are the photographs from the photographers that he invited to record his actions.

    P.S. Joshua Wong also said that the police is holding his mobile phone as evidence, and it will be months before he can get it back. So you better donate even more money to him to buy another iPhone 7.

    - Over the past week, there were many news reports about strict enforcement of traffic rules (such as walking against the pedestrian red light, jaywalking, etc). People reminded each other to follow the rules, because we can be fined $2,000 for any violations. These photos are ironclad evidence that certain people have violated the traffic rules and they should be fined $2,000 immediately, apart from any other charges to be investigated.

    - Hong Kong Police Force Pedestrian traffic offenses that the police will strictly enforce: climbing over fence and jay walking; disobeying pedestrian red light signal and traffic signs; crossing without 15m of pedestrian crossing facilities. In 2015, there were 81 pedestrians killed, 790 serious injuries, 2642 slight injuries.

    - Apple Daily posted this video at first but deleted it later because it was politically inconvenient: https://www.facebook.com/csking.chan/videos/1078093992256634/ and https://www.facebook.com/HKYDS/videos/624420721059164/ . What happened was that an innocent citizen happened to walk by as the Demosisto folks tried to rush on the roadway.  This bystander was arrested and he made a phone call to explain why he would be late for work. A policeman confirmed to the bystander's boss that this was the case.

    - Another video https://www.facebook.com/NathanLawKC/videos/675406685944001/ by a shaky amateur cameraman.

    - (HKG Pao) The police took Joshua Wong back to his Ap Lei Chau home to gather evidence. In one photo, two policemen escorted Wong who has his hands behind his back. You would think that Wong was handcuffed behind his back. But the TVB camera followed the three and also showed the view from the back. Joshua Wong's hands were free. He was just posing as if he were handcuffed!

    - On this 50th anniversary of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, the proper way is this:

    Marshal Peng Dehuai

    - (SpeakoutHK)

    Joshua Wong: "Why are you still demonstrating?" I think that we want Zhang Dejiang to realize one thing: what he needs to listen to is not just the demands from the legislators, but the demands of the people of Hong Kong.

    Female radio host: If you were invited, what would you say?

    Joshua Wong: If there were such an invitation, I think that as far as I am concerned, I will choose not to attend.

    [You want Zhang Dejiang to listen to you, but you refuse to see him?]

    Joshua Wong: Demosisto is a political group that is more focused on street resistance. In the end, we were able to be very successful.

    Female listener: I want to ask the young people. When you charged onto the roadway that day, what was it for? You want to meet with Zhang Dejiang and express your opinions. Therefore I don't think that there is any problem with the pan-democrats going to see Zhang Dejiang to express their opinions.

    - (Bastille Post) Summation of how the Central Government succeeded:

    (1) The Central Government has established the practice of "inspection." Zhang Dejiang declared that he was here on an inspection tour. He went to Government Headquarters to listen to the reports by senior HKSAR government officials on the implementation of One Country Two Systems and he issued directives.

    (2) The Central Government held the power. A senior Central Government official came to Hong Kong to communicate with Hongkongers using an acceptable format. Zhang Dejiang articulated the warning against wrong ideas such as Hong Kong independence, self-determination, etc.

    (3) The Central Government reminded the people of Hong Kong that running the economy is like paddling a boat up the river. Either you move ahead or you fall behind. Zhang Dejiang called for Hongkongers to unite, or else they will pay the bill together.

    These are the three main points, and not the meeting with pan-democrats. In that meeting, the pan-democrats could not grasp the circumstances and started to make complaints about CY Leung with Zhang Dejiang. Democratic Party's Emily Lau tried. Zhang Dejiang replied. Lau persisted. Zhang lost his patience and told her, "I did not come to Hong Kong to have a war of saliva with you" and asked "Is there anything wrong with what I said? Please point it out to me?" Lau did not say anything more.

    Civic Party's Alan Leong was even worse. He said that nothing positive at all came out of the 19 years after the handover, and One Country Two Systems was not implemented. In so saying, he has completely negated all the policies of the Central Government with respect to Hong Kong.

    The pan-democrats have made a misjudgment. In their meeting with Zhang Dejiang, they only know how to repeat their slogans. The meeting should have been conducted at a different level.

    - (Sky Post) By Chris Wat Wing-yin. May 20, 2016.

    Like many Hongkongers, I would have like to know what the four pan-democrats were like when they met a Central Government official behind closed doors.

    Why doesn't the Journalists Association come out to complain about this suppression of the freedom of press? Why didn't the four pan-democrats make a secret recording as per the Hong Kong University Council meetings? Compared to the internal squabbles within HKU, this ice-breaking meeting between the pan-democrats and the Beijing official is much more significant for the people of Hong Kong. The people of Hong Kong have the right to know.

    I heard that during that one hour, Emily Lau did not scold anyone and Alan Leong did not smirk. The NPCSC chairman said: "I am not here today to debate with you. I am not here to fight a battle of words. I don't need to convince you. Today I will listen to what you say and you should listen to what I have to say. Hong Kong is a pluralistic society."

    Normally the four pan-democrats would have risen up in anger, glared, growled and turn the table upside down. But this time they were very tame. When they came out, they boasted that they communicated well and looked forward to further contacts. No wonder China Liaison Office director Zhang Xiaoming had to interject: "The last time I invited you to dinner, you didn't come."

    So when there is no camera, the pan-democrats' show is off.

    Maybe it was because Zhang Dejiang is ranked high in the party/government hierarchy and he speaks putonghua. The four pan-democrats were intimidated, because they couldn't understand everything that Zhang said and they were inarticulate in putonghua themselves. So there went 19 years of bitterness and hatred right out of the window. In the end, this meeting served only thing --- it boosted the re-election of CY Leung.

    The pan-democrats were about 1/10-th of what they are normally like. But that was bad enough already. Zhang Dejiang talked to them for one hour. He finally understood how hard life must be for CY Leung. He was probably thinking: "I want to die after one hour of this. How could CY live with them for four years?" Suddenly the NPCSC chairman appreciated the Chief Executive much more so than ever before.

    (SCMP) Drone plot foiled ahead of Zhang Dejiangs Hong Kong visit. May 16, 2016.

    A man arrested over an alleged plot to use a drone to disrupt a state leaders Hong Kong visit was asked to buy the device by veteran local activist Tsang Kin-shing.

    Shenzhen police on Sunday said they had arrested five people two of them from Hong Kong and the others from the mainland over the alleged plot, just two days before Hong Kong hosts state leader Zhang Dejiang under the highest security alert.

    One of the Hongkongers, identified as a 56-year-old man surnamed Guo, was said to be helping a member of Hong Kongs opposition to cause a nuisance. He was described as a long-time sponsor of the opposition camp and had procured a drone for the opposition figure, only named as Tsang.

    Last night, Tsang Kin-shing confirmed he had asked some friends, including Guo, to buy a drone from the mainland a month ago. Tsang, a former lawmaker and now a member of the League of Social Democrats who is known as The Bull, said he had thought of using a drone for protests, not just for Zhangs visit.

    (Oriental Daily) May 15, 2016.

    The Shenzhen Public Security Bureau notified the Hong Kong Police this morning about the arrest of an crime organization led by a 56-year-old Hongkonger named Guo Huachang. Guo was alleged to be buying/selling Hong Kong ID cards for use in credit card fraud, telecommunications fraud, money laundering and unlicensed business operations.

    Guo also confessed that he has been supporting Hong Kong opposition figures, including being asked by Hong Kong opposition member Tsang Kin-sing to purchase an aerial drone to disrupt the Hong Kong visit of Central Government representatives.

    In the afternoon, League of Social Democrats member Tsang Kin-shing told the press that he is not connected to the case, that he does not know anyone by the name of Guo Huachang and that he has not asked anyone to purchase an aerial drone in Shenzhen. Tsang said: "Why would I have to buy it in Shenzhen when it is available in Hong Kong." Tsang said that he had no plans to buy an aerial drone while National People's Congress Standing Committee chairman Zhang Dejiang is in Hong Kong. Tsang said: "I don't know how to operate an aerial drone."

    In the evening, Tsang Kin-shing revised his statement. He said that he did ask Guo Huachang to purchase an aerial drone for him. Tsang said that at first he was unaware that Guo Huachang is the real name of Kwok Tinloy whom he met first during the 1989 activities of the Alliance To Support Patriotic Democratic Movements in China and met up again during Occupy Central. Early this year, Guo donated several thousand dollars to Tsang's district office. Tsang said that he always wanted to use an aerial drone to demonstrate and not just specifically against Zhang Dejiang. Earlier this year, he asked friends (including Kwok Tinloy) to locate an aerial drone for him. He wanted to maintain secrecy on the operation, and so he issued a denial when he was first asked in the afternoon. Later he realized that this was a serious matter because the mainland authorities want to link the aerial drone with the other illegal activities of Guo. Therefore Tsang decided to come out with a clarification.

    Meanwhile League of Social Democrats member Tam Takchi posted on Facebook on May 9 that he was looking for remotely controlled helicopter plus a pilot but he did not state the purpose. Tam said that he wanted to use a drone to carry banners to demand universal suffrage for Zhang Dejiang to see. Tam said that he did not ask anyone to purchase an aerial drone for him in Shenzhen.

    Internet comments:

    - (Oriental Daily) May 15, 2016.

    In 1994, Guo Huachang ran unsuccessfully for District Councilor under his original name of Kwok Tin-loy. From 1994 to 1997, he set up a shell company and used the information from his wife, friends and collaborators to purchase insurance. These insured persons would run into work-related injuries while on company business in mainland China. In total, he defrauded 8 insurance companies of $340,000 in false insurance claims. His cohorts later denounced him to the ICAC. In 2000, Guo was sentenced to 2 years in jail.

    After Guo got out of jail, he joined up with his elder brother to look for candidates who filed insurance claims of work-related eye injuries. Some of these candidates were suffering from problems such as glaucoma already, but two of them had perfect vision. Guo convinced the two to undertake minor surgeries by mainland doctors in order to sustain injuries. Those two would lose vision in one eye permanently afterwards.

    The second case was tried in 2007. The judge said that Guo Huachang was involved in 14 separate cases with the same modus operandi. "You are smart and you have good organizational skills, but you are using it for criminal purposes" to lure economically disadvantaged mainlanders to injure their bodies in order to defraud insurance companies. The judge sentenced Guo Huachang to 4 years 3 months in prison because he pleaded guilty and testified against the others.

    - In the prior cases, Guo Huachang has always turned state witness in exchange for leniency. I wonder what he is going to spill this time?

    - Guo Huachang is 56 years old. If he gets sentenced to 10 years in a mainland jail, his life is effectively over and done with. At this time, he needs to hire a fiction writer to write a confession to all manners of crimes by the Hong Kong opposition.

    - The Localists say that everything in China is fake and/or rubbish. But when the time comes to buy an aerial drone, they find that the market is dominated by Shenzhen-based DJI. The body/wallet is more honest than the heart.

    - Why buy an aerial drone that is MADE IN CHINA? Because we know that you don't have to build a bomb with it! The thing will explode on its own!

    - Tsang Kin-shing said that he needed to maintain secrecy and therefore his immediate response was to deny everything. Who is the bigger liar? CY Leung or Tsang Kin-shing?

    - The initial press report gave the name of the opposition figure as Tsang X Sing. Immediately Internet media outlet HK01 began to speculate whether this was Legislative Council chairman Tsang Yok-sing or his brother Tsang Tak-sing. Hey, wake up! The Tsang brothers are in the pro-establishment camp and not the opposition camp.

    - The Shenzhen Public Security Bureau displayed 815 Hong Kong ID cards as part of the evidence collected for the case. What are the cards used for? To register voters in Hong Kong, of course!

    - (HKG Pao) According to reliable information from Shenzhen, Tsang Kin-shing told potential suppliers about the requirement that the drone should be able to carry three bottles of 1250 ml Coca Cola (which weighs 4.075 kilograms by our measurement). One source said: "Tsang's requirement was not easy to meet. We obtained a drone. It can carry 1 bottle of Coca Cola. It began to wobble with two bottles. It wasn't able to take off with three bottles." This explained why Tsang had to go outside of Hong Kong to because those drones available in Hong Kong could not meet the requirement.

    Tsang obviously has no intention of using a drone to transport Coca Cola. We asked Tsang and he said: "If I am going to buy a drone, it obviously must carry a payload!" He explained that he wanted the drone to carry a vertical banner and that no violence would be involved.

    - Other 'drone attacks':

    (USA TODAY) October 9, 2015.

    U.S. Park Police confiscated a drone that crashed on the Ellipse near the White House on Friday and issued a citation to the operator involved.

    Howard Solomon III of Washington, D.C., was cited with launching, landing or operating an unmanned aircraft in a restricted area, park police said. The citation carries an $85 fine, police said. Reached by phone Friday, Solomon told The Associated Press that he had been trying to take pictures of the monument and that the wind blew the drone across a street that divides the Ellipse from the grounds of the Washington Monument. I was just flying trying to take pictures of the monument, he said of the aircraft that officials said could be bought for about $65.

    Drones are prohibited in Washington, D.C., because of security around federal buildings and safety concerns about flying over people and around other planes.

    The Federal Aviation Administration announced a 'no-drone zone' campaign in June to reinforce the prohibition. People who violate the ban could be fined up to $25,000. The ban covers everywhere within a 15-mile radius of Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.

    Another drone crashed in January on the White House grounds. No charges were filed in that case, which was considered accidental by an operator who lost control of a drone from a nearby apartment building. But the incident raised security concerns about how to protect the White House, Congress and other important buildings from the threat of a drone carrying weapons.

    (The Guardian) April 22, 2015.

    Japanese authorities have launched an investigation after a small drone reportedly containing traces of radiation was found on the roof of the prime ministers office, sparking concerns about drones and their possible use for terrorist attacks.

    No injuries or damage was reported from the incident on Wednesday. The prime minister, Shinzo Abe, who is at present in Indonesia, works at the building during the day and commutes from his own private home roughly 15 minutes away. Police said it was not immediately known who was responsible for the drone.

    The chief cabinet secretary, Yoshihide Suga, said the incident was a wakeup call to the potential dangers of drones, including possible terror attacks when Japan hosts the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo.

    - (EJ Insight) May 16, 2016.

    Police said they will be taking counterterrorism security measures to ensure the safety of Zhang Dejiang, chairman of the National Peoples Congress Standing Committee, during his three-day visit to Hong Kong starting Tuesday.

    Zhang, who will deliver a keynote address at the Belt and Road Summit Wednesday at the invitation of Chief Executive Leung Chung-ying, is the first top Beijing leader to visit Hong Kong since 2012, when former president Hu Jintao took part in the 15th-anniversary celebrations of the citys handover to China.

    Police said Sunday that appropriate counterterrorism security measures, including personal and traffic escorts, will be provided throughout Zhangs stay in Hong Kong.

    Inconvenience to the public and road users might be unavoidable, such as temporary diversion of traffic and pedestrian access and temporary closure of flyovers and footbridges during the passage of the motorcade, police said.

    Special traffic arrangements on Hong Kong Island from May 17 to 19 will include the rerouting of Harbour Road between Fenwick Pier Street and Fleming Road to one-way eastbound and to one-way westbound from 7 a.m. on Tuesday to noon on Thursday.

    This section of the road will be intermittently closed if necessary, police said.

    Expo Drive, Expo Drive Central and Expo Drive East will be closed from midnight Wednesday to midnight Thursday.

    Construction work near the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre, where the summit is being held, will be suspended for four days.

    The arrangements are expected to cause serious traffic congestion in Admiralty and Wan Chai, the Hong Kong Economic Journal said Monday.

    Nelson Cheng Yiu-mo, assistant commissioner of police (operations), stressed that the priority of police work is to make sure nothing will jeopardize safety of Zhang and other participants in the summit, and police will take decisive action to prevent any potential threats.

    He did not confirm whether the police have received any terrorism-related information, nor did he disclose which places around the venue of the summit are part of security zones.

    Sham Yee-lan, chairwoman of the Hong Kong Journalists Association, quoted police as saying that, after negotiations, people from the media are allowed to move and take pictures freely in the security zones.

    While police apparently want to avoid the raising of controversial issues, as occurred during a 2011 visit paid by then vice premier Li Keqiang, using tight security measures, some critics questioned the necessity of doing so.

    Political commentator Johnny Lau Yui-siu told Ming Pao Daily it is unwise for the police to implement high-level security arrangements for Zhangs visit, as that could only make the situation in Hong Kong more tense.

    Law Yuk-kai, director of Hong Kong Human Rights Monitor, said police should set security zones with clear boundaries, based on the Public Order Ordinance, as they did during the World Trade Organization Ministerial Conference back in 2005.

    Ivan Choy Chi-keung, a senior lecturer in the department of government and public administration at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, said police are trying to use the potential threat of terrorism merely as a justification for heightened security.

    -  Only dictators need to have a high level of security because they know that they are so unpopular. In a democratic society, a leader elected by universal suffrage with civil nomination has nothing to fear. See, for example, President Barack Obama of the United States of America.

    (Times of India) December 4, 2014.

    Security agencies of the US and India are bracing for one of their biggest challenges when US President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Narendra Modi share the dais this Republic Day.

    Sources said security on the ground and in the air this January 26 will be of a kind "never seen before". The US Secret Service, CIA, Navy Seals and India's Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), Intelligence Bureau, paramilitary forces and Army will be working together round-the-clock to ensure the safety of the two leaders of the two largest democracies who face a high order of threat from global terrorist groups.

    A senior officer said security at this year's Republic Day would be "unmatchable". Without going into details, the officer said, "Usually, around 25,000 police, paramilitary and other officers work alone in Delhi to make Republic Day safe. But this time, the number of security, Army officers may touch 40,000 to 45,000 with Secret Service and SPG closely monitoring every security detail."

    Sources said when Obama came to India in November 2010, more than 500 personnel including almost all White House security and staff arrived here in advance to make foolproof security arrangements for him. This time, the US may send a much larger contingent as Obama is attending a ceremony in the open.

    Sources said several contingency routes and exits were likely to be worked out for Republic Day. From 7, RCR to the entire India Gate lawns, Maurya Sheraton and Taj hotel (where Obama's entourage stayed last time), every route will be monitored through CCTV cameras, surveillance equipment and satellites. Those who take part in the parade tableau are likely to undergo double security check and verification as they pass close to the dais where the leaders will sit.

    An officer added that spectators may face more difficulty this year as almost all Metro stations within a radius of six to seven kilometers may be closed. People may also have to undergo extra security checks and watching the parade from close quarters may not be allowed.

    Anti-sabotage checks, security drills and surveillance of India Gate will begin much earlier this time and air traffic over Delhi NCR is likely to be halted on January 26 till the end of the parade.

    (Tuoitrenews.vn) May 17, 2016.

    More than 1,000 people are expected to accompany United States President Barrack Obama during his visit to Vietnam from May 23 to 25, according to a Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper source. The delegation includes officials and employees of the U.S. government, the presidents entourage, representatives of businesses, security officers, and secret service agents, the source added. About six hotels in Vietnam are anticipated to be rented in order to accommodate the large group of visitors.

    According to the Tuoi Tre source, U.S. teams in charge of security and preparations for the upcoming trip of President Obama have arrived in the country to work with their Vietnamese counterparts. This includes discussing proper ways to welcome the head of state, and transport him during his visit.

    Three Boeing C-17 Globemaster III military transport aircraft have landed at Noi Bai International Airport in Hanoi so far, carrying tens of metric tons of equipment set to assist the arrival of the U.S. president. The most recent plane brought some 53 metric tons of such equipment to the capitals airport, the source said. At least four more aircraft of the same type are scheduled to arrive at the international airport prior to the presidents visit to transfer all necessary items for his entire trip, it added. They will also carry the helicopter Marine One, the presidential state car, automobiles of other key officials of the delegation, special vehicles, ambulances, weapons for security and protection, and devices for communication.

    - Demosisto's Joshua Wong posted a photo of Obama in a Vietnamese restaurant to demonstrate that the American president did not need a large contingent of security agents. Internet users posted other photos from the scene that showed the security agents.

    P.S. Why are the restaurant patrons completely indifferent to the presence of President Obama? How unrealistic can this get? These are obviously actors/actresses and the real people are outside behind the metal barriers.
    P.S. Notice that all the shops that are next to this restaurant were shuttered!

    Video: https://www.facebook.com/silentmajorityhk/videos/1059847434104362/ inside the Vietnamese restaurant
    SpeakoutHK: https://youtu.be/jIPPXoVQJkI

    P.P.S. Zhang Dejiang's motorcade went the wrong way on a road in Science Park. which shows that Communist dictators make up their own laws. This was immediately turned into a headline story by Apple Daily:

    By comparison, President Obama's motorcade adhered strictly to traffic laws because they respect the people of Vietnam and their democratically elected government.


    Video of the Obama motorcade: https://www.facebook.com/HKDiscussForum/videos/989448184437580/

    (Armenpress) May 25, 2016.

    Japan's Mie prefecture is scheduled to hold the Thursday-Friday G7 summit in the city of Ise-Shima, report Sputnik News. A record-setting 100,000 police officers will maintain security at the G7, Japanese television reported Wednesday. The summit venue and the airport where world leaders are expected to arrive will be secured by nearly 23,000 police, the NHK broadcaster said. Another 70,000 law enforcement officials will guard 3,500 major stations, shopping districts, and other so-called soft targets of less secure sites where people converge, the channel added.

    Up to 4,500 will be on duty during US President Barack Obama's visit to Hiroshima, the city the United States dropped an atomic bomb on to force Japan's surrender in World War II.

    (Associated Press via The Standard) May 10, 2016.

    Lawmakers from three pan-democratic parties say they will not attend a banquet with the chairman of the NPC Standing Committee, Zhang Dejiang, next Wednesday. Civic Party leader Alan Leong said there was no point in going, since legislators will not have a chance to discuss Hong Kong's social problems and political development during the meal. People Power lawmaker Albert Chan, meanwhile, said it was not appropriate for the banquet to be held on Wednesday, when the Legislative Council should meet. Labour Party lawmaker Cyd Ho Sau-lan said her colleagues would not attend either, saying they would rather spend the time preparing for the Legco meeting the next day. Ho also criticized the government for asking those who wanted to attend to fill out a form. This procedure is very much the same as applying for a visa in a foreign country," she said.

    (SCMP) May 13, 2016.

    Four pan-democrat legislators, along with six from pro-Beijing parties, have been invited to a short meeting with state leader Zhang Dejiang next Wednesday. It would be the first meeting between the pan-democrats and Beijing officials since the sides met in Shenzhen on political reform in May last year. The meeting is scheduled before a banquet with Zhang on May 18 at the Convention and Exhibition Centre in Wan Chai.

    According to invited lawmakers, it would be a pre-dinner cocktail reception lasting around 40 minutes. The invitation was made by Edward Yau Tang-wah, director of the Chief Executives Office.

    The invited pan-democrats were Democratic Party chairwoman Emily Lau Wai-hing, Civic Party leader Alan Leong Kah-kit, Labour Partys Cyd Ho Sau-lan, and health services lawmaker Joseph Lee Kok-long.

    Zhang, who chairs the National Peoples Congress Standing Committee and oversees Hong Kong affairs, will arrive in the city on May 17 for a three-day visit. He will become the first mainland state leader to visit Hong Kong since 2012. The invitation for lawmakers to meet Zhang came after at least 18 lawmakers from the pan-democratic camp said they would not attend the banquet.

    Lau said she would be attending the meeting with Zhang after consulting with her party. Hong Kong people are now angry and jittery as Beijing is stepping up interference in Hong Kongs internal affairs, she said. Lau said she would highlight the importance of introducing universal suffrage as soon as possible and raise the issue of the bookseller disappearances.

    Leong said even though pre-dinner cocktails was not the best arrangement it was still better than a banquet where you cannot even see Mr Zhang with a telescope. He agreed the meeting would be a good chance for a state leader to directly hear the views of pro-democracy lawmakers who represented the majority of Hong Kong voters.

    But Ho said she would not attend the meeting. We hope to have a proper work meeting with Zhang Dejiang on the pressing issues facing Hong Kong, she said. We dont want to just exchange pleasantries at a cocktail party.

    Lee said he would most likely attend the meeting with the hopes of discussing problems in the citys governance, though had yet to make a final decision.

    Across the political divide, the six pro-establishment lawmakers invited to the meeting included Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kongs Starry Lee Wai-king. Lee said it was a positive signal that Zhang wanted to meet with different lawmakers even though his schedule is very tight. I hope this will build a good basis for communications in the future, she said.

    New Peoples Party lawmaker Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee, another invitee to the meeting, said she would go as an executive councillor and intended to give more chance for pan-democrats to express their views. But Liberal Party lawmaker Felix Chung Kwok-pan, who was also invited, said the pro-establishment legislators should have the same amount of time.

    The other pro-establishment lawmakers invited include Legislative Council President Jasper Tsang Yok-sing, Federation of Trade Unions Chan Yuen-han, Business and Professionals Alliances Andrew Leung Kwan-yuen and commercial sector lawmaker Martin Liao Cheung-kong.

    (EJ Insight) May 13, 2016.

    At least 5,000 police officers will be mobilized for the visit next week of Zhang Dejiang, chairman of the National Peoples Congress Standing Committee, the Hong Kong Economic Journal reported, citing unnamed persons with knowledge of the matter. Police have refused to reveal the number of officers to be deployed for the senior Chinese officials visit, but said a press briefing will be held on Sunday on the security arrangements.

    The sources said the polices Tactical Unit, VIP Protection Unit and Special Duties Unit will be on standby when the national leader arrives in Hong Kong on May 18. The Search Unit will ensure that all of the places Zhang is set to visit, including the hotel where he would be staying and other speaking venues, will be secure. All people entering the restricted areas would have to undergo security check and identity verification. The arrangements for the visit will also serve as a rehearsal for the security measures to be implemented during the 20th anniversary of the handover next year.

    According to Apple Daily, the construction work for the Central-Wan Chai Bypass would have to be suspended during Zhangs three-day visit.

    The Chinese official will attend the Belt and Road summit on Wednesday morning at the Hong Kong Convention & Exhibition Center and meet with members of the Executive Council and the Legislative Council in the evening. Zhang will also visit two places on Wednesday afternoon, including the Science Park in Sha Tin.

    Meanwhile, the construction sites at the Wan Chai Bypass and the MTRs Shatin to Central Link would be suspended for four days starting next Monday, at least three workers told Ming Pao Daily.

    Both the Highways Department and MTR Corporation confirmed on Thursday night that they were asked by the police to halt operations at the construction sites near the HKCEC from next Monday to Thursday. Many construction workers were displeased with the announcement, which means they would not get any wages during the period, while surveyors said the suspension of work would mean millions of dollars in losses for the affected contractors.

    Legislator Claudia Mo, a member of the Legco panel on security, said the arrangements were unreasonable. She said the work at the two construction sites should not be suspended unless there is reliable intelligence of any potential risks to Zhang and his entourage. Mo criticized the government for disregarding the impact of the work suspension on the livelihood of the workers and the financial losses to the contractors.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) Shock and awe police deployment protects unaccountable official from the public. By Richard Scotford. May 14, 2016.

    It looks very much like Hong Kong is about to be given a lesson in Chinese style subjugation with a healthy dollop of shock and awe next week. Early reports are that an army of 5,000 police officers will be deployed to protect the personal safety of Zhang Dejiang, who will be in town to promote the baffling One Road One Belt initiative. Government sycophants are increasingly trying to big-up Mr. Zhangs visit as though he were the Emperor of China himself.

    But the reality is much more underwhelming. Zhang Dejiang, even though hes the Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National Peoples Congress, and the head honcho in looking after Hong Kong and Macau affairs, in global terms is a non-descript, altogether forgettable Marxist small potato, with a patchy career in governing and a penchant for quashing civil liberties wherever he is posted. And please, dont mention SARS.

    Some commentators even offer credible evidence that a purge of Zhang could eventually be on the cards. But lets not focus on such minor details; for CY Leungs government, Zhang is the man that Hong Kongers need to bow down before to ensure that the kind benevolence keeps flowing south from the Party.

    For all the parroting about how the Basic Law is sacred and protects Hong Kongs freedoms and makes it prosperous, we can forget all that come next week when Zhang is in town. The local police are already hinting at a good dose of civil liberties suppression, Beijing-Style. His hotel will be guarded by no less than one thousand police officers. Everywhere he goes will be off-limits to people like you or me.

    To boot, if your signs, flags, banners or T-shirts could upset the sensibilities of the man himself, or get even slightly close to his gilded, sanitized world, then you will be carted away too. Good luck trying to argue your right to freedom of expression and movement, as protected by the Basic Law next week. There will be an army of black-vested cops to tell you otherwise.

    The reality is that his visit is an altogether unnecessary political and financial burden on Hong Kong right now. Flooding the streets of Hong Kong with thousands of jack-boot paramilitary police and restricting peoples liberties, so that just one man can walk around unfettered in his Marxist-fantasy is exactly the kind of system Hong Kongers are prepared to throw bricks at.

    The trip has the potential to be a complete non-event because most people in Hong Kong care nothing about what Zhang Dejiang has to say about One Belt One Road. Conversely, it could turn into another seminal moment of Hong Kongs rejection of the Communist Party of China. Only time will tell.

    Internet comments:

    -  (Ming Pao)

    According to information, more than 500 persons received invitations to attend the banquet with Zhang Dejiang. the invitation letter stated many restrictions, including providing information on date of birth, Hong Kong ID number, telephone, address, photographs, etc.

    People Power said that the requirements are an insult to the invitees and therefore will not attend.

    Labour Party's Cy Ho said that asking so much information is no way to treat a guest and there won't be any chance to communicate with Zhang Dejiang. Therefore the four Labour Party members will nottend.

    Neo Democrats' Gary Fan said that there were too many requirements which means that the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region government does not respect the guests. Therefore, he has decided not to attend.

    League of Social Democrats' Leung Kwok-hung was not invited. He believes that this was retaliation by Chief Executive CY Leung. Leung Kwok-hung said that he went to Guangdong with the Legislative Council group in 2004 and met with Zhang Dejiang. He said that he posed no security threat and he has no prior record of disrupting any banquets. Therefore it was unreasonable not to invite him and he will protest outside that evening.

    Path to Democracy convener Ronny Tong Ka-wah said that he will attend. He recalled that he was always required to provide identification information and photographs during previous visits by state leaders. He said that his secretary was "completely used to doing it."

    - (Speakout HK)

    Cyd Ho: The meeting format is not clear yet. Even if it is clear, it can only be a very simple shaking-of-hands and small-talk. So we feel that unless we can meet face-to-face, there is really not much usefulness otherwise.

    Cyd Ho: We asked the Special Administrative Region government to organize a work meeting with the chairman of the NPC Standing Committee so that we can all sit down.

    Commercial Radio host Chan Chung: In an evening banquet with several hundred people,  you say that there is no possible way of close contact. So I can understand why you won't go. But if the pre-banquet meeting has only 10 to 20 people and there is a chance for close contact and then you won't attend, what signal does that send? How are you going to communicate? Can communicate only take place during a work meeting? How are you going to sit down and talk? What do you want Zhang Dejiang to say to you during such a meeting?

    - What do the pan-democrats really want? On one hand, they demand the Central Government must not interfere with Hong Kong affairs. On the other hand, they demand the Central Government remove CY Leung as Chief Executive. This act of removal would have been the maximum interference!

    - Chris Wat Wing-yin: "If I were Zhang Dejiang, I would tell those legislative councilors who want me to remove CY Leung: 'In 2014, we gave you a chance to elect your Chief Executive by one-person-one-vote. But you people vetoed it. If you had passed the constitutional reform back then, you could have voted him out yourselves. Why would you need to ask me today?'"

    - (Wen Wei Po) At first, Civic Party chief Alan Leong took exception to the fact that Zhang Dejiang is 'inspecting' Hong Kong. He said that this was demeaning to Hong Kong because the term 'inspect' is only used by emperors. Apple Daily promptly quoted Leong and said that the use of 'inspecting' belittles Hong Kong.

    Now it is common practice for mainland media to describe all visits by Central Government leaders to local provinces and cities as 'inspections'. Hong Kong is a special administrative region, so it is normal to describe the visit as an 'inspection.'

    Well, well, well, well, well. Internet users promptly went to Alan Leong Kah-kit and the Civic Party's Facebook pages and showed that Legislative Councilor Alan Leong reported himself as 'inspecting' conditions inside the Wang Tau Hom village of his Kowloon East district. So does that make Alan Leong an emperor? Elsewhere, Leong also said that he "inspected" hospitals, markets, etc along with government officials. Leong had no comments on these findings.


    Photo of Alan Leong Kah-kit inspecting Wang Tau Hom village

    - (NOW TV) Civic Party chief Alan Leong said that the majority of this party agreed that he should meet with Zhang Dejiang. He said that he will take the opportunity to explain to Zhang Dejiang that self-determination/autonomy does not equate separatism and also demand that CY Leung resign.

    - (Kinliu) The Modern Day Mr. Ip. By Chris Wat Wing-yin. May 14, 2016.

    There once lived a nobleman named Ip in the nation of Chu. He loved dragons. His clothes were emblazoned with dragons, his cups were carved with dragons, his home was decorated with dragons, for such is the love of Lord Ip for dragons. When the Sacred Dragon in Heaven learned about Ip, it decided to visit Lord Ip at home. The Sacred Dragon flew into the Ip home, stuck its head through the window and stretched its tail through the courtyard. Lord Ip was scared out of his wits when he saw the dragon and fled uncontrollably. The Sacred Dragon was disappointed and flew away, sighing that Lord Ip did not really love dragons but he only loved things appear to be dragons.

    This story has been read by every elementary school student, referring to those who say that they love something but actually don't (or are even afraid of it).

    I remembered this story because of what I read about the pan-democratic legislators' coy behavior with respect to whether they will meet with Zhang Dejiang (or maybe not). They said that they wouldn't and then they said that they would.

    For the longest time, the pan-democrats have said that they needed to communicate with the Central Government but the latter won't listen to them. They complained that they have no direct channel to the Central Government because the Chief Executive CY Leung is blocking all their signals ... yet when Xi Jinping's emissary comes to Hong Kong in the person of Zhang Dejiang, who is ranked number three on the Politburo, to gather information, the pan-democrats scatter like Lord Ip in the presence of the Sacred Dragon.

    Alan Leong said that the evening banquet was a group show and therefore it was pointless to attend. The pan-democrats have always thought of democracy as a show and they won't bother if they have to sit in the back far away from the camera. No wonder many veteran police officers say that Leung "Long Hair" Kwok-hung always pose for the camera. He appeared to be charging the police line and once the camera crews are done with filming, he became normal again and told the police officers "Thanks. I apologize for what happened just then. Sorry about that." For them, this is all just a show.

    Apart from the group show, Zhang Dejiang also issued an invitation for a small group. Emily Lau, Alan Leong, Cyd Ho and Joseph Lee are invited. So can Lord Ip avoid this? Even so, they played around and finally agreed to attend because they really could not come up with any reason not to.

    This is perplexing. They are always saying that there is no communication and that the Central Government does not understand the wishes of the people of Hong Kong. So now the Central Government shows up in front of them in the form of Zhang Dejiang and they dodge left and right. "I don't like having too many people around." "I am not seated at the main table" ... I am suddenly inspired to think that the pan-democrats are just like Lord Ip. They don't really want to communicate. They are in fact most afraid of communication, because the opposition camp's existential value lies in absence of communication.

    - (Bastille Post) May 13, 2016.

    The Civil Human Rights Front plans to march on Wednesday morning from Shelton Sports Ground to the Wanchai Convention and Exhibition Centre to submit a letter of petition to Zhang Dejiang. They want the Chinese Communists to stop interfering with Hong Kong affairs, to oppose One Belt One Road, to release the arrested human rights defenders in mainland China and so on.

    The Civil Human Rights Front, the Alliance to Support Patriotic Democratic Movements in China, the League of Social Democrats, Civic Party, Labour Party and the Federation of Trade Unions held a press conference. According to the Civil Human Rights Front convener Jimmy Sham, One Country Two Systems, Hong Kong Ruled by Hongkongers and A High Degree of Autonomy has been gradually eroded since the handover. Earlier this year, the five Causeway Bay booksellers were disappeared directly destroyed the Basic Law and One Country Two Systems. Furthermore, the Hong Kong-mainland China economic cooperation plans from the Central Government have all proven to be "more thunder than rain." Therefore, the One Belt One Road project must not be followed blindly.

    The Civil Human Rights Front said that they have notified the police about their arrangements by telephone. They said that they have no intention to apply for a "non-objection letter" from the Hong Kong Police and they will not provide an estimated size of the demonstration march.

    - This is all for show. If the Central Government really wants to find about what is going on in Hong Kong, they can just get on the Internet and check out Facebook. Facebook may not be accessible to mainland Internet users, but Central Government workers are exempt. Conversely, if you hand a petition letter to a representative of the Central Government, it does not mean that it will be treated seriously. Therefore, the sole purpose of the presentation of the letter of petition is a photo opportunity to show that they are doing something and therefore everybody must continue to contribute more money to the Civil Human Rights Front, the Alliance to Support Patriotic Democratic Movements in China, etc in order to continue their good work of soliciting more money in order to solicit more money ad infinitum.

    - The Civil Human Rights Front want the Central Government to stop interfering with Hong Kong affairs. Well, according to the Basic Law, Hong Kong is an inalienable part of the People's Republic of China. The State Council of the People's Republic of China has a Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office that is specially responsible for Hong Kong and Macau. Why are you telling them not to do their jobs?

    (Wen Wei Po) May 14, 2016.

    Pokmon is a series of best-selling electronic games published by Nintendo. Recently, Nintendo announced that the new Chinese translation of the game shall be 精靈寶可夢 and that all its 151 original characters will also unified Chinese names. For example, Pikachu will be known hereafter as 皮卡丘 instead of 比卡超.

    Hong Kong Indigenous posted "Nintendo surrenders openly to the Communists, the Hong Kong translation of Pikachu as 比卡超 is now gone."

    Demosisto secretary-general Joshua Wong also posted: "I want 比卡超, I don't want 皮卡丘, I demand Nintendo change the name." Wong wrote that the unified Chinese names are "unseemly translations of the sound into putonghua" and he wanted Nintendo to reverse its decision.

    Many radical localists commented on Facebook that Nintendo's use of putonghua is "disrespectful to Hong Kong" and that even "cartoons are being turn Red." Someone said that Nintendo is joining in the
    "conspiracy to destroy the unique language and culture of Hong Kong." They also said that after the Hong Kong Nation is built, there will be laws enacted to restrict "actions that disrespect the people of Hong Kong such as these."

    However, many genuine electronic game fans said that the reality is that 70% of the translated names (including the popular Pikachu) are based upon the pre-existing names used in Taiwan and the remaining 30% (such as 大比鳥 for Pidgeot) are based upon the pre-existing names used in Hong Kong. So when Nintendo unifies its Chinese translations, it is based upon consideration of a commercial strategy directed at Greater China (Hong Kong/Macau, Taiwan and mainland China) and not related to politics.

    (EJ Insight) June 1, 2016.

    Japanese game-maker Nintendo is about to release two new games in its hugely popular Pokemon series. But a decision to use only Putonghua names for the characters has proved controversial in Hong Kong, the BBC reports. Nintendos decision is seen in the citys tense political climate as a further step in its mainlandization.

    Pokemon characters names used to be translated differently in different parts of the Chinese-speaking world, to reflect local pronunciation. Hence, the hugely beloved Pikachu was known for decades as Beikaatciu (比卡超) in Hong Kong and Pikaqiu (皮卡丘) in mainland China.

    But Nintendo announced earlier this year that it would be unifying the names of more than 100 Pokemon characters and has renamed many of them in line with the Putonghua versions.

    Cantonese and Putonghua speakers both read Chinese, although people in Hong Kong use the traditional Chinese script, while people on mainland China use simplified Chinese. However, the same words can be pronounced differently in each language.

    For example, Pikachus new official Chinese name, 皮卡丘, is pronounced pi2ka3qiu1 in Mandarin. But in Cantonese, those characters would be pronounced pei4kaa1jau1 which Hong Kong critics argue sound nothing like Pikachus original name.

    More than 6,000 people signed a petition in March asking Nintendo to reverse its decision.

    Then on Monday, dozens of people protested at the Japanese Consulate General in Hong Kong. Our main point is that the translation ignores Hong Kongs culture, said a spokesman from a Facebook group known as Petition to keep Regional Chinese Translations of Pokemon. Theres no respect for it. We are aware of the reasons behind Nintendos translation, presumably to make it easier for purposes such as publicity, but the move ignores a lot of players. We hope the Hong Kong market can be taken seriously and treated sincerely.

    The BBC said the dispute taps into growing local fears that Cantonese along with local culture and tradition is being supplanted by Putonghua.

    Professor Stephen Matthews of the School of Humanities at the University of Hong Kong said: In the last few years, people have felt that what makes Hong Kong special is disappearing bit by bit, and what is an issue of Pokemon, which is fairly trivial, becomes a big one, because its very sensitive.

    Last year, the citys Education Bureau caused an uproar when it suggested that Cantonese was not an official language.

    Hongkongers, supported by many linguists, believe Cantonese is a proper language, on par with Putonghua. I think language is perhaps one of the most important things that marks Hong Kong from the rest of China, said Matthews.

    In February, Hong Kong officials received more than 10,000 complaints in three days after a television program began using subtitles in simplified Chinese characters instead of the traditional script.

    Hong Kong activist group Civic Passion organised Mondays demonstration. Pikachu has been in Hong Kong for more than 20 years, said Sing Leung, one of those who took part. It is not simply a game or comic book it is the collective memory of a generation. It was a good decision for them to launch a Chinese version of the game, but it has not respected the culture and language of specific places.

    Internet comments:

    Yellow Ribbons

    - I detest mainlandization of everything! They completely don't care about how the people of Hong Kong feel!

    - I demand Nintendo release a Hong Kong edition. When even Hongkongers don't respect their own local culture, how do you expect other people to respect Hong Kong culture?

    - They are slowly carrying out cultural genocide.

    - Half the comments are approving. Nobody is supporting Cantonese. Such is the quality of the people of Hong Kong. It is a fucking wonder if the Hong Kong race is not exterminated!

    - It is fucking over when you fucking give up yourself. You are a fucking pig if you just take whatever they fucking give you.

    - This is fucking embarrassing when Hong Kong uses mainland Chinese transcriptions. I fuck your mother's stinking cunt!

    - That is why Hong Kong must build its own nation. After the Hong Kong Nation is built, we can enact laws to ban actions that disrespect Hong Kong people such as this.

    Blue Ribbons

    - Don't be fucking stupid! How can you say that this is surrendering to the Chinese Communists? Please check before you comment. The translated names sometimes follow Taiwan practice and sometimes Hong Kong practice. Even 皮卡丘 comes from Taiwan.

    - I read the comments, and clearly none of the commentators are familiar with the game itself. All they fucking talk about is how to defend the Cantonese language of Hong Kong (which comes from the city of Canton (Guangzhou) located in Guangdong province, mainland China)! Do they know that the Cantonese language does not have an accurate transcription of Pikachu, and that 比卡超 is inaccurate?

    - Hong Kong people have fragile glass hearts and require special handling. We are special because we always want something or the other. If we don't get our way, we'll throw a tantrum!

    - Does the whole world have to abide by what a few Hongkongers want? ... I would like to think that Hongkongers do not have glass hearts and they have good quality. People with good quality are not intolerant and they won't continuously whine so that the whole world has to bend over and stoop down to please them.

    - Nintendo wants to hold a competition in Greater China, so the first thing that they have to do is to make sure that the game and its characters have one set of names instead of separate ones by region. However, these Localists are saying that this shows that Nintendo is surrendering to the Chinese Communists, that they disrespect Hong Kong and therefore we must defend our own language and culture. What the fuck? This is fucking asinine!

    - How much do you want to politicize a game? If you want to divide Hong Kong from China, why don't you just do it directly instead of dragging an electronic game into this!

    - Reference: Quartz, January 8, 2014. Why Nintendo doesn't stand a chance in China. In summary, Nintendo Pokmon isn't even a factor in the Chinese market, so what do they care about appeasing the Chinese Communists?

    - (HKG Pao) A Facebook group organized a demonstration march on May 30 at 10am from Chater Garden to the Japanese consulate-general in Hong Kong. They said that Hong Kong always had its own system of Pokemon names and they want to preserve this part of Hong Kong life and culture. They demand that Nintendo not change anything and produce two local systems, one in Hong Kong and one in Taiwan using the original names.

    - Fucking morons! Nintendo's office is located in Hung Hom (Kowloon) and not Hong Kong Island. What the fuck does the Japanese consulate care?

    - This was never about getting the Japanese government (or even Nintendo) to do anything. In fact, it would be even better if they don't do anything. The event was always about getting media coverage for the election campaign. Inaction leads to more demonstration and therefore more media coverage.

    - Nintendo have traditional character systems for its games because they thought that Taiwan plus Hong Kong is a large enough market. Right now, only some Hongkongers are hollering and Taiwan is quiescent. This leaves the protestors with little or no bargaining power. It means nothing to Nintendo if a small number of Hong Kong users boycott their products.

    - Wan Chin suggests that the matter can be taken to the United Nations through the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Japan signed and ratified the covenant; Hong Kong is not a nation and cannot sign; Taiwan signed and ratified, but its deposit was rejected by the United Nations because it is not a recognized nation. Article 15 recognizes the right of everyone to participate in cultural life, but it would be a far stretch to argue that this means the United Nations should intercede in how Nintendo wants to names its characters.

    - (Oriental Daily) May 30, 2016. 20 Internet users marched from Chater Square to the Japan consulate at Exchange Square. They chanted slogans such as "We reject uniform translated names," "Respect Cantonese," "Follow local customs" and "Restore the original translated names." They were not admitted into Exchange Square, but a management office worker came to take their petition letter.

    - Cowards! They didn't dare to charge into the Japanese consulate and occupy it indefinitely until the Japanese company Nintento surrenders. And to think that I used to believe that Civic Passion is so valiant and righteous!

    - (Nintendo Hong Kong) May 10, 2016.  Due to various factors, our company is evaluating whether to make changes to the 2016 Pokmon National Championships Hong Kong Video Game National Championships. We do not exclude the possibility of canceling this event.

    - (Wen Wei Po) June 1, 2016.

    The 2016 Pokmon National Championships Hong Kong Video Game National Championships is the first large-scale competition to be held in Hong Kong, and it will be a watershed event for Nintendo's development in Hong Kong. Earlier, the Hong Kong PokMon Alliance (PMA), which provides organizers for the event, said that the event may have to be canceled because they cannot guarantee the personal safety of the competitors in view of the demonstration march.

    If the event is canceled, then Hong Kong users may not be able to accumulate enough championship points in order to participate in the world championships in August. Of course, Hong Kong users can still act like second-class citizens and travel to Singapore and Taiwan to compete in their national championships in order to gain points. At present, two Hongkongers are among the top  of the Asia Masters category and one is leading the Asia region senior category.

    Even as Pokmon fans criticize Civic Passion for being destructive instead of constructive for the sake of election publicity, Civic Passion members have come out to condemn Nintendo and its supporters, telling them that they should "go back to mainland China!"

    - This competition would actually be tremendously helpful to the cause of Hong Kong independence! Did you notice that Nintendo called it the Hong Kong Video Game National Championships!!?? Hey, Nintendo recognizes Hong Kong as a sovereign nation!!! So why does Civic Passion want to torpedo this competition?

    Q1. Who do you think bears the greatest responsibility for the failure of the 2015 constitutional reform?
    27.0%: Hong Kong Chief Executive and other government officials
    10.6%: Central government
    5.3%: Pan-democrats
    4.4%: Occupy Central trio
    2.5%: Foreign forces
    1.9%: Pro-establishment camp
    1.5%: Students/young people
    0.2%: Business community
    39.4%: Don't know/no opinion
    7.2%: Refused to answer
    0.0%: Others

    Q2. Do you think that the Central Government should restart the debate on constitutional reform in Hong Kong?
    56.0%: Yes
    10.6%: No
    30.8%: Don't know/no opinion
    2.6%: Refused to answer

    Q3. When should the debate be re-started?
    74.5%: As soon as possible
    8.5%: During the term of the current government (that is, before July 2017)
    11.2%: After the term of the current government (that is, after July 2017)
    5.4%: Don't know/no opinion
    0.4%: Refused to answer

    Q4. How important is communication with the Central Government to solve the issue of democratization in Hong Kong?
    26.2%: Very important
    52.6%: Important
    3.8%: Unimportant
    0.4%: Very unimportant
    1.1%: Refused to answer

    Q5. If the Central Government invites the pan-democrats to discuss constitutional reform in Hong Kong, do you think they should go?
    63.2%: They should
    5.2%: They shouldn't
    6.3%: They should consult the opinions of civil groups
    1.7%: Refused to answer
    23.6%: Don't know/no opinion

    Q6. Do you think Hong Kong needs political moderate groups to push constitutional reform?
    58.5%: Yes
    13.8%: No
    26.1%: Don't know/no opinion

    Q7. Do you accept the following methods of resistance?

    Attend assemblies, demonstrations, marches and protests without police permits
    4.4%: Very acceptable
    28.6%: Acceptable

    Occupy public places
    1.9%: Very acceptable
    17.5%: Acceptable

    Occupy government buildings
    1.9%: Very acceptable
    14.2%: Acceptable

    Throw objects at government officials or persons in the opposing camp
    2.7%: Very acceptable
    11.4%: Acceptable

    Charge at government buildings
    1.2%: Very acceptable
    7.4%: Acceptable

    Call for others to charge
    1.2%: Very acceptable
    6.7%: Acceptable

    Charge at the police
    0.8%: Very acceptable
    6.2%: Acceptable

    Use force
    0.9%: Very acceptable
    6.0%: Acceptable

    Q8. During the past 3 years, have you taken part in clashes for political reasons?
    6.9%: I haven't tried, but I will if necessary
    88.9%: I haven't tried and I won't

    Q9. What does Localism mean to you?

    60.8%: Protect Hong Kong's lifestyle, culture and history
    53.4%: Hong Kong resources given with priority to Hong Kong people
    46.7%: Implementation of Basic Law in order to ensure a high degree of autonomy for Hong Kong
    43.0%: Protect Hong Kong core values
    39.6%: Protect Hong Kong's autonomy and self-rule
    19.8%: Attack parallel traders and decrease individual travelers
    16.1%: Placing Hong Kong's interests over and above national interests
    10.2%: Hong Kong independence
    4.6%: Slow down the convergence of the Hong Kong and mainland Chinese economies
    0.2%: Other

    Q1. Compared to before the handover, do you think that the overall development in Hong Kong has been forwards, backwards or the same?
    22%: Forwards
    57%: Backwards
    16%: The same
    5%: No opinion

    Q2. Are you pessimistic or optimistic about the future of Hong Kong?
    21%: Pessimistic
    64%: Optimistic
    14%: Hard to say
    1%: No opinion

    Q3. Do you think that 50 years after the handover, Hong Kong's future should be One Country One System, One Country Two Systems or Independent/Self-Rule?
    10%: One Country One System
    71%: One Country Two Systems
    14%: Independent/self-rule
    2%: Other
    3%: No opinion

    Q4. As for the groups who are recently formed to advocate Hong Kong independence, do you think that their main motivation is to defend the interests of Hong Kong or to obtain personal benefits?
    24%: Defend the interests of Hong Kong
    50%: Obtain personal benefits
    21%: Hard to say
    5%: No opinion

    (Wen Wei Po) May 8, 2016.

    Yesterday, Civic Passion opened up their leader Wong Yeung-tat's Kowloon East election campaign office. In attendance were "Four Eyed Brother" Cheung Kam-mun, Cheng Chung-tai, Raymond Wong Yuk-man and Wan Chin who are likely candidates in the other four districts. As usual, the superstars Raymond Wong and Wan Chin were late while the plebes had to wait under the sun.

    There was a sales booth at the scene, selling souvenirs including a set of five two-inch-tall figures of the five candidates with the asking price of $1,000.

    As they waited, five independent online media reporters showed up to gather news. These reporters wore press badges on their chests. One of the reporter tried to approach Wong Yeung-tat, but the Civic Passion members rushed over to separate the reporter from Wong Yeung-tat. They surrounded the reporter and pressed him back to the railing. Plainclothes policemen at the scene interceded to separate the two sides, and then the uniformed police also came in. Afterwards a female reporter claimed to be injured and was taken to the hospital for a medical exam.

    After the disturbance, the ceremony began as the five principals cut the ribbon and burned joss sticks just like they do for triad societies. Wong Yeung-tat prayed to Heaven and Earth, while Wan Chin asked the Yellow Emperor to offer blessings.

    (HKG Pao) May 8, 2016.

    During the ceremony, Loyal Militia founder "Ah Man" Shek Fong-yau showed up with 7 online media reporters. The scene got chaotic and the ceremony was interrupted. A large number of Civic Passion members surrounded, pushed and shoved the online media reporters. One reporter claimed to be injured. In the end, the principals were taken down to the police station to assist in the investigation. In previous actions, Civic Passion always led the charge. They have never been counter-attacked. On this occasion, they got a taste of their own medicine. Civic Passion could not react properly and the ceremony was disrupted.

    There were not many citizens at the scene. Wong Yeung-tat tried to sell his peanut-shaped doll listed for $88,888, but nobody bid for it. There were many Occupy Central souvenirs for sale, but the response was tepid. So it is not certain that they raised enough for their campaign.

    Video links:

    Soaphk.hk
    https://www.facebook.com/775416222580183/videos/880152002106604/
    https://www.facebook.com/775416222580183/videos/879729812148823/

    Soaphk.hk
    https://www.facebook.com/775416222580183/videos/880860678702403/
    In clear detail, Lee Ching-hei (Civic Passion) kicked the female reporter C.C. Yun in the leg on the sly. In response, Lee Ching-hei denied that he kicked her. He said that if he really did kick her, then she wouldn't be taken by an ambulance to the hospital -- she would have been taken down to the morgue instead.
    https://www.facebook.com/9UpNewsHK/videos/1193058517379699/ When the police arrived, Lee Ching-hei courageously and righteously avoided to speak to them because the press was filming him.

    HKG Pao
    https://www.facebook.com/368513580020590/videos/548894158649197/
    Cheung Chung-tai (Civic Passion) surreptitiously removes a stack of joss paper from civil reporter Ah Man. Afterwards, Ah Man said: "If Cheng Chung-tai needed money, he needs only ask and I'll burn more for him."

    Internet comments:

    - If the Proletariat Political Institute/Civic Passion/City-State succeed in building a nation, then your leaders will be: Raymond Wong, president; Wan Chin, Chief Secretary; Cheng Kam-mun, Secretary of Finance; Wong Yeung-tat, Secretary of Security; Cheng Chung-tai, Secretary of Education. Now isn't this scary?

    - Earlier Civic Passion members showed up to disrupt the press conference given by the Hong Kong Copyright Alliance. Remember the Civic Passion 'reporters'?

    The Hong Kong Copyright Alliance was accused of violating freedom of press when they refused to accept the credentials of the Civic Passion 'reporters'. Well, what happens in today's incident? The seven online media reporters were not masked, they wore badges that identified their media outlets and they were jostled by Civic Passion. Where is the Hong Kong Journalists Association when needed?

    - Lee Ching-hei (Civic Passion) raised his hands and then sneakily kicked his opponent. This is Standard Operating Procedure taught for Occupy Central with Love and Peace (see #081 for a demonstration).

    - (Wen Wei Po) September 23, 2016. Previously Lee Ching-hei said that he was not guilty of assaulting the female reporter. Yesterday, the trial was held and Lee immediately pleaded guilty to one count of common assault. The defense said that 30-year-old Lee Ching-hei did not plan to assault the female reporter. On that day, the female reporter came with a unfriendly group of people, so Lee reacted rashly. Fortunately, the injury to the female reporter was mild.

    The magistrate refused to buy into the argument. She said that Lee was tall and strong, and so it was unbecoming of him to assault a woman. Furthermore, the woman was a female reporter gathering news for a website and Lee was interfering with her duties.

    The defense said that Lee used to be work as a technician but has become unemployed due to a work-related injury in October last year. He has to receive medical treatment regularly. Lee is married with two children. The defense submitted three letters, respectively from his wife, his mother and a church pastor who wrote that Lee should only be fined because Lee had a strong sense of justice and ran in the District Council elections.

    - (TVB) October 6, 2016. Civic Passion member Lee Ching-hei was fined $2,000. The magistrate watched the video and observed that the defendant had only "made a light sweep with his leg." The magistrate believed that the defendant was angry at the two other individuals who were causing trouble.

    (Wen Wei Po) October 7, 2016. The defendant Lee Ching-hei claimed that the female victim provoked Lee first and the defendant retaliated in a moment of rashness. Afterwards the defendant was sorry about what he did. The defendant also said that the female victim merely worked for an unfamiliar media outlet (Soap TV) outside of the mainstream, so the penalty should be less. In addition, the defendant has been unemployed for more than one year due to a work-related injury and community service will impede the progress of his recovery.

    The magistrate said that the female victim and the defendant tussled with each other, so that "both were responsible for causing chaos." The magistrate said that he asked the defendant whether he had kicked the female victim in anger and received a positive answer. However, Lee did not kick very hard. Nevertheless, the magistrate said that it was wrong to express one's feelings in this manner and he suggested to the defendant not to do this again.

    - (Oriental Daily) September 30, 2016. Civic Passion member Lee Ching-hei encountered a political opponent Leung Chun-tung at a restaurant in Tin Ping Plaza, Fanling District on January 19, 2016, and assaulted the other man. He was charged with one count of common assault.

    - (Oriental Daily) December 21, 2016.

    According to Leung Chun-tung, he was meeting with friends to have lunch that day. As he walked towards his friends' table, he spotted the defendant Lee Ching-hei. Leung said: "The dog is eating here." The defendant got up and cursed Leung out. As the two quarreled, the defendant charged up and used his left shoulder to ram Leung's chest. Leung fell down to the ground. After Leung got up, he felt pain in his chest. His friends summoned the police.

    Under cross-examination, Leung Chun-tung said that the defendant was in the 2015 District Council elections and identified himself on Facebook as a "Hot Dog" (Civic Passion member). Leung said that he had quarreled with Lee four times. Leung said that there is no enmity but he thought that Lee was a radical troublemaker.

    The defense said that when Leung said that "the dog is eating here", he was referring to Lee Ching-hei. Leung denied this and said: "At the time, I really saw a dog eating there." The defense asked: "Are you talking about an animal with four legs?" Leung said: "My nickname is Dog Tung. I was talking about myself." Leung said: "I can spot dogs with two legs." The defense said that what really happened was that the two quarreled, Leung rammed his shoulder against the defendant's chest, fell down on the ground on his own and falsely claimed to have been attacked in order to take revenge. Leung denied it.

    The defendant testified that Leung and others harassed him many times during the 2015 District Council elections. Leung had kicked him, and Lee made a complaint to the police. On that day, the defendant rammed his should against the defendant's chest, fell down on the ground while saying "Ouch! Ouch! It hurts a lot!"

    Outside the courtroom, Lee Ching-hee told everybody that he has left Civic Passion.

    - (Headline Daily) January 13, 2017.

    Today the magistrate Tsui Mei-ha found the defendant Lee Ching-hee not guilty of common assault. The reasoning was that the victim and another witness testified that Lee rammed his shoulder into the chest of the victim, whereas another witness testified that Lee bumped his chest against the victim's chest. Given that the witnesses contradicted each other and that the defendant was taller than the victim, these allegations are dubious. At the same time, the magistrate said that the injury according to the medical report was much less than what the victim claimed.

    - Does the magistrate watch WWE? If so, she would know that everything is possible far beyond her imagination.

    - Headcount for Civic Passion: 2012 vs. 2016.

    - (May 26, 2016) In Tin Ping Village (Sheung Shui), the Police Tactical Unit held drill exercises. Resident Lee Ching-hei (Civic Passion) came out of his home to curse out the police first (see video) and then the workers in the management office (see video).

    Never in the history of the Internet has so many abusive comments been made against Lee Ching-hei ... Basically, the prevalent themes were "The PTU has been conducting these drills in Tin Ping Village for the last 20 years. Where the fuck were you all this time!?" and "If every Hongkonger talks like Lee Ching-hei, Hong Kong would be hell to live in."

    Here are the famous sayings of the Tin Ping Estate female manager, who has become a folk heroine:

    "We have never issued memos before. If you want a memo, then what is the reason?"
    "Oh, the police are strangers? I don't know if you know them well or not, but they have their duties to carry out."
    "So are they going to your home now?"
    "Alright, let me tell them now. Okay?"
    "Did they come up and enter your home?"
    "Only in the corridor? That's public space. It is not your home!"
    "We register them. But can we recognize everybody?"
    "They wear uniforms. Those who wear the uniforms are the police!"
    "So what do you want now!? Fine, so we'll issue a memo next time. Alright?"
    "If they come tomorrow, we'll issue a memo. Have they come now? Not yet, right!"

    (Hong Kong Free Press) March 22, 2016.

    A restaurant owner who gives food to low-income citizens in Sham Shui Po has moved into new low-rent premises after being forced out of his original store due to rent hikes, StandNews reported.

    Pei Ho Dim Sum Teahouse was previously located on Tai Nan Street, and its owner Brother Ming was well known for giving food to the poor in the area. The restaurant was was due to close at the end of the month after the landlord increased the rent to HK$50,000.

    Tse Lam, the owner of the restaurants new location, said that that he is renting out his 1,300 square feet store for HK$36,000 per month. Brother Ming said that the new store is cheaper but also 300 square feet larger. Tse said that he had been with Brother Ming to give food to people living under bridges and Nam Cheong Estate. Seeing his determination, I really admire him, Tse told StandNews. My whole family supports Brother Ming.

    Brother Ming said that renovations may cost around HK$1 million but he wanted to avoid taking money from financial groups. If there is someone offering HK$10,000, its easy for some rich people. But this is no comparison to 10,000 people each giving HK$1. There are at least 10,000 people supporting you, said Brother Ming. Food-giving activities will continue, and we will never let it stop, he said.

    Also Hong Kong Magazine.

    That was then, but this is now ...

    (Speakout HK) April 29, 2016.

    0:01 Chan Ho-tin (Hong Kong National Party): Hong Kong has many objective conditions to become independent.

    0:03 Agnes Chow Ting (Demosisto): We are mainly fighting for self-determination and referendum.

    0:06 Wong Chun-kit: I will say that I am a Hongkonger.

    0:17 Brother Ming: If you are Chinese, you are Chinese. How can you say no? If you are of Chinese extract, you are Chinese. You are living in a Chinese place. A place governed by China. It is not up to you to deny it. What can you do to make the country democratic, progressive and respected? You should try to think how to make China rich and strong, and become strong in the world. You cannot just look at things from Hong Kong. You should stand taller and see the whole world ... all the political struggles and democratic advances ... to come up with a genuine idea to make Hong Kong prosperous and stable. That will make Hong Kong become better.

    (Wen Wei Po) May 2, 2016.

    Localists heap insults at Brother Ming for his statement at Speakout HK:


    Do not patronize this Brother Ming
    because he supports the Communist Party

     Brother Ming has lost his reputation in one blow. All his charitable deeds have gone to waste.

    - This dickface deserves to be cursed out! He should have known that he is ugly and therefore should not have pretended to be a good guy. Now everybody has lost his/her appetite.

    - All along Brother Ming was giving out meals in order to propagandize for the Hong Kong Communist government.

    - Brother Ming should go back to mainland China where he belongs and distribute food there.

    - Brother Ming is merely being ignorant. But ignorance is what is scariest.

    - After we build the Hong Kong nation, people like Brother Ming will be screened out and shipped back to China.

    - Unless the older generation of Chinese people all drop dead, Hong Kong has no future!

    Contrarian opinions abound:

    - If these localists successfully build a nation, at least 90% of the people of Hong Kong will have to die!

    - Politics is politics. Brother Ming is performing charitable deeds. Frankly he does not mind whether you patronize his restaurant or not on account of your view of his politics. He only cares that he can provide a good meal to needy people. I admire Brother Ming for what he does.

    - The extreme form of populism means that you are either my friend or my enemy with nothing in between. At first, nothing is known about Brother Ming's politics, and the whole world applauded him for his charitable deeds. Once his politics is revealed, some people now want his head on a pike.

    (EJ Insight) June 1, 2016.

    Pei Ho cha chaan teng, a Hong Kong-style Chinese BBQ tea restaurant in Sham Shui Po, is set to reopen in mid-June, thanks to the donations received by its owner Chan Cheuk-ming. Chan, also known as Ming Gor or Brother Ming, received backing from several people as he was well known in the neighborhood for offering cheap or even free meals to the poor and needy.

    Earlier this year, Chan was forced to look for new premises due to rent hike at his old facility. He found a place at concessionary rent but was still confronted with a lot of other costs. Amid this situation, warm-hearted donors came to his rescue, offering him help in kind. Chan received donations such as cooking tools, construction materials, lamps, televisions and air-conditioners, helping him save over HK$400,000.

    According to a post by a Facebook Group named Sham Shui Post, Chan is yet to cover all his costs but the donations are allowing him to go ahead with plans for a reopening of his restaurant. As the new facility will no longer be just a cha chaan teng, Chan decided to name the outlet Pei Ho Counterparts (北河同行), a name used by a voluntary group gathered by him.

    He told Apple Daily that he hopes after the opening of the outlet in Sham Shui Po, there will be more branches in different places in Hong Kong, such as Yuen Long and Tin Shui Wai.

    Among the various donations, Chan said he was really surprised and pleased as he received a calligraphy nameplate from Chua Lam (蔡瀾), a famous travel columnist and food critic. The calligraphy was of the restaurants new name. Chan said he hopes that Chua will come to the restaurants opening ceremony. In other comments, he said he is confident that he can self-finance the restaurant in the future as he sees it as a social enterprise.

    In February, Chan was asked by his previous landlord to move his restaurant out of the Tai Nan Street premises by the end of March as Chan failed to agree to a 25 percent rent hike. In March, he received an offer from a friend to avail of new premises at relatively low rent. Following that offer, Chan received a lot of other help from people in the form of equipment and other things.

    Given Chans charitable nature and generosity towards the poor, many people in the neighborhood felt that they should help him get back on his feet and allow him to continue his good work.

    (SCMP) Why talk of an independent Hong Kong fails the test of reality. By Regina Ip. May 7, 2016.

    The idea of Hong Kong independence was first mooted on a website, Hong Konger Front, in 2004. It advocated building an independent Hong Kong nation by referendum. As the relationship between mainland China and Hong Kong was stable at that time, the website drew little public attention.

    In 2011, the relationship began to deteriorate, following the influx of mainland women coming here to give birth and the spike in parallel trade in powdered milk and other daily necessities. The resultant disruption and tension spawned a slew of radical localist groups, which staged anti-mainland protests under the banner of protecting local interests. Some even challenged Chinas sovereignty by unfurling the British colonial flag and demonstrating outside the Peoples Liberation Armys barracks in Central.

    The Hong Kong independence movement gained traction in the wake of the debate on universal suffrage for the chief executive election. In 2014, the University of Hong Kong student union published a series of articles urging self-determination by the Hong Kong race. In recent months, advocates of independence have stepped up their ideological push by publishing further statements.

    In 2011, the relationship began to deteriorate, following the influx of mainland women coming here to give birth and the spike in parallel trade in powdered milk and other daily necessities. The resultant disruption and tension spawned a slew of radical localist groups, which staged anti-mainland protests under the banner of protecting local interests. Some even challenged Chinas sovereignty by unfurling the British colonial flag and demonstrating outside the Peoples Liberation Armys barracks in Central.

    The Hong Kong independence movement gained traction in the wake of the debate on universal suffrage for the chief executive election. In 2014, the University of Hong Kong student union published a series of articles urging self-determination by the Hong Kong race. In recent months, advocates of independence have stepped up their ideological push by publishing further statements.

    Irrespective of whether the term autonomy, self-determination or independence is used, the thrust of the arguments is the same. The objective is to shake free the shackles of the Basic Law to redefine who qualifies as Hong Kong permanent residents, who has the authority to control the movement of Chinese people into Hong Kong, and to seek a new political status that will enable Hong Kong to determine its own destiny. All of this shows clear signs of influence of political thinkers who advocate defining nationhood on the basis of the common cultural and social identity of the people.

    The students show great dissatisfaction with the status quo, and many of their complaints against the social and economic inequities are understandable and justified. They are naturally the boldest in urging negotiation with Beijing to achieve a freer, more independent status. Yet, their vision fails miserably against the test of reality.

    The reality is that Hong Kong had never been autonomous or free before the Chinese takeover, as imagined by independence advocates. Hong Kong peoples status and right of abode were defined by British nationality legislation. It was the British authorities which decided, by an act of Parliament in 1981 and an Order in Council in 1986, to take away from British nationals in Hong Kong the right of abode in the UK, and confer on them the residual status of British National (Overseas).

    It was also the British Hong Kong government which initiated discussions with the Chinese authorities to control immigration by way of daily quotas, and sought an increase of the quota from 75 a day to 150 in stages, to facilitate family reunions.

    All those who have been involved in immigration control would know that, given the vast asymmetry in size, the Hong Kong authorities would not have been able to control the border without Chinese cooperation.

    Older Hong Kong permanent residents would know that the British succeeded admirably in governing Hong Kong according to Confucian values. The emphasis on human rights, freedom, democracy, equal opportunity, privacy and access to information were latter-day additions to Hong Kongs gamut of core values in the last 10 years of British rule.

    As for the argument that Hong Kongs culture is defined by the centrality of Cantonese and traditional Chinese characters in everyday life, such an emphasis clearly goes against Hong Kongs long-standing commitment to promoting a biliterate and trilingual policy, and the importance of a good command of English to sustaining Hong Kongs position as a premier international financial and business hub.

    The various elements of Hong Kongs high level of autonomy enshrined in the Basic Law our status as a separate customs territory, our ability to keep our own currency, shipping register and negotiate civil aviation rights, and so on have been made possible only through the support of the two sovereign powers which controlled our destiny.

    The reality is, like or not, China will always control our destiny. Our economic fortunes ebb and flow with those of China. Political separation is not just a matter for the 7.2 million Hongkongers, but also for the 1.4 billion mainland Chinese. Hong Kong could lose all its daily necessities, business and protection if it jumps ship. The students may be naive, but the grown-ups ought to wake up.

    Internet comments:

    - (Oriental Daily)

    The Democratic Progressive Party of Hong Kong was founded by former League of Social Democrats member Yeung Kecheong. Today at 6pm at the party press conference, Yeung announced that there are many options for self-determination/autonomy, including:

    (1) Hong Kong becomes an independent nation

    (2) Hong Kong joins the Republic of China in Taiwan as a county/city

    (3) Hong Kong becomes a territory of the United States of America, either as a state (such as Hawaii or Alaska), or an unincorporated organized territory (such as Guam, Northern Marianna Islands, Puerto Rico or the United States Virgin Islands), or an unincorporated unorganized territory (such as American Samoa).

    (4) Hong Kong forms a federation with the Guangdong and Guangxi provinces of China.

    All these options will still allow Hong Kong to elect its own leader by universal suffrage. Yeung admitted that he has not discussed these options with the relevant authorities in Taiwan, the United States or Guangdong/Guangxi.

    Yeung Kecheong said that when National People's Congress Standing Committee chairman Zhang Dejiang visits Hong Kong next week, he will try to get close to Zhang and express these demands. Yeung said that he was prepared to bear responsibility for his actions. He said that the Democratic Progressive Party of Hong Kong will participate in the Legislative Council elections in September.

    The Democratic Progressive Party of Hong Kong claims to have several dozen members, and they adhere to "peace and rationality," and "localism without valiant force."

    - (Democratic Progressive Party of Hong Kong) March 4, 2017.

    The Democratic Progressive Party of Hong Kong was unable to achieve quorum for its annual meeting, therefore it will cease all activity effectively immediately.

    - Taiwan (ROC) needs Hong Kong like it needs a blow in the head. Look at the population counts: Hong Kong 7.3 million and Taiwan (ROC) 23.5 million. So Hong Kong will count for 24% of the new (Taiwan+Hong Kong) entity. This is far from enough to dominate but their choice will determine the election outcome if preferences between the KMT and the DPP are approximately equal in Taiwan.

    By city, New Taipei has 4 million, Kaoshiung has 2.8 million, Taichung has 2.7 million, Taipei has 2.7 million, Taoyuan has 2.1 million, Tainan has 1.9 million, ... So Hong Kong will become the largest city in the new entity.

    The Hong Kong Localists insist that they will speak only Cantonese and they will not accept any formal putonghua (Mandarin) teaching in Hong Kong schools. How are they going to communicate with the Taiwanese? Do they already know or will they learn Minnan/Hokkien/Fujianese/Hoklo/Hakka?

    - Hong Kong's population is 7.3 million; Guangdong's population is 104 million; Guangxi's population is 46 million. In the new Hong Kong/Guangdong/Guangxi entity, Hong Kong will account for less than 5% of the population. Therefore, under universal suffrage, the newly elected Guangdong/Guangxi/Hong Kong Federation leader will be a Guangdong person, such as former Communist Party Secretary of Guangdong Wang Yang. So if the Federation leader wants to start a war against Taiwan, Hong Kong will be automatically drawn into it.

    - Why would be the United States be interested in acquiring Hong Kong? First of all, the majority of the population are not fluent in the English language. And you can't even teach them, because they want everything in Cantonese only.

    Washington DC is located at 77 degrees west in longitude. Hong Kong is located at 114 degrees east in longitude. They are at the opposite ends of the world. When it is noon in Washington DC, it is midnight in Hong Kong.

    When a territory of the United States attains statehood, its residents automatically become citizens. That is why the US Congress/Senate seek reassurance that the newcomers are qualified. For example, take a Hongkonger at random and make him take this naturalization test in civics. How is he/she going to pass? And nothing in that test means anything to a Hongkonger. Who were John Adams and James Madison? What is the Second Amendment? What is the open-carry law? What was the Chinese Exclusion Act? What was the Sedition Act of 1918? What is Roe v. Wade? How would you like to pay 33% US Federal taxes on your income? What is the Social Security Act and what will happen to retirement benefits of Hongkongers? Is Obamacare applicable? Do you accept Donald Trump as your president? ...

    - (SCMP) US should look to its own conduct before crying interference. By Alex Lo. March 8, 2017.

    Lets consider Puerto Rico, a US protectorate. Exactly a century ago, Washington granted US citizenship to a million people on the island. It promptly drafted 2 per cent of the population into fighting in world war one. That set off a century of ruthless American exploitation that is unabated today. Beijing formally controls the foreign and military affairs of Hong Kong while we still run our own trade, currency, border control, government, tax, law, water, energy and much else.

    The Puerto Rican government has no control of much of anything. According to Nelson Denis, author of War Against All Puerto Ricans, US federal agencies now run the islands banking and legal systems, foreign trade and relations, shipping and maritime laws, broadcasting regulations, postal service, immigration, social security, customs, transportation, defence, the environment, territorial waters and air space. It uses the US dollar as its official currency. It is poorer than the poorest US state, Mississippi.

    Yet, its government has recently raised the retirement age and public pension contributions while cutting benefits. It has raised rates for water, gas, electricity and sales taxes from 10 to 60 per cent. More schools and clinics are shut. Why? Because it has become a municipal bond debtor being targeted for privatisation by Wall Street and US hedge funds. Puerto Rico has a public debt of US$72 billion, equivalent to three-quarters of GDP.

    Poll after poll has shown most Puerto Ricans want to join the American union. Yet, last year, all three branches of the US government declared the island to be no better than a colony.

    The Obama White House said it was a US territorial possession without sovereignty, and the Supreme Court agreed. The US Congress created a financial control board to run its economy and government, to make sure American financiers got their pound of flesh.

    (SCMP) May 8, 2016.

    The last public hearing session on the governments retirement protection consultation in Tai Po was cut short by a few minutes on Saturday, after the chief secretarys speech was interrupted by protesting calls from the audience.

    This session was better than the previous four ... I hope we started well and can end well, said Chief Secretary Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor at the last of five public hearing sessions. Unfortunately, her comments were made too early, when protesters rushed towards the stage one with a bubble gun spraying bubbles around which caused Lam to abandon the meeting without finishing her speech. The six-month public consultation over retirement protection slated to end in June had caused controversy, with the public sessions often becoming heated protest sites.

    Cheng continued the government rhetoric that a universal pensions scheme is unaffordable and would be a waste of public funds as the money would be spread across all elderly citizens, instead of targeting the poor ones.

    Much of the argument comes from groups who advocate for a universal scheme, opposed to the government suggestion of distributing around HK$3,300 a month for elderly Hongkongers who have assets of HK$80,000 or less.  Members of the public in turn criticised the governments harsh criteria, with one saying that HK$80,000 in assets isnt even enough to deal with funeral expenses and expressed disappointment at the governments attitude and suggestions.

    Many of those who attended the meeting supported a retirement protection scheme without any asset limit or test, while others complained that the government-suggested asset limit was too low, which would exclude most elderly people.  In the consultation document, a means-tested pension scheme with the asset limit at HK$80,000 was suggested which meant only 23 per cent of all elderly people in the city would qualify.

    (Oriental Daily) May 8, 2016.

    During the meeting, 19 citizens spoke. Ms. Yu, a night-shift security guard, said that she sees senior citizens rummaging for cardboard paper and soda cans in the trash. She said that she gets paid the minimum wage and she has less than $100,000 in her Mandatory Provident Fund account. She questioned that if the means-tested asset limit is $80,000, then whether that is enough to pay for a coffin.

    Housework aide Ms. Bo said, "I am not as luck as Carrie Lam who can retire to England." She wants to live a life with respect under a universal retirement protection scheme.

    Mr. Pan said: "Many senior citizens who rummage for cardboard paper and soda cans are actually very wealth." This comment caused an uproar among the audience members. 18-year-old Mr. Mak deplored Mr. Pan: "You are not human. Who rummages for cardboard paper as a hobby?" Mr. Mak said that a universal retirement protection scheme is a basic human right.

    Carrie Lam said that the government respects human rights, but League of Social Democrats member Raphael Wong interjected: "Don't lie!" Ultimately, Lam was unable to complete her response and the meeting was called off early.

    Video links:

    RTHK
    http://news.rthk.hk/rthk/ch/component/k2/1258801-20160507.htm

    TVB
    http://news.tvb.com/local/572df5c56db28c2c16000004/

    Current News
    https://www.facebook.com/832553626780002/videos/992026234166073/

    Internet comments:

    - (Wen Wei Po) Carrie Lam said that this meeting was better than the previous four because there had not been any physical clashes yet. She wanted the meeting to end well and that people would sit down quietly. But League of Social Democrats member Raphael Wong suddenly started to yell from his seat and said that Lam is "lying." Lam said to Wong: "You are making noise before I finish speaking." This caused other League of Social Democrats to be upset, and one of them took out a bubble gun to shoot out soap bubbles while yelling for a universal retirement protection scheme. Things got out of control. Lam said: "I am not done with speaking." But the security guard could not persuade the League of Social Democrats to stop and so the organizers announced that the meeting was over.

    - All in all, the League of Social Democrats has once again made great progress in procuring universal retirement benefits for the people of Hong Kong. By today's action, they have also ended one-party rule in China.

    (Oriental Daily) May 5, 2016.

    People Power member Tam Tak-chi was manning a street booth at Exit B, Choi Hung MTR Station with four other People Power members when a middle-aged woman approached and cursed him out. The two sides argued. The woman seized Tam's microphone and the two tussled with each other. During the chaos, Tam was pushed to the ground with the back of his head hitting the ground. The other People Power members seized the woman and called the police. The police came and arrested the woman for assault. Tam was taken to the hospital by ambulance. No bone fractures were detected on the X-rays, and Tam was released. However, Tam said that he still felt dizzy and nauseous. The doctor said that further tests may be necessary if the conditions don't improve. Afterwards Tam went down to the police station to assist in the investigation.

    Video Links:

    NOW TV https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qSXxq2KoCcU

    Internet comments:

    - People Power member Tam Tak-chi planned to participate in the Legislative Council elections in September. Yesterday, he claimed that he was attacked by a 60-something-year-old woman, who grabbed his microphone first and then pushed him such that he lost his balance and fell down with the back of his head hitting the ground. Afterwards Tam wrote on his Facebook: "The back of my head hit the ground. Swollen. Dizzy. Nauseous." "Medical examination at United Christian Hospital." "When I fell down, there were voices which kept saying: 'Faking it. Taking a dive. Call the morgue'."

    The result of this minor episode ended up being an Internet war of words between supporters of Civic Passion and People Power. On one side, Civic Passion people said that Tam Tak-chi is a weakling who got his butt kicked by a grandma. On the other hand, People Power people said that Civic Passion people are lowlifes who exploit a bad situation.

    Civic Passion leader Wong Yeung-tat's wife Chan Sau-wai said that Tam is a "stupid cunt" who got pushed around by a 60-something-year-old woman and then took a dive with his body in the shape of a big X. Another Internet user Poki Chan said that Tam is a weakling: "He is a big fat slob who was knocked down by one punch from an old woman." Interestingly, People Power has often denounced police violence in the past but today they called the police for assistance. Isn't this ironic?

    - Hong Kong's revolutionaries want nothing to do with their nominal enemies, which are supposed to the Occupation force known as the People's Liberation Army. Instead, there is a constant stream of stories about them beating up grandmas or being beaten up by grandmas.

    - Does Tam Tak-chi stand for People Power? What kind of power is it that can be KO'd by a 60-something-old grandma?

    - According to a prior court case, the magistrate released the defendant who was accused to assaulting a police on the grounds that the magistrate cannot believe that the 90-pound defendant could push the policeman to the ground. So do you believe that the 60-something-year-old grandma could push the big fat slob Tam Tak-chi to the ground?

    - The media were not present during the incident, so that the photos came from those present. Why is there no photo of the grandma?  There are two descriptions at this time. One description said that she is a 60-something-years-old 90-pound 4'10" white-haired grandma. The other description said that she is a 250-pound 6'3" sumo wrestler with rippling muscles.

    - (Apple Daily) Tam Tak-chi told the Apple Daily reporter that several women said to him: "We are Chinese. You People Power folks refuse to admit that you are Chinese. Mainland China sends the Dongjiang River water for us to drink." Tam went up to reason with the women, but they took his microphone and pushed him so that he lost his balance and fell down.

    - (Headline Daily ) Tam Tak-chi said that when that auntie came over to seize the microphone, he was scared because she might scream "Sexual assault!" if they made physical contact. Tsk tsk tsk!

    - (Apple Daily) May 18, 2016. Today People Power member Tam Tak-chi drove around Hong Kong in a van with the sticker "The Hearse for Zhang Dejiang." He drove up to Government House to display banners to demand "Human waste Mr. and Mrs. Zhang Dejiang responsible for SARS deaths yo disclose your mistresses and corrupt fortune." Four police officers came and stopped him. Tam said that he decided to go to Government House instead of Wanchai where 10,000 police officers were deployed. "I want to show disrespect to the SARS murderer Zhang Dejiang!"

    -  The calligraphy for "Zhang Dejiang's hearse" is worse than what a primary-school third-grade student can do.

    - Since Zhang Dejiang and CY Leung were both at the Convention Centre, what is the point of going to Government House? If Tam Tak-chi were by himself, he wouldn't have done it. Tam did it only because he got Apple Daily to send reporters to record the incident. Conversely, if Tam did not tell Apple Daily that something was going to take place, Apple Daily would see no need to station a reporter at Government House. So it is a symbiotic relationship between activists and journalists which violates the traditional stricture against journalists creating news themselves.

    - Some guys tore the banners off Tam Tak-chi's truck. What did he do? He valiantly called the Hong Kong police canines for help: https://www.facebook.com/832553626780002/videos/998030860232277/


    People Power Facebook, January 12, 2017.
    At around 20:15 tonight, People Power vice-president Tam Tak-chi was attacked by a man at the Wah Ming Centre, De Voeux Road West, Sai Wan district. The man pushed Tam down, kicked him and punched him. Eyewitnesses called the police who came to arrest the man. Tam is in stable condition without any great harm.
    People Power condemns the assault, and urges the police to conduct a thorough investigation of the case in order to protect rule-of-law in Hong Kong. People will continue to speak up for democracy, freedom, human rights and rule of law in Hong Kong and will not bow to the evil forces. January 12, 2017. People Power Executive Committee.

    (Ming Pao) January 12, 2017.

    At around 8pm last night, People Power vice-president Tam Tak-chi and a volunteer were by  #39 De Voeux Road West when a middle-aged man suddenly yelled: "I recognize you!" The man pushed Tam onto the ground, kicked and punched him. The man attempted to leave, but Tam grabbed his collar and wrestled with him. The police were summoned and arrested a 55-year-old man named Lam for common assault. Tam was taken to the hospital for a medical examination later. Tam told reporters that he is not acquainted with Lam and does not know the reason for the assault.

    - Injuries? Do you see any injuries? (see Cable TV) Do you expect this wuss to overthrow the Chinese Communist Party?

    (EJ Insight) David Chu does some plain-speaking on Leung. By SC Yeung. May 5, 2016.

    When a former member of Chinas parliament makes scathing remarks about Hong Kongs patriotic elite and also finds fault with the central governments approach toward the city, its time to sit up and take notice.

    On Wednesday, David Chu Yu-lin, an ex-Hong Kong deputy to the National Peoples Congress, spoke some bitter truths about the citys political and business leaders who tend to go overboard in trying to please Beijing on all key issues. Patriotism is seen as a business that one can profit from, Chu said, accusing the elite of acting with selfish motives and ignoring the larger problems confronting the city.

    Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying came in for some particularly sharp criticism, with Chu questioning the leaders unquestioning embrace of Chinas One Belt, One Road initiative, among other things. Blaming young people for the problems in society is not right, Chu said, insisting that it is the adults, especially one of them, who need to shoulder the responsibility.

    The barb was directed at Leung, who has been accused of using his official position to dominate the so-called patriotic camp in Hong Kong and forcing all pro-Beijing politicians to be loyal to him. There are people in Hong Kong who do things to please Beijing, Chu said. These people treat patriotism as a business. 

    Ahead of the latest outburst, Chu had slammed Leung in recent weeks over an airport baggage controversy. Leung has been accused of pressuring airport staff to have security rules bypassed so that his daughter can have a forgotten bag delivered to her inside the restricted zone in the airport. Abuse of power is something that no Hongkonger will accept, Chu said. 

    In a news conference Wednesday, Chu called for a new start in Beijings policy over Hong Kong, saying the one country, two systems can only be implemented by appealing to peoples hearts, and not through show of power. Beijings wrong approach is partly to blame for the problems and divisions in Hong Kong society, Chu said. Top leaders should respect Hong Kong peoples way of living, rather than force the citys residents to follow a particular path, he suggested. In a free society like Hong Kong, it is quite normal for people to have different opinions.

    As Beijing has sought to tighten its grip over Hong Kong, the attempts have only bred resentment and fueled the rise of localism and even pro-independence sentiments, especially among the youth. This was among the things that Chu sought to highlight in his news conference. 

    According to the veteran politician, Leung bears a lot of responsibility for the divisions in Hong Kong society. While no one knows what Beijing thinks about Leungs performance in the past four years, mainland authorities should allow the pro-establishment camp to at least nominate candidates on their own for the chief executive election next year. Rather than listen to a handful of patriotic politicians and business tycoons, Chinese leaders should heed the voices of ordinary people and make the right decision. Hong Kong deserves a leader who enjoys the trust of locals as well as Beijing. 

    Internet comments:

    - The EJ Insight report by SC Yeung treated this as a normal press conference. It was anything but normal.

    Press conference video segment: https://www.facebook.com/368513580020590/videos/547174112154535/

    David Chu holds a microphone in his right hand and a fruit knife in his left hand.

    David Chu (in Shanghainese-accented Cantonese): I ... I ... I ... trouble you, okay? If I cannot persuade everybody, I will ... (makes a gesture of slashing his own throat) ... Okay? Is there anyone here who disagrees with what I said? If there is anyone who is not convinced by me ... if anyone has a different opinion, please raise your hand! But you should be careful. The consequence of raising your hand will be very painful. Does anyone raise their hand? Anyone raise their hand? Don't do this for me. Anyone raise their hand? Have you really been convinced by me?

    - Reporters are there to report, not to participate in a public opinion poll. Whether the reporters are personally convinced by David Chu is not germane to the purpose of the press conference, just as the BBQ snacks and red wine that he prepared for the press.

    - David Chu needs to take care of his own psychiatric illness first before he holds any more of these press conferences. When you put a knife on your throat and use suicide to coerce others to agree with your view, you are very sick.

    - You better be careful about saying David Chu has an psychiatric illness, because columnist Chris Wat Wing-yin is facing complaints at the Equal Opportunities Commission for having written about the Hong Kong National Party as "the rebellion of mental patients."

    - David Chu was challenged on his statement that he spoke to the Cathay Pacific ground crew member who spoke to CY Leung. Chu said that the ground crew member broke out in tears. He amended his statement the next day to say that he spoke to someone who is close to the ground crew member who broke out in tears but he did not speak to her directly. At the press conference today, he said that he will contact Cathay Pacific and its unions to locate that ground crew member who broke out in tears in order to understand what happened that day. Well, Chu should do it and tell us, instead of telling us what he wants to do but never delivering any results.

    - If that Cathay Pacific ground crew member saw the video of Chu putting a knife to his neck during the press conference, what are the chances of her willing to meet with Chu?

    - (Wen Wei Po) April 21, 2016.

    A 21-year-old woman without a boarding pass managed to go though security checks through the e-passage. She is reported to be mentally ill and wanted to travel to South Korea to start a company and chase after television actors. Her mother apologized for her: "Very sorry" because some security workers may lose their jobs over this lapse.

    However, neither David Chu, nor the pan-democratic legislator councilors, nor the Hong Kong Cabin Crew Federation have indicated any interest in this major breach of security protocol.

    - In cooperation with Apple Daily and HK01, David Chu tested the system when he took a flight to the Philippines. After he entered the restricted zone, he said that he left a piece of hand-carry luggage at the Cathay Pacific counter. He demanded that Cathay Pacific workers retrieve the luggage for him. The workers refused. So he left without his luggage.

    - (HKG Pao) May 28, 2016. David Chu held another press conference during which he displayed on a placard containing this Whatsapp message to the hotline number 9579-1810 that Chu set up: "CY Leung, liar. He scolded a female Cathay Pacific co-worker until she cried. Our First Class team co-workers handled this case. The big boss treats this seriously and we have all been ordered to shut up."

    Who sent this message? David Chu refused to say. He said that it was from a person close to the case. The person had requested not to have his/her identity disclosed.

    - Of course, this reproduced Whatsapp message can be faked anytime by anyone. Why should anyone believe this?

    - The First Class team consists of ground crew members who handle check-ins for first-class passengers. There may be only two to three of them on duty at the time. So how hard is it to find the list of all those who were on duty at the time, and speak to them?

    - If the ground crew member who broke out in tears is a member of the First Class team, then she is not qualified for the job. Due to the importance of First Class passengers (as measured by customer dollar value), only the best and most experienced people are assigned to the First Class team. When a team member breaks down in tears over one phone call, she is not primed for the job.

    (Quartz Facebook) China Really Hates This Guy. April 30, 2016.

    Internet comments:

    - (Silent Majority HK Facebook) Why Does China Hate This Guy? May 3, 2016.

    Reason #1: He paralyzed Hong Kong and inconvenienced citizen in order to realize his own political goals. He even shamelessly said: "Why aren't the people of Hong Kong ready to pay a price? Is traffic really more important than Hong Kong democracy?"

    Reason #2: He used illegal methods to occupy the streets. Wong pleaded ignorance and said that assemblies do not need police permission. After Occupy Central was over, he did everything possible to avoid paying for the consequences. In the interview, Wong said that he was prepared to pay the price and that he would willingly accept a jail term in court.

    Reason #3: He caused trouble in Hong Kong with western connections. In the interview, Wong seriously said: "Hong Kong is an international city. At the time of the handover, China (asked for) the endorsement of United States. Why can't we seek western support?" The statement was extremely naive and showed ignorance of history.

    Reason #4: His study grades are dreadful but he wants to play student representative. Wong was evasive: "A good student does not have to study well" and "the most important thing is that the student must be willing to contribute more to society."

    Reason #5: He criticizes others while refusing to criticize himself. For example, he ate publicly inside the MTR subway car. Wong did not respond directly but said: "They need to find a better reason to criticize me."

    Reason #6: He opposes China while being a Chinese. On many occasions, Wong has claimed to be Chinese and also patriotic, but he continued to be hated because he opposes China. Wong said that he likes Chinese culture, but he "does not love the People's Republic of China" because of one-party rule. He said: "I'm ethnically Chinese" but "I won't say that I am a citizen of the People's Republic of China. I am Hongkongese."

    - In the interview, Wong gave the impression that he started and ran Occupy Central With Love And Peace. Well, the number of times he appeared in the Occupy Mong Kok area can be counted with one finger -- he came, he was seen and he was told to fuck off.

    - Joshua Wong said that he is a member of the Chinese race, but he is a "Hongkongese" and not a citizen of the People's Republic of China. Internet users "rewound the tape" and dug out the numerous occasions in which he had previously declared that he is Chinese. So Wong's identity is a function of local politics. Depending on the specific situation, he will undergo instant genetic mutation.

    Unfortunately, it does not matter what Wong wants to call himself because foreigners will still say that he is Chinese.

    - Wong uses a Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China passport when he travels around the world. If he is Hongkongese and not a People's Republic of China citizen, he should be using a Hong Kong national passport, right?

    But let us grant that Wong is using a British National (Overseas) passport instead of the HKSAR PROC passport, then what business does he have to meddle in the politics of Hong Kong, which is an inalienable region of the People's Republic of China?

    - Joshua Wong's Facebook has plenty of fetishist photos:

    - (Wen Wei Po) Short after switching race from Chinese to Hongkongese, Joshua Wong posted a complaint against mainland Chinese courier service SF Express. Wong said that he had read a Facebook page in which someone said that they ordered something from Taobao but SF Express refused to deliever. Wong wrote: "This is how things are in China. As soon as the mainland courier service spots a sensitive keyword, they won't even deliver a Gundam toy model."

    What was the product? It was a Kotobukiya M.S.G. MW 22 Rocket Launcher/Revolver Launcher. When the buyer called up SF Express, the client service representative said: "Are you sending a rocket launcher? Even toy models (of a rocket launcher) cannot be delivered."

    - Why don't you try to send a 'rocket launcher' from the United States to Hong Kong via DHL/FedEx?

    - What exactly did the seller state was in the package? If the description is "rocket launcher", then no courier service will deliver this. If the description is "plastic toy", then there shouldn't be any problems.

    - Yes, but how can a 19-year-old live with people mocking him for not having outgrown plastic toys?

    - Oh, please! Joshua Wong is 19 years old already and should have grown out of playing with Gundam. After all, he wants to become a Legislative Councilor. How about putting the toys aside and start reading a few books on political science, history, economics, etc? And how about getting a job for the first time in your life, so that you know what working people actually have to deal with in the real world?

    Q1. Do you agree with the following ...?

    Teach students in school to speak in putonghua:
    12.2%: Only in primary schools
    16.0%: Only in secondary schools
    56.4%: In both primary and secondary schools
    10.4%: Disagree
    5.0%: Don't know/hard to say

    Teach simplified Chinese characters to students in school:
    3.3%: Only in primary schools
    19.2%: Only in secondary schools
    18.5%: In both primary and secondary schools
    50.8%: Disagree
    8.2%: Don't know/ahrd to say

    Use putonghua to teach Chinese language
    7.2%: Only in primary school
    13.3%: Only in secondary school
    30.9%: In both primary and secondary schools
    37.6%: Disagree
    11.0%: Don't know/hard to say

    Q2. How frequently do you do the following  in your daily life?

    Speak or listen to putonghua?
    15.5%: Frequently
    40.2%: Occasionally
    33.1%: Rarely
    11.2%: Never
    0.0%: Don't know/hard to say

    Read/write simplified Chinese characters?
    12.0%: Frequently
    29.6%: Occasionally
    32.4%: Rarely
    25.5%: Never
    0.4%: Don't know/hard to say

    Q3. How do you think the following is useful to your daily life and work in Hong Kong?

    Putonghua:
    11.9%: Very useful
    35.3%: Quite useful
    36.7%: A little bit useful
    14.5%: Not at all useful
    1.5%: Don't know/hard to say

    Simplified Chinese characters
    5.5%: Very useful
    20.8%: Quite useful
    36.1%: A little bit useful
    36.4%: Not at all useful
    1.1%: Don't know/hard to say

    Q4. In Hong Kong, some people are glad to use putonghua/simplified Chinese characters while others are resistant. Which are you?

    Putonghua:
    14.3%: Glad to use
    70.8%: Indifferent
    14.4%: Resistant
    0.6%: Don't know/hard to say

    Simplified Chinese characters:
    10.1%: Glad to use
    56.3%: Indifferent
    31.6%: Resistant
    1.9%: Don't know/hard to say

    Q5. Twenty years from now in Hong Kong, will the following happen?

    Putonghua replaces Cantonese as the most popular spoken language
    6.6%: Yes
    27.0%: In-between
    55.5%: No
    10.8%: Don't know/hard to say

    Simplified Chinese characters replace traditional Chinese characters as the most popular written language
    5.7%: Yes
    21.8%: In-between
    61.4%: No
    11.1%: Don't know/hard to say

    Relevant Link: Burn This Book!

    Internet comments:

    - This is not a case of taking a public opinion poll and then following the majority opinion to decide that we need to teach or not to teach putonghua/simplified Chinese characters in Hong Kong primary/secondary schools.

    You can easily imagine what a public opinion poll about teaching English in Hong Kong primary/secondary schools would be like. A lot fewer Hongkongers will find English relevant to their daily lives and work than putonghua. But nobody will clamor for English to be dropped from the school curriculum anytime soon. Hong Kong is a cosmopolitan city. It cannot be cosmopolitan if the next generation is brought up speaking only Cantonese, which is spoken in Hong Kong plus Guangdong/Guangxi provinces in China and nowhere else.

    - The argument for putonghua/simplified Chinese characters education is that Hongkongers are blessed with being educated in two languages (Chinese and English) and three dialects (Cantonese, putonghua and English). Well, do you want to cut off putonghua? I don't think even the Taiwan independence proponents want to go in that direction.

    - It is hard for foreigners to learn the written Chinese language. Instead of 26 Roman alphabets, the basic vocabulary has 3,000 Chinese characters. But it is much easier for someone who already knows the vocabulary in one writing system to learn the other (e.g. for a mainlander who knows the simplified Chinese characters to learn the traditional characters, or a Hongkonger who knows the traditional Chinese characters to learn the simplified characters). Quite often, the computer software takes care of 99% of the translation. For example, a Hongkonger can write a letter in traditional Chinese characters and ask the software to convert into simplified Chinese characters just by clicking a menu item.

    (Oriental Daily with video) May 1, 2016.

    Five organizations (HK National Front, North District Parallel Imports Concern Group, ProgressUST, Valiant Frontier and Studentlocalism) were scheduled to hold a demonstration march at 3pm at Sun Kung Street. More than 100 police showed up by 2pm to patrol Sun Kung Street and the neighboring area. A number of stores shuttered their store fronts in anticipation of trouble. Localist scholar Wan Chin issued a call on Facebook for his followers not to participate because the Localists will be smeared for destroying the Hong Kong economy and killing jobs.

    At 3pm, only a dozen or so demonstrators were present. Captain America Andy Yung Wai-yip was there to wave the British Lion/Dragon flag for Hong Kong independence. There was a clash with counter-demonstrators who tried to seize the flag. The police arrested a demonstrator.

    North District Parallel Imports Concern Group convener Ronald Leung Kam-shing suddenly announced that he had received reliable information that Wan Chin's followers had infiltrated the demonstrators in order to cause trouble, hoping to turn this event into a re-run of the Mong Kok riot. Therefore Leung decided to call off the demonstration march today. Leung denied that the decision was made because too few people showed up.

    Civic Passion member Lee Ching-hei showed up and charged into a number of stores to quarrel with the storekeepers. He also confronted Loyal Militia member Ah Man and exchanged obscenity-laced curses with each other. The police separated the two men and sent in more reinforcement. Lee proceeded to a shuttered dispensary in Metropolis Plaza and pounded on the iron gate to demand service.

    At the same time, about 10 members of Hong Kong National Front went from Sun Kung Street to Sheung Shui MTR station and said that they were there to arrest parallel traders who were hauling too much luggage. The police checked ID's for the demonstrators, searched them and found that some of these people were carrying V masks.

    Video links:

    Born In A Time of Chaos Facebook https://www.facebook.com/1640482902830291/videos/1721223484756232/ Civic Passion member Lee Ching-hei protected by the police during his shopping trip

    SpeakoutHK
    https://youtu.be/xGbT6YWHtPM
    https://www.facebook.com/speakouthk/videos/650441835103899/ Civic Passion member Lee Ching-hei exhibits his mastery of obscenities to the press

    HKG Pao
    https://www.facebook.com/368513580020590/videos/545574228981190/

    Channel 3
    https://www.facebook.com/368513580020590/videos/545574228981190/
    A member of the previous unknown Studentlocalism holds up a piece of A4 paper with something written on it. An old man tries to snatch the paper and the young man fled.
    https://www.facebook.com/channel3hk/videos/1585637308413808/

    INT News Channel
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kea8YlSdE7M (15:24) Leung Kim-shing explains why action was canceled.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YeaBQn1yhKk (15:29) Civic Passion member Lee Ching-hei
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eegkKrFVs90 (16:24) Sheung Shui MTR station

    SocREC
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ztiPJq7vQY Leung Kim-shing explains why action was canceled
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yEzDosTP6XI Passengers carrying large luggage
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEmaDsdTrkw Sheung Shui Rural Affairs Committee chairman Hau Chi-keung declines to comment on the cancellation of the demonstration march.

    HK Epoch Times
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCxdD3k16aI Civic Passion member Lee Ching-hei
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4J1DUEnydM  Sheung Shui "king" Hau Chi-keung
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vWgAUJnyFdY Leung Kim-shing announces cancellation of event

    Internet comments:

    - The instigator of today's event was Ronald Leung Kim-shing. He used to be a community assistant director for the Neo Democrats and wanted to use this issue to help his chances in the September Legislative Council elections. But why would the other Localists let him get away with it? First, City State's Wan Chin made a public appeal to the Localists not to participate. Wan Chin said that the participants are "even stupider than pigs." Next, Hong Kong independence proponents wearing British Union Jack T-shirts interrupted Leung's speech multiple times. They accused him of showing up late and letting their comrade be provoked and arrested earlier. In the end, Leung was completely defeated as he called off the demonstration march. Clearly, Leung had too few followers as less than 20 people showed up. Instead of a demonstration of force, this became a demonstration of weakness.

    - Leung Kim-shing said that he was misinformed by someone that he trusted. Well, please tell us who that might be. There are a multitude of reasons why this is essential. Firstly, the public needs to know that such a person really exists and is not a phantom created by Leung. Secondly, the public should know who can be trusted or not. Thirdly, if the person misled Leung, then Leung is not required to protect his identity. That person betrayed Leung first, so confidentiality is no longer necessary.

    - Leung Kim-shing has disappeared himself from Facebook since. By this time, there is no reason why anyone should vote for Leung Kim-shing come September.

    - Sheung Shui Rural Affairs Committee chairman Hau Chi-keung was present. Hau had just founded the New Progressive Alliance. However the new party is not doing well, as the Rural Affairs Committee is not supportive and two fund-raising banquets have already been canceled due to lack of interest. Today Hau Chi-keung showed up by his lonesome self, thus suggesting that his new party's ability to mobilize is suspect.

    - Leung Kim-shing organizes a demonstration march to protest against the parallel trade, and then "Captain America" shows up to wave the British Lion/Dragon flag for Hong Kong independence, with the idea being that China will hand Hong Kong back to the United Kingdom which will make Hong Kong independent (if you can figure this out!). Does Leung Kim-shing need "Captain America"? With friends like these, who needs enemies?

    - Wan Chin's Facebook

    Fortunately, I analyzed the situation last night. I told the supporters not to be conned. Apart from wanting to smear the Recover action for being accused by the Hong Kong Communists as sabotaging the Hong Kong economy during the May 1st Labor Day holiday, they are also targeting me. Leung Kim-shing's logic is intriguing. It is obvious that the Hong Kong Communist CY Leung has sent people ready to produce scenes of fighting and the Police Tactical Unit is ready to suppress with a heavy hand in order to put on a good show in front of Zhang Dejiang so that CY Leung can be re-elected, he says that those lying in ambush are the supporters of Wan Chin.

    - Studentlocalism Facebook

    (Statement of apology)
    Our organization planned to join Valiant Frontier, Hong Kong National Front and ProgessUST to work as "volunteers" at the Sheung Shui MTR station after the demonstration march to help MTR workers "enforce the law". However, we were not able to reach the Sheung Shui MTR station per our agreement.

    The reason was that the police was everywhere. When our members arrived in Sheung Shui, they got their ID's checked four times. Each occasion took up a lot of time, so that we could not get to the location to start the demonstration march. Finally, our members and two Hong Kong National Frontier members were surrounded by the police, reporters and citizens during one of those ID checks. We learned that the organizers have canceled the meeting and the police could not disperse the crowd. Therefore, our members could not break free. The National Front could not break free either. In the end, our organization decided to retreat. During the process, the citizens and the reporters continued to follow us. We had to split up and leave separately.

    We apologize to the three organizations and the citizens of Hong Kong for the non-appearance of our members.

    - Hong Kong National Front Facebook

    Unfortunate things kept happening at the May 1st Recover Sheung Shui action. Our organization apologizes to all the justice warriors who showed up.

    Our organization absolutely disagree with Leung Kim-shing for canceling the event without notifying the other organizations because "the disciples of Wan Chin have infiltrated in order to cause trouble. It is rumored that Leung Kim-shing and Wan Chin are both running for the Legislative Council in New Territories East. If so, it was shameless of Leung Kim-shing to use mobilization and personal safety of the justice warriors as chips to attack his presumptive opponent.

    Fortunately, the newbies joined our organization to proceed to the Sheung Shui MTR station at the critical moment and successfully conducted a new round of forcing parallel traders to have their wares weighed. This validates the resistance method of "not having a grand stand and never giving up." Our organization pays the highest respect and gratitude to all those who participated in this action. Our organization is honored to have such fellow travelers.

    - ProgressUST Facebook

    To those warriors who had hopes to recover Sheung Shui:

    Our organization apologizes to people who had expectations for the Sheung Shui action on May 1st. We also apologize to those who came in person to participate in the action. the action was intended to chase away parallel traders and restore peace in Sheung Shui. But the action was terminated before it ever got started, so that our organization and other participants could not stop the parallel traders near the Old Sheung Shui Market. With whatever manpower left, we went instead to the Sheung Shui MTR station and supervised the MTR workers to enforce the law. Although a number of Sheung Shui warehouses and dispensaries temporarily halted business so that peace was temporarily restored in Sheung Shui, our organization admits that this action did not achieve the expected results. Once again, we apologize to the public.

    A big reason for the failure of the Restore action is because the demonstration was canceled before it got started. Any action run by a number of different organizations will necessarily contain different ideas. This action was supposed to last from 3pm to the evening. Our organization wanted to proceed to demonstrate at the Old Sheung Shui Market and the Sheung Shui MTR station after marching in the demonstration organized by Leung Kim-shing. But Leung Kim-shing did not consult the opinions of the various organizations and went ahead unilaterally to cancel the demonstration march. This surprised those who participated in the action, causing them to lose confidence in the organizers and disrupting the plans of the various other organizations. This was an extremely irresponsible action. If this action fails to deal a blow to the parallel trade, it will only encourage the smugglers. Therefore our organization deplores Leung Kim-shing to the maximum degree.

    May 1st is a major holiday on mainland China, so everything possible must be done for maximum publicity to teach the mainlanders never to come to Hong Kong again.

    Touring the dispensaries to thank the tourists
    Buy infant formula on May 1st
    Sun Kung Street, Shek Woo Market, Sheung Shui district, 15:00 Sunday
    Jointly organized by:
    HK National Front
    North District Parallel Imports Concern Group
    ProgressUST
    Valiant Frontier
    Studentlocalism

    ProgressUST

    We should listen to the instructions of the law enforcement agents
    Insist on Peace, Reason and Non-violence

    We should not
    Treat the Chinese people violently
    Destroy the parallel goods warehouses or dispensaries that serve parallel traders
    If other resisters commit such actions, we should rush up immediately to provide help

    (Oriental Daily) April 28, 2016.

    Sheung Shui Rural Affairs Committee chairman Bowie Hau Chi-keung said that he will "take a look" at the demonstration on that day. He said that "it is very normal to be concerned about district matters" since he is a Sheung Shui resident. How many people will he bring to the scene? Hau counter-questioned: "Why do I have to instigate anything?" He said that he is supported by many local residents "anytime that he goes anywhere." He also said that he is not the only person who cares about Sheung Shui. Will he instigate radical action? Hau said that "peace is valuable." He said that their action is simply to make sure that nobody causes trouble in Sheung Shui.

    Internet comments:

    - (NOW TV) April 27, 2016.

    Localist organizers plan to repeat demonstrations directed at mainland Chinese tourists on May 1st. Some mainlanders are worried and are choosing not to come to Hong Kong.

    ProgressUST: We have already won a victory before we even took any action!

    - IMDB: Suppose They Gave A War and Nobody Came? (1970). All talk and no action.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) April 27, 2016.

    Pan-democratic groups and organisations including the Labour Party and the League of Social Democrats protested at the real estate investment trust Link REITs Kwun Tong headquarters on Tuesday. They demanded that the trust stop raising rents and stop outsourcing market management to other companies. They also urged the company not to sell its property to speculators and asked to see the trusts Chief Executive Officer George Hongchoy.

    Today, we occupied Link REIT. For the last month, Link was condescending to residents and did not care about them, this is our resistance against Link, said district councillor Au Nok-hin on Facebook. He also said that the Senior Divisional Relationship Manager So Hong Ling told everyone that he had already received their demands and told them to go to lunch.

    Labour Party member Cheng Sze-lut said on Facebook: Link tried to drag things out to make the protesters go away. At first they promised to schedule a time to meet next week, but now it has become next week we will give a reply on when there can be a meeting.'

    The investment trust has attracted controversy in recent months after it announced that it was outsourcing Cheung Fat Market management to Uni-China (Market) Management Limited, leading to a week-long strike initiated by stallholders against the prospect of exorbitant rents. The stallholders were then told to vacate the market so that renovation works can be conducted in early April.

    However, Link told Ming Pao that it had confidence in the companies that it outsourced market management to and that there was improvement on environment and service, as well as variety of goods and food prices are also very attractive, leading to a rise in degree of satisfaction.

    Link has also attracted criticism by changing the monthly rental system of its parking lots from a set number of monthly parking spaces to an altering number of monthly spaces and raising parking rates by 8 per cent. It told Ming Pao the rise was to cover the costs of electricity, staff, as well as maintenance.

    (EJ Insight) April 27, 2016.

    Dozens of people staged a protest against the Link Real Estate Investment Trust (Link REIT) on Tuesday, decrying what they called the property management firms merciless and profiteering attitude. 

    Accusing the firm of causing hardship for small shop operators by selling properties to speculators, outsourcing management of wet markets and demanding higher rents, the demonstrators called on Link REIT to change its ways.

    The protesters comprised members from several pan-democratic groups, including Hong Kong Association for Democracy and Peoples Livelihood, Neighbourhood and Workers Services Centre, the League of Social Democrats, and the Democratic Party.

    The demonstration began at around 9 am and lasted for nearly 7 hours at Link REITs headquarters in Kwun Tong, the Hong Kong Economic Journal reported.

    Some protesters barricaded the reception desk and entrances of elevators in the building, chanting slogans and holding banners that read bloodsucker, among other things.

    The event saw some scuffles break out. A female employee of Link REIT was sent to hospital after she claimed that she was pushed down to the ground, causing her to faint.

    Meanwhile, some protesters took an elevator and went up to the companys office on the 33rd floor, where they demanded a meeting with Link REITs chief executive George Hongchoy Kwok-lung. But they were unable to meet him as the CEO was allegedly on leave.

    Protesters left the building only at around 4:30 pm after a company spokesman promised that a meeting will be arranged with Hongchoy no later than May 6. Stall operators who had been affected by Link REITs property renovation work are welcome to attend the meeting, the spokesman said.

    Claiming that Hongchoy is open to rational discussions, Lo Bing-chung, Link REITs director of corporate communications and external relations, said the CEO had met members of pan-democratic groups more than 10 times in the past. Lo added that he hopes the protesters misunderstandings can be cleared up through a meeting, Apple Daily reported.Meanwhile, he criticized the protesters for disturbing normal office work at the building. Some groups may be just trying to get media exposure by causing trouble intentionally, the official said.

    Au Lok-hin, a Southern District Council member from the Democratic Party who participated in the demonstration, urged Link REIT not to break its promise with regard to a meeting with Hongchoy. Unless the company comes up with an acceptable solution, the groups could escalate their protests, he warned.

    (Oriental Daily with video) April 26, 2016.

    A dozen or so persons from four pan-democratic political parties (Hong Kong Association for Democracy and Peoples Livelihood, Neighbourhood and Workers Services Centre, the League of Social Democrats, and the Democratic Party.) launched a sudden occupation of the Link REIT headquarters in Kwun Tong at 9am to express their dissatisfaction with Link REIT for selling properties and outsourcing markets and parking garages. They demand that these activities be stopped immediately and that the government should buy back Link REIT.

    The demonstrators put up banners such as "Link REIT sucks blood mercilessly" and "A danger to Hong Kong" and pasted slogans in the Link REIT office. They demanded to meet with Link REIT CEO George Hongchoy Kwok-lung. Link REIT said that Hongchoy is on vacation, but the demonstrators continued to occupy the offices. At about 10am, the Link REIT suddenly locked the back stairwell and elevators so that the demonstrators can only leave but nobody else can enter the 33rd floor Link REIT offices. This made some of the occupiers very unhappy and they clashed with the Link REIT employees. During this period, a female Link REIT fainted and had to be taken away to the hospital for treatment.

    At around 1pm, the demonstrators expanded their territory. Three demonstrators included Central West district councilor Hui Chi-fung protested against the blocking of the stairwell/elevator to cut off food/water supplies by sitting down on the floor of three elevators in the lobby and ate lunch.

    At around 3pm, a Link REIT worker told the demonstrators that Honchoy will meet with them next week to hear their demands. At this time, only a manager can accept their petition and listen to what they have to say. The demonstrators asked two other representatives downstairs be allowed to come up for the meeting, but Link REIT refused. The demonstrators freed two elevators, and Hui Chi-fung tried to come up in one of them. The security guards dragged Hui back out.

    Link REIT explained that due to costs increases for electricity, labor, repair and maintenance have caused them to raise monthly/hourly parking prices by 8%. Also, the system of outsourcing the markets has been in use since 1998 while Link REIT was still owned and operated by the government and has proven to be quite effective. Link REIT said that they have already met with these political parties for more than 10 times already, and they hope that they can continue to discuss peacefully and rationally without a recurrence of an incident like this one.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) April 29, 2016.

    Real estate investment trust Link REIT began legal proceedings on Thursday against a group of pan-democratic lawmakers and other activists after they protested at its Kwun Tong headquarters. The company demanded that protesters to be barred from entering the grounds of their headquarters and has asked for compensation after the demonstrators caused a disturbance at Lok Fu Plaza, which they manage.

    Among the accused were Democratic Party district councillors Au Nok-hin and Ted Hui Chi-fung, Labour Party district councillor Tam Chun-yin, League of Social Democrats lawmaker Leung Kwok-hung and others who participated in Tuesdays protest against the trusts outsourcing practices and rent hikes.

    Internet comments:

    - What were the reasons for privatizing Link REIT? Because public management proved to be slow, ineffective, unresponsive and unimaginative. The markets were old and decrepit (e.g. lack of ventilation/air conditioning systems, unsanitary conditions, unrented spaces due to low return on investment, etc). A privatized Link REIT increased rents but also improved the conditions dramatically. Everybody knew that this trade-off was going to happen. What is the point of going back to government-run markets and bringing back the old problems all over again?

    - The Democratic Party protesting against Link REIT? Really? Didn't they vote for the privatization of Link REIT? Didn't they know what will happen?

    - When the government sold off Link REIT at a fairly cheap price, the pan-democrats approved. After the Link REIT became a public company, they want the government to buy back Link REIT at several times the original sales price. Why, oh why?

    - In Hong Kong, there are no longer any rights or wrongs. The power goes to whoever can "resist more valiantly."

    - Many citizens went up to the three guys who were stopping the elevators in the lobby and complained about not being able to access the other floors that do not belong to Link REIT. But the three guys ignored them. These three guys really needed to be "resisted valiantly."

    - I don't understand what happened here. The Link REIT offices are located inside a private commercial building with many other tenants. Couldn't the security director just call the police to remove the demonstrators who are intruding on private property? Can there be any doubt as to whether the law should be enforced?

    - The pan-democrats say that they are pro-democracy, but they behave like Communists who are ready to confiscate the property of the landlord.

    - As a Link REIT (0823) shareholder, I hope that they would sell off all the estate markets to others and distribute the proceeds to the shareholders. This way, I won't ever have to listen to these protestors again. P.S. I have no idea why they are protesting.

    - It's really very simple. The protestors are socialists in a capitalist society. They think that if the food markets are nationalized and made rent-free, food prices will be lower. And where does the government find the money to operate these rent-free food markets? Higher personal and corporate taxes, of course! That is the essence of socialism: robbing the rich to give to the poor in the manner of Robin Hood.

    - (SCMP) Link Reit protests only happened because a Legislative Council election is looming in Hong Kong.  May 7, 2016.

    The recent spate of protests by politicians at Link Reits headquarters took place only because the election season is coming, said Link Management chief executive George Hongchoy Kwok-lung yesterday. He made the remarks two days after scuffles broke out at the trusts Kwun Tong headquarters, when more than 30 pan-democrat politicians and community activists clashed with security guards.

    Hongchoy, chief executive of the organisation that manages Link Reit, appeared on a TVB talkshow on Saturday and said the series of protests was because the Legislative Council election is taking place later this year. He stressed that the trust is always willing to meet with different political parties, adding they have met different parties about 90 times in the past year.

    Link Reit has long been criticised by community activists and politicians of adopting a business practice that resulted in rent hikes since it took over government-owned malls and wet markets in 2005.

    The accusations turned even more intense in recent months over the trusts decision to let subcontractors operate its markets. Some tenants claimed it was a move to push the rent of market stalls to an exorbitant level and warned that daily groceries could cost more. Link Reit later said it would slow down the outsourcing.

    On Saturday, Hongchoy also said the occupancy rate at the trusts malls had been going up over the years and was now over 95 per cent. Renewal rate was also 70 to 80 per cent. He believed that the tenants are willing to stay because they are making money. To show that he cares about the customers, he said: It is a demand I have for myself every day how to make the customers feel that the money they spend are worth it.

    On Thursday, about 30 protesters showed up at Link Reits Kwun Tong headquarters and demanded in vain to meet Hongchoy. Some even urged Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying to intervene. At present, besides the markets owned privately by Link Reit, there are 76 public markets managed by the Food and Environmental Hygiene Department.

    - (EJ Insight) Fight Link REIT with competition law, not publicity stunts. By Wong On-yin. May 11, 2016.

    It has been quite eventful recently at the head office of the Link Real Estate Investment Trust.

    Protests led by pan-democratic parties against soaring rent and the hegemony of real estate developers at its front door have been occurring almost daily.

    As George Kwok-lung Hongchoy, Link REITs chief executive, said earlier, it has become almost a routine for politicians to stage protests in front of his office whenever there are elections coming up.

    The fact that the pan-democrats always go after Link REIT only indicates their complete ignorance.

    It is a public company, and under the law, only the Security and Futures Commission has the power to oversee its business practices.

    As long as Link REIT hasnt committed any crime, such as cooking the books, what it does is perfectly legal including raising the rent for tenants in its shopping malls or evicting those who cant afford to stay no matter how unpopular or unjust such an act might be, because that is exactly how a market economy works.

    Protests and empty slogans wont change anything.

    In fact, it is absolutely meaningless to hold big businesses to a high moral standard, because in any capitalist society, businesses are born to pursue profits perhaps with the exception of social enterprises.

    It is the universal rule of the capitalist game, under which companies only need to make sure they carry out their businesses legally, not morally.

    Only nave leftist idealists would believe in the notion that holding big businesses to a high moral standard can make our world a better place.

    I bet all the politicians who have staged protests at Link REITs head office are well aware that their actions wont make any difference at all.

    The reason they keep doing that is they need this kind of publicity stunt to please their supporters.

    As I said, since under capitalism, businesses are subject only to legal regulation, not moral criticism, instead of just shouting empty slogans at its head office, the only way to bring a giant company like Link REIT into line or put it in its place is to bring its business operations under close scrutiny to see if it has violated any law.

    If there are signs that it has, then we should immediately raise the red flag and report it to the authorities.

    As a matter of fact, I have identified some smoking-gun evidence that may indicate that Link REIT could have violated the Competition Law, which came into effect a little more than a year ago.

    It really boggles the mind as to why the pan-democrats, with so many legal experts and prominent barristers on their side, have failed to notice that.

    Is it because they have been so busy with their token protests lately to bother to do their homework?

    For example, Link REIT recently outsourced the management and maintenance of the public wet market at Cheung Fat Street, Tsing Yi, to a subcontractor and is planning to introduce a vertically integrated business model to vegetable and seafood vending, despite the fierce opposition of the existing tenants.

    Based on my observations, there are signs that such a change may involve malpractices such as predetermined sales volume, price fixing, price maintenance and customer allocation, all of which constitute anticompetitive practices under the law.

    Another example is that when the Link REIT sells its properties by tender, the process often lacks transparency and oversight, giving rise to possible malpractices such as bid-rigging, predatory pricing or price squeezes.

    In fact, given that there is so much potential for breaches of the Competition Law in the various business operations of Link REIT, all the pan-democrats need do is await the slightest slip on its part, then jump in and nail it to the wall.

    So why continue to waste time on those meaningless protests?

    One explanation may be that the pan-democrats themselves could also have noticed such potential malpractices but just dont have the guts to take on big business.

    All they intended to do was pull off some nice publicity stunts to please the grass-roots voters in the upcoming Legislative Council election.

    If that is true, then they are just as hypocritical as lawmakers representing the Federation of Trade Unions, who on one hand vow to protect labor rights but on the other eagerly toe the governments pro-business line when it comes to casting their votes on labor rights bills in Legco.

    (Wen Wei Po) April 25, 2016.

    Civic Passion, Proletariat Political Institute and City-State announced that they will field candidates in the September Legislative Council. If elected, they will immediately resign in order to trigger a de facto referendum. For the Hong Kong Island district, "Four-eyed Brother" Alvin Cheng Kam-mun is their candidate. Yesterday there was an opening ceremony for his campaign office. The other candidates Raymond Wong Yuk-man, Wong Yeung-tat, Cheng Chung-tai and Wan Chin were present.

    The opening ceremony was scheduled for 2pm at the Tai Lok Street Sitting-out area, San Wan Ho district. But Raymond Wong, Wan Chin and Cheng Chung-tai were all late. So the Civic Passion devotees had to stand in the rain to wait for their leaders to arrive. The two Wong's lead some chants about "Nation building" and "Down with the Communist Party." Then they waited in the rain for the Lucky Hour to arrive to cut up the roasted piglet. Afterwards they went into Cheng's new office.

    Previously, Cheng Kam-mun was arrested for a YouTube video to show how to destroy public library books written in simplified Chinese characters. Yesterday Cheng distributed pamphlets advertising his new fund-raising book-exchange program. He promised that for an initiation fee of $1,000, you can read books for free at his office and also swap any one of your books with one of his. He said: "I'll take any book, except ones that are written in simplified Chinese characters." Cheng also offers a $4,000 "Four-Eyed Brother Club Membership" which entitles you to enjoy having Cheng come in to eat at your home and he'll wash the dishes afterwards.

    At 5pm, there was an auction. On the table  were a number of cartoons from private collections with a starting bid of $3,000. But after the bidding period, there were no offers. So the host invited the cartoonists to take a group photo and called an end to the proceedings.

    Internet comments

    - Wan Chin's Facebook

    Hong Kong Island is the site of the city of the Victorian empire. It has a unique aura. Yesterday at 230pm, the Hong Kong Island office of the Civic Passion/Proletariat Political Institute/Hong Kong Resurgence Order alliance was opened in heavy rains. During this period, I offered prayers to the Dragon God and the Guanyin Goddess with no effect. Finally I prayed to the Heavenly God for 30 minutes of rain stoppage and that was effective. We were able to light the candles, offer tribute to Heaven and Earth, and prayed for victories in the five district elections.

    Hong Kong Island may have the fruits left behind by the wizards of the British colonial government. That is why only praying to the Heavenly God works. In Kowloon and New Territories, it is only necessary to pray to the Dragon God. There is no need to bother the Guanyin Goddess.

    - Raymond Wong is a Legislative Councilor, Wan Chin was a university professor and Cheng Chung-tai is a university tutor. If they can each donate one month of their respective salaries, that would be at least a couple of hundred thousand dollars.

    - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3av7OPCodxg Here is a video of the same folks soliciting donations at a dinner banquet. Bonus: "Miss Crooked Teeth" Bonix Chung.

    - In mainland China, there is a general lack of trust because you think that everybody is a swindler going after what is in your wallet. By his own admission, Cheng Kam-mun was born in Jiaozhou city, Guangdong Province, People's Republic of China. Why would you trust him? Why would you invite him into your home?

    - 浦你阿磨("Fuck your mother" in Jiaozhou dialect)!

    - $4,000? Well, I would do it as long as Cheng Kam-mun will eat everything that I put on the table. Hehehe. I am going to put out a plate of dog feces and make him finish it. I don't even want him to wash the plate because I'll just throw it out. I'll videotape the whole episode and I will get tens of thousands of LIKES on YouTube/Facebook. It'll be worth every cent of that $4,000.

    - All that action always leads to one thing: $$$.

    - What happens if Cheung Kam-mun gets elected? If he stays on the job, he gets paid $93,000 a month. But he says that he'll quit immediately to trigger a de facto referendum, which means that he will solicit donations all over again. So is there more money in election campaigning than actually serving?

    - Well, you are paying too much attention to the lack of donations at the event. They are going through the motions as they must. Eventually it will come out that they got millions in donations. How? It all comes from a mysterious "anonymous donor." They have to go through the motions in order to appear that they are getting donations from all over. By the way, this is better known as "money laundering."

    [Illustrative case: A couple of years ago, Hong Kong University Public Opinion Programme said that they needed to raise $800,000 to a referendum on universal suffrage. As the deadline approached, there was only about $30,000. Then they announced that they had met their target because an anonymous donor just gave $800,000. What do you think happened? You can guess for all you want but they won't give you the details because of ... you know ... democracy/freedom/human rights/rule of law/privacy/confidentiality.]

    (Lingan University Public Governance Programme) 1,003 Hong Kong adults were interviewed March 29-April 5, 2016. Telephone numbers were drawn from the telephone directory and the last two digits were randomized. In homes with multiple adults, one is chosen randomly. The response rate is 34.3%.

    Q1. Do you think that the force that the police applied in the clashes of recent years was excessive, appropriate or inadequate?
    31.1%: Excessive
    35.2%: Appropriate
    21.1%: Inadequate
    7.7%: Sometimes excessive and sometimes inadequate
    4.5%: Don't know/no opinion
    0.3%: Refused

    Q2. Do you think that the force that the participants used against the police in the clashes of recent years was excessive, appropriate or inadequate?
    60.3%: Excessive
    20.2%: Appropriate
    6.7%: Inadequate
    7.2%: Sometimes excessive and sometimes inadequate
    5.4%: Don't know/no opinion
    0.2%: Refused

    Q3. Some people think that the police can apply force against those present in order to restore order, including force that is excessive given the situation. Other people think that the police cannot use force that is excessive given the situation. What do you think?
    30.0%: Agree with the former
    54.6%: Agree with the latter
    9.4%: Agree with neither
    5.4%: Don't know/no opinion
    0.6%: Refused

    Q4. Some people think that the participants must never use force against the police no matter the circumstances. Other people think that when the police use excessive force, the participants can resist with force. What do you think?
    46.8%: Agree with the former
    30.0%: Agree with the latter
    17.5%: Agree with neither
    4.4%: Don't know/no opinion
    1.2%: Refused

    Q5. Some people think that resistance by force will stop the HKSAR government from carrying out certain policies. Other people think that resistance by force will only make the HKSAR government work harder to carry out those policies. What do you think?
    28.8%: Agree with the former
    45.1%: Agree with the latter
    17.6%: Agree with neither
    7.8%: Don't know/no opinion
    0.6%: Refused

    Q6. Some people think that political demands can only be obtained through peaceful means and not by force. Other people think that political demands should be obtained through peaceful means but resistance by force should not be counted out. What do you think?
    57.8%: Agree with the former
    35.6%: Agree with the latter
    4.3%: Agree with neither
    1.8%: Don't know/no opinion
    0.5%: Refused

    Q7. What do you think is the main reason for the Mong Kok incident?
    20.0%: Taking the opportunity to cause trouble
    7.2%: Dissatisfied with the government
    6.3%: Discontent
    5.1%: Incitement by certain persons to blow up the matter
    4.8%: Youth problems
    4.6%: Governance problems
    4.0%: Government problems
    3.6%: Police problems
    3.0%: Police-civilian clash
    2.9%: Social problems
    2.3%: Rioting
    2.2%: Inappropriate handling by the government
    2.1%: Vendor problems
    1.9%: The government refuses to heed public opinion
    1.6%: The demonstrators over-reacted
    1.4%: Everybody was wrong
    1.4%: Localists
    14.5%: Other answers
    14.1%: Don't know/no opinion
    0.5%: Refused

    Q8. On a scale of 0-10, how would you rate your approval of the force used by the police during the Mong Kok incident? 0 means very unacceptable, 10 means very acceptable.
    0 score: 13.7%
    5 score: 18.8%
    10 score: 22.2%
    Average score 5.51

    Q9. On a scale of 0-10, how would you rate your approval of the force used by the participants against th epolice during the Mong Kok incident? 0 means very unacceptable, 10 means very acceptable.
    0 score: 42.9%
    5 score: 13.7%
    10 score: 4.5%
    Average score = 2.67

    Q10. After the Mong Kok incident, will the chances for a similar incident in the next one or two years be more or less?
    62.1%: More
    11.5%: Less
    13.5%: Same as now
    12.5%: Don't know/no opinion
    0.4%: Refused

    Q11. After the Mong Kok incident, do you want the HKSAR government to handle such clashes more severely, more lightly, or the same way?
    37.6%: More severely
    24.8%: More lightly
    24.5%: The same way
    11.8%: Don't know/no opinion
    1.2%: Refused

    Q12. After the Mong Kok incident, do you want the Central Government to tighten, loosen or keep the same its Hong Kong policies?
    13.1%: Tighten
    40.4%: Loosen
    36.8%: Keep the same
    8.5%: Don't know/no opinion
    1.2%: Refused

    Q13. Do you think that the HKSAR government should set up an independent commission to conduct a full study of the Mong Kok incident?
    64.9%: Yes
    26.3%: No
    8.4%: Don't know/no opinion
    0.3%: Refused

    Q14. What descriptor would you use for the Mong Kok incident?
    8.6%: Riot
    5.7%: Disturbance
    3.6%: Violence
    3.5%: Chaos
    3.5%: Riot
    3.3%: Misfortune
    3.3%: Taking an opportunity to cause trouble
    2.8%: Clash
    2.0%: Police-civilian clash
    1.9%: Government problem
    1.9%: Unnecessary
    1.7%: Inappropriate
    1.5%: The government forced the people to revolt
    1.3%: Dissatisfaction with the government
    1.3%: Tragedy
    1.3%: Hooligans/thugs
    1.1%: Inexplicable
    1.1%: Everybody was wrong
    1.1%: Plot
    1.1%: Going too far
    1.0%: Trivia
    30.8%: Other answers
    15.8%: Don't know/no opinion
    1.0%: Refused

    (Sing Tao) April 24, 2016.

    HKUST Business School professor Francis Lui said on radio that if Hong Kong achieves independence, the overall wealth/income of Hong Kong will drop by 90% and it will take more than a decade to rebuild. Lui said that Hong Kong is able to attract foreign investments due to its geographical proximity to mainland China. The foreign investments will flee if Hong Kong becomes independent. The Central Government will regard the episode as a supreme insult and treat Hong Kong as a hostile nation.

    Lui said that Hong Kong has no natural resources. About 23% of the Hong Kong GDP depends on import/export trading and logistics, of which half is going from the outside world through Hong Kong into mainland China, and the other half is coming from mainland China through Hong Kong to the outside world. If mainland China breaks of all economic ties with Hong Kong, Hong Kong will immediately take a 20% loss in its GDP. Lui said that the finance industry is also reliant on mainland China.

    Lui also pointed out that while food and water can be purchased, "where does Hong Kong come up with the money to pay for them?"

    Internet comments:

    - (Ming Pao Facebook)

    - After many years of high economic growth, China still does not have rule of law. Even Li Ka-shing is moving his assets away. Foreign investors want to make money. As long as China cannot be trusted, they will continue to invest in Hong Kong where there is rule of law. The problem with Hong Kong right now is that CY Leung and his minions are breaking the rule of law by executive fiat. That is why we must have an independent Hong Kong nation. At the very least, we will save a few hundred billion by scrapping Big White Elephant projects such as the High Speed Railway, the Zhuhai-Macau-Hong Kong bridge, the Third Runway at the Hong Kong International Airport, etc.

    - In the 1960's, Hong Kong underwent an economic transformation from a trading port to a light manufacturing city. In the 1980's, the manufacturing industry went north and Hong Kong underwent an economic transformation to focus on finance and trading. We just need to come up with a new economic model.

    - Francis Lui says that Hong Kong has no capital left without Chinese investments. So far in Hong Kong, the Cyberport, the Science/Technology Park, the Chinese Medicine Port, the City of Education, etc have all failed to become new economic sectors. But was this because Hong Kong is incapable? Or because the government policies were lousy? When one hears the name Cyberport, one immediately thinks of hotel/restaurant/movie house instead of high technology. Whose fault is it?

    - There are many super-rich people with tons of money in Hong Kong. When the day of independence approaches, they will have acquired foreign passports and taken their money out. Information Technology? How many Hongkongers have the training to work as IT specialists? The IT industry will employ a small number of highly paid people. These people will have to be taxed harshly in order to support the rest of the population. If they have any sense, they would have moved elsewhere while still reaping the same benefits from Hong Kong. Cultural industry? What culture will Hong Kong have to appeal to the outside world? When that time comes, Hongkongers will be applying to become domestic servants in the Philippines.

    - Francis Lui is taking these fools far too seriously. Those fools have too much time on hand so they bring up the subject of Hong Kong independence. The people of Tibet and Xinjiang have been talking about independence for decades too, and look just how far they have gotten. If Hong Kong independence happens, then the people of Guangdong and Guangxi will be talking about independence too. Hey, Professor Lui, if you have time on hand, why don't you analyze the stock market and make some money instead?

    - A small drop in mainland tourists cost 30,000 jobs in the retail, tourism, restaurant, import/export trade and logistics sectors. Together 1.3 million people are employed in these sectors. As Ricky Wong said, the first people to suffer will always be the working class.

     - We have always been complaining that housing prices are too expensive. That was supposedly due to mainlanders coming to buy up houses in Hong Kong. If Hong Kong becomes independent, Francis Lui estimates that housing prices will come down by 90%. Isn't that exactly what we want? If even a pro-establishment economics professor agrees that this will happen, we should be ready to go ahead with Hong Kong independence.

    - Fool! Francis Lui says that assets and incomes will fall by 90%. You used to make $10,000 a month and the mortgage for an 300-sq-ft apartment is $10,000. That's why you can't afford it. After independence, the mortgage for that apartment will only be $1,000. Great! Except your real salary will be $1,000, because assets and wages go in tandem. So you still can't afford it.

    - Suppose that you have just bought a $5 million apartment on the basis of $1 million in down payment and $4 million via a bank mortgage loan. The collateral for your mortgage loan is your $5 million apartment. After independence, your apartment is worth $500,000. The bank is going to come after you immediately to come up with the $3.5 million shortfall in collateral. You have only one option left. As the condition for your mortgage loan, you had to buy life insurance for $4 million. So if you kill yourself, the insurance company will pay that sum. You will even have $500,000 left for your beneficiary.

    P.S. If this sort of thing occurs on a massive scale, the insurance companies will all be out of business and nobody gets a cent.

    - As for food and water, somebody or the other will sell it to you if you pay for it. They can be sent it by ship (if the ship can get past the Chinese navy embargo). Bottled water may not cost only $3 anymore, but I am sure that someone will fly it over by C-130's if you pay $100 a bottle. Money may not solve everything, but it solves many things.

    - Francis Lui does not understand why people are talking about Hong Kong independence. The reason for Hong Kong independence is that the older generation is monopolizing economic opportunities in Hong Kong. 90% of the wealth is in the hands of the older generation. Li Ka-shing is 88-years-old already, but he refuses to retire and continues to rake in billions of dollars each year. The young people have no upward mobility, and the government has done nothing to redress the situation. When the Central Government refuses to take responsibility, the young people will have to take matters into their own hands.

    - What do you want Li Ka-shing to do? Should he set up a booth at the Tsim Sha Tsui clock tower and give every person holding a Hong Kong ID under age 20 $500,000 in order to redress the inequality of wealth?

    - Li Ka-shing should do the logical thing by obtaining citizenship and moving his assets to Bermuda/Panama/Cayman Islands.

    - I have faith in the people of Hong Kong. They will find a way out after independence just like they found a way out in the 1950's, 1960's, 1970's and 1980's. If you don't trust the people, you shouldn't bother with independence.

    - Hong Kong always counted on doing business with foreign countries (the United States, Europe, etc). It was after the 1997 handover that Hong Kong did more business with the Locusts.

    - The American and European economies aren't doing so well.

    - But the Chinese economy is about to implode any day now. I can smell it. It is going to happen any day now.

    - Gordon Chang's The Coming Collapse of China (2001) redux. Mr. Chang has been saying the same thing every year. He believes that his conclusion is absolutely correct; the only uncertainty lies with the exact timing.

    - The Chinese Communists are dependent upon Hong Kong, because the foreigners will only do business with the Chinese Communists through Hong Kong. Besides, the dirty money in China needs to be laundered through Hong Kong to overseas destinations. This is how it was and this is how it will be.

    - Francis Lui is wasting his time. The pro-independence people are proletariats who have nothing. There is no point in telling them that they will have nothing after independence. It is the same to them. What they want is a society that is transparent, ethical, fair and equitable without special privileges going to people like CY Leung and Li Ka-shing.

    - Well, if they don't want to work to begin with, they will always wind up with nothing (except for the public welfare payments). That's why they don't care if the Hong Kong economy gets ruined after independence.

    - Why not try it? If you are scared, you can always leave.

    - If things don't work out, we can always ask China to take us back (but on our own terms, of course). Blood is thicker than water.

    - Hey, we Hongkongers are daring, thoughtful and adaptable. I don't believe for one moment that we can't live without China. Please open your eyes, dear Professor. The world consists of more than China.

    - And if things turn out badly, it is okay. At least we know that we gave it a nice try.

    - Why does China have to treat the Hong Kong Nation as a hostile entity? Isn't blood thicker than blood? How can China refuse to trade with fellow WTO member Hong Kong?

    - Right now, the mainlanders come to Hong Kong to buy Hong Kong products because they know that mainland products stink. If Hong Kong becomes an independent international city, there will only be foreign products from America, Europe and Japan and no mainland products. Hurrah! Hurrah!

    - YES!

    Genuine democracy has no place under Chinese-Hong Kong!  Hong Kong Independence!

    It is only possible under United Kingdom rule! How so? First of all, the United Kingdom will treat all Hongkongers (and dogs) equally. Secondly, all decisions will be made by faceless bureaucrats at the Home Office and be unanimously accepted by all Hongkongers who know that they have no choice.

    - Yesterday the same radio show was talking about cutting off food and water. Hong Kong pays HK$5 billion a year for the water from Dongjiang River. Before and after independence, that is still a lot of money. I don't see how the Chinese Communists could afford to give it up. Besides the mainland China depends on Hong Kong for infant formula, medicine, vaccines, etc.

    - According to Wikipedia, China's GDP (PPP) is USD 20.854 trillion = USD 20,854,000,000,000 so they can ill afford to forego HKD $5,000,000,000 which is 0.005% of their GDP. If your monthly salary is HKD$10,000, you wouldn't want to lose 50 cents (=0.005%) just because you are angry at someone for an apparent slight, right? I can totally see this! NOT!

    - Hong Kong imports infant formula, medicine, vaccines from foreign countries so that mainlanders can purchase them here. It is economically more efficient for those foreign countries to export directly into the vast mainland Chinese market. Currently, their major problem is that they cannot scale up quickly enough to satisfy that humongous market.

    - China does not have to treat Hong Kong as a hostile entity. It can simply treat Hong Kong as a foreign entity and revise existing procedures.

    For example, here is the employment picture of the four key industries in Hong Kong (see CENSTATD):

    (1) Financial services: 236,600

    (2) Tourism: 271,800

    (3) Trading and logistics: 765,000

    (4) Professional services and other producer services: 506,600

    Here are the procedural changes:

    - Hongkongers will be asked to choose citizenship/nationality, because dual citizenship won't be allowed.

    - Hongkongers traveling to mainland China must apply for a visa on each trip. The procedure will be similar to that used at the American consulate in Hong Kong: submission of application, financial data, police records and $1,000 application fee; a personal interview; visa will be issued or refused without explanation; if refused, the application fee will not be refunded. Thank you very much. This is a much better business than anything else that I can think of.

    - Mainlanders who want to travel to Hong Kong must apply to the Hong Kong consulates in mainland China as well as exit permits from the local public security bureau. They will find the process very burdensome, and the exit permits may be issued or refused without explanation. Therefore they will avoid coming to Hong Kong.

    - China will not recognize Hong Kong as a nation, so there won't be any Hong Kong consulates. They may allow a single Hong Kong trade representative office in the outskirts of Beijing.

    - Hong Kong companies trading in mainland China will now have to deal with Chinese custom rules and regulations. This means that there is no point for foreign companies to use a Hong Kong agent to trade with China. Meanwhile, any foreign company shipping directly to China will be expedited.

    For freight and storage services, Hong Kong presently enjoys an advantage over Shenzhen because their paperwork allows goods to reach China faster by unloading in Hong Kong and trucking it across the border into Shenzhen. This will change when Hong Kong becomes a foreign nation. Trucks will be backing up from the border inspection post all the way into the city, as Chinese customs inspectors check every container from one end to the other. Truckers will be eating/sleeping three days by the roadside waiting for their turn while the goods rot. As a container port, Shenzhen is already ahead of Hong Kong in terms of volume. At present, it is simply not allowed to outperform Hong Kong. After independence, Shenzhen will expedite their process to allow virtually free entry.

    - The professional services and other producer services depend on other industries doing well. Auditors audit companies, and they are stranded when mass numbers of companies go out of business. Ditto management consultancy, information technology-related services, advertising and specialized design services, etc.

    - Certain Hongkongers have successful businesses in mainland China. They will be asked to choose between Hong Kong and Chinese citizenships, with dual citizenship not allowed. What will they do? For example, during Lunar New Year 2016, three Hong Kong movies racked up more than 90% of the mainland box office receipts. Will Stephen Chow and Wong Jing continue to make billions in mainland, or will they stay to make movies for millions in Hong Kong? It makes no sense either in terms of money or artistic creativity to stay. So there will be a major exodus of creative talents from Hong Kong to mainland China.

    - When Francis Lui said that the average salary will fall by 90%, he is not saying that there will be an across-the-board pay cut. What will happen is that certain salaries will not be cut, other salaries will be slashed and many people will be jobless.

    If you work for the Water Works Department, you will continue to have a job because somebody has to operate the water treatment plant and repair the broken pipes. You will have the same salary. If they cut your salary, you will file a judicial review because your contract must be honored. There is no way that those British judges at the Court of Final Appeals will ever rule against you. So you will be one of the few lucky ones.

    If you work for a hotel which closes due to lack of business, you will be jobless. Because the unemployment rate may be above 50% by that time, you will have no realistic chance of finding employment any time soon.

    If there is a job opening at another hotel, there will be hundreds of applicants. The salary may only be a pittance of what you used to make. But that's alright, because we all have to make some sacrifice.

    - How can housing prices go down by 90%? Is Francis Lui stupid? The costs of land, building materials and labor must be more than that.

    - Nobody is going to build any new housing any time soon. Francis Lui is talking about existing housing stocks. On one hand, many wealthy people want to leave with everything that they have got, and they are willing to sell at fire sale prices. On the other hand, those who don't have much money want to own homes and so their offering prices will necessarily be low. The transaction price is wherever supply meets demand.

    - The price for something does not necessarily represent the costs of production. For example, consider a 10-year-old car. Its current market value is much less than the original sales price or its cost of production. The price is set at whenever and wherever demand meets supply.

    - I can see a currency war coming. When the voice of independence gets louder, the first thing to do is to convert your Hong Kong Dollars into foreign currencies. Better yet, you should heavily sell the Hong Kong Dollar short. When the Hong Kong economy slows, the hedge funds will close in for the kill. The Hong Kong sovereign reserve fund currently used to defend the Hong Kong Dollar will be quickly exhausted by the budget deficits. By that time, your import bottled water will cost not HK$5 but HK$100 even as your salary is rapidly decreasing.

    - Interesting that nobody has ever talked about what kind of changes will take place after Hong Kong achieves independence. At present, there is only some mumbo-jumbo about an open, diversified, just, fair and equitable society in which no one has special privileges. After all, what is the point if the system remains the same afterwards? My guess is that Hong Kong will be nominally democratic and substantively communist. Everything will be put to plebiscites/referenda and if you don't like the voting results, you will filibuster/blockade/throw eggs/valiantly resist. For example, the land rent will rise to $100/sqft per month and the housing units of those who are in arrears will be confiscated immediately with no appeal.

    - Here is the script after Hong Kong becomes an independent nation.

    (1) The politicians will continue to enjoy good lives because they have their big salaries and donations;

    (2) Most other citizens will be jobless and have to scrape through with social dole;

    (3) Government revenues will drop precipitously and the government will be running a huge deficit;

    (4) The "democratic" government will be forced to introduce the universal retirement plan which will make the deficit go through the roof;

    (5) The political instability allows the hedge funds to make a killing on the financial markets, especially by dumping on the Hong Kong currency;

    (6) The politicians will increase all kinds of taxes on rich people;

    (7) But rich people are smart and most of them will have moved their money out already; most large corporations are re-located to Shenzhen and Shanghai already; the domino effect makes a 90% drop in wealth/salary possible;

    (8) The people of Hong Kong realize that they should not have listened to the politicians who are unable to deliver on their promises. Therefore, they march in the streets and occupy Central to demand the politicians resign.

    (9) The police are sent out to suppress the demonstrators. They fire tear gas, they employ water cannons, they fire live rounds, they use machine guns, they drop barrel bombs on Occupied areas, they deploy chlorine gas ...

    - If people have no money, the government can simply print more money to give away. This is simple economics that Professor Lui does not understand.

    - If you print money at will, your paper money will be worth less than the toilet tissue that you wipe your ass with. (Reference: Zimbabwean dollar)

    - If there are no mainland pork or vegetables, we can eat imported Japanese waygu beef, Russian caviar, South African abalones, French oysters and American spam. If there is no mainland water, we can drink Fiji water, Asahi beer and French champagne. Money can solve many problems.

    - Water is used for many other things other than drinking. According to the Water Supplies Department, the average water consumption per person per day in Hong Kong is 0.13 cubic meter (i.e. 130 liters). At this time, 80 18L bottles of Watsons Bottled Water cost $49 per bottle. Thus, you need to order to 80 18L bottles every 11 days at $49 x 80 = $3,920 for yourself. If you have a family of four, that would be $3,920 x 4 = $15,680 every 11 days.

    - Of course, you will learn to be frugal when water is so expensive. Less toilet-flushing, less bathing, less housecleaning, less soup-making and more sandwich-making, more disposable eating utensils, less laundry, criminalizing swimming pools/fountains/horticulture/car washing/gold fish tanks, etc.

    - Famous saying by Lau Wing-hong:

    Hong Kong is unable to become independent at this time, but that is not the sole factor why we want to think about whether Hong Kong should become independent.

    If we think that Hong Kong should be independent but it does not have the ability at this time, we should be thinking about how to make Hong Kong able to become independent.

    Those who think that you should give up doing something because you can't do it now are just guys who don't dare to pick up their female goddesses when they see them.

    - Joke Daily (spoof of Apple Daily)

    Ten stupid ideas/actions for Hong Kong independence

    #10. Fantasize that the Chinese economy will melt down and allow Hong Kong independence to take place

    #9. After independence, we will all be able to afford to buy our own houses

    #8. I've never visited mainland China, but I am an expert on what is going on over there

    #7. I haven't completed my studies yet, but I am going to lead Hong Kong and change everything! (Edward Leung, Ray Wong, Alex Chow, Joshua Wong, Chan Ho-tin, Agnes Chow, Billy Fung and Yvonne Leung).

    #6. I know how to put on a good entertainment show (Princess Chiu Ming/Nakade Hitsujiko, Captain America Andy Yung, Wan Chin)

    #5. I support democracy but I won't tolerate dissent. (My typical methods are public revelation of personal information, cyber-bullying, laying siege to people's homes, threats)

    #4. Hong Kong's economy does not depend on China. On the contrary, China's economy depends on Hong Kong.

    #3. If the American soldiers come, I will be the first to guide their way. (Okay, I know that they have GPS, but at least I am making the offer!) I am willing to offer my ass in the Comfort Camps for the American soldiers.

    #2. Things were much better during the British colonial era than today! (Actually, these people weren't even sperms dui

    #1. We will have a bloody revolution in which we will duel the People's Liberation Army to the death! (Chan Ho-tin, Nakade Hitsujiko, Wan Chin, Billy Chiu, Edward Leung)

    - (EJ Insight) April 8, 2016.

    The past two years have been a time of introspection for Hong Kong. Growing dissatisfaction has turned to cries of independence. Many disagree with more autonomy for Hong Kong and while opinion polls are not always accurate, they show that the majority is against independence.

    On the other hand, self-determination is not a popular idea in Taiwan. Opinion polls show that if the Taiwanese were not threatened by Beijing, two-thirds would support nationhood. However, only one-third of the population is willing to stand up to an invasion. Another third is worried about the mainland using mass violence to keep the Taiwanese under control.

    In Hong Kong, Beijing is careful not to create such an impression with pro-independence voices on the rise. That said, there are useful lessons from Singapore which separated from the Malaysian Federation in 1963.

    For instance, Hong Kong will benefit from being able to generate more of its own water. Singapores water resources enjoy legislative protection. The country aims to be completely self-reliant for water in 2061 when its long-term supply agreement with Malaysia expires.

    In most cases, Hong Kong water will be cheaper than imported water from Guangdong. Desalination at HK$12 per cubic meter is cheap compared with the HK$59 per cubic meter for water from Guangdong, especially when 35 percent of it is not even used.

    Singapores food security is equally impressive. Since independence, Singapore has managed to become the second most food secure country in the world, according to a recent study by The Diplomat. Of 109 countries surveyed, Singapore ranked No. 1 in affordability, No. 11 in availability and No. 13 in quality and safety.

    Singapore achieved this feat through the Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority. Its No.2 ranking in food security comes despite heavy imports, mainly from the US. In contrast, Hong Kong is not rated in the study and Taiwan is not even mentioned. Mainland China comes in at No. 42.

    In terms of energy independence, Singapore companies are pushing for solar power. Nuclear energy is also being considered despite its bad reputation. Hong Kong buys nuclear power from Guangdong, paying HK$1.50 per kwh compared with about HK$1 for Shenzhen.

    While Singapore is cruising toward self-reliance, Hong Kong is being made ever more dependent on the mainland by politicians and business tycoons. Hong Kong people can rely only on themselves to safeguard their own interests.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) April 20, 2016.

    The Ming Pao Staff Association has said it is extremely angered and dissatisfied by the sudden firing of the Chinese newspapers executive chief editor.

    The union said that Chief Editor Chong Tien Siong fired executive chief editor Keung Kwok-yuen at midnight Wednesday, with immediate effect to save resources.

    The Association thinks that the incident was unclear, [we] question whether the company was using the reason of saving resources on the surface, but actually punishing staff members who have different opinions on editorial issues, a post on the unions Facebook page said.

    The union has demanded the management and Chong to speak to staff members and explain the incident directly. It will also hold a staff meeting at 6pm on Wednesday evening.

    The operational environment of the newspaper industry is difficult, the company has to actively take on cost-cutting measures. We are left with no alternative but to cut staff this cut involved business and editorial staff, including top-level staff, a statement from Ming Pao said.

    The company hopes to get past these difficult times as soon as possible. The editorial policy of Ming Pao remains unchanged.

    On Wednesday, the newspaper carried a front page report on the Panama Papers documents it acquired from the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists.

    Aside from his editorial roles, Keung was known for writing a long-term analysis column in the newspaper every Sunday using his pen name On Yu 安裕. Keung previously worked at TVB and Apple Daily, among others.

    When Chong Tien Siong, a Malaysian journalist, took over as the newspapers chief editor in 2014, he was not welcomed in all quarters. Chong was said to be a close ally of the papers boss Tiong Hiew King, a Malaysian Pro-Beijing businessman, and was criticised by the union for allegedly lacking local knowledge.

    Chong replaced the popular Kevin Lau Chun-to, the then chief editor. He was first appointed as the executive chief editor in March 2014, and was then appointed as chief editor in October of the same year.

    Chongs office was surrounded by Ming Pao reporters on his first day of arrival, asking him to sign a charter of press freedom. When reporters asked him if Ming Pao would become a pro-government newspaper, Chong said I dont know, saying he was still not the chief editor.

    In February last year, Chong decided to change the front page of Ming Pao after midnight, from a report on confidential documents related to the 1989 Tiananmen massacre already approved by top-level editors  to a story about Alibaba chief Jack Ma.

    He later explained the decision was made according to the logic of news and the report on the Tiananmen documents was unchanged and still published on other pages. He did not explain what was meant by the logic of news.

    The decision was criticised by the union, which staged an hour-long pens down protest.

    (EJ Insight) April 21, 2016.

    Ming Pao Daily journalists say executive chief editor Keung Kwok-yuen was a victim of reprisal after his surprise sacking on Wednesday, along with several other employees. The staff union said it suspects Keung was dismissed because of differences with chief editor Chong Tien-siong over editorial policy, the Hong Kong Economic Journal reports.

    Ming Pao Group earlier said it was forced to cut Keung and several other staff members because it was experiencing operating difficulties. It said there will be no change in its editorial policy. But newsroom employees said Keung and Chong often clashed over how stories should be edited.

    Last night, they held a protest outside the newspapers headquarters in Chai Wan and put up posters with the word unclear, referring to the circumstances behind Wednesdays events. Meanwhile, eight media associations issued a joint statement in which they expressed shock and regret at the decision.

    Keung was called to Chongs office at about 12:30 a.m. Wednesday and told that he was being fired as the newspaper was trying to cut costs.

    Keung, a 30-year veteran in the Hong Kong media industry, has written articles critical of Beijing and supportive of human rights activists in the mainland. He was invited to continue his Ming Pao column, sources said.

    Chong, under pressure from the staff union, told hundreds of protesting employees that the decision was made in order to cut spending by 8 percent. He blamed the situation on worsening conditions in the Hong Kong newspaper industry and the lackluster global economy.

    Chong, who was appointed chief editor in 2014, said the choice had come down to between him and Keung. He said he regrets Keung, whom he called his right-hand man, got the ax and that he is also prepared to leave if asked.

    Ming Pao Group chief executive Tiong Kiew-chiong said the sackings were not aimed at any particular staff and were left to department heads, confirming Chong did the firings.

    Ming Pao Staff Association wrote a letter to the board Wednesday night demanding that the sacked employees be reinstated and that it explain its plans for future cost cutting.

    (EJ Insight) April 21, 2016.

    The abrupt sacking of a top editor at Ming Pao Daily News, one of Hong Kongs most influential newspapers, will intensify concerns about erosion of press freedoms in the city. The papers management insists that executive chief editor Keung Kwok-yuen was let go for cost-cutting reasons, but most people in the local media community are not buying that explanation.

    There is speculation that Keung was fired as he has earned the displeasure of some elite due to his bold editorial decisions. The suspicions are understandable given that the marching orders came Wednesday soon after Ming Pao devoted its front page to a story about the links of the citys wealthy and politically-connected to offshore entities. 

    While pro-Beijing mouthpieces have played down the so-called Panama Papers leaks, Ming Pao has carried extensive coverage on the controversial documents that pointed to the dealings of some tycoons, politicians and celebrities in overseas tax havens.

    The termination of Keungs employment has come as a shock to Ming Paos editorial staff as well as the Chinese-language newspapers vast army of readers.

    Some lawmakers have also expressed concern, given that the paper had over the years carved out an image of being outspoken and daring to question those in power, through in-depth and high-quality articles.

    It is believed that Keung had some differences with Ming Paos chief editor Chong Tien-siong over editorial policy, which led to the boss suddenly sacking his deputy.

    Chong is seen as someone who is sympathetic to Beijing and its backers in Hong Kong.  When Chong, a Malaysian, took the top job in 2014, there were concerns that he could undermine the papers editorial independence. It was rumored that the groups owner, Malaysian tycoon Tiong Hiew King, wanted the Chinese daily to be more favorably disposed towards the Xi Jinping regime.

    Following Keungs dismissal, Ming Pao staff association has asked the management to reconsider its decision, but it appears that the company has made up its mind.

    The paper said that it was forced to cut staff due to a difficult business environment, and stressed that its editorial principles remain unchanged. While it is difficult to prove that Keungs removal was due to his tough stance on upholding independent journalism, journalists have several questions for the management.

    If cost-cutting was the only reason, why did the company not consider an across-the-board salary cut on employees, instead of eliminating jobs? And, was it right to remove an experienced, outspoken and respected journalist, citing his high salary package?

    Simon Fung, a former executive editor-in-chief of Ming Pao, commented: The management underestimates the wisdom of the editorial staff and the readers.

    Seen from a wider perspective, Keungs dismissal has fueled worry that Hong Kongs press freedom is coming under increasing threat as Beijing seeks to extend its influence in the territory.

    Journalists here can still work on the stories they like, but there is the prospect of top editors or management killing articles they deem politically sensitive or likely to anger the big tycoons.

    Incidentally, international press freedom concern group Reporters without Borders unveiled its latest world press freedom index report on Wednesday.

    In the report, the group noted that in Hong Kong, the medias independence vis--vis Beijing is the main issue for freedom of information. The media are still able to cover sensitive stories involving the local government and Mainland China, but the need to fight to protect their editorial positions from Beijings influence is increasingly noticeable. The purchase of Hong Kong media by Chinese firms is extremely disturbing, the journalists group added.

    Chinas Alibaba Group, led by its chairman Jack Ma, has taken control of Hong Kongs top English language newspaper, the South China Morning Post, a move that observers believe will make the paper steer clear of strong criticism of China or its leaders.

    On Thursday, the paper published on its front page an interview with Ma, where the new owner sought to explain his decision to acquire the Hong Kong newspaper. Among other remarks, Ma said readers have the right to know whats happening in China in a factual and objective way. There are a lot of misunderstandings about China, he said, adding that there is a need to address the issue.

    While Ma did stress that he wont interfere in the newsroom operation, the tycoons comments on imbalances in China reporting will make people wonder as to what exactly would be deemed fair and objective coverage. Although there may not be explicit instructions, editorial staff will feel the pressure to go easy on stories critical of the central leadership.

    Overall, there is no disputing the fact that Beijing is stepping up efforts to control the Hong Kong media and steer the public discourse on pro-establishment path. In this, some media owners are being co-opted, through calls to create a harmonious society.

    While newspapers can still enjoy sufficient room to criticize local officials and policies, a red line is sought be drawn to prevent coverage on sensitive topics on China such as human rights, political dissidents, and wrongdoings of top Communist leaders.

    A survey conducted recently by the University of Hong Kong has shown that concerns are growing about the shrinking of press freedom in the city. Fifty-two percent of the interviewees said they believe Hong Kongs news media practiced self-censorship to avoid rubbing the central government the wrong way.

    The latest news of the sacking of a senior editor, who was known to champion editorial independence, will only add to the prevailing concerns.

    (EJ Insight) April 22, 2016.

    Members of Ming Pao Staff Association said Thursday they were very disappointed after management rejected their request for a meeting, the Hong Kong Economic Journal reports. They said it is possible that they might take some action after discussing the matter with their employers.

    Ming Pao Group on Wednesday announced that it was dismissing the executive chief editor of its Chinese newspaper, Keung Kwok-yuen, and several other staff members amid operating difficulties. The move shocked the newspaper staff, with the staff union demanding that management reinstate the sacked employees as well as explain plans for future cost-cutting.

    On Thursday, it asked to meet with management to discuss the issues, only to be rejected.

    Ming Pao Group chief executive Tiong Kiew-chiong was quoted by the union as saying that he has nothing to add to what he said Wednesday and management has no plans to meet with union members in the near future.

    The union turned to Lee Yin-king, Ming Pao Dailys human resources head, to ask if more employees will be sacked, but she said the question should be taken to chief editor Chong Tien-siong, who made the decision to let Keung go.

    Kevin Lau, who was replaced by Chong in 2014, posted an article on his Facebook account Thursday, saying Keungs leaving is definitely a loss to both the newspaper and its readers.

    (EJ Insight) April 25, 2016.

    Readers of Ming Pao Daily on Sunday may have been surprised to see blank spaces where they might have expected the columns of three of the newspapers commentators to be.

    Eva Chan Sik-chee, a senior lecturer in the Chinese University of Hong Kongs School of Journalism; Audrey Eu Yuet-mee, the former leader of the Civic Party; and veteran journalist Sam Ng Chi-sum decided to leave their columns blank except for headlines protesting against the decision to fire executive chief editor Keung Kwok-yuen last week.

    The Ming Pao Staff Association said the newspapers Malaysian editor-in-chief, Chong Tien Siong, who had the day off on Saturday, returned to the editorial office that night and halted the printing of Sundays paper, the Hong Kong Economic Journal reported Monday.

    Chong reportedly suggested filling the blanks with other content, but the editorial team balked at the idea.

    In the end, Sundays papers could only resume printing after it was agreed that an editors note reiterating the reason for the axing of Keung would be added to each of the three blank columns.

    Chong said limited financial resources were the reason the paper dismissed several staff last week.

    The staff association said it strongly opposed Chongs interference in halting the presses.

    The union demanded that Chong admit his handling of the blank columns was wrong, withdraw the decision to remove Keung from office, with an apology, and consult staff on possible solutions to cut costs.

    It said it will initiate industrial action if Chong does not respond by 5 p.m. Monday.

    The union observed that no editors note had been added to the blank columns filed by columnists as a protest in 2014 when Chongs predecessor as chief editor, Kevin Lau Chun-to, was removed from his job.

    The staff association condemned Chong for obstructing the freedom of expression by columnists and said his actions would cast doubts on whether he would be determined and able to defend the freedoms of the press and speech.

    Apple Daily reported that former radio talk show host Li Wei-ling and Martin Lee Chu-ming, founding chairman of the Democratic Party, who are also Ming Pao columnists, will leave their columns blank in the coming days in protest against Keungs termination.

    Li said that while many people have been saying that, after all, Ming Pao Daily belongs to its boss, people must not forget that the freedom of the press belongs to all the people of Hong Kong.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) April 27, 2016.

    More blank columns appeared in Ming Pao on Wednesday, the fourth consecutive day that writers have been protesting the sacking of a top editor last week.

    Brian Fong Chi-hang, assistant professor of politics at the Hong Kong Institute of Education, submitted a column entitled Support On Yu the pen name of Keung with no content.

    Dr. Alfred Wong Yam-hong of the medical professional group Mdecins Inspirs also submitted an empty column entitled How sad for Ming Pao. Wong included a footnote saying he planned to submit a 1,000-word article on the sacking of Keung, but he was shocked by Ming Pao chief operation officer Keith Kam Woon-tings assertion that the newspaper was generous in allowing the empty columns. Therefore, he decided not to submit one.

    Both columns were accompanied by an editors note justifying the cost cutting measure.

    Meanwhile on the same page, veteran commentator Sam Ng Chi-sum submitted a column criticising the editors note, entitled There is no need to add an editors note. Ng submitted an empty column which was printed on Sunday, when the editors note was added for the first time.

    Such editors notes appeared frequently everywhere on Ming Paos pages, repeating and repeating, like an annoying buzzing sound near the ears, this is a joke, he said. He added that such arrangements did not respect writers and readers. Ng said that he knew his articles must have angered Ming Paos management and his column may be cut with an excuse. The same editors note appeared at the end of his article.

    In the supplement page on Wednesday, three more columns criticised the decision to fire Keung, including another one from Ng.

    Ming Paos Eastern Canadian edition covered empty columns with drawings on Tuesday. The edition, mostly the same as Hong Kongs version, did the same for Mondays empty columns.

    A Ming Pao staff member coincidentally met with chief editor Chong Tien Siong in Hung Hom on Monday, when he left a direct train from China. Chong was questioned by the staffer as to why he did not meet with Ming Pao employees on that day. Chong said he would meet with them on Wednesday.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) April 28, 2016.

    The Ming Pao Staff Association has said that preparations will be made to escalate their protest following a refusal by newspaper management to reinstate former executive chief editor Keung Kwok-yuen. Association Chairwoman Tsang Kam-man threatened industrial action on Wednesday, a week after the respected editor was suddenly fired following a report on the Panama Papers leaks. Tsang said that, during the latest meeting with company management, the Association requested that the dismissal be overturned but their request fell on deaf ears, RTHK reported.

    Tsang also stated that company management promised the Staff Association that budget targets had been met and there would be no further dismissals from the editorial department, but it failed to make specific commitments, Ming Pao reported.

    The response we have gotten from the company is that they will improve internal communication but we have not been given tangible promises or commitments. Therefore, the Association has decided that we will make preparations to escalate our protest. We hope that the company can give us a comprehensive and clear response, she said.

    (AFP via Hong Kong Free Press) May 2, 2016.

    Hundreds of protesters gathered Monday outside the headquarters of a Hong Kong newspaper where a respected editor was recently sacked after publishing a front-page story linked to the Panama Papers leak.

    Around 300 reporters, activists and members of the public rallied over the firing of Keung Kwok-yuen, saying it was further evidence of deteriorating press freedoms in the semi-autonomous city as Beijing tightens its grip.

    The public is very concerned over press freedoms in Hong Kong. We have been doing a good job covering a lot of news including sensitive political issues such as human rights in China, said Phyllis Tsang, head of the newspapers staff association.

    We demand a clear explanation (from the management) on the real reasons for the firing of Mr. Keung. Was there any relation to this kind of reporting?

    Protesters sat on the ground outside Ming Paos offices Monday afternoon. One banner read: They cant fire us all. Some also held up pieces of ginger which sounds Keung, the editors surname, in Cantonese.

    Hong Kong is a unique place in China where there is freedom of the press Such freedoms could deteriorate if the bosses bow to pressure, said reader Stanley Ng, 55, an urban planner, who had joined the protest.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) May 6, 2016.

    The management of Ming Pao is standing by the decision to terminate former executive chief editor Keung Kwok-yuen, but Chief Editor Chong Tien Siong apologised if anything was inappropriate regarding Keungs termination.

    However, Keung told Ming Pao I think that this apology is very sloppy, and it didnt say clearly the real reasons behind the crude termination. I cannot see the sincerity, and cannot accept [this apology.]

    Ming Paos management said in a statement Thursday that it will not rescind and has already completed the termination of Keung. The newspaper bosses also commit that [they] will not lay off employees in this fiscal year. They promised that they would communicate with employees and the Ming Pao Staff Association to increase the transparency of personnel matters before making any important decisions about terminations or saving resources.

    After meeting with management on Thursday, the association said We agree that the management has the sincerity to solve the problem and understand the staffs concerns. At the meeting, the management agreed that the handling of the incident could be better, and the Chief Editor Chong Tien Siong expresses regret for the termination incident. The association also said they would continue communicating with management.

    Ming Paos management also announced that they would be appointing Leung Heung-nam to replace Keung, after accepting the recommendations of the editorial department. Leung was a former vice-executive chief editor at Ming Pao

    Li Wei-ling, a radio talk show host, said in her column in Apple Daily: I have worked with both Leung Heung-nam and Keung Kwok-yuen and the way they treat news, their conduct and morals towards news, even their simple and low-key character are very similar. So instead I have a question: If the management cannot accept Keung Kwok-yuen, why would it accept Leung Heung-nam? I dont know if the association asked the management this: What is the difference between Leungs salary and Keungs salary? Saving resources! she added.

    (EJ Insight) May 6, 2016.

    Ming Pao group said on Thursday that it will enter into dialogue with its staff union before any decisions in future that involve significant cuts in resources or manpower at the newspaper group.

    The assurance came following a meeting between the management and union representatives to discuss recent layoffs at Ming Pao Daily, including the controversial sacking of a top editor, the Hong Kong Economic Journal reported. 

    Keung Kwok-yuen, Ming Paos former executive chief editor, was let go, along with several other employees, on April 20 in a sudden and surprise move.

    The group said the layoffs were necessary as it needed to cut costs due to a difficult operating environment. But employees suspected that Keung was a victim of reprisal due to his editorial decisions, and demanded that the paper reconsider its move.

    On Thursday, Ming Pao said it understands employees concerns and admitted that it should have handled the sackings better. But it said that it will not take back its decision on Keung and other dismissed employees.   

    However, to provide some comfort to the staff association, the newspaper group promised that there will be no more staff cuts in the current fiscal year that ends in March 2017. It also stressed that there will be no change in its editorial policy.

    The group said that it has appointed Leung Heung-nam, who had been an assistant executive editor at Ming Pao, to the post of acting executive chief editor, in line with the suggestion put forward by the papers journalists. Leung, 58, is believed to enjoy the trust of the papers employees as well as management.

    Phyllis Tsang, who chairs the staff union, told reporters that the union is still unhappy with Keungs dismissal. But she agreed that the management did show some goodwill in trying to address the employee concerns. The union will hold an internal meeting Friday to discuss its next move. Tsang noted that Ming Paos chief editor Chong Tien-siong, who ordered the sacking of Keung, expressed regret and offered apology during the meeting Thursday over the handling of the incident.

    In a response, Keung was quoted as saying that the apology was not acceptable to him as it seemed perfunctory and lacking in sincerity. Chong has failed to reveal the real reason behind the rude dismissal, Ming Pao quoted him as saying.

    Internet comments:

    - (Bastille Post) Early this morning Chief Editor Chong Tien-siong let the executive chief editor Keung Kwok-yuen go. In the afternoon, Chong met with union representatives and explained that the layoff was made because an 8% reduction in expenses had to be made in view of the woeful economy.

    Chong explained that the layoffs were based upon three principles: job performance; tenure; and salary level. Within the editorial department, either Chong or Keung would have to go in order to meet the target reduction. A worker asked Chong, "You are Mr. Keung's supervisor. Why don't you leave instead"? Chong replied, "I am ready to leave anytime. If the boss tells me to leave, I will leave." But as the person in charge, Chong has certain responsibilities. The workers were apparently unhappy with Chong's explanations. They demanded whether the decision was political and related to the Panama papers report in Ming Pao. After about 30 minutes, Chong wanted to leave the editorial room. But the workers continued to pepper him with questions. In the end, Chung left by the backstairs.

    - Yellow Ribbons have prevented legislators from leaving. They have prevented government officials from leaving. They have prevented university council members from leaving. So it is natural that they prevent the chief editor from leaving the editorial room.

    - (HKG Pao) ... When Ming Pao Group chief executive Tiong Kiew-chiong appointed Chong Tien-siong as Ming Pao chief editor, the purpose was to introduce reforms and turn Ming Pao back into politically neutral. Two years later, Ming Pao has not corrected its course. Instead, it is following the path of Apple Daily. Today Ming Pao is a newspaper where Tiong Kiew-chiong pays the bills whereas the staff follows Jimmy Lai's ways. Just like Apple Daily, readers and advertisers are leaving in droves.

    What should Chong Tien-siong think? It is likely that he is swarmed in helplessness.

    Is it easy to reform a media organization? When the chief editor faces resistance by his colleagues and subordinates every day, then what is the point? So you want to change things around here. Your boss verbally supports you in principle but he tells you to maintain amiability in practice. You own all the responsibilities but you can't make any decisions. So what is the point in persisting?

    ... Why is going to happen to Chong Tien-siong? I think that he is waiting for his boss to say: Come back to Malaysia!

    - (HKG Pao) For media organizations, income reporting is done by the four quarters of the year. However, the four quarters are not all equal to each other. Instead, the typical distribution is 15% for Q1, 20% for Q2, 25% for Q3 and 40% for Q4. This happens because that is how the advertising industry allocates their expenditures.

    For Q2/Q3 2015, Ming Pao earned $240 million with a net profit of $2.6 million. For Q4 2015, Ming Pao earned $130 million with a net profit of $8.4 million. So for the last three quarters of 2015, Ming Pao only made $11 million in profits. It would not be surprising that Ming Pao is losing money going into 2016 Q1.

    In terms of corporate management, Ming Pao should have seen what was coming and started its austerity program sooner. In Hong Kong, Next Media has shut down publications and laid off employees, Sing Tao is reducing/freezing salaries and the Oriental Group has shuttered The Sun. This much is clear.

    We don't know whether the Ming Pao management was late to become aware, or if they thought that their Malaysian parent company will cover any losses. But it is astonishing to see that the first layoffs occurred only in April 2016.

    How bad will 2016 be? The real estate and retail sectors are in deep trouble. The media industry live off their advertising expenditures. When even "Big Brother" TVB is in trouble, where do you think Ming Pao stands?

    You may say that Ming Pao does not seem to lack advertisements recently. Hey, you don't understand that people need to save face. If you go by the book, your advertisements will tank and you will have a very thin newspaper. So the easy solution is to reduce the price in order to keep the quantity. As industry insiders know, the way is to reduce the yield-per-page. If you charged $30,000 per page before, you can close the deal for $20,000 plus a free gift of another full page. Now it appears that you haven't lost any advertisements even thought your real income is plunging. But you can save your face before you are forced to disclose your earnings.

    In 2016, print media are predicted to make 15% less than they did in 2015. In particular, the Yellow Ribbon media (Next Media and Ming Pao) are expected to do even worse.

    So when Ming Pao Group chief executive Tiong Kiew-chiong says that he wants to reduce spending by 8% and then revised this figure to 5%, he is only trying to postpone the inevitable. Instead of decisive surgery, he wants death by one thousand nicks. You can imagine how much more painful this will be down the road.

    Keung Kwok-yuen is merely the first victim of the economic downturn and the Yellow Ribbon turn of Ming Pao. Many more will follow.

    - (HKG Pao) When any organization needs to impose layoffs, it is best to start from the top. For example, Sing Tao recently announced that all senior managers will be subjected to a 20% pay cut while other workers only have to put up with salary freezes. This was feasible because the damage was limited.

    Chong Tien-siong said that Ming Pao needs to reduce expenditures by 8%. Letting Keung Kwok-yuen go won't meet that goal, so Keung is merely the first of many more to go. Ming Pao probably has expenses of at least $400 million. So 8% is $32 million or so. This is not going to all come from salaries, but maybe 50% or 60% should be coming from the workers in this labor-intensive industry. Thus Chong needs to find about about $16 million from the payroll. A reporter/editor makes $300,000 per year (or $25,000 per month). So Chong would have to layoff 53 reporters/editors to reach his target. I don't know how much Keung Kwok-yuen makes, but he is not going to worth $16 million a year. So there will be more layoffs coming up.

    - (HKG Pao) What would I think if I were the chief editor?

    Firstly, the important thing is that I will have to do it even if I don't like to. Frankly, who else but the chief editor could execute this unpleasant business at Ming Pao? I can refuse to do it personally and let the Human Resources Department do it. But that will merely make it worse.

    Secondly, the way to save Ming Pao is to not make it Yellow Ribbon. It has to be turned back into a neutral newspaper. Ever since Ming Pao became a Yellow Ribbon newspaper, advertising revenues have taken a steep drive. Today, the 800+ Ming Pao employees have been hijacked by certain reporters/editors. Everybody is now looking at collective unemployment. This may be the last chance to save Ming Pao and its employees. Do you think that I should do it?

    - When Next Media fired dozens of journalists and shut down profitable magazines, the Journalists Association praised the organization for its bold move ("a strong man cuts off his arm in order to free himself"). Now Ming Pao fired a dozen or so journalists (including the executive editor Keung Kwok-yuen), the Journalists Association is expressing its consternation.

    Well, the rules here are simple to remember: Everything that Next Media does is okay because they are Yellow Ribbons; anything that anyone else does is wrong because they are not Yellow Ribbons.

    - As expected, the Journalists Association have come out to recite the standard script. As expected too, legislator Emily Lau (Democratic Party) has come out to recite this standard script. Less expected is for the Professional Teachers Union to come out to recite this standard script. What business is the personnel decision at a newspaper to the Professional Teachers Union?

    - Politicians think that they can meddle in everything. For example, when Disneyland laid off close to one hundred workers because they lost $148 million last year, the politicians demand that the workers be re-hired immediately and Disneyland be made to explain why it was losing money. Of course, the correct answer was that the same politicians supported Occupy Central/Shopping Revolution/Anti-Parallel Trade Actions which chased away tourists. But that answer is not as acceptable as "It is all CY Leung's fault."

    -As another example, when the MTR raised its prices, the politicians want the government to buy back the company and reduce prices.

    - (Headline Daily) Why couldn't this incident be hyped up even more? First of all, nobody except industry insiders know Keung Kwok-yuen. He is not closely connected to the political parties like ex-chief editor Kevin Lau is, and he does not like to face reporters at critical moments. Without a recognizable victim, it is hard to turn this case into a political storm. Keung is well-aware that if he comes out and makes a call, the politicians will jump in to exploit his case and the Ming Pao colleagues will rise up in support. In the end, both management and labor will suffer the consequences of the struggle. Given the sour economy, the Ming Pao union has no bargaining power except the threat to put the newspaper out of business (and themselves out of their jobs). Keung's final words to his colleagues were to tell them to stay at their posts. He knew that the case was irreversible and he wanted to protect his colleagues.

    - (HKG Pao) My many years of experience as editor tells me that the blank spaces in Ming Pao did not occur just because the writers wanted it that way. If the editors did not want it, there won't be any blank spaces. Even if individual writers failed to provide articles, the editors can always find something else to publish or even write something themselves. In this case, the editors worked with the Yellow Ribbon columnists to apply pressure on the Ming Pao senior management.

    The two editors who were responsible for the five blank spaces over two days are named: Choi Hui-tong and Lam Yuet-wai. There is no information on the former and the latter is likely to be a lightly experienced young editor. How can they be expected to make the decision on such an important move? So their supervisor(s) must have made that decision.

    - (SCMP) Fears for press freedom in Hong Kong are overblown try publishing a Ming Pao-style blank column in a Rupert Murdoch paper. By Michael Chugani. April 26, 2016.

    Oh no, there it goes again the death knell being sounded for Hong Kongs media freedom. Time to mourn. But wait. Didnt we hear that same sound in 2013 when the Executive Council refused to give Ricky Wong Wai-kay a television licence, in 2014 when Commercial Radio sacked Li Wei-ling, and when Ming Pao replaced chief editor Kevin Lau Chun-to? Its back again with Ming Paos sacking of executive chief editor Keung Kwok-yuen. If media freedom is dying, its sure taking a long time.

    Lets recall what the media was doing while supposedly gasping for life. It gave blanket coverage to Chief Executive Leung Chun-yings alleged pocketing of HK$50 million from an Australian firm, exposed ex-ICAC chief Timothy Tong Hin-mings extravagant lifestyle, ran leaked recordings of University of Hong Kong governing council meetings, revealed Permanent Secretary for Home Affairs Betty Fung Ching Suk-yees alleged flat-swap wrongdoing, and exposed the so-called baggage-gate scandal involving Leungs daughter.

    How dead is media freedom when Ming Pao published blank columns from writers protesting against Keungs sacking? Try doing that in a Rupert Murdoch paper. Tune in any weekday morning to Commercial Radios Chinese-language talk show. The three hosts take turns mocking Leung. One had fired Leung-basher Li but now makes a big deal of Ming Pao firing Keung. Ming Pao co-founder and novelist Louis Cha Leung-yung reportedly once said: Press freedom of Ming Pao is the press freedom of the owner. Those who are not happy could set up another paper to pursue their own freedom. The Guardian last year quoted former New York Times editorial board member David Firestone as saying: I dont know of any publisher who pays no attention to the editorial board on the papers they own.

    Public Eye doesnt know if Ming Pao fired Keung to muzzle him or to cut costs. If it was to silence him he needs to say it out loud. But Ming Paos owners have every right to their own agenda. The same goes for Apple Dailys Jimmy Lai Chee-ying and the state-owned Ta Kung Pao. Their money bankrolls their papers. If you dont like their agenda, work for someone else. Those who fear media freedom is dying can find like-minded people with the means to start their own paper. Yes, some Hong Kong media self-censor, as happens everywhere. If you feel Ming Pao is self-censoring, dont read it or work for it. But true media freedom means the freedom to decide what to publish. It sure as hell doesnt mean staff can dictate to their bosses what media freedom is.

    - Ming Paos Eastern Canadian edition actually inserted quotations underneath their cartoons: "When you are petty-minded, all trivial matters get blow into major incidents"; "let things follow their natural course and keep a calm attitude"; "when someone helps you, you are lucky; when nobody helps you, then it is a fair fate."

    - (HK01) Here is a constructive proposal. According to the Ming Pao union, a large number of reporters/editors have volunteered to reduce their resources so that Keung Kwok-yuen's position can be restored. One concrete proposal is that the workers give up their company-provided meal voucher. At present, the 200+ editorial department workers receive about meal vouchers worth about $400 each month. The total amount is approximately $100,000. So if the company can realize this saving, then it should no longer have to let Keung Kwok-yuen go for economic reasons.

    - The economic problem that Chong Tien-siong is facing is that he needs to find $16 million in savings for the year. The meal vouchers will save $1.2 million. Where is the rest coming from? The workers want to save everybody's job, they will have to give up considerably more than their meal vouchers.

    - They need to find $16 million from 800 employees. All the employees have to do is cough up $20,000 per person.

    - (Oriental Daily) Chong Tien-siong told his people that Ming Pao was faring economically worse than the competition. So what kind of newspaper is first in public trust but last in economic performance? In truth, Ming Pao is full of self-contradictions. On one hand, it describes itself as the newspaper for intellectuals. On the other hand, it has more typographic errors than other newspapers. Also the boss cannot fire any employee at will because the opinion of the employees must be consulted first. Columnist can also file blank spaces to protest against the owner although they are only victimizing the readers. The union workers also put up posters about the newspaper being "neither transparent nor white" but they refused to quit all the same.

    Hong Kong is a free market. People work for companies by mutual agreement. Recently an internal speech of Ma Yun at Alibaba was reported. He said that he despised those people who gripe all the time about the company but refused to leave. This is applicable to Ming Pao. Each company has its own management style and each newspaper has its own ideas about how journalism should be conducted. If the workers think that there is no freedom of press or editorial autonomy, they should quit and form their own news outlet where they can decide themselves on how to do things. If the columnists are not happy with the newspaper, they should stop writing for it. As for that dismissed executive chief editor, he should have plenty of job offers if he is as good as the Ming Pao union says he is. 

    - (HKG Pao) If someone says that a certain person is indispensable to the extent that the newspaper will fold without him, would you believe it? When Keung Kwok-yuen left, a number of Ming Pao workers and columnists and Yellow Ribbon politicians praised him to the high heavens. In truth, they are merely using the case to launch a political attack on Chong Tien-siong and the management. In the history of Ming Pao, the single most important person was the founder Louis Cha Leung-yung. He was incomparable. After Louis Cha left, Ming Pao did just as fine for many years afterwards. Only when certain reporters/editors turned the newspaper into a Yellow Ribbon rag did the problems emerge. Do you think Keung Kwok-yuen is greater than Louis Cha? More valuable? More important?

    Today the Chinese-language newspapers are going downhill. There are two Yellow Ribbon newspapers left: Apple Daily and Ming Pao. A Yellow Ribbon journalist will have to work for one or the other. At Apple Daily, there have been waves and waves of layoffs. One should be glad just to be able to keep one's job, and never mind any salary raise/promotion. In this world, nobody is indispensable. Those who have more experience, management skills and salaries are actually more likely to be discarded, especially when they are regarded as the cause for business deterioration.

    Meanwhile at Ming Pao, the union and politicians are praising Keung Kwok-yuen for leading the Yellow Ribbon movement. Is that supposed to help him, or hurt him? And where is Keung Kwok-yuen going to go now? Apple Daily can't afford any new hires. There is no other newspaper in Hong Kong. Taiwan? Singapore? Malaysia? Mainland China? He is basically unemployable given what the Ming Pao union and the Yellow Ribbon politicians have said about him. Good luck to him! He needs it.

    - (SCMP) The Ming Pao Staff Association said on Wednesday night that the managements attitude at the meeting was disappointing, and they had decided to initiate preparation for industrial action. The associations chairwoman Phyllis Tsang said they would study different options before taking action. We hope the company can give a concrete and clear reply to the calls from the colleagues, Tsang said.

    - This is all talk and no action. So typical of Yellow Ribbons: they threaten armed revolution but they won't go any further than passing out leaflets and soliciting for donations. Perhaps it is time for the Ming Pao Staff Association to ask for alms to support their noble cause.

    - What options are there for industrial action? Resignation, strike or work-to-rule slowdown. The last two are dismissible offenses (see Cap 57 Termination of Contracts of Employment):

    An employer may summarily dismiss an employee without notice or payment of wages in lieu of notice if the employee, in relation to his employment, willfully disobeys a lawful and reasonable order.

    Good luck with finding another job in this economic climate.

    - (Oriental Daily) The Ming Pao Staff Workers Union has authorized the Ming Pao Staff Workers Union to take whatever form of industrial action necessary, but the Ming Pao Staff Workers Union has not taken any immediate industrial action. They only said that if management breaks any promise, they will make the appropriate action. Is it no wonder that Internet users think that this is a display of cowardice?

    - (Oriental Daily) May 17, 2016. This February, Next Media consolidated Next Weekly, Eat & Travel Weekly and ME!, laying off more than 100 workers during the process. Today, it is reported ME! will cease publication after this week.

    - Because this action takes place at Next Media, there won't be any criticisms from the Journalists Association, the Confederation of Trade Unions, the Professional Teachers Union or the Next Media unions. Why? Because FREEDOM DEMOCRACY JUSTICE RULE OF LAW UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE.

    (Oriental Daily) May 18, 2016.

    Next Media confirmed that ME! will cease publication. All thirty-four ME! employees will be terminated. In addition, another Next Media magazine Ketchup will cease publication at the end of the month.

    - When Ming Pao fires 10 persons, the Journalists Association threw a fit. When ME! fires 34 persons, the Journalists Association goes missing in action.

    (EJ Insight) April 22, 2016.

    Its strange to see the traditional democratic camp keeping silent in the recent heated debate over the call by some radical young political groups for independence for Hong Kong.

    Some supporters of the democrats are worried that the old-school politicians might be absorbed into the establishment camp as they rely on Beijings commitment to the one country, two systems principle.

    But on Thursday, a group of young politicians and academics from the democratic camp issued a Resolution on Hong Kongs Future on social media to present to the public their views on the future of Hong Kong when the commitment to that principle expires in 2047.

    The declaration was signed on a personal basis by fewer than 40 people.

    They include Civic Party members Alvin Yeung Ngok-kiu and Tanya Chan Suk-chong, the Democratic Partys Eric Lam Lap-chi, Institute of Education political science scholar Brian Fong Chi-hang and social commentator Max Wong Wai-lun. Apart from Yeung, no other democratic lawmakers signed the declaration.

    So, the declaration represents the views of only a small number of democrats on the topic. In fact, traditional democrats still have different views on the question of Hong Kong independence.

    Its still far enough in the future for the democratic camp to work out a unified stance before 2047 on whether to support independence or self-determination for the city.

    The declaration demands the right to determine Hong Kongs affairs internally in accordance with self-determination principles under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.

    Hong Kongs political status after 2047 should be decided by the people of Hong Kong through mechanisms which carry a democratic mandate and are binding, the declaration says. Its signatories suggest perpetual self-rule as an option for Hong Kong.

    Unlike younger activists, who dont rule out a violent approach to voicing their goal, the declaration states its signatories will stick to non-violent resistance in an effort to gain the approval of most Hongkongers to fight for political reforms and that they are not opposed to negotiating with Beijing on the citys future.

    Compared with pro-independence groups such as Hong Kong Indigenous, the Hong Kong National Party and others that clearly state their support for independence or recognition of Hong Kong as an independent political entity, the declaration is quite conservative on the possible status of Hong Kong.

    It leaves the options open for public discussion.

    The soft stance indicates the signatories are trying to avoid breaching the Basic Law as well as mainland Chinese laws, as it states Hong Kong is an inalienable part of China.

    Some radical pro-independence columnists responded coolly to the declaration, saying its soft stance on Hong Kong independence and its suggestion of internal self-determination has nothing to offer to break the deadlock between Hong Kong and the mainland.

    They argued that the declaration indicates the signatories intention to let Hong Kong stay in China and that they do not dare touch the bottom line of the Communist Party.

    So, the opposition camp is now splitting into two streams.

    Traditional pan-democrats, including those who signed the declaration, still recognize the statutory relationship between Hong Kong and mainland China, and their aim is to fight for internal self-determination for Hong Kong after 2047.

    The other stream is pro-independence groups who say Hong Kong should secede from China to become an independent state.

    The traditional democrats are clearly no longer the only opposition camp in Hong Kong political landscape.

    The pro-independence camp could play a key role in the Legislative Council election in September as it tests the water to see to what extent Hongkongers support their call for independence.

    Meanwhile, pro-Beijing Hongkongers and mainland officials in Hong Kong have displayed a tough stance in front of media cameras, saying its illegal for Hongkongers to discuss independence, saying it violates the laws of Hong Kong and China.

    They are trying their best to redefine freedom of expression, saying that it has its limitations.

    The tough stance demonstrates that the authorities are taking the calls for independence, as well as the potential support for it in the Legco election, seriously.

    Zhang Dejiang, chairman of the Standing Committee of the National Peoples Congress, who is visiting Hong Kong next month, is expected to issue a hardline statement on calls for Hong Kong independence, in an attempt to suppress the debate.

    But the fact is that the debate over independence is now unavoidable, as more politicians and young Hongkongers discuss the option seriously and present theoretical arguments in favor of it.

    All the political pronouncements wont stop the young people of Hong Kong from delving deeply into the issue.

    Thursdays declaration may help to narrow the gap, but its conservative approach can only help the pro-independence camp to gain momentum in the Legco election campaign.

    More Hongkongers, especially the younger first-time voters, might prefer to offer their support to the pro-independence camp in the election in an effort to balance out the voice of the pro-unification camp, which now includes traditional democrats as well as Beijing loyalists.

    Thats the new political landscape in Hong Kong. 

    Internet comments:

    - (Bastille Post) After the release of the Resolution, there were Internet reports that the signatories included Hong Kong Indigenous, Demosisto and Youngspiration. These organizations immediately hit back and denied that they support the Resolution. Hong Kong Indigenous went further and said that they are not in the pan-democratic camp and that only a free and independent Hong Kong can become the true home of the people of Hong Kong. They demanded the signatories to issue a clarification immediately.

    One commentator said that statements such as Occupy Central is non-violent resistance or Hong Kong should "determine their own fates and continue autonomy in perpetuity" might be considered radical, but today any qualms will only draw in criticisms such as "You are an old fart who had better get out of the way because you are radical enough."

    - (Hong Kong Free Press) April 22, 2016.

    A signatory to a declaration calling for internal self-determination and self-rule said on Friday that they were not advocating for Hong Kong independence and that the city does not yet have a legal basis for independence.

    Tanya Chan Suk-chongs comments came a day after the release of a declaration entitled Resolution for Hong Kongs Future. It was signed by more than 30 young individuals from various pro-democracy groups and stated that Hongkongers themselves should decide the political status of Hong Kong after 2047.

    Chan, a co-founder of the Civic Party and former lawmaker, said: Even though Im in a political party myself, speaking as a signatory to the declaration I can say that were not releasing this for the upcoming Legislative Council elections. Some of the signatories are scholars. Were not targeting just one or two elections, Chan said on RTHK.

    Chan also said that in light of the questions Hong Kong is facing regarding its future, it would be irresponsible to look at just these elections and then feel satisfied at having solved the problem.

    As a Civic Party member, this is even more so I wont say that [the declaration] will affect the elections. What were talking about here is internal self-determination it does not include [ideas of] Hong Kong independence. We hope that it will determine the political structure for self-rule.

    If we cant implement internal self-rule, then maybe we would look at external self-rule such as Hong Kong independence, but I think everyone understands that at this point in time we do not have the conditions to discuss this.

    Chan also said that right now, Hong Kong lacked the relevant legal basis for independence.

    - (Wen Wei Po) April 26, 2016.

    Neo Democrats' legislator Gary Fan posted on his Facebook: "Why Hong Kong independence if we have democracy?" However, the Localists didn't appreciate it and demanded that Fan clarify whether he supports Hong Kong independence or not.

    Today Fan continued to waver during a radio interview. He said that "nation building" is not a policy or position of the Neo Democrats, but he does not exclude the possibility of studying/discussing the issue in the future. He also said that he would consider signing the "Resolution for Hong Kong's Future" if he were asked.

    With respect to Gary Fan's Facebook statement, former Neo Democrat Ventus Lau posted the Neo Democrats' 2015 party constitution. Article 1 says "We support Hong Kong being an inalienable part of China." Today Gary Fan acknowledged that this article was included in the party constitution since day one. So the radio host asked asked Fan: "Have you started to understand the pain of being criticized by ex-party members?" in reference to the fact that Gary Fan quit the Democratic Party because he said that the latter was enshrouded in a Big Brother culture and not aspiring.

    (EJ Insight) April 7, 2016.

    Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying is being accused of misusing his power as he is said to have instructed airline staff at Hong Kong to do something that is against the airport regulations.

    According to an Apple Daily report, Leung allegedly pressured Cathay Pacific Airways staff late last month to go beyond the normal rules and help Leungs daughter with regard to some luggage.

    The incident took place as the chief executives youngest daughter, Leung Chung-yan, 23, was preparing to board a plane for San Francisco on the morning of March 28, a source told the paper. After she passed through the baggage screening area along with her mother Regina Tong Ching-yi, who was allowed to accompany her daughter in the airport as a special person, it was found that one of Leung Chung-yans carry-on bags was missing. Apparently, the young woman had forgotten to carry it for bagging screening, leaving it outside somewhere in the airport terminal.

    Regina Tong then asked Cathay staff to bring it over. However, the staff turned down the request as airport regulations require that departure procedures must be followed all over again if something has to be brought in from outside into a restricted area. As Tongs insistence on receiving assistance did not yield the desired results, the daughter called her dad for help.

    CY Leung then called Cathay to demand assistance in retrieving the luggage for his daughter as soon as possible, Apple Daily cited its source as saying. Leung is said to have even corrected a person who answered the phone to address him as Chief Executive Leung, rather than just Mr. Leung.

    Informed about the situation, Airport Authority officials decided, after some discussions, to make an exception for Leungs daughter and bring her left-behind bag into the restricted area. The staff made it clear to Regina Tong that they were making a special exception, and that normal procedures are different. Regina Tong then allegedly remarked that these regulations are not correct.

    Describing the whole incident as unfortunate, Carol Ng Man-yee, secretary general of the Hong Kong Cabin Crew Federation, said no one should enjoy any privilege that goes against airport security rules. CY Leung may have set a bad example, she said, adding that the chief executive owes a detailed explanation.

    Dora Lai Yuk-sim, chairwoman of Cathays cabin crew union, said bringing unaccompanied baggage into the restricted zone can pose a security risk as someone can put dangerous stuff into unattended items. A passenger should leave the restricted area, retrieve any forgotten baggage on his or her own and go through the normal screening process again, she said.

    Gary Fan Kwok-wai, a lawmaker from the Neo Democrats camp, criticized Leung and his family for seeking special privileges. Such actions will only make the public very angry, he said.

    Apple Daily cited an Airport Authority spokesperson as saying that they are looking into the alleged incident. Leungs office and Cathay Pacific didnt respond to queries, the paper said.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) April 7, 2016.

    Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying allegedly used his powers to help his youngest daughter bypass security rules at Hong Kong International Airport last month, according to Apple Daily, in an article published on Wednesday night.

    The newspaper said that Leungs daughter Leung Chung-yan was waiting to board a flight to San Francisco when she realised that she had left her carry-on baggage outside the airports restricted area.

    Her mother, Regina Leung Tong Ching-yee, who was in the restricted area as a special person to send Leung Chung-yan off, reportedly requested that airline staff help bring the luggage into the restricted area; apparently the staff declined to do so.

    Airport security rules stipulate that a passenger must exit the restricted area to claim the luggage and go through immigration procedures again.

    According to the newspaper, Leung Chung-yan then called her father, the Chief Executive, for help. In a phone call with a staff member, Leung Chun-ying allegedly said Call me Chief Executive Leung and asked that the luggage be brought into the the restricted area.

    After much discussion, the airport authority ultimately decided to have a staff member bring the luggage into the restricted area. Staff members told Regina Leung that this was a special case. According to the newspaper, the luggage went through required security checks.

    Leung did not answer reporters questions as he arrived at the Chief Executives Office this morning, according to local media.

    (EJ Insight) April 7, 2016.

    An internal Cathay Pacific airline document detailing an incident whereby Chief Executive Leung Chun-yings youngest daughter was reportedly able to bypass security rules with help from her parents, has been published by Apple Daily. The incident at Hong Kong International Airport unfolded after she accidentally left her carry-on baggage behind when entering a restricted zone. She was preparing to board a flight to San Francisco.

    The first document, marked Special Incident, revealed details of the event on March 28. At close to midnight, the chief executives daughter Leung Chung-yan said she had argued with staff from Avesco, the airport security company, for about 20 minutes, and had tried to get Cathay Pacific to retrieve the baggage for her, the document said. She said that she must not waste any more time and had to get onto the flight.

    The second document said that, at 11:59pm, airline staff were told that a passenger Leung Chung-yan had left her black soft carry-on bag in the area before the entrance to immigration, and the staff found a piece of luggage matching that description, with a name tag that read CY Leung.

    Her mother, Regina Leung Tong Ching-yee, soon returned to the location and confirmed that the bag belonged to her daughter, according to the document. The Cathay Pacific staffer explained the bag was under the control of Avesco, and that they could not allow either the airline nor Leung to take the bag back. At 12:09am, Avseco [redacted] arrived and Mrs Leung urged [that] her daughter must be on board with this bag. Avesco returned the bag to Mrs Leung after identified [it].

    Avesco staff eventually brought the bag through via north immigration to the boarding gate after seeking permission.

    It also said, During our conversation Avesco did try hard to explain [that the] passenger must be [the one to] identify the baggage herself but Mrs Leung did not agree with some points, although we did apologise at all times. Mrs Leung did say thank you to us when she left.

    According to an earlier report, Leung Chung-yan had called her father for help, who the told staffers to Call me Chief Executive Leung, asking for the luggage be brought into the restricted area.

    In a press release on Thursday evening, Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying denied any wrongdoing and said that he had not asked any staff members to call him by his title.

    (EJ Insight) April 7, 2016.

    Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying has gotten into more controversy after his wife was reported to have asked Hong Kong airport staff to bring her daughters handcarry luggage to a restricted area. This comes as more details are emerging from the March 28 incident involving the couples younger daughter, Chung-yan, who was leaving for San Francisco, according to confidential airport logs cited by Apple Daily.

    Earlier, Leung Chun-ying was accused of misusing his office when he was reported to have intervened on his daughters behalf over some luggage.

    In the latest installment of the episode, Leungs wife, Regina Tong, told airport staff to bring her daughters handcarry luggage to a restricted area apparently after the younger Leung left it on the immigration counter, according to one log.

    Leung Chung-yan, 23, who was in the restricted area, reported to Cathay Pacific at 11:57 p.m. on March 27 that her handcarry bag was left at the South Hall security checkpoint due to her forgetfulness, the log said.

    A Cathay Pacific staff quoted Chung-yan as saying she had been arguing with Aviation Security Co. Ltd. (AVESCO) staff for more than 20 minutes, it said. Leung [Chung-yan] asked us many times to claim her bag on her behalf from AVESCO, the log said. She was aware time was running out [boarding had started] and she did not want to waste time going through immigration.

    At 00:05 on March 28, passengers mother returned to the site and confirmed the bag belongs to her daughter, according to another entry. Mrs. Leung said her daughter must board [the flight] with this bag.

    AVESCO personnel tried to explain to Regina Leung that airport security regulations require the passenger to identify the baggage herself but Leung insisted her way, the log said. At 15 minutes past midnight, a Cathay Pacific staff brought the bag through the north immigration checkpoint with permission from AVESCO and it arrived at the boarding gate at 00:23. Leung Chung-yan boarded [the flight] the following minute.

    Apple Daily released an exclusive photo showing Regina Tong talking to some airport staff.

    A previous report said Leung Chun-ying had talked to an airport official on the phone and asked for help with his daughters luggage. In a statement Thursday, Leung said he had talked to a Cathay Pacific staff on his daughters mobile phone about how to recover the bag after the flight departs. He said he did not ask the staff to call him Chief Executive Leung, nor did he contact any Airport Authority official. He said he did not abuse his power.

    (info.gov.hk) April 7, 2016.

    The Chief Executive issued the following statement on a news report by Apple Daily today (April 7) regarding an incident of his daughter, Leung Chung-yan, leaving behind her hand luggage at the airport:

    1. Leung Chung-yan followed the boarding procedures and used the passage used by regular passengers when departing that day. Mrs Leung was only seeing her off at the departure hall used by regular passengers. Mrs Leung did not enter the airport restricted area or boarding gate area as claimed by the news report, and she did not wear any "special identity" as claimed by the news report.

    2. Leung Chung-yan did not ask for the Chief Executive's "help" regarding her leaving the hand luggage behind. The Chief Executive only knew about the incident when he called Chung-yan by habit to say goodbye, and understood from Chung-yan that she and his wife were handling the matter.

    3. During the whole incident, the Chief Executive did not have any contact with Airport Authority officials, let alone exerting pressure on them.

    4. The Chief Executive had, through Chung-yan's mobile phone, learnt from the airline staff assisting Chung-yan about the arrangements for claiming the hand luggage left behind in the case where Chung-yan was to depart Hong Kong first.

    5. The Chief Executive did not request any one to "address me as Chief Executive Leung" and did not exercise any privilege at that night.

    (SCMP) As abuse-of-power scandals go, the Leung Chun-ying luggage story packed little punch. By Alex Lo. April 9, 2016.

    Oh well, at least Leung Chun-yings name didnt appear in the Panama Papers. So in the absence of a real scandal, we have the chief executive allegedly abusing his position to help his younger absent-minded daughter retrieve a piece of left-behind luggage at the airport after she entered the restricted area to board a flight.

    It was reported in Apple Daily that Leung personally asked over the phone that Cathay Pacific staff help his daughter when she was about to board a flight to San Francisco late in March.

    A senior staff member from the Airport Authority reportedly arrived at the boarding gate to make a special arrangement so the piece of luggage could be directly delivered to her.

    You know, as a father, if my kid was in the same situation, I would abuse the hell out of whatever position I had which admittedly in my case would not amount to much to get it back for her.

    It would probably be along this ineffectual line. Hey, buddy, you better get the suitcase for my daughter or I am going to write a very nasty column about you and your airline.

    At which the airline staff would probably laugh. But I mean, what parents wouldnt do whatever it took for their children?

    Besides, the most damning aspects of the Apple story have been denied. The newspaper also published an internal Cathay memo about the incident, but it contained nothing of the compromising details the paper alleged. So much for journalistic proof!

    But assuming it was all true, what harm was done? A security breach would be the first answer. What if during the time the piece of luggage was unattended, someone planted a bomb or drugs inside?

    A statement from Leungs wife claimed the luggage was checked by airport security before being handed back to her daughter.

    The Airport Authority has confirmed her claim. But the most obvious thing not reported by Apple is that similar situations are not uncommon and that there is a security protocol in place to help such passengers.

    But for a story premised on the abuse of power that endangered public safety, it was all pretty thin. I love a good political scandal as much as the next guy. But lets deliver a real one instead of a missing suitcase.

    (EJ Insight) Why the Leung airport baggage incident has us worried. By Dennis Kwok (Civic Party legislator). April 13, 2016.

    Several years ago, a hit-and-run driver in Baoding city in Hebei province was chased down and arrested by the local police.

    Rather than coming clean or showing remorse, the young male driver behaved cockily and yelled at the police officers.

    Do you know who my father is? My father is Li Gang (我爸是李剛)! Charge me if you can, go ahead! he said, referring to the then deputy commissioner of the Baoding police department.

    Since then, My father is Li Gang has become a catchphrase in Chinese online forums, with netizens deploying the term to mock the modern-day young aristocrats who throw their weight around using the power and influence of their parents.

    Now, lets come to Hong Kong.

    Media reports have said recently that Chief Executive Leung Chun-yings wife, Regina Tong, ordered airport staff to take a left-behind carry-on bag into the restricted area and deliver it to her daughter at a boarding gate.

    According to the reports, aviation security staff tried to explain to Regina that airport regulations require that a passenger needs to identify any missing baggage on his or her own and go through regular baggage screening.

    However, the Leungs sought to have the rules bypassed.

    It is reported that Leungs daughter, Leung Chung-yan, who was preparing to catch a flight to San Francisco, rang up her dad and asked him to intervene.

    The chief executive then spoke to an officer at the scene over the phone, after which a Cathay Pacific employee took the bag through the security checkpoint and handed it to Leungs daughter in the restricted area.

    According to the guidelines laid down by the International Civil Aviation Organization on handling passengers carry-on luggage, security staff at airport checkpoints must check that the luggage belongs to the passenger on-site and place it on the inspection table in order to make sure there isnt any dangerous item in the luggage that might put other passengers at risk.

    As Leung has acknowledged that he did speak with the airport staff over the phone about his daughters left-behind bag, it is apparent that the chief executives intervention has led to a serious breach of airport security rules.

    We can deem the incident as being the Hong Kong version of My father is Li Gang.

    Even though there was no dangerous item in Leung Chung-yans luggage, the chief executive was wrong in suggesting to the airport staff that his daughter be spared the standard security check procedures.

    Calls for bypassing of the rules would mean that he might have abused his power.

    According to our laws, such as the Legislative Council (Powers and Privileges) Ordinance, Legco members are entitled to certain privileges under some circumstances in order to allow them to carry out their duties, but there are strict limits on the privileges.

    And the law applies only to people holding public office.

    Obviously, Leungs daughter doesnt fall into this category and therefore shouldnt have been entitled to any privilege under all circumstances.

    The chief executives conduct has once again dealt a serious blow to the rule of law in our city.

    (EJ Insight) April 13, 2016.

    Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying has tried to distance himself from the decision to allow a carry-on bag his daughter left in the airport check-in area to be brought to her in the restricted area where she was waiting to board a flight.

    The March 28 incident has sparked criticism of Leung and his wife, Regina Leung Tong Ching-yee, for leaning on airport and airline staff to circumvent security regulations that require cabin baggage to undergo a security check in the presence of its owner, in this case their younger daughter, Chung-yan. 

    While the chief executive has admitted speaking with a Cathay Pacific employee about the bag, he told reporters before Tuesdays Executive Council meeting that the decision that a member of airport security staff should carry his daughters cabin baggage into the restricted area was not made by him, his daughter or anyone else other than airport security staff and the airlines ground staff.

    Nonetheless, the Hong Kong Cabin Crew Federation (HKCCF) said it will announce on Wednesday measures, including a possible sit-in at the airport, that its members will take to protest the alleged abuse of power by Leung, the Hong Kong Economic Journal reported.

    The Civil Aviation Department (CAD) replied to an HKCCF letter of complaint with an email Tuesday, saying airlines can, depending on the situation, help passengers by carrying their cabin baggage into the restricted area after the bags undergo the required security check. But the HKCCF condemned CAD director general Norman Lo Shung-man for negating the efforts made by the industry to ensure airport security. The federation said it would write Lo another letter urging him to make a personal response.

    Pilot Jeremy Tam Man-ho, a Civic Party member, submitted on Tuesday 34,000 signatures on an online petition from the public to the Airports Council International, the International Air Transport Association and the International Civil Aviation Organization. Tam asked the three governing bodies to determine if the airport incident violated international flight safety protocols.

    A Cathay Pacific representative said the airlines internal guidelines on cabin baggage were compliant with international standards but refused to comment on individual cases, Ming Pao Daily reported.

    The Airport Authority of Hong Kong, CAD and the Security Bureau have all insisted that the incident did not violate security protocols laid down by international aviation organizations.

    Democratic Party legislator James To Kun-sun said during a meeting Tuesday of the Legislative Councils panel on security that if government departments such as the Security Bureau insist that the carrying of cabin baggage into the restricted area by a person other than the owner does not violate airport security regulations, the panel should urge the government to table in writing the applicable guidelines and procedures for airlines and airport staff, so as to convince the public, Apple Daily reported.

    Civic Party lawmaker Claudia Mo Man-ching has called for a special meeting of Legco to which the chief executive or government representatives be summoned to explain the incident.

    (EJ Insight) April 18, 2016.

    Hundreds of people joined airline cabin crew to protest an airport luggage incident involving the family of Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying. They demanded talks with Civil Aviation Department (CAD) chief Norman Lo and threatened to escalate their protest if no action is taken, the Hong Kong Economic Journal reports.

    The Hong Kong Cabin Crew Federation, which organized the protest, said more than 2,500 showed up for the mass action in Hong Kong airport. Police estimated the crowd at 1,000 at its peak. The group handed a list of demands to a CAD representative, including a direct meeting with Lo.

    Minor scuffles broke out with several Leung supporters who accused the protesters of insulting the chief executive and ruining Hong Kongs reputation.

    The protesters accused Leung of misusing his power when he intervened to have his daughters carry-on luggage sorted after it was left in the passenger check-in area.

    Leungs wife Regina later got airport staff to bring it over to her daughter who was already in a restricted area waiting to board her flight to San Francisco. Reports said the Leungs bypassed security regulations.

    Carol Ng, secretary general of the Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions, demanded Lo retract his statement to the Legislative Council that similar cases will happen in the future.

    Former lawmaker David Chu said Cathay Pacific Airways suggested sending the luggage to San Francisco on another flight which would arrive the next day but was turned down by the Leungs. He said none of the five or six staff involved in the incident has come forward, which suggests they are under some kind of pressure.

    Cathay Pacific has remained silent about the incident.

    Meanwhile, the government said it is aware of public concerns but denied airport security or travel safety was compromised. It said it will consider whether follow-up action is necessary after it receives an official report of the incident from the Airport Authority。

    (Airport Authority) Airport Authority Submits Report to the Government on Handling of Unattended Baggage. April 25, 2016.

    The Airport Authority Hong Kong (AAHK) submitted a report to the Government today on an event involving the handling of a piece of unattended cabin baggage on 27 March and 28 March 2016.

    AAHK prepared the report with reference to the airports duty report and closed circuit television footages, as well as reports provided by the Aviation Security Company Limited (AVSECO) and Cathay Pacific Airways respectively. The report looks into the question of whether aviation security was compromised during the event.

    The report affirms that aviation security requirements were not compromised during the event. From AAHKs perspective, the key is that both the baggage and the airline staff carrying the baggage into the restricted area had passed the required security screening.

    The report lists the security screening procedures for personnel and baggage to enter the restricted area, which are established according to international and local aviation security requirements. All cabin baggage shall go through x-ray security screening. Only when there is any restricted article present or suspected to be present will AVSECO confirm the ownership of the baggage and conduct a secondary search on the baggage in the presence of the owner.

    According to the sequence of the event as provided in the report, after an AVSECO staff member detected the unattended bag close to Check-in Aisle B, the stipulated security check (explosive trace detection) was carried out on the bag. The result of the check confirmed no indication of explosive trace. With the assistance of the airline, the ownership of the bag was verified and AVSECO released the bag to an airline staff. The airline staff, who possessed a valid Airport Restricted Area permit, carried the bag into the restricted area after passing through security screening for the staff member and the bag. As no restricted article was found present or suspected to be present in that security screening of the bag, there was no requirement for a secondary search and the presence of the owner was therefore not required. The bag was subsequently returned to the owner.

    The report also mentions AAHKs established procedures for the handling of lost and found property, which allow AAHK staff and the relevant contractor, subject to availability of manpower, to provide courtesy delivery of found property to its established owner. These procedures include taking found property into the restricted area. For the period March 2015 to March 2016 some 517 courtesy deliveries of items were recorded. Items including travel documents, bags, wallets, clothing and electronic items were taken into the restricted area and returned to their owners after the required security screening.

    AAHK recognises that appropriate handling of lost and found property is essential in promoting customer service at the airport without compromising airport and aviation security. Whether airlines choose to provide courtesy delivery of found property to their passengers in the restricted area depends on their own discretion. Provided that airlines comply with airport security screening requirements, airlines do not require approval from AVSECO or AAHK to provide such service. As part of the regular review and enhancement of customer service at the airport, AAHK will review and fine tune the existing handling procedures of airlines for lost and found items.

    (SCMP) April 25, 2016.

    The Airport Authority is trying to ease the controversy over Chief Executive Leung Chun-yings daughter being delivered her left luggage in a restricted area by claiming that hundreds of such courtesy deliveries have been made over the past year at Hong Kong International Airport.

    The government on Monday published a report prepared by the authority categorically denying safety protocols might have been violated, or any special privileges granted, when Leung Chung-yans baggage was delivered to her from a non-restricted area to a closed-off area after her father spoke over the phone about it to airport staff last month.

    For the period from March 2015 to March this year, 517 such courtesy deliveries were recorded, according to the Airport Authority. Items including travel documents, bags, wallets, clothing and electronic devices were taken into the restricted area and returned to their owners after the required security screening.

    But the authority did not specify whether all these items had been delivered under the same circumstances and dealt with in exactly the same way as Chung-yans baggage.

    Whether airlines choose to provide courtesy delivery of found property to their passengers in the restricted area depends on their own discretion, the authority said.

    Provided that airlines comply with airport security screening requirements, airlines do not require approval from the Aviation Security Company or the authority to provide such service.

    The report came about a week after a major protest by cabin crew members and their supporters at the airport on April 17.

    A source closed to the case denied the left-luggage incident amounted to any breach of air safety regulations.

    Asked whether Mrs Leung breached any rules at the airport, the source just reiterated the chain of events AA provided was clear.

    Asked when the authority or the airlines coined the term courtesy deliveries and whether there are any guidelines on such service for frontline staff, the source said the authority was not in a position to comment on it.

    The source said the authority did not maintain statistics on which type of passenger obtained such service. He said: All passengers are treated equally.

    Mobile phones and bags are subject to the same procedure. All of them have to go through x-ray screening, the source said.

    While stressing there were more than 500 courtesy deliveries in the year from March 2015 to March 2016, the source said AA could not provide the total number of requests it had received and refused.

    Dora Lai Yuk-sim, executive member of Hong Kong Cabin Crew Federation, said she was disappointed about the Airport Authoritys report because it had failed to clear up the publics doubt over security loopholes at the airport.

    The veteran flight attendant from Cathay Pacific said she had never heard of courtesy delivery. Lai urged the authority and CY Leung to provide details in those 517 cases cited.

    She said there were courtesy service for specific kinds of customers but the service would not extend to VIP treatments on luggage bypassing security checks.

    The union would discuss their next possible industrial action over this new development.

    Cathay Pacific said its internal security guidelines were in full compliance with the Civil Aviation Departments regulation.

    Dora Lai Yuk-sim, executive member of Hong Kong Cabin Crew Federation, said she was disappointed about the Airport Authoritys report because it had failed to clear up the public doubt over whether there were unfixed security loopholes at the airport.

    And the veteran flight attendant from Cathay Pacific said she had never heard of courtesy delivery. She urged the authority and (Cy) Leung to provide details in those 517 cases (of courtesy delivery)

    She said there were courtesy service for specific kinds of customers but the service would not provide special treatments on security issues relating to luggage.

    The union would discuss their next possible industrial action over this new development.

    Cathay Pacific said its internal security guidelines were in full compliance with the Civil Aviation Departments regulation.

    (EJ Insight) April 28, 2016.

    Leung Chung-yan, the daughter of Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying who triggered a political rumpus now called Baggage-gate, has offered to explain what really happened on March 28 at the Hong Kong International Airport.

    Critics immediately questioned her motive in sending a letter to the Airport Authority (AA) offering her side of the controversy, saying it has created more doubts in the minds of people about the whole affair.

    The AA confirmed on Wednesday that it received a letter from the younger Leungs solicitor last Friday before it said in an investigation report submitted to the government on Monday that the whole episode was a case of lost baggage and airport security was not breached, the Hong Kong Economic Journal reported.

    In the letter, she said she was willing to provide more information on the incident, an AA spokesman said, adding that she did not mention the names of her father and mother in it, according to Apple Daily.

    The AA declined her offer as it had already finished writing its report at the time, the spokesman said.

    The Chief Executive Office declined to comment on whether the letter had created pressure on the AA, but only said that neither Leung nor his wife had written any letter to the AA, Cathay Pacific Airways or Aviation Security Co. Ltd. which provides security at the airport.

    In fact, the younger Leung and her mother Regina Leung Tong Ching-yee had issued a joint statement soon after the incident came to light early this month, claiming that the family absolutely did not use any privilege or put any pressure on anyone in connection with the incident.

    While the younger Leung said in the statement that she had never mentioned to anyone at the airport that she is CY Leungs daughter and she realized she left a baggage outside the restricted zone and asked for help soon after she entered it, the AA report told a different story.

    The authority found that she only did so 20 minutes after she passed through security check and staff from Cathay Pacific, whose flight to San Francisco she was going to board, actually asked the AA to send some officials over to help her find the baggage as she is the Hong Kong leaders daughter.

    Questioning the daughters motive, lawmaker Lee Cheuk-yan of the Labour Party said she might have decided to send a letter to the AA because she is worried that the incident could end up putting her in a legally unfavorable situation, Apple Daily reported. Also, sending the letter through a solicitor suggested that she had a legal team to support her, and that was tantamount to exerting pressure on the AA, Lee said, adding that Leungs family has wasted too much public resources because of the incident.

    Legislator Gary Fan Kwok-wai of the Neo-Democrats agreed with Lee, saying that such a letter was not necessary if she did not take advantage of any privilege that day.

    Videos:

    TVB
    http://news.tvb.com/local/571345e96db28c6776000004/
    http://news.tvb.com/local/57135b7d6db28c5976000004/

    SocREC:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w4jB7WX1W6w https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWiNwVYAYSI
    Clash between citizens who hold different views.

    Speakout HK
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yk1ENAzRMgI
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYTpCL_TnVg
    A cabin crew demonstration? Or just the usual politicians? Leung Kwok-hung (League of Social Democrats); Cyd Ho (Labour Party); Alvin Yeung, Tanya Chan, Alan Leong, Ken Tsang (Civic Party); Gary Fan (Neo Democrats); Tam Tak-chi, Erica Yuen (People Power); Leung Yiu-chung (Neighborhood Workers); Frederick Fung (ADPL); Cheng Chung-tai (Civic Passion); James To (Democratic Party).

    Resistance Live Media
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcLUPIY5yi0
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F0IdjZRKglc
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Htbjmy13Uso

    Internet comments:

    - (Wen Wei Po) April 26, 2016.

    On April 7, Apple Daily reported that Leung Chung-yan realized that she had left her luggage outside the restricted zone. So her mother Regina Leung who had entered the restricted zone as a "special person" demanded Cathay Pacific workers to deliver the luggage into the restricted zone. The request was rejected. Leung Chung-yan called her father CY Leung for "help". When the worker picked up the phone, she said "How are you, Mister Leung?" But CY Leung corrected her and said: "Call me Chief Executive Leung." He demanded the worker to help his daughter retrieve the luggage. Eventually the Airport Authority did a special favor for the Chief Executive and delivered the luggage directly to Leung Chung-yan in the restricted zone against the airport security rules.

    But according to the records of the Airport Authority, the airport security company and Cathay Pacific, Regina Leung did not enter the restricted zone. She only handed the luggage to the Cathay Pacific worker near the northern entrance to the restricted zone. CY Leung only spoke to the Cathay Pacific worker to be apprised of the situation and he emphasized that he did not ask anyone to address him as "Chief Executive Leung" or otherwise exercise any special powers. The luggage was outside the restricted zone at first; it was passed through the security screening process before it entered the restricted zone, and it underwent another security check at the boarding area in accordance with American requirements. There was no violation of security procedures.

    The Apple Daily report was rife with fictional details.

    - (Bastille Post)

    The Hong Kong Cabin Crew Federation is calling for citizens to come to the Hong Kong International Airport to protest. The Hong Kong Cabin Crew Federation is not directly connected to the Confederation of Trade Unions whose secretary-general is Lee Cheuk-yan (Labour Party). However, the Hong Kong Cabin Crew Federation chief executive Carol Ng was the British Airways Union chairperson and joined became the treasurer of the Confederation of Trade Unions in that capacity. Meanwhile, the cabin crew unions at Cathay Pacific, Dragon Air, British Airways and Virgin Atlantic are member organizations of the Confederation of Trade Unions. So it is clear that this demonstration has everything to do with the Confederation of Trade Unions.

    Once you understand this part, you will also understand the other part about why the Staffs and Workers Union of Hong Kong Civil Airlines (affiliated with the Federation of Trade Unions) have come out against this demonstration. Thus the Staffs and Workers Union of Hong Kong Civil Airlines deputy secretary-general Ip Wai-ming said that lost luggage happens occasionally and airlines deal with the cases based upon the situations for the convenience of passengers.

    - This is supposed to be a passenger safety issue. 2,500 persons showed up to demonstrate. Who are they? According to Carol Ng in her own words, there were no airport security guards and no ground crew members among the demonstrators. None whatsoever. There were about 20 cabin crew members. As for the rest, who were they but the usual demonstrators at Occupy Central, etc?

    - (HKG Pao) Field observations.

    (1) The Hong Kong Cabin Crew Federation was formed less than six months ago. So how many stewardesses participated in this demonstration? We observed about 20 or so persons holding the HKCCF banner. Even fewer people came from the Cathay Pacific and British Airways unions. How representative are these people of the cabin crew in general? There is a question mark. Instead many workers have come forth to say that there was nothing unusual about how the case was handled.

    (2) Of course, other people approve of what the HKCCF is doing. Yesterday the politicians present included: Audrey Eu, Alvin Yeung, Ken Tsang, Gary Fan, Cyd Ho, Cheng Chung-tai, Oscar Lai, Leung Kwok-hung, Tsang Kin-shing, Leung Yiu-chung, Ip Wing ... they couldn't approve this demonstration more? What could be better than when someone else sets up a stage for you to perform right before the Legco elections?

    Our usual expectation is that labor unions start actions for labor rights for salaries, benefits, working hours, layoffs, etc. On this occasion, the HKCCF's action had nothing to do with these kinds of issues. Instead there were more politicians than workers. So this was a refreshing change.

    (3) It is hard for most people to relate this luggage incident with air travel safety. However, it was easy to spot anti-CY Leung banners everywhere. A friend joked that if CY Leung ever leaves, who will they find to hate in his place? As for CY Leung, he must be relieved to see so few people show up for this demonstration. After several years of fruitless actions such as these, the people are getting tired of it.

    (4) The HKCCF claimed 2,500 demonstrators while the police said that there were 1,000 at the peak. No matter how you put it, this was no "Occupy." Hey, brother, it is expensive to travel out to the Hong Kong International Airport. A same-day roundtrip Airport Express ticket between Central and the HKIP costs $100! On the whole, it is much cheaper to demonstrate/protest in Mong Kok or Victoria Park!

    - (Hong Kong Free Press)

    A former member of Chinas top legislative body has claimed that Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying did indeed pressure an airline staff member during an incident where his daughter accidentally left luggage in a restricted area.

    David Chu Yu-lin also claimed that an airline staffer cried when dealing with Leung. Chu is a former National Peoples Congress member who attended a demonstration at the airport on Sunday. He urged the public to continue following up with the incident: I do not want anyone else to cry after speaking on the phone with the privileged.

    Chu claimed that he heard that Cathay Pacific  the airline involved in the incident suggested sending the lost luggage to Stanford University, Leung Chung-yans destination. However, the idea was rejected. Stanford University is very close to the airport, and [he] rejected that what is it if not exercising privilege? Chu said. Chu also claimed that the airline instructed five or six staff members not speak about the incident and that it was a case of white terror. I hope we can find the source of the abuse of power, then eliminate that source, Chu said.

    During a Commercial Radio show on Monday, Chu revealed that the staff member he spoke to was not the one who took the phone call with Leung, but someone around the staff member involved, whom he said he coincidentally was in contact with last Saturday. If a girl jumped the queue and told me my dad is someone, I would tell her: go to hell, Chu said. If her dad calls me later, I will tell her dad: go to hell, he added. If he doesnt go to hell, I will help him to do so.

    Chu said that he attended of his own accord, and not simply because he wanted to attack Leung Chun-ying. I am not interested in singling him out  Leung Chun-ying is not qualified for me to attack him, Chu said. I am in opposition of abusing power, because it broke the principle of equality.

    - On Sunday, David Chu said that a staff member cried. On Monday, he said that he did not directly speak to the staff member who took the phone call but just "someone around the staff member involved." It is now many days later, and nobody has heard from the staff member involved or anyone around the staff member involved. This leads you to think that it was all a figment of David Chu's imagination.

    - Speakout HK
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lo_uyddrkRA

    0:18 David Chu: You are making some serious charges against the Chief Executive. How confident are you about the version that you heard?
    0:22 David Chu: My judgment is that this is for real PERIOD.

    0:38 David Chu: No. She is someone close to the person involved.

    0:49 David Chu If what I say is wrong, I will apologize immediately.

    0:55 Ko Tat-bun: If you say that you got that information from her, you get her to come out. You said it, not somebody else.

    1:00 David Chu: You help me to find her. You help me find her.

    Also reported on NOW TV.

    David Chu: A woman had made contact with that worker. She told me that the female worker shed tears during the conversation PERIOD ... She has a family name, she has a given name, she has a job position. Why can't she be located? Not even the SAR government can find her? I challenge Mr. Ko to locate her to tell the truth. If what I said was wrong, I will apologize immediately.

    Ko Tat-bun: I don't think that the SAR government should waste the time of public service workers. You got information from your source. It is very simple. You go ahead and locate her.

    David Chu: That worker is unwilling to come out. She is scared.

    Host: What is she scared of?

    David Chu: Scared of pressure from those with special powers.

    ...

    David Chu: I don't know if the Chief Executive applied pressure. But I heard that the woman who spoke to him was in tears. PERIOD.

    Also reported on TVB.

    David Chu said: "Twenty years after the handover, there are still incidents in which special powers are being exercised. I don't want another Hongkonger to burst into tears when speaking to those with special powers. Many workers at the airport came into contact with this incident, but none of them have come out to say anything." We asked Chu what he meant by "those with special powers." He responded in this manner: "This is up to your own analysis."

    During the period, a number of ground crew held banners to protest against the demonstrators for ruining the reputation of the airport. The two sides engaged in shouting matches. The police and airport security guards separated the two sides.

    Cargo loader Mr. Wong said: "I find it unacceptable to smear the airport, or to say that the security screening is bad. We make our living at the airport. I have worked here for more than 30 years. I am very fond of the airport."

    - (Sing Tao) September 18, 2014.

    Recently, the Dongguan public security bureau received a tip that about an underground casino in an industrial park in Caolei village, Xiegang town, Dongguan city, Guangdong province. Undercover officers observed a number of individuals coming and going not looking like factory workers. Early morning this Sunday, more than 100 public security officers and dogs surrounded and burst into the building. 82 persons were persons were arrested, included Hongkonger David Chu who was personally bankrupt due to gambling addiction and set up this casino in order to make money through loan-sharking.

    Eh, so how does this lead to hating CY Leung? Did Leung tip off the Dongguan public security bureau?

    - (Headline Daily) If a ground crew member broke into tears while speaking to a customer by phone, then that worker is unprepared to work as customer service representative.

    Also noted by Suen Ming-yeung is that this story went through an evolutionary process of enrichment as different people added details so that is became a case in which CY Leung is now reported to have said: "Call me Chief Executive Leung." Suen asked: "Why wasn't this detail immediately disclosed the next day? Why did it show up one week later? If the Chief Executive really used the special powers of his position to bully an airport worker, I don't see what convincing reason there can be to explain this time gap of more than one week."

    - (SCMP) Airport sit-in a vain attempt by Hong Kongs pan-democrats to show displeasure towards CY. By Alex Lo. April 19, 2016.

    I dont know what threatened airport security more: retrieving a piece of left luggage for the chief executives daughter or organising thousands of people to jam-pack into the main arrival hall of Hong Kongs only airport.

    At best, the protest on Sunday, ostensibly organised by the Hong Kong Cabin Crew Federation, caused serious inconvenience to travellers. At worst, it took away police and security resources that could have been deployed to detect crime and guard against potential terrorism.

    The federation, part of the pan-democratic Confederation of Trade Unions, claimed the protest was not political, and that it was only concerned with ensuring flight security. If thats true, its a strange way to demonstrate concern by compromising security further.

    The federation said 2,500 people took part; police estimated only 1,000. But even the federation admitted only 10 per cent of crew members participated in the rally. The rest was all made up of the usual pan-democratic suspects the Civic Party, the League of Social Democrats, myriad localist groups, and their supporters.

    The controversy followed reports that in late March, Cathay Pacific employees helped Leung Chun-yings youngest daughter retrieve a bag she had left behind in the departure hall when she was already at the boarding gate. Leung spoke to airport staff to help his daughter.

    Airport officials said the bag was scanned and checked by airport security. The Airport Authority is preparing a report on the incident for the government. It should release the full report to the public to address any lingering doubts.

    However, if security was the real concern, the protesters could have rallied outside Leungs office in Admiralty and the Civil Aviation Department. Instead, the pan-dems, using cabin crew members as a front and wanting to attract maximum publicity, preferred to take over the airports arrival hall. What major city would tolerate that happening in a major airport? Probably only in Hong Kong.

    Clearly, the strategy is that if they cant vote Leung out of office, they will protest and riot to force him out. That tends to happen to unpopular leaders when there is freedom but not full democracy. I just wish the pan-dems wouldnt hold the rest of us hostage by occupying major public transport hubs like the airport.

    - (HKG Pao) Legislative Councilor Raymond Wong Yuk-man was reported to be sitting in the first-class section of a southbound MTR East train without paying the additional fee. He was asked to disembark at the Kowloon Tong Station to deal with this issue. During the process, Wong displayed a bad attitude by saying that "I am a legislative councilor. I am in a hurry in order to serve the citizens." Well, how come none of the pan-democrats have anything to say about this exercise of special privilege?

    - When Hong Kong last governor Chris Patten's dog when missing, he ordered the Hong Kong Royal Police to make a complete search of the peak area in the middle of the night. How about that abuse of power? Did Lee Cheuk-yan ever complain?

    - (HKG Pao) After Chris Wat Wing-yin cited Chris Patten's missing dog as an example of abuse of power, Ming Pao immediately came out and accused her of citing inaccurate information. According to the old news reports, "At the time, Chris Patten's information officer said that the police won't be mobilized to search for the dog in order not to waste public funds."

    Our reporter went back to read the old news report. On November 10, 1992, Ming Pao said "The Aberdeen police district commander personally visited the scene yesterday morning to be apprised of the situation." On November 11, 1992, Ming Pao wrote "The governor abused his privileges by ordering the police to look for his missing dog" and "the governor abused his privileges once again and told the police many times to look for his missing dog, so that the district commander put aside his other business in order to visit the scene in person ..." So what was the Ming Pao reporter reading?

    Interestingly, our reporter also read through the old news reports in Sing Tao, Economic Times and Wah Kiu Yat Po (Overseas Chinese Daily News) and even the pro-China Wen Wei Po. They were even less critical of Chris Patten than Ming Pao was. So what was Ming Pao's source now?

    It turns out that on November 10, Sing Pao's report closed with this sentence: "The governor's information officer Hon Sun said that they would not ask the police to run a search because that would be a waste of public funds." So why would the Ming Pao reporter ignore his own newspaper's reports and cite some other newspaper instead? What do you think?

    Is there anything Ming Pao won't do today to attack CY Leung and Chris Wat Wing-yin?

    - Let's talk about unintended consequences.

    Back then the anti-parallel trade people demanded restrictions on the size of luggage that are carried within the MTR system. The MTR obliged and enforced the rules strictly. But it also meant that musicians carrying large instruments were banned from using the MTR. Previously these musicians could bring their instruments because everybody sees them for what they are and will make allowance.

    There was another demonstration to demand large musical instruments be exempt. So the MTR went through process of setting up a registration system to allow musicians bring their large musical instruments. In the end, the consequences are (1) the MTR is spending time, money and resources to register musicians; (2) musicians have to register; (3) unregistered musicians are still not allowed to bring their large musical instruments. Is the public better off? Are the musicians better off?

    Now we have a demonstration to demand restrictions on how unattended luggage must be handled. Specifically, all hand-carry luggage must be accompanied by the owner at all times without exception because that is the only way to ensure travel safety. Fine. Let us say that the rule goes into effect. Will travel safety be improved? Well, previously the unattended luggage will be brought in by ground crew and screened by the security guards before being delivered to the owner in the restricted zone. So it was not as if there ever was any security risk. And how will that affect the public? Generally the public is not affected one way or the other --- unless you happen to misplace your hand-carry luggage, mobile phone, iPad, keys, passport, etc! When you tell the ground crew about your predicament, the ground crew will just tell you that nothing can be done. Why? Because the Hong Kong Cabin Crew Federation and the pan-democratic legislators have declared that there be no exceptions. Why are we better off?

    - (HKG Pao) This demonstration was started by the Hong Kong Cabin Crew Federation which is under the Confederation of Trade Unions. Then a bunch of Umbrella Soldiers issued a call. The Civic Passion "Hot Dogs" also entered to make noise and block passage. The Legislative Council elections will be held in September, so everybody needs airtime.

    At the Hong Kong International Airport where tens of thousands of persons pass through each day, someone is going to misplace their luggage. It is fictional that the luggage must accompany the person during security screening. The airline VIP services handle the processing of the luggage on behalf of their VIP customers all the time. So the whole case is preposterous.

    The fact that this was turned into a demonstration shows that nowadays it is hard to find an issue to hype up. So when this came around, everybody jumped on the bandwagon. Lee Cheuk-yan must be pretty upset that while he started this thing, other people took advantage and gained more limelight than him. Since the pan-democratic voter base is fixed, their gain is his loss.

    - So the cabin crew and politicians went to demonstrate against the Chief Executive. Later the ground crew and the security guards went to demonstrate against those demonstrators for smearing them. Security screening is the responsibility of the ground crew and security guards. The key point is whether the luggage had gone through security screening and whether the owner can be identified. If the answers are both positive, then there is no problem. Whether the luggage is by the side of the owner is completely beside the point. If you think that all luggage must be accompanied by the owner, then there shouldn't be any check-in luggage, right? As soon as you check in your luggage, it is put on the conveyor belt and sent into the black hole where persons unseen can do anything that they want unseen.

    The most risible part is the demand to divulge the details of the security screening procedure. Why is this stupid? The greater the transparency, the easier it is to find security flaws. You speak on behalf of travel safety, but you are actually aiding terrorists. The cabin crew has no grounds to tell the ground crew what to do.

    - Ronny Tong Ka-wah

    Let me share some personal experiences:

    (1) I am a somewhat absent-minded person. Three years ago I went to Okinawa with my wife. On the way back, I went through security screening and went to the departure lounge to wait to board. Then I realized that I left my mobile phone in the rental car. The ground crew contacted the rental car company. They sent someone to bring the phone to the airport and a ground crew person brought it into the restricted zone to give to me. Two years ago I went to Hokaido with my wife and I left my iPad on the airplane. When I realized that, I had already left the airport. I went back to the airport and told the ground crew about my predicament. They sent someone to locate my iPad on the airplane, and they brought it out to give back to me. During these two incidents, the ground crew did not know that I was some kind of Legislator. They were merely doing their jobs. CY Leung is not a good Chief Executive and I don't like him. But these facts make me wonder whether the affair over his daughter is being overblown.

    - (The Stand News) The Airport Authority report says that Regina Tong wanted to go to the "boarding gate." CY Leung said that his wife "had no intention to go to the boarding gate, because she would have to go past security screening and the immigration desk to do so. She could not have done it, nor did she want to."

    - Hong Kong Cabin Crew Federation secretary general Carol Ng has worked as cabin crew for twenty-five years, but she said that she never heard of what is known as "courtesy delivery." The Airport Authority said that there were 517 courtesy deliveries last year, but 25-year veteran union secretary-general Carol Ng managed to not be aware of them or any of all the others that took place over all the years.

    - Six reasons why customer satisfaction is so important:

    • It is a leading indicator of consumer repurchase intentions and loyalty

    • It is a point of differentiation

    • It reduces customer churn

    • It increases customer lifetime value

    • It reduces negative word-of-mouth

    • It is cheaper to retain customers than acquire new ones

    Carol Ng worked for 25 years as a cabin crew member without being aware of these reasons.

    - The Hong Kong Cabin Crew Federation issued a statement that the 517 cases of misplaced items included "travel documents, wallets, electronic items and clothing" but there is no evidence that it includes anything comparable to Leung Chung-yan's hand-carry luggage. Therefore the statement is misleading."

    In item 3.6 of the Airport Authority report, it is spelled out explicitly that the 517 cases refer to "items including travel documents, bags, wallets, clothing and electronic items" in English and "items including travel documents, wallets, electronic items, hand-carry luggage and clothing etc" in Chinese. It could not be more clear. So why did the Hong Kong Cabin Crew Federation conveniently drop "bags"/"hand-carry luggage" from their statement? Why do they persist on the smear job?

    - Under the special topic of "My Dad is Chief Executive Leung", (Apple Daily) reported first on the Airport Authority report under the title:

    【我爸係梁特】報告還原 證梁太曾狂奔圖親攜行李入禁區

    [My Dad is Chief Executive Leung] Report restores the truth: It proves that Mrs. Leung raced madly to bring the luggage into the restricted zone.

    Anyone who has traveled through Hong Kong International Airport knows that there are three checkpoints between the departure lobby and the restricted area.

    Firstly, there is a security guard who checks that you have a boarding pass, that you have a travel document (e.g. passport or mainland home visit permit) and that the photo in the travel document matches your appearance. This security guard will scan the QR code on your boarding pass and send you through into the restricted area.

    Secondly, you have to pass through security screening. Your hand-carry luggage, computer, mobile phone and other metallic objects are placed on trays to be scanned by the X-ray machines. You yourself will have to walk through a metal detector gate. If the alarm sounds, you will be searched manually.

    Thirdly, you will have to go through the Immigration Department desk. If you have a Hong Kong ID card, you can use the automated gate that will check the fingerprint corresponding to your HK ID. If you have a passport, you will have to queue up and be cleared by an Immigration Department officer.

    In the case of Mrs. Leung, she could not have gone passed the first checkpoint because she did not have a boarding pass in her name.

    Once the comments under this story got too embarrassing even for Apple Daily, the title was changed to:

    【我爸係梁特】龍蝦媽大鬧機場 足本過程曝光！

    [My Dad is Chief Executive Leung] Lobster Mom kicked up a storm at the airport. Full version of the incident now revealed!

    - (Speakout HK) According to Appendix A2 of the Aviation Authority report, Mrs. Leung began walking towards the northern lobby at 00:16. Airport security guards, Cathay Pacific employees and Airport Authority workers followed her closely from behind because they were afraid that she might charge into the restricted zone. At 0:18, when she reached the entrance, a Cathay Pacific employee took the hand-carry luggage from her and walked into the restricted zone.

    So if Mrs. Leung was charging into the restricted zone, then where did this Cathay Pacific employee appear from? Mrs. Leung's explanation is that she proceeded to the entrance in order to meet up with a Cathay Pacific employee who received instructions to meet Mrs. Leung there. Of course, there would be neither need nor motive for Mrs. Leung to charge into the restricted zone. So what are we talking about now?

    - (RTHK) April 26, 2016.

    After the airport incident, Next Magazine sent two reporters to trail Leung Chung-yan on the Stanford University campus. One of them spoke Cantonese, the other spoke Putonghua. The two sat outside the classrooms. Chief Executive CY Leung said that Next Magazine should not be harassing his daughter and that the relevant actions are deplorable.

    (Ming Pao) April 26, 2016.

    Next Magazine issued a statement to emphasize that their two special correspondents did not harass Leung Chung-yan and any other persons at Stanford University. The reporters were carrying out their duties as reporters who report on matters that involve the public interest. Next Magazine said: "We are angry at CY Leung who said that he respects freedom of press but nevertheless suppress reporters in the line of duty."

    - After Leung Chung-yan arrived at Stanford University, there is in fact nothing more to follow up on. The reason why Next Magazine dispatched two reporters to trail her is to harass her until she loses her composure. And that would be the next big news story!

    - (HKG Pao) Legislative Council candidate and Civic Party member Jeremy Tam posted on Facebook said that he contacted US Transportation Security Administration officials who were inspecting the Hong Kong International Airport and informed them about the incident. He said that Leung Chung-yan was flying to San Francisco and therefore the flight had to comply with TSA regulations fully. "I have always questioned whether a third party bringing luggage through security screening is a violation of TSA regulations. Therefore I wrote to the TSA to get an answer."

    According to the Airport Authority, the TSA people checks on airlines which fly to the United States each year with respect to traveler registration, boarding procedures, etc. However, these inspections do not check airport security screening. So TSA merely forward Jeremy Tam's inquiry to other departments. Furthermore, all flights to the United States are subject to a second inspection at the boarding gate in which the hand-carried luggage is inspected by hand in the presence of the passenger.

    - There is in fact a bigger security risk that Carol Ng won't address -- the cabin crew (including pilots, stewards/stewardesses) are allowed to board the airplane without going through the second round of security screening and they are also entitled to bring liquid with them. That is known as special privilege. Would Carol Ng care to address this huge security hole ...? Our lives may be jeopardized!

    - (Apple Daily) April 28, 2016. On Commercial Radio, Hong Kong Cabin Crew Federation secretary-general Carol Ng disclosed that there is a story circulated within the aviation industry that the ground crew gets depressed whenever the family of CY Leung travels, because their style is to "fold their arms like big bosses." They never carry their own luggage as they want the accompanying government workers and ground crew members to push the luggage carts to the boarding gate. Our newspaper checked this story with the Chief Executive's Office but has not gotten a reply by deadline.

    - This is the definition of rumor mongering, with the entire story based upon "a story circulated within the aviation industry." No names, no sources whatsoever. This has led to follow-up comments along the lines of "There is a story circulated within the aviation industry that Carol Ng blah blah blah (obscenities deleted) ..."

    - I have taken Cathay Pacific many times before. I have seen the stewardesses fawn on westerners while pulling long faces on Hongkongers. They showed off their English language skills while pretending that they don't understand Cantonese. When they see a cute guy, they flirt. Frankly, I get depressed too whenever I fly Cathay Pacific.

    - Well, when CY Leung folds his arms and acts like the big boss, the ground crew gets depressed. Conversely, when Regina Leung took her daughter's luggage and ran around the airport herself, she is applying a great deal of pressure on the ground crew. To paraphrase Freud, what does the ground crew really want?

    - After some effort, I have found the photographic evidence: CY Leung does not carry the luggage himself!!! Oh, but where are the depressed ground crew members!?

    - By comparison, American president Barack Obama and his family always carry their own luggage and they never exercise special privileges. Here is the photographic evidence of them carrying their own luggage during their ground-breaking trip to Cuba:

    P.S. If you can't see the luggage in their hands, it is because you hate FREEDOM/DEMOCRACY/HUMAN RIGHTS/UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE/RULE OF LAW.

    - At universities, journalism is taught either as 傳訊 (communication), 傳媒 (media) and/or 新聞 (news) . Apple Daily has synthesized these into 傳聞, which happens to mean "rumors."

    - (SCMP) Who in their right mind would want to be Hong Kongs next leader? By Yonden Lhatoo. April 28, 2016.

    The more I look at our chief executives face on television or in newspapers these days, the more I want to ask him, in all sincerity: dude, is it really worth it?

    I mean, seriously, Leung Chun-ying looks gaunter, greyer and grimmer than ever.

    I remember how he bowed a lot that day in July 2012, when a small-circle election installed him as Hong Kongs top official. These days, all I see is an increasingly stooped version of our fearless leader scurrying past angry protesters wherever he goes.

    Otherwise, its only pained smiles in the spotlight and foot in mouth when confronted by the media pack, which is armed to the teeth with awkward questions.

    I neither want to attack nor defend Leung in this column. I just want to take a step back and look at the man weve seen so far in the context of what this town has become. And why he, or anyone else, would want his job.

    It should have been good for Hong Kong when Leung defeated former chief secretary Henry Tang Ying-yen, who was a shoo-in for the top job back then until the massive illegal basement unearthed at his house buried his ambition. With Tang in charge, it would have been like the business-as-usual years under Leungs predecessor, Donald Tsang Yam-kuen cosy ties with big business, tycoons calling all the shots, and a total reluctance to rock a boat full of ailing policies.

    It was different with Leung, but not enough to prevent the dark horse from morphing into the dark lord in the eyes of many Hongkongers. Doubts about his integrity as well as his loyalty to Hong Kong have never faded.

    Faux-populist or not, Leung did start off with a people-before-profit approach, and he has made some bold moves to please Hongkongers at the risk of upsetting local billionaires and mainlanders.

    Now hes the most divisive figure in the city, no matter how well meant his intentions. In a polarised society and politically poisonous atmosphere, he can never win. No matter what he brings to the table, somebody overturns it right away.

    And its taking a toll on his family. Just look at the latest brouhaha over the matter of his younger daughter asking for her parents help when she left her baggage behind and they tried to have it delivered to her at the boarding gate.

    Did the first couple abuse their power, bully airport staff and ride roughshod over security protocol? They say they didnt, but 2,000 or more people disagreed strongly enough to amplify their discontent, politicised or not, to a global arena at the citys airport.

    Now the daughter has been tailed by reporters at her university overseas. Give them a break. The elder daughters run-ins with the media were bad enough. Involving these two young women in the constant abuse directed at their father is not transparency its shameful harassment and serves no public interest.

    Which brings me back to the burning question: why in seven hells, after this kind of trauma, would Leung want to run for a second term? He hasnt confirmed he will, but it looks like he may.

    Is he a sucker for punishment, numbed by ambition or under unrelenting pressure to continue from the people who put him in power? Hong Kongs first chief executive, Tung Chee-hwa, quit the job when he couldnt handle it any more. If there was any shame in it, Tung got over it, and hes a respected elder statesman now.

    Apart from Leung, why would anyone want his job? Look how ugly the public mood has become. The next chief executive is in for a whole new world of pain.

    Sounds hopeless, doesnt it? Its like watching a train wreck that Id only wish upon Donald Trump.

    - (Wen Wei Po) June 3, 2016.

    Jeremy Tam Man-ho is Alan Leong's designated successor for Civic Party's Kowloon East legislative council position. Last year, Tam lost his district council election, so now he can only gain media exposure as a pilot. Previously, he announced on Facebook that he wrote to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), ACI (Airports Council International) and IATA (International Air Transport Association) about the Leung Chung-yan luggage incident.

    ACI and IATA replied to say that Tam should contact the ICAO instead. So Tam announced on Facebook that he would personally travel to ICAO headquarters in Thailand. He added that he would not use a staff ticket to travel because he might be refused entry. He said that he had purchased a Thai Airways ticket and he is determined to meet the person in charge.

    Yesterday at 11am, Tam arrived at the destination. He wrote: "I had been in constant contact with ICAO. I told them that I will be presenting a letter at this hour. But when I called the ICAO worker from the security room, I was told that every office worker is in a meeting. Therefore nobody can meet me to accept the letter. Furthermore, the ICAO worker even refused to give me his name. I went out of the security room to call Hong Kong, and they lowered the gate and locked the glass door to stop me from returning. I cannot imagine that an international organization can treat its visitors in such a way. I will look for other ways to get the letter to them."

    So Tam stood outside the gate and waited for ICAO workers to leave. Finally he spotted someone who looked as if he might be a senior ICAO official. So he intercepted the vehicle and "successfully handed over the letter." Tam said that this "worker" took the letter and promised to deliver it to the secretary-general. Of course, nobody knows if the letter will go straight to the rubbish bin. In any case, Tam's show was done and he returned to Hong Kong.

    - What the fuck! ICAO = International Corruption Association Organisation?  Note: CAO in putonghua means "FUCK"!

    - Why is the ICAO located in Thailand? Because they won't have to follow any rules or regulations.

    - Tam should know that the Thai police can frame you for drug smuggling so that you get jailed for life.

    - Tam gave his petition to a "worker" and proclaimed victory. Does he realize that the petition was heading straight to the Circular File?

    - (Bastille Post) March 9, 2016.

    This afternoon our reporter found Edward Leung and Ray Wong of Hong Kong Indigenous meeting for almost two hours with two individuals who are believed to be with the US Consulate in Hong Kong.

    At around 3pm inside the Cova restaurant on the third floor of Pacific Place in Admiralty, five persons were meeting including one foreign male and one foreign female. Some of the conversation was conducted in putonghua.

    Leung and Wong sat across each other. The foreign man sat next to Wong. The foreign woman sat next to Leung. The foreign man listened and also spoke. They talked for a long time, and left around 430pm. Leung, Wong and another woman left first. The two foreigners stayed to settle the bill. Afterwards our reporter trailed the two foreigners who left Pacific Place and walked to the US Consulate on Garden Road. The two were able to enter by showing identification. So they are likely to work at the US Consulate.

    Our reporter called Ray Wong to ask if he met with US Consulate personnel and what they talked about. Wong said that it was personal business and he does not have to explain it to the public. Our reporter was unable to reach Edward Leung.

    (China168.hk) April 18, 2016.

    We recently received an email from a reader:

    Hong Kong Indigenous members Ray Wong and Edward Leung were reported to have met with US Consulate officials on March 9. The details were not known. I am now disclosing the true facts behind this meeting.

    Hong Kong Indigenous member Ray Wong went through a middleman to express his wish to meet with US Consulate personnel in order to present the political demands of Hong Kong Indigenous. The Americans expressed that they treat this seriously and arranged to meet with Ray Wong. However, it was improper to meet inside the consulate so the meeting was set up as a private meeting. On the afternoon of March 9, the meeting was arranged through Radio Free Asia reporter Chan Yuk-yan of Hong Kong Indigenous members Ray Wong and Edward Leung with consul Clare Orivs of the Economic Political Section and another male official known as Shawn in the Cova Ristorante & Caffe in Pacific Plaza.

    Leung told Shaw that Hong Kong Indigenous was founded in 2014 around the time of Occupy Central. It has more than 60 members, with more than 20 in the frontlines. About 90% of the members are in their 20's. The group wants to gain Hong Kong independence in terms of culture, democracy and localism. He quoted Adolf Hitler who said that the way to destroy a nation is to destroy its culture first. Thus, the Chinese Communists wants to "suppress" Cantonese by Putonhua and traditional characters by simplified characters in order to destroy local Hong Kong culture. Hong Kong Indigenous advocates Hong Kong cultural independence and complete severance from China. They organized "resistance by force" and they will fight for Hong Kong freedom and democracy without abandoning the use of violence in order to save Hong Kong culture and its people. Wan Chin's City-State Sect and Hong Kong Indigenous are both Localists, but Wan Chin accepts that Hong Kong culture originated from Chinese culture and this compromise means that they do not represent the true voice of the people of Hong Kong.

    Leung believes that the Hong Kong SAR government is a puppet regime controlled by the Chinese Communists. After the Mong Kok incident, Hong Kong Indigenous was severely suppressed by the Hong Kong government and its members were arrested for illegal assembly and incitement to riot. However, Hong Kong Indigenous received the support of large numbers of Hongkongers. Leung said that he was 90% confident that he will win the New Territories East Legislative Council by-election. Leung said that Hong Kong Indigenous was not only suppressed by the Hong Kong government, but the pan-democrats here also refused to support the violent method of resistance. Some pan-democrats even said that Leung's Localists are taking away their votes. Leung said that the fact is that his participation in the election brings in more voters for both the traditional pan-democrats and the localists to hurt the pro-establishment camp.

    Ray Wong told Orvis that he came out to work as soon as he graduated from secondary school. Because he grew up as a grassroots member, he understands the hardship for itinerant vendors. During Occupy Central, Wong witnessed how the police applied violence against peaceful demonstrators. Therefore he did not think that democracy will just fall down from the skies; instead resistance by force is needed in order to force the government to take the demands of the people seriously.  He also thought that every young man has the responsibility to fight for democracy. Thus he founded Hong Kong Indigenous to fight for freedom and democracy in Hong Kong.

    Wong explained that there was no way to emerge from the numerous opposition parties unless one has the will and image to violently resist by force. However, it was inaccurate to say that Hong Kong Indigenous planned the Mong Kok incident or that the police was prepared beforehand. In truth, both sides were unprepared. Although the Hong Kong government has always restricted the vendors, they were going to ban all vendors from setting up in the streets. That was why Wong led Hong Kong Indigenous to support the vendors. This evolved into a confrontation and clash with the police which was quite unexpected.

    Orvis asked whether Wong had contacts with other persons (in politics) after the Mong Kok incident. Wong said he did not take any direct action. However a "powerful Beijing department" contacted his family members twice and said that Beijing treats Wong very seriously and wants Wong to work for them. They showed a HK$5 million check and asked Wong to state his terms. However Wong refused. The two US Consulate officials said that Wong should inform them immediately if this happens again, because they can provide assistance.

    The two US Consulate officials also expressed interest in the financial condition of Hong Kong Indigenous. Wong and Leung said that Hong Kong Indigenous is supported by donations from overseas supporters. At present they have HK$1.5 million in donations, mostly from Hongkongers living overseas, especially in Canada. Some people even donated $100,000 at a time. Most of the donors immigrated before 1997. At this time, they are seeing that there are Hong Kong-China conflicts, the Hong Kong government is unpopular, Hong Kong is eliminating traditional Chinese characters, national education is being imposed and so they feel guilty about abandoning Hong Kong. Therefore they donate money in order to leave something for themselves.

    Shawn asked them whether the funding was sufficient. Leung said that it was far from enough, because many Hong Kong Indigenous members are being summoned or prosecuted for violent actions during the Mong Kok incident. The present funds won't be enough to pay for legal fees. In addition, the members are impoverished and so the organization is obliged to provide financial help. Furthermore, Leung said that he is going to enter the Legislative Council election and so he will need money. Shawn said that the US government cannot openly support violent resistance by young people due to diplomatic considerations. However, under the present circumstances, the US government expresses sympathy and understanding for Wong and Leung trying to gain freedom and democracy with violent methods. Shawn agreed to give consideration to financial aid to Hong Kong Indigenous members, but he needed them to provide more detailed facts to study.

    Shawn continued by saying that he hopes Leung and others will report to the US Consulate when something like the Mong Kok riot happens so that the American government can understand the happenings on a timely basis, because "it is worrisome when the inexperienced resisters can be caught in bad situations." As for the request for funding, Hong Kong Indigenous should make a written request (including the list of persons to receive aid, the specific projects) and then the American government may contemplate helping Hong Kong Indigenous through the National Endowment for Democracy. The middlewoman Chan Yjk-yan asked Shawn if he had ever used violent methods to resist the American government, Shaw smiled and said: "Never." Before the meeting ended, Orvis exchanged contact information with Leung and Wong and said that they can contact each other directly thereafter. Leung asked Shaw for contact information. Shawn was cautious and said that he did not bring his business cards with him. Shawn did not leave any means of contact.

    I used to be on good personal terms with Edward Leung and others. But I disapprove of Leung trying to use foreign powers for resistance. Hong Kong ahs been returned to China for almost 19 years. Certain people claiming that they support democratic self-determination have organized the illegal Occupy Central movement, the violent anti-parallel trade actions and the Mong Kok riot during the Lunar New Year. These actions have destroyed the rule-of-law which is a core value that the people of Hong Kong are proud of. Recently a major western ratings agency has downgraded its rating of Hong Kong, and Singapore has surpassed Hong Kong as the financial centre of Asia. These destructive actions have cost Hong Kong dearly in terms of economic livelihood. If I didn't disclose these facts, I would be letting the people of Hong Kong down. During the Mong Kok riot, Ray Wong was told people to valiantly resist. Afterwards he was a coward who sought protection everywhere. Hong Kong Indigenous should be a grassroots organization for which unity is critical. At this time, their members are looking for self-aggrandizement and they are fighting among themselves over the allocation of funds. They are neither united or democratic. How do you expect them to win democracy for Hong Kong?

    (Wen Wei Po) May 7, 2016.

    According to the filing by Edward Leung to the Electoral Affairs Office, he spent about $750,000 for the Legislative Council by-election in New Territories East.

    Several days before the Mong Kok riot (including February 4, 2016), Leung's team purchased 10 anonymous telephone cards. On February 7, they bought three smart phones. On February 8 just after 830pm, the team purchased beverages from a convenience store on Portland Street. At around midnight after the riot broke out, they also made purchases from a convenience store on Portland Street. At 3am, there was a taxi receipt. So it can be said that Leung's team was quite active on the night of the riot based upon the submitted expenses.

    Among the expenses, there was an $8,500 celebration banquet held in March, of which $1,500 was for renting the space. This is an expense incurred after the election was held, but Leung reported it as an expense incurred during the election. Leung noted that this was the fulfillment of a promise made to the campaign volunteer workers.

    Does Edward Leung have a secret financier, given the size of his election campaign. Even Democratic Party chairman Emily Lau was impressed. Hong Kong Indigenous spokesperson Ray Wong was arrested with $530,000 in cash.

    According to the filing, Edward Leung received $510,000 in donations, of which only $70,000 or so are small donations under $1,000. The largest donation came from Aileen Lam in the form of $180,000 in cash. Another person named Lau Ho-yan donated $150,000. The Proletariat Political Institute also provided more than $90,000 in volunteer services, such as online ads, etc.

    Another perplexing expense is $1,400 to hire an environmental recycling company to dispose/destroy of 140 boxes of documents. What documents? How do they accumulate so many pieces of paper?

    Leung also reported purchasing "gasoline" during the election period. At least we understand how that might have been used:

    - P.S. Don't forget that $1,200 needed to transport goods from Shenzhen to Hong Kong. Hey, they say that they don't want anything to do with Hong Kong, but their action speaks louder than their words.

    (Ming Pao) May 7, 2016.

    February 8, 2016

    4:00am McDonald's (To Kwa Wan), $236
    4:35am Bottled water (To Kwa Wan), $442
    7:34pm McDonald's (To Kwa Wan), $900+
    8:28pm Taxi, $41.2
    8:40pm Two bottles of water (7-11, Portland Street, Mongkok) $12.9

    February 9, 2016

    12:15am Bottled water (7-11, Portland Street, Mongkok), $209

    3:36am (after Edward Leung claimed to have been arrested) Taxi, $54

    [Note: The person who consumed these products/services may not be Edward Leung himself.]

    (EJ Insight) April 7, 2016.

    A new political party called Demosistō will be formed on Sunday, led by student activists Joshua Wong Chi-fung and Agnes Chow Ting, thestandnews.com reported Wednesday night. Wong was the convener of the now-defunct student group Scholarism, and Chow used to be its spokeswoman.

    The invitation to Chinese media issued by Wong portrays the partys inauguration as a movie premiere under the tagline The Younger Games a play on the title of the hit film franchise The Hunger Games. In line with that theme, Chow, like the movies heroine, is pictured with a bow and arrow. 

    Nathan Law Kwun-chung, a former secretary general of the Hong Kong Federation of Students, will be one of the founding members of the new party. Law said Wednesday night that the partys name suggests it will stand with the people in their quest to turn around the destiny of Hong Kong.

    The name Demosistō is formed from the Greek work demos, meaning people, and the Latin word sisto, meaning I stand, Law said. While demos is a root word of democracy, sisto is a root of words such as insist, persist and resist. The partys name suggests it will stand by the people to resist suppression.

    Some netizens, however, found the name difficult to pronounce, hard to remember and maybe grammatically incorrect. 

    (Hong Kong Free Press) April 7, 2016.

    Student activist Joshua Wongs new political party will be named Demosistō, after his group Scholarism suspended operations. Yet the rather surprising name has drawn questions and parodies.

    The new party, which will be launched on Sunday, said its name was derived from the Greek word Demos people and the Latin word Sisto stand and that it will stand with the people to resist suppression.

    Key well-known members of the party, other than Wong, include Oscar Lai Man-lok and Agnes Chow Ting formerly of Scholarism and Nathan Law Kwun-chung formerly of the Hong Kong Federation of Students.

    The agenda of the party is unclear, but Wong has previously called for a referendum to decide on Hong Kongs future after 2047, when the One Country, Two Systems agreement expires. The party is also expected to run in the Legislative Council elections in September.

    However, the new combination of words in its name may not have given the party a great start. The name is difficult, it is hard to pronounce, I accept the criticisms, I will reflect on it deeply, Nathan Law said on his Facebook page after the announcement. Joshua Wong had to send a voice recording to reporters on how to pronounce it.

    Some pointed out that the name may not be grammatically correct, that sisto is a first person singular form of the word, meaning there is only one person standing or resisting. Demos means people, you should use third person plural form sistunt meaning they stand, a commentator posted on Joshua Wongs Facebook account. Common people would not be able to speak and remember the name, no matter how meaningful it is, it seems distant to people, another said.

    At least eight Facebook pages using the partys name were set up after the announcement. Some even made websites such as demosisto.github.io and demosisto.com with messages to Gif a play on Joshua Wongs Chinese name Chi-fung. However, the party has not set up any official Facebook page or website, although Wong said they were ready to be rolled out.

    The party also admitted that the groups Chinese name 香港眾志 with roughly the same meaning as the English one was only announced hours after the English name. Some foreign journalists suddenly told us they were coming to Hong Kong, we must respond immediately, we are sorry for the chaos due to the rush, Law added.

    Hong Kong Language Studies, a group promoting Cantonese teaching, translated its name into Latin using the same style of graphic as the new party in response. But how to pronounce it in Latin is not the main point. In Hong Kong, Cantonese and traditional Chinese characters must come first, it said on its Facebook page.

    The last two characters of the Chinese name are also the same as Chung Chi Tang, a building at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, where there is a canteen famous for its HK$10 cheap meals. I didnt intend to, but my first impression was Chung Chi Tang at CUHK, Tommy Cheung Sau-yin, a former Scholarism member and CUHK student leader, posted on his Facebook account.

    (EJ Insight) April 12, 2016.

    After being rejected by HSBC in an attempt to open a joint account to receive donations, the new political party Demosistō has hit another banking hurdle.

    Earlier this month, Joshua Wong Chi-fung, convener of the now defunct student activist group Scholarism and now secretary general of Demosistō, said HSBC rejected his applications to open a joint account with deputy secretary general Agnes Chow Ting and an individual account.

    Demosisto then decided to use Chows personal account at Hang Seng Bank to receive donations from the public that would be monitored by a lawyer and an accountant.

    However, Chow received notice from the bank Monday that, because her account wasnt being used for personal purposes, money could only be withdrawn from but not deposited into the account, the Hong Kong Economic Journal reported Tuesday.

    A representative of Hang Seng Bank said it had learned from newspaper reports that Chow was using her student banking account to collect public donations. The bank said it will keep an eye on whether the account is being used properly by the account holder.

    Chow said it is extremely difficult to open a bank account, and supporters can now donate money to the party only through online payment system Paypal. She emphasized that all donations will be monitored by a lawyer and an accountant. Chow said earlier she is worried that the partys application for registration as a company might also be rejected.

    - (SCMP) Good luck with the new political party, Joshua, but shame about the name. By Alex Lo. April 12, 2016.

    In keeping with their tradition of picking the worst possible name for themselves, the young activists who previously formed Scholarism have now launched a political party called Demosisto.

    Way back then, I thought scholarism was a neologism. No doubt its co-founder Joshua Wong Chi-fung, then a secondary school student, thought so too.

    Its scholar followed by ism, something like a system of thought or belief that is scholarly and thoughtful, perhaps?

    The word turned out to be just an ugly word that fell into disuse after the late 1980s. A 1989 edition of the Oxford English Dictionary defines it as pedantic learning. An earlier edition even offers a helpful example: the word means pedantic methods bordering on plagiarism to advance ones academic career.

    Some recent editions no longer consider scholarism a proper word, recommending instead the word scholastic.

    If there is one good thing about Scholarism being disbanded, it is that English writers can now put this non-word out of its misery.

    Alas, young Joshua wouldnt let up and has come back with another made-up word.

    I had no idea what Demosisto meant, so I looked it up.

    A Wikipedia page, probably written by Wong and his friends, helpfully offers the following explanation, which I have not edited: The name is derived from the Greek demo (meaning people in which English word democracy derived from) and Latin sisto (meaning to stand in which English words such as insist, persist and resist derived from).

    Wow, you need Greek and Latin to know what it means. So much for populism. Shouldnt the name of a political party be easy to say and remember, and be immediately identifiable as to its political agenda for its supporters and potential voters? I doubt many of them have had a Western classical education. The groups Chinese name is a little better. At least it has Hong Kong in it, and means, roughly, the peoples will.

    While I dont share the politics of Wong and his gang, I wish them well. They have taken a more moderate stance than the radical localists who call for Hong Kongs independence, and accept that Hong Kong people may legitimately choose to remain part of China.

    If only they would pick a more user-friendly name for themselves.

    (EJ Insight) April 12, 2016.

    Hang Seng Bank has frozen its deposit account.

    Cybersquatters have occupied its domain name.

    Its hastily organized news conference, held Sunday night in a subterranean auditorium, had all the trappings of a student council meeting: it started several hours late, and live streaming on YouTube was interrupted so many times that the number of viewers hovered around 300 and at times dropped below 20.

    If that is any indication of the challenges facing Joshua Wong Chi-fungs new political party, then it is in for a bumpy road ahead.

    Demosistō, the grown-up version of Scholarism which Wong founded four years ago to oppose Leung Chun-yings patriotic education plan is meant to help the 19-year-old and his posse shed their schoolboy image to better position themselves for a serious Legislative Council bid in September.

    Wong is hoping that the new party with an intelligent-sounding name will wipe the slate clean and allow pro-democracy activists of all ages to join without looking like they are crashing a high school party.

    For instance, 60-year-old filmmaker Shu Kei (real name Kenneth Ip Kin-hang), who was present at the news conference, would have looked oddly out of place if he were to be introduced as a new Scholarism recruit.

    A lot of ink has been spilled over the high-profile rebranding, and so far there has been more criticism than praise.

    The word Demosistō, a portmanteau created by Boy Wonder himself, combines the Greek word for the people (demos) and the Latin word for I stand (sistō).

    No one other than Wong himself seems to like the new name. In fact, it isnt even grammatically correct: it loosely translates into I the people stand (sistō being the first person singular of the verb sistere).

    Netizens have been quick to call the awkward appellation a public relations blunder, invoking the famous Cantonese proverb that to be given a bad name is worse than to be born with a bad fate.

    One commentator joked that the name sounds like demolition, some sort of contraption invented by Wong to destroy the traditional pan-democratic parties.

    Other people took issues with the partys logo, which was designed around the letter D, saying that it looks like a mobile phone SIM card.

    Things have not gone smoothly for the partys official website either.

    The domain name www.demosisto.com has been claimed by an anonymous party.

    When clicked, the link goes to an empty page with a villainous taunt to Wong: U still [have] no site?

    Outsmarted by their political opponents, Demosistians grudgingly settled for the next best thing: www.demosisto.hk.

    A skeletal version of the site was launched hours before the news conference Sunday.

    But thats not all.

    Demosistōs fundraising efforts have been stunted by delays in the company registration process, as well as HSBCs refusal to open a bank account for the party to receive donations.

    To date, every financial institution approached by Wong has told him to take his business somewhere else.

    As a result, all donations had been funneled through deputy secretary general Agnes Chow Tings personal savings account, which presented audit and transparency issues.

    Then Monday afternoon, Hang Seng Bank suddenly notified Chow that her account could no longer accept deposits, with immediate effect. The situation just went from bad to worse.

    With the entire financial system stacked against the party, it remains unclear whether Demosistō will manage to meet its HK$2 million crowdfunding target in time for the Legco election campaign season that is set to begin as early as this summer.

    The good news is that jokes about names and logos will eventually pass, and banking and other administrative issues will be sorted out or gotten around somehow.

    The new party will gain traction, and voters will warm to it as long as it has a solid policy platform.

    So far, however, Demosistō is long on ideology but short on actionable plans.

    The partys website remains a work in progress the Policy tab displays a blank page with the words coming soon in Chinese.

    It leaves open the question of where Demosistō stands with respect to policy issues from universal retirement protection to cross-border relations, to the partys willingness to engage CY Leungs government and even Beijing officials to break the current political impasse.

    What we do know is that Demosistō will continue Wongs non-violent approach to the fight for universal suffrage and greater autonomy for the city.

    He has called himself a centrist and placed his new party halfway between radical localists who call for Hong Kongs independence through any means possible and the pan-dems who do little more than shout slogans and issue strongly worded statements in response to bad government decisions.

    Yet, the middle path can be fraught with peril.

    A centrist party may wind up pleasing no one and alienating voters on both sides.

    On one hand, moderate constituents who worry about the emergence of radical forces will find Demosistōs self-determination rhetoric too incendiary for comfort.

    On the other hand, voters who buy into the localists take-no-prisoners tactics will dismiss Wong or any of his Demosistians as just another career politician climbing the greasy pole.

    Whats more, now that the new party has officially thrown its hat into the ring for the upcoming elections, it has turned old allies into new rivals.

    Once-friendly faces like Alan Leong Kah-kit and Long Hair Leung Kwok-hung may suddenly stop returning Wongs phone calls.

    There will be no one to offer ground game advice or coordinate voting tickets to avoid siphoning votes from each other.

    In the gladiatorial game that is local politics, it is every man for himself.

    But there are worse things than a cold shoulder.

    Like wild animals unleashed from underground dungeons, localist sympathizers wasted no time in their vicious attacks against the new kids on the block.

    Social media trolling began within minutes after the Demosistō Facebook page was launched, replete with a liberal use of expletives and colorful epithets.

    Still, Demosistōs biggest trouble may come from within.

    Of the partys four core members, only chairman Nathan Law Kwun-chung and vice chairman Oscar Lai Man-lok are old enough to stand for election in September.

    While the Occupy movement made both men household names, they are as much untested as they are saddled with political baggage.

    Lai, the former spokesman for Scholarism and Wongs longtime sidekick, has been the butt of many jokes ever since he was found stalking the Civic Partys Alvin Yeung Ngok-kiu and repeatedly photo-bombing the candidate during the Legco by-election two months ago.

    Lai was given the nickname Magnet Man the Cantonese catchphrase for a camera hog for sidling up to the pan-dems for cheap media exposure.

    His high-profile announcement that he was severing his ties to Scholarism and throwing his support behind Yeung just days before the by-election made Lai look mercenary and opportunistic.

    If Lai comes off as a shameless attention-seeker, then Law has the opposite problem.

    In front of the camera lens, the former Lingnan University student union president and Hong Kong Federation of Students (HKFS) secretary general often appears demure and distant someone who would make a better academic than a firebrand politician.

    Moreover, Law has been criticized for not taking responsibility for his ineffective leadership during Occupy, culminating in his disastrous call for protesters to besiege the government headquarters at Tamar, which hastened the demise of the movement.

    That and subsequent missteps by the HKFS leadership eventually prompted half its member universities to leave the federation a year ago.

    All that has made Demosistō a risky proposition for Joshua Wong.

    He has put all his political eggs in one basket by making the bold move to disband Scholarism.

    Forced to sit out the September elections, Wong can only campaign for Lai and Law without knowing how much of his aura and star power can be transferred to them.

    It is a high-stakes gamble not only because the opposition vote will be split three ways among the pan-dems, the localists and his centrist party, but also because Wong has made himself the face and voice of Demosistō.

    If his surrogates Lai and Law make a poor showing in the September elections, winning only a tiny fraction of the overall votes, it will call into question Wongs leadership and whether his prodigious fame will eventually flame out.

    Nevertheless, if there is one thing we know about Wong, it is that the teenager is full of surprises the kind that have helped him reinvent himself each time critics were about to write him off as an overgrown child star.

    This is a young man who combines the acumen to have put forward a proposal for civil nomination even before Occupy began and the foresight to urge the city to look beyond the current political wrangles and focus on life after 2047, the year when the Basic Law expires and one country, two systems ends.

    Wong has a knack for knowing where to place his chips and how to make a winning bet for himself and the causes he fights for.

    No matter how shaky things may look for Demosistō at the moment, he is not one to be written off just yet.

    (SCMP) April 12, 2016.

    Step aside Demosisto, the newly formed political party, and make way for Demosisto the game.

    Its been a month since student leader Joshua Wong and friends applied for Demosisto to be registered as a company, but someone has already beaten them to it by registering a game with the same name under the Business Registration Ordinance.

    Demosisto the game was registered by an unnamed party with effect from April 8 for a year.

    Its not clear whether the registration of the game, which happens to be about Hong Kong politics, has anything to do with the political groups application to the Companies Registry, which is still pending approval.

    Meanwhile Demosisto the party is struggling to open a bank account to handle its donations as it faces one rejection after another.

    The partys co-founder and deputy secretary general, Agnes Chow Ting, said on her Facebook page that she had received a verbal notice from a Hang Seng Bank regional head that all the functions of her personal account except fund withdrawals had been cancelled from Monday, meaning the party would no longer be able to use it to collect donations.

    The reason cited was that the account was not being used personally.

    The Hang Seng account was recently set up by Chow for the sole purpose of fundraising, and was placed under the scrutiny of lawyers and accountants.

    Chow formerly from the now-suspended Scholarism said the bank had refused to issue a written notice of the move.

    The new political party publicised the account recently when it appealed for public donations.

    It remains unknown whether we will be able to accept public donations with a new account. It was so difficult for us to open an account at the beginning. And now it will be even more difficult after we disclosed this incident, Chow said.

    The public can still only use online payments system PayPal to make donations.

    A spokesperson for the bank confirmed to the Post it had suspended all the deposit functions of Chows Green Banking student account after learning that she used it to collect public donations.

    A student account is a personal account for private transactions only. The account should not be used for non-personal purposes, the spokesperson said, adding this has been a stated condition for all personal accounts.

    We will not accept any further deposits into that account. The Bank monitors all account activities to ensure compliance with all relevant terms and conditions, the spokesperson added.

    Chows personal account had been used temporarily to take public donations after the party failed last month to open a joint current account at HSBC.

    The partys secretary general, Joshua Wong Chi-fung, formerly with Scholarism, accused HSBC of exercising political censorship in rejecting his request to open the account.

    But a bank spokesman countered that it did not refuse to open accounts because of an individuals political views.

    As a matter of policy, HSBC does not comment on its relationship with its customers, the spokesman said. HSBC accepts or rejects account opening applications based on whether they meet our account opening requirements.

    The party said it would try to find a solution to the financial problem.

    (EJ Insight) April 19, 2016.

    The student leaders of the 2014 Occupy Movement are back in the limelight as they seek to pursue the democracy struggle by participating in the Legislative Council elections in September. However, the public appear lukewarm to their comeback after their reputation has somehow suffered as a result of their failure to achieve genuine universal suffrage for Hong Kong.

    The outcome of the 79-day protests, which ended not with a bang but a whimper, may have convinced many of those who joined the campaign that its useless to pursue the old methods of struggle to force Beijing to listen to their demands.

    Such feelings of frustration and fatigue have given rise to localism, which is now inching its way into the mainstream of political thoughts.

    Given this situation, it could be quite difficult for these student leaders to win the votes of pan-democratic supporters in the September polls.

    But these student leaders, while recognizing the difficulty of pursuing the struggle within the boundaries of their old associations, feel that the Legco elections present another opportunity for them to carry on the endeavor.

    And so Joshua Wong, Nathan Law and Oscar Lai have co-founded Demosisto with Law considering running for a seat in the Hong Kong Island constituency and Lai possibly joining the race in Kowloon East.

    Alex Chow and Lester Shum, along with other campus comrades, have formed a new alliance with Shum deliberating on a crack at the Kowloon West seat.

    But the lay of the land has changed since two years ago.

    Demosisto appears to find it hard to win the support of the internet generation, who thinks the name of the new group is strange and uncool.

    Some even accused the group of copying a Spanish design for its logo. And not a few raised a howl over its chaotic debut press conference and the wrong information provided in its press releases.

    All this suggests that their ertswhile supporters no longer regard them with awe, and have developed a critical attitude towards their plans and programs.

    Their young supporters, who remain bitter over Beijings arrogant responses to their demands, are now entertaining the idea that a more radical approach is needed to pursue the struggle.

    Thats why when Demosisto broached the idea of a referendeum in 10 years time, the young activists insist that they should push for a vote in 2021 and work at a faster pace for a change of the political status of Hong Kong.

    The young activists are also hesitant to support the student leaders who refuse to admit their errors during the 79-day campaign.

    Looking back, they now view the Occupy campaign as a wasted opportunity because it lacked a clear direction and concrete goals, as exemplified by the lack of results from the meeting between the student representatives and government officials at the height of the protests.

    The mass followers of the Occupy Movement seem to feel cheated because their struggle resulted in nothing while their leaders gained more political exposure and even global stature.

    And so while Joshua Wong landed on the cover of Time magazine, the movement dragged on and ended in charges being filed against its leaders and followers.

    And so while many of the young activists wallowed in frustration, the luminaries of the movement shed their status as student leaders and became politicians.

    Thats probably a natural transformation, but now their supporters will have to look at them, not anymore as firebrands of a political movement, but as politicians whose main objective is the advancement of their political career.

    The deluge of negative posts on social media about the emerging political parties suggests that the mass activists are unwilling to transfer their support from the movements leaders to the new politicians, even though the personalities involved are the same.

    The rise of localism, along with the emerging ideas of Hong Kong independence and the use of violence as an option, does not necessarily marginalize the leaders of the Occupy campaign.

    Rather, it indicates that the young generation wants new modes of struggle to pursue the fight for democracy. They want results, not just words.

    This new thinking has found expression in the Mong Kok clashes in early February as well as the results of the Legco by-election in the New Territories East, where Edward Leung, a candidate of the radical Hong Kong Indigenous, won 15 percent of the vote.

    And so while the localist groups, which are also joining the parliamentary struggle, is targeting first-time voters in the upcoming elections, the new parties of the former student leaders cant seem to decide what they are standing for.

    Finding themselves the targets of the establishment in its efforts to get back at the Occupy organizers, the former student leaders are taking a conservative approach towards the Hong Kong independence issue.

    The Occupy campaign is no doubt one of the most important milestones in Hong Kongs political history since the 1997 handover as hundreds of thousands of Hong Kong people, mostly youngsters, occupied the streets to seek genuine universal suffrage for the 2017 chief executive election, inspired by the involvement of student leaders such as Wong, Chow and Shum.

    But the failure of the campaign means its leaders can no longer ride on the protest movement to reach out to the people even as they are losing the support of the young generation.

    As such, these student leaders should abandon the baggage of the Occupy Movement and shift their focus to the issue of Hong Kongs future.

    Throwing the ball to the public, as what their proposal for a referendum in 10 years suggests, simply wont do.

    (SCMP) Hong Kongs political activists and localists groups are deluding themselves by calling on the people to decide on what happens after 2047 (or sooner). By Alex Lo. Aprl 20, 2016.

    Radical democrats and populists romanticise referendums as the ultimate exercise in the peoples will. We have plenty of those in Hong Kong. From Benny Tai Yiu-ting of Occupy Central to our current crop of newly formed localist groups, our political activists delight in conducting mock referendums as a tool to fight Beijing and the Hong Kong government.

    Demosisto, a new political party formed by former members of the defunct Scholarism group, wants to carry out a referendum in 10 years on whether Hong Kong should remain part of China after 2047. An alliance of localist/independence groups wants to hold such a referendum sooner rather than later.

    Of course, their very conception is absurd. A referendum is no referendum if it has no power to enact the outcome being voted on. It is no more than a public opinion poll. So instead of being grandiose, why not be honest and call it what it is a poll or survey, and nothing more?

    Hong Kongs constitutional settings do not allow for referendums. That stems from the inherently limited democratic nature of our political system. But instead of calling it a weakness, it is actually a strength. A referendum is one of the worst features of Western-style democracy.

    The issues to be decided by referendums are by definition highly complex matters. Why, then, should such difficult issues be decided on a single day by one vote through the asking of one simple ballot question?

    Such ballot questions typically oversimplify; they are often not even the questions that many voters have in mind but who are being forced to vote anyway. Such exercises in direct democracy are the antithesis of representational or parliamentary democracy.

    Britain is a good example. Less than two years ago, Scots were asked to vote on whether they wanted to remain part of the British union. The world looked on aghast and uncomprehending as to why a fruitful union of more than three centuries could be dissolved by a single vote. That it didnt had a lot to do with luck. Now, Brits will vote this summer on Brexit, on whether to exit the European Union, an issue far more complex than Scottish independence. Referendums are a collective leap into the dark. They are nothing to celebrate, let alone emulate.

    Internet comments:

    - (Wen Wei Po)

    - The name Scholarism is the anglicized version of the Latin or German term Scholarismus. So I guess that they want to do something similar ... sisto is first person singular, so demo+sisto means The People, I stand alone. Now this is truly independent political party, because it is a political party for a single person standing alone.

    - Another way of parsing the term is even more ominous: demos+isto means The People, That Person. But since isto is an ablative male, it means The Man Who Has Left The People.

    - They wanted to convey a message like The People Stand Together. In the Chinese-language press release, they proclaimed that they are presenting a great work on the future of Hong Kong titled "眾志圍城" (The Will of the People lay siege to the City." But Stand (sistō) in Greek means "have or maintain an upright position supported by one's feet in a fixed location" and not "an attitude towards a particular issue or a position taken in an argument."

    - No wonder they had to stop the Copyright Amendment Bill in spite of the wishes of the American Chamber of Commerce. Here is he rip-off version of The Hunger Games poster.

    - A spoof on the poster changed "眾志圍城" into "I don't know how to read this."

    - (Wen Wei Po) April 7 2016.

    - Generally speaking, Hongkongers have trouble pronouncing English words with many syllables. Typically they map the English word into Chinese words and memorize those words. An easy-to-remember mnemonic for Demosistō is 地踎屎塔 (which literally means Toilet Used By Unemployed Coolies). Reference: How to Use a Squat Toilet in China.

    - The invitation to attend the press conference took the form of a film premier. The poster is titled The Younger Games starring Agnes Chow, Joshua Wong, Oscar Lai and Nathan Law. So this is just democracy being sold as a computer games and/or a movie.

    The director is Shu Kei, who may or may not be the person of the same name who is the Dean of Film and Television at the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts. The names of the scriptwriter and the producer are pseudonyms.

    How serious can these people be?

    - The slogan on the poster says that on April 10, they will bring the city down with one arrow. Thanks a lot for shooting Hong Kong!

    - Here is the exercise of the inalienable right to spoof.

    DEMO: In Cantonese, this means Fuck Someone's Mother.
    SISTO: In Cantonese, this means Fleeing After The Act.
    So DEMOSISTO means fucking someone's mother and fleeing after the act.
    "眾志圍城" is a homonym as "眾    痔圍城", which means that everyone who has hemorrhoids is laying siege to the city. By being destructive and non-constructive, Joshua Wong is indeed Hong Kong's hemorrhoid.

    - On an RTHK radio talk show, Joshua Wong and Kaizer Lau were guests. After the show, they shook hands. A picture tells the story better than one thousand words. So what did you think happen? What does this have to say about family upbringing and self-cultivation? What kind of democracy will you have if you totally disrespect all dissidents?

    - (SCMP) Hong Kong activist Joshua Wong must realise that banks have rules; By Alex Lo. April 7, 2016.

    Its a good thing I am not a news editor. I wouldnt last a day in todays newsroom. I cant, for example, understand why political activist Joshua Wong Chi-fungs inability to open an account with HSBC was news, when it was reported in practically all the major local media outlets. Some pan-democrat lawmakers even demanded answers from Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury Chan Ka-keung. I could have thought of more worthwhile things to ask in the legislature.

    When I first became a reporter 20 years ago, the Bank of China wouldnt let me open a current account because, a branch manager told me, I earned too little to qualify to have my own cheque book. Later, they refused me a mortgage because they didnt think I was financially viable. I could have claimed political persecution because of my job. By the way, I was actually holding down a steady job with a stable, if very low, income.

    So heres young Joshua, formerly of the student activist group Scholarism, screaming bloody murder because HSBC turned down his application to open an account. But even according to Wong, HSBC didnt simply say no. Its just that the bank asked for additional information, which he refused to supply. Worse, he wasnt entirely forthcoming about his purpose of opening a joint savings account with a fellow activist when asked by the bank.

    He also tried to open a current account but was turned down. We were asked about the purpose of the joint account and we said it was for personal savings, Wong said.

    But when interviewed by reporters, he admitted they needed the accounts to handle donations and other business dealings for a new political party they were setting up. It seems the fuss is because I am a politically sensitive person, Wong said. Political censorship seems to have been involved in [HSBCs] business considerations.

    So heres a young guy with only a secondary school education, has never earned a cent in his life or never held down a steady job. When asked for more personal details, he declined to comply out of what he called privacy concerns.

    Is it any wonder that HSBC, or any bank, would refuse to do business with such a person?

    - (Oriental Daily) 50 reporters were grumbling after not being allowed to attend the party launch press conference.

    - Volunteers wanted!
    First, Demosisto posted an advertisement for volunteers to "determine our future." The accompanying photo showed Joshua Wong being pushed by a traffic policeman. The message is that Demosisto needs many more people to be pushed around by the police. Very quickly, Hong Kong Indigenous posted an advertisement for volunteers to "reclaim our homeland." The accompanying photo showed three Hong Kong Indigenous members pushing each other in order to get away from the police. The message is that Hong Kong Indigenous to join them when they flee from the poice. The design of these two advertisements are virtually identical. Is Hong Kong Indigenous paying a tribute or being sarcastic?

    P.S. Studentlocalism says that they also need volunteers to wear N95 masks, fold their arms and stand around.

    - Joshua Wong has a special message to you.

    The Legislative Council elections are approaching. We do not have wealthy financial groups to back up and we are not a political group with an experienced election machine. At a time when the future is uncertain, Demosisto invites all those who care about the future to Hong Kong to use Paypal to donate online and join us to push the self-determination movement for the sake of the future of Hong Kong.

    - Here is a shorter summary: Brother, I need a lot of money to buy western suits and travel around the world. Please send your money directly into Paypal. I am too busy to stand at the street booth and collect donations. The time to suction money is obviously before the Legislative Council elections, not after. That's all.

    - (Wen Wei Po) May 25, 2016.

    Demosisto has been putting their hands out for money using all sorts of methods (personal account, company accounts, Paypal) and running into all manners of debacles.

    In the latest round, Joshua Wong Chi-fung urged people to write checks for "WONG CHI FUNG" and mail them to a Kowloon Central Post Office box number 73962. He promised that the associated bank account and the financial statement would be overseen by lawyers and accountants, but he did not explain how. Citizens wanted to know who these people are, but Demosisto says "Don't ask, just trust us."

    Internet users then found out that the post office box belonged to the now defunct Scholarism organization. Ironically, Demosisto has been insisting that it is an independent organization. When asked about the whereabouts of the Scholarism money, Demosisto responded that "We have not take a cent from Scholarism."

    Given the latest revelations, Demosisto has gone back to that previous response and quietly added that they are presently using the Scholarism post office box. In that addendum, Demosisto said that the former Scholarism members either went to Demosisto or to a student organization that will be formed after the summer vacation. "The newly formed student organization agreed to let Demosisto used the post office box. Registration and user rights are being transferred and the relevant expenses will be paid for by Demosisto."

    Internet users noted that this is using one lie to cover up another lie. "How can an organization that has not yet been formed and without a general assembly being ever held authorize Demosisto to use its post office box? Is this organization a satellite organization run by supreme commander Joshua Wong?" "An unborn baby is siding with his uncle to take over his father's assets?"

    After more than 400 mostly negative comments on its Facebook, Demosisto maintained its silence.

    - Enumerating the mistakes in the alms-begging note:

    - You guys are totally wrong about the effectiveness of this error-filled check scam. Joshua Wong's checking account will be shut by the bank with certainty, because no bank will get involved in mail fraud. However, Joshua Wong will then claim White Terror political persecution, and he will be able to raise millions in cash donations at the Demosisto street booths on June 4th and July 1st. Cash donations are not traceable and therefore not accountable either. This is far better than using the checking account, which is traceable and accountable.

    Q1a. Is the conflict between the government and the citizens serious?
    66.5%: Serious
    24.2%: In-between
    6.6%: Not serious
    2.8%: Don't know/hard to say

    Q1b. Is the political wrangling in Hong Kong serious?
    71.4%: Serious
    21.8%: In-between
    4.3%: Not serious
    2.5%: Don't know/hard to say

    Q2a. When struggling with the government to fight for our demands, we should always adhere to peaceful, rational and non-violent means.
    69.5%: Agree
    20.5%: In-between
    8.1%: Disagree
    2.0%: Don't know/hard to say

    Q2b. Nowadays in Hong Kong, taking radical actions such as physical clashes or traffic blockage is the only way of making the government respond to people's demands.
    15.9%: Agree
    23.2%: In-between
    57.8%: Disagree
    3.1%: Don't know/hard to say

    Q2c. Taking radical action is the only way to make the government respond to your demands.
    9.1%: Agree
    23.9%: In-between
    63.6%: Disagree
    3.4%: Don't know/hard to say

    Q3. In fighting for public interests, you prefer to
    22.3%: Stick to your principles and not compromise
    66.9%: See both sides make concessions in order to co-exist
    2.0%: Neither
    8.8%: Don't know/hard to say

    Q4. During a demonstration, are the following actions acceptable or not?

    Physical clashes
    18.6%: Acceptable
    23.0%: In-between
    56.9%: Unacceptable
    1.5%: Don't know/hard to say

    Throwing eggs at government officials
    18.9%: Acceptable
    17.6%: In-between
    61.0%: Unacceptable
    2.5%: Don't know/hard to say

    Lie-down protests
    41.7%: Acceptable
    17.6%: In-between
    37.2%: Unacceptable
    3.5%: Don't know/hard to say

    Traffic blockage
    3.9%: Acceptable
    10.9%: In-between
    82.2%: Unacceptable
    2.9%: Don't know/hard to say

    Throwing hard objects at law enforcement officers
    3.9%: Acceptable
    10.9%: In-between
    82.2%: Unacceptable
    2.9%: Don't know/hard to say

    Vandalism
    2.9%: Acceptable
    13.5%: In-between
    81.0%: Unacceptable
    2.5%: Don't know/hard to say

    Burning tires or rubbish bins
    3.9%: Acceptable
    8.7%: In-between
    84.6%: Unacceptable
    2.8%: Don't know/hard to say

    Q5. Do you expect social conflict to become more serious over the next three years?
    45.5%: More serious
    25.5%: About the same as now
    13.2%: More moderate
    16.0%: Don't know/hard to say

    (Hong Kong Film Awards) 35th Hong Kong Film Awards

    Best Film: Ten Years
    Best Director: Tsui Hark (The Taking of Tiger Mountain)
    Best Screenplay: Philip Yung Tsz Kwong (Port of Call)
    Best Actor: Aaron Kwok (Port of Call)
    Best Actress: Jessie Li (Port of Call)
    Best Supporting Actor: Michael Ning (Port of Call)
    Best Supporting Actress: Elaine Jin (Port of Call)
    Best Cinematography: Christopher Doyle (Port of Call)
    Best New Performer: Michael Ning (Port of Call)

    (YouTube) Ten Years trailer
    (YouTube) Hong Kong Film Awards presentation of Best Film award

    (BBC) Ten Years: Controversial Hong Kong film wins top Asia award. April 4, 2016.

    A controversial film depicting a bleak future for Hong Kong under Beijing's control has won one of Asia's top film awards. The low-budget, independent movie Ten Years has packed screenings in Hong Kong, but is banned in mainland China. Set in 2025, it depicts political gangs and persecution of local people for speaking Cantonese not Mandarin. It comes amid increasing nervousness in Hong Kong about perceived Communist Party interference in its affairs.

    Ten Years, which is made up of five vignettes, won the best film prize at the Hong Kong Film Awards held on Sunday. "Ten Years exposed the fear of Hong Kong people (towards China)," said one of the film's directors, Chow Kwun-wai.

    Producer Andrew Choi told the BBC the award came as a surprise. "It's important for Hong Kong that a film that echoes so much of what people are feeling in their hearts has won." He said the film won after several rounds of voting by mainly Hong Kong filmmakers and praised the "integrity" of that process.

    The film includes scenes such as children in uniform policing adults, reminiscent of the child Red Guards of China's violent 1966-76 Cultural Revolution, and an old woman setting herself alight in front of the British consulate.

    In January, China's state-controlled Global Times ran an editorial describing the film as a "thought virus". Shortly after, many cinemas in Hong Kong stopped screening it, though independent screenings have continued to show the film. It is also expected to appear in limited release or at festivals in Taiwan, Singapore, the US and Italy. The film's makers have never sought distribution in mainland China, but the awards ceremony was not broadcast there, as it normally is. Censors in the mainland also blacked out the story when it appeared on BBC World News.

    (Hong Kong Free Press) April 5, 2016.

    Dystopian movie Ten Years won Best Film at the 2016 Hong Kong Film Awards held at the Cultural Centre in Tsim Sha Tsui on Sunday.

    Ten Years is a dark socio-political fantasy that imagines what Hong Kong may look like ten years on. Five directors produced five shorts exploring a city where shops are attacked by uniformed army cadets for selling banned materials, where Mandarin is the dominant language, and where an activist self-immolates in a fight for Hong Kongs independence.

    Ng Ka-leung, one of the films directors, told reporters that he was not concerned by Beijings opinion: If you ask me what Beijing might feel towards us, I would say it doesnt really matter. The movie was made for Hong Kong people. We are open-minded to anyone who likes it or not. We just hope that Hong Kong people can share our feelings. We would like people to think about the future of Hong Kong.

    The film was called a miracle, for its success despite a limited showing in cinema chains. Thousands of Hong Kongers flocked to see the movie at special screenings across the city of Friday. Despite being produced on a low budget of HK$500,000, it took over HK$6 million at cinemas according to latest figures at Box Office Mojo, a website owned by the international film site IMDB.

    Earlier in late January, the films success caught the attention of the Chinese government. Chinas state newspaper Global Times criticised the film as ridiculous, saying that it was spreading desperation.

    In February, Chinese state media broadcaster CCTV notified the Hong Kong Film Awards Association that it will not broadcast this years event on television. Tencent, the Chinese technology giant, also told the association that it will cease its broadcasting online.

    As Sundays ceremony came to a close, news of the best film winner was omitted from reports in mainland China. On Saturday, state mouthpiece Global Times ran an article entitled: Hong Kong Film Awards fails to attract attention at home.

    (EJ Insight) An independent Hong Kong? Stop dreaming. By Michael Chugani. April 14, 2016.

    What will Hong Kong be like in the year 2025? The locally produced Cantonese movie Ten Years gives us an imagined glimpse.

    It visualizes Hong Kong in 2025 being under the totalitarian thumb of communist China.

    Putonghua is imposed on the population, the Peoples Liberation Army crushes protests, Youth Guards that resemble Red Guards are deployed to harass localists and Beijings Liaison Office foments fake terrorism to justify enactment of national security laws.

    Bearing in mind that 2025 is just nine years away, is it really possible that the central government can impose such great political change on Hong Kong in so short a time?

    Anything is possible, as the saying goes. Judging from what the makers of Ten Years said about the movie, it is apparent they did not consider the movie to be far-fetched fiction meant purely for entertainment.

    The makers seemed to believe to a certain extent that a future Hong Kong could indeed be under the totalitarian thumb of communist China.

    The movie, influenced by and made after the so-called Umbrella Movement, was a hit among those who took part in the movement.

    This belief among many young people of a bleak and undemocratic future is rooted in the central governments hardline attitude towards so-called genuine democracy for Hong Kong.

    As the old saying goes, a week is a long time in politics.

    That means nine years is an eternity in politics terms. Anything can happen. But what political future is in store for us will be influenced very much by how Hong Kong people want Hong Kong to fit in as a part of China.

    I do not believe that the central government will, for no reason, turn Hong Kong into what is depicted in the movie Ten Years.

    What can Beijing possibly hope to gain by imposing Putonghua here, restricting freedoms, and using the PLA to crush protests just for the sake of it?

    It did not use the PLA even during the 79-day Occupy movement and during the Mong Kok riots. On the contrary, Beijing risks losing a lot by doing what is depicted in the movie.

    This doesnt mean Beijing will never use its iron fist on Hong Kong but I believe it will do so only as a last resort when it feels it has no other choice.

    As we all know, the central government is obsessed with national security. It will do whatever is necessary to protect national security even if the methods it uses draw international condemnation.

    We can see that in Tibet and Xinjiang.

    Beijing often suspects the bogeyman of foreign interference in Hong Kong to undermine the nation even when there is none.

    If a time ever comes when Beijing is fully convinced that national security is under threat by certain forces in Hong Kong, it will use its iron fist to deal with the threat even if that means damaging the foundations necessary for international confidence in Hong Kong.

    National security always comes first for the central government.

    Beijing is keenly aware that international confidence in Hong Kong is based on our civil rights, core values, rule of law, independent judiciary, free media, freedom of information and corrupt-free society. This is what separates us from the rest of China.

    It is these core values to which Hong Kong owes its success as an Asian financial center and its status as an international city where numerous multi-national corporations have their Asian headquarters.

    Take away these core values and Hong Kongs status will disappear overnight. If Beijing were to impose the harsh measures depicted in the movie, Hong Kongs role as an Asian financial hub and international city will be wiped out.

    Hong Kong used to be the only goose that laid the golden eggs for a backward China. Now, Shenzhen, Guangzhou and Shanghai are also laying golden eggs but Hong Kongs eggs still remain the best.

    Thats why Beijing will think thrice before using its iron fist on us.

    The problem with the movie Ten Years is that it visualizes the future with its mindset stuck in the present.

    Mao Zedongs China was not Deng Xiaopings China. Deng Xiaopings China was not Xi Jinpings China.

    What will be the China of Xi Jingpings successor?

    China in 2025 could be even politically harsher than now or it could be less so. No one knows. But Ten Years depicts a future China to be exactly like the harsh regime it is now which will impose authoritarian rule in Hong Kong.

    In fact, anything can happen between now and 2025, let alone between now and 2047 when the 50 years of no change under the 1997 agreement between China and Britain ends.

    It is not unthinkable that the combination of the digital age, growing wealth, social media and increased capitalism will force future mainland leaders to become less authoritarian in governing the country.

    It is not inconceivable that by 2047 Chinas one-party state is communist only in name or even that it is no longer a one-party state.

    If the disintegration of the Soviet Union with the fall of the Berlin Wall can happen, a democratic China can also happen by 2047, which is still 31 years away.

    Some Hong Kong people, including student groups, have recently said society should start discussing what kind of Hong Kong we should have when the 50 years of one country, two systems end in 2047.

    Student groups want Hong Kong to be an independent city-state in 2047. Those calling for a public discussion to start now on the status of Hong Kong in 2047 are either not using their heads or have their heads buried in a cloud.

    The central government has not even started focusing on who should be Hong Kongs next chief executive when Leung Chun-yings first term ends next year.

    The country faces so many pressing issues that need immediate attention. Why would leaders want to consider dealing with an issue that wont arise for many years to come?

    As far as mainland leaders are concerned, one country, two systems under the Basic Law is still working well and does not need immediate attention.

    Those who say it is entirely up to Hong Kong people to decide what happens to Hong Kong in 2047, as some students have said, not only have their heads buried in a cloud, they are dreaming.

    They were not born in the 1980s when Britain and China negotiated the future of Hong Kong and so may not even know about what was then called the three-legged stool.

    Hong Kong legislators wanted Hong Kong to have a say in the British-China handover talks but Beijing firmly rejected a three-legged stool that included Hong Kong in the negotiations. It insisted the future of Hong Kong was a matter between China and Britain only.

    Aside from national security, reunification is as equally important to China. Thats why it never shies from hinting it will even go to war to make sure Taiwan sticks to the one-China policy.

    If it is willing to go to war to preserve the one-China policy, why would it allow Hong Kong people to decide on their own if they want independence in 2047 after having undergone such difficult negotiations with Britain to regain sovereignty over Hong Kong on the condition that there is one country, two systems?

    It makes no logical sense.

    Those who understand politics understand the importance of timing.

    There is a good time to do something and a bad time. What may seem impossible at one time can become possible at another time.

    It would have been impossible for Donald Trump to have become the Republican Partys top US presidential candidate four years ago when Barack Obama was running for a second term.

    But it has become possible now. It is the worst timing for students and others to talk about independence, self-rule, or merely more autonomy now when mainland leaders have grown even more distrustful of Hong Kong after the Occupy movement and the Mong Kok riots.

    How can any sensible thinking person expect the central government to engage in a public discussion about Hong Kongs status in 2047, including the status of independence, when Beijing has rejected even so-called true democracy that would allow a free choice of candidates to run in chief executive elections?

    No one can even guess what Hong Kong or mainland China will be like in 2047. But if China is still a one-party communist state, then independence is totally out of the question. Mainland leaders would never even consider it.

    But if China is no longer an authoritarian one-party state in 2047, then the push for Hong Kong to become independent from a communist regime becomes moot.

    (Los Angeles Review of Books) 'Ten Years' - More than just a lesson in despair. By Jeffrey Wasserstrom. June 9, 2016.

    The more that I heard about the Hong Kong independent film Ten Years during the first months of this year, the more certain I became that I would need to see it. The film was made on a tiny budget, not just a single movie, but five films-within-a-film, each by a different director, offering a multi-sided dystopian take on what Hong Kong would or at least might be like a decade from now. Mainland censors were so worried that Ten Years would win a prize at the Hong Kong film awards as indeed it did that they decided to prevent the ceremony from being streamed into the mainland. And I learned that there were vignettes in the film that touched on the history of Hong Kong social movements, as well as brought in tactics associated with protest in other parts of the Peoples Republic of China.

    As someone who has been concerned with censorship and demonstrations throughout his career, who has often written about dystopian works (albeit more often novels than films), and who has written several pieces in recent years on inspiring and distressing Hong Kong events, how could I resist feeling duty-bound to see this?

    I worried, though, that dutiful would be precisely the word for what I might feel while watching Ten Years. When I see a film, I like it to appeal to the cinema lover as well as the scholar in me, and I wasnt sure this one would do both. So, once I got a copy of the film loaded onto my computer, I found it hard to work up the enthusiasm to actually start playing it, fearing that seeing it would not just be depressing but would seem like a chore. Thankfully, though, I was ultimately proved wrong.

    This didnt happen immediately. The first two section of the film, while having their merits, both felt a bit didactic. The opening segment, about an orchestrated act of violence designed to allow stringent security measures to be introduced, was well done but predictable. The second part, meanwhile, which offered a more surreal look at the disappearance of local culture, felt too self-consciously symbol-laden.

    Then, though, the third segment began and I was won over completely. It focuses on the tribulations of a Cantonese-speaking taxi driver in a Mandarin-dominated Hong Kong to come, in which mastery of the language of power separates haves from have-nots as clearly as ethnicity and race can in other sorts of colonial or quasi-colonial settings. Bullied and finding it increasingly difficult to ply his trade, the lead character becomes a kind of 21st-century counterpart to the rickshaw puller in Lao Shes classic Camel Xiangzi. But the director steers clear of didacticism, skillfully using nice touches of intergenerational drama (youth are shown having none of the trouble switching into Mandarin that plagues their elders) and sly bits of dark humor (for example, when the drivers GPS stubbornly refuses to recognize the addresses he gives it, due to his accent and use of the local patois) to keep us engaged with the story and caring about the character.

    I made it through the first three segments on an early May domestic plane flight, but only watched the rest of Ten Years very recently. This was because, though I had initially planned to finish it the day after I had watched the first parts, I got an email from a friend right as I landed, in which she told me that there would be a fundraising screening of the film in London late in May when we would both be in the city, and suggesting we go to that. I liked the idea of watching the rest of the film, which has not been released widely yet, on a big screen, so decided to wait to see whether the fourth and fifth parts were more like the first and second segment or the more engaging third one.

    As it turned out, the London screening was cancelled, and due to how filled my time in England was with events and research, I didnt get around to seeing those last two segments until my plane ride back to California. This timing, as it turned out, was eerily appropriate. I left England on June 3 and began watching the final parts of Ten Years right around the point, Beijing time, when June 4, the date associated with the 1989 massacre, was beginning, and each of the last two parts provided appropriate food for thought during the passing of this highly charged anniversary.

    The fourth segment, the most discussed and most controversial part of the film, deals with an act of self-immolation, suggesting that Hong Kongs predicament may become more and more like that of Tibet. One thing that activists in this segment set in the middle of the next decade ponder when discussing self-immolation is whether previous Hong Kong struggles, such as those of these last few years, would have somehow been more effective and powerful if one or more participants in them had died.

    The final segment, another very effective one, also made appropriate June 4th viewing, but it would have been even more apt to have seen it a couple of weeks earlier. This is because it includes youth brigades who bear a strong resemblance to the Red Guards of the Cultural Revolution, an event whose fiftieth anniversary was marked in mid-May. The difference between the youthful militants of this imagined future as opposed to the Red Guards of history is that, while the latter directed their iconoclastic energy not at things dubbed bourgeois or feudal, the former are shown lashing out against all that is seen as dangerously local, with a seller of carefully grown and healthful local eggs becoming a particular target of abuse.

    I wasnt quite sure what to make of the centrality of eggs in this segment until, after landing, I did some additional reading around about the film on the web and came to a smart review of it that Maggie Lee wrote for Variety. The shorts egg motif, she claims, pays homage to Haruki Murakamis manifesto about the egg that breaks against the high wall a metaphor for the individuals clash with the system. Lees interpretation is open to debate, of course, but it struck me immediately as compelling, in part because in early June, I always think of a man standing his ground before a line of tanks, and Murakamis line Between a high solid wall and an egg that breaks against it, I will always stand on the side of the egg captures so evocatively one reason that this Tiananmen image remains so enduringly powerful.

    Internet comments:

    - Ten Years was nominated in one and only one category (Best Film) and won. Port of Call was nominated in ten categories including Best Film and swept most of the major awards (Best Screenplay, Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actor, Best Supporting Actress and Best Cinematography) but it is not the Best Film. It is hard not to think that the voting was political.


    35th Hong Kong Film Awards
    Politics hijacks Art

    - How extraordinary is this? Here are the results for the Best Film over the past 35 years. The first column of numbers is the number of nominated awards and the second column is the number won. The only film that won the Best Film Award without winning any other categories was Ann Hui's Ordinary Heroes (2000) about social activists. But even that film had 8 nominations in total, and it was also voted the Best Film at the Taipei Golden Horse Film Festival. Ten Years is the only Best Film ever to be nominated for Best Film only and failed to make the final nomination list in every other category.

    - Ten Years is composed of five vignettes directed by five different teams. Therefore it could not be nominated for Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actor, Best Supporting Actress or Best Cinematography. There is no need to politicize everything.

    - If you want to tell five different stories woven around a single theme (="Hong Kong ten years from now"), then you should write a script that weaves those five stories together. It is because your scripting skills are insufficient that you tell five separate stories instead.

    - If you want to improve your story-telling skills, please read Dream of the Red Chamber, Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Water Margin, Lord of the Rings, War and Peace, One Hundred Years of Solitude, Tereza Batista, etc.

    - Correction: The first three titles are Chinese, so please remove them because Hong Kong is not China.

    - (Apple Daily) Quotes from the Ten Years team: "Ten Years is more than a film. Production-wise, we are in many ways inadequate. This award tells us to continue to be humble. At the same time, it tells us that there is a great deal of possibilities for Hong Kong films. As long as you honestly make a film, there can be a lot of forces. Therefore I must thank every Hongkonger, because you are telling us that it is not too late for Hong Kong." "The emergence of Ten Years is somewhat peculiar, because it is not qualified to become Best Film in terms of film art and technique. But I am very grateful to the Film Awards judges, because they used their angle to affirm this film."


    Last night a Hong Kong film Ten Years was selected as the Best Film. Is this movie so exceptional in its art and production? Does it really overwhelm the other nominees? Or was the key issue about Ten Years producing a terrifying and desperate image in the five vignettes of Hong Kong ten years later under One Country Two Systems? Ten Years is a totally fictional film intended to generate political fear. Look at the stories of the five vignettes:

    (1) Floating Melon: Senior government officials plotted to assassinate a legislator during an assembly and used the resultant chaos to pass through the National Security Bill;

    (2) Winter Cicada: Two genetic scientists turned themselves into preserved specimens because they cannot shake off their memories;
    (3) Dialect: Taxi drivers must know putonghua in order to work; those who don't know putonghua struggle to make a living because their taxis are labeled "non-putonghua."

    (4) Self-immolator: A social movement leader was sentenced to jail for violating Basic Law Article 23. A supporter sets himself on fire in front of the British Consulate in Hong Kong. The police attacked the senior citizens and students, and prevented the students from speaking about Hong Kong independence to an interviewer.

    (5) Local egg: A farmer insist on producing and selling local eggs. His son joins the Youth Army and attacked local eggs.

    Ten Years is made up of these five stories and became the Best Film. This is a low-budget black-and-white production whose directors, actors and actresses are all unknowns. Apart from political reasons and smearing One Country Two Systems, there is no justification for this film to be given the Best Film award.

    At a time when the Hong Kong film industry is in the doldrums, what is the reason that the Hong Kong Film Awards organizers and the judges gave Ten Years the Best Film award? When Ten Years was nominated, the mainland Chinese television stations canceled their live broadcast of the Hong Kong Film Awards ceremony. What good does this do to cooperation and exchange between Hong Kong and mainland China?

    Self-immolator: In 2025, Basic Law Article 23 was enacted in Hong Kong. 19-year-old Auyueng was arrested for breaching national security because he supported Hong Kong independence. He died from a hunger strike in jail. This caused a Hongkonger to set himself on fire in front of the British Consulate in order to express his dissatisfaction with the Communist Party. At the same time, non-violent resistance has proven to be ineffective and the people of Hong Kong must give up their times to fight for Hong Kong independence.

    Dialect: Hong Kong is being invaded by putonghua. The government required that taxi drivers who have not passed the standard putonghua test to pick up passengers at the airport, piers and Central on pain of prosecution.

    Floating Melon: In 2020, the Chinese Communist Party and the pro-establishment camp fabricated a terrorist attack against a political party party in order to successfully enact Basic Law Article 23. But the new immigrants and the South Asian who carried out the terrorist attack were shot and killed by the police.

    Winter Cicada: The house of a Hongkonger was razed by bulldozer and the residents killed. A taxidermist couple was turning everything that the people of Hong Kong are losing into specimens. Finally, they found the burden too heavy and the husband chose to let his wife turn him into a specimen.

    Local Egg: The Youth Army became a new version of the Red Guards during the Cultural Revolution. They patrol and look for irregularities. The word "Local" is now banned in Hong Kong. The people of Hong Kong are donating money to support a bookstore that sells banned books. Finally the last local farm was forced to migrate to Taiwan and "local eggs" disappear forever.

    - (Ming Pao) Peter Lam Kin-ngok spoke as a film investor that it was unfortunate for the Hong Kong film industry to have Ten Years win the Best Film award. He said: "Although I respect the choice of the judges, I disagree with the result. I feel the same way as the Ten Years' executive Choi Lim-ming who admitted himself: 'Although the production is inadequate in many ways, this film showed that there is a great deal of possibilities for Hong Kong films.'"

    Lam said that Ten Years was not nominated in any other category and it was not a top seller, so this shows that it is not the best film. He said that it was unfair to the film industry for Ten Years to win the Best Film. Politics ran roughshod over professionalism and the whole judging was politicized.

    - (Wen Wei Po) Director Johnny To had this to say about Peter Lam and Wong Pak-ming saying that Ten Years is unfit for Best Film because it was not nominated in any other category: "What is the background of the person who is saying these things? Let's see if he's fair? Even if Peter Lam has been a wonderful boss, I have to speak out because this is about the dignity of the film industry."

    Peter Lam responded: "I thank Johnny To for describing me as his good boss. I also think that he is a marvelous director. But I would like to make an analogy about what he said last evening. Suppose I invested in a restaurant. Is it up to the cook to decide whether a dish tastes good or not? For example, Michelin gives various number of stars to restaurants based upon the judgment of various professional epicureans. According to information, the most professional Hong Kong Film Critics Society named Port of Call as the Best Film and the Hong Kong Directors Association named The Taking of Tiger Mountain as the Best Film. So I don't know what Johnny To was trying to say."

    - (Ming Pao) Veteran filmmaker John Shum said that the judging should be based upon professionalism. While Ten Years should be praised for its spirit and youthfulness, "This is not what the Best Film award should be about." He said that Global Times criticized the film and the awards show was not broadcast in mainland China. This might have touched the nerves of certain judges and Hongkongers, because the film could not have drawn such a response otherwise. He said that he did not think that the judging was politicized; however, it may have been emotional.

    - (Ming Pao) Motion Pictures Industry Association executive director Crucindo Hung Cho-sing said that he voted but Ten Years would not even be on the menu of choices. "It is risible that the standards of Hong Kong films should drop to this level." He said that when professional judges vote out of sympathy for films with the "right message," then it is unfair to all film producers and actors in Hong Kong. "In the history of the Hong Kong Film Awards, how many films won the Best Film while being nominated for only that category?" "When someone else puts in 100% effort to make their film, and you put in 15% effort, is it fair for you to win?" "Where is the art in Ten Years?" Hung said that he cannot believe that Ten Years would be better than Little Big Master, which is based up on a real-life story. He asked the judges to "examine their consciences to see why they voted for Ten Years."

    - Legislative Councilor Leung Mei-fun wrote: "Derek Yee is the Hong Kong Film Awards Association chairman. At the awards ceremony, he spoke in praise of this pro-Hong Kong independence film. In order to divert attention, he spoke against my criticisms of this movie several months ago. He said that I shouldn't have articulated my thoughts about this film. I am astonished. I am not acquainted with Director Yee, although I have heard of his name before. I did not expect him to make some unreasonable accusations in this matter of utmost importance.

    Ten Years is a film shown publicly in the cinemas with tickets being sold to the general public. If the film does not want to listen to dissident opinions, the producers should have held closed-door sessions for pro-Hong Kong independence people only. As a legislator, I have to denounce the flaws of a film that was selling Hong Kong independence and proposing ideas such as 'The reason why Hong Kong hasn't gotten democracy is that nobody has died yet.' During my eight years in politics, I have criticized many people. None of them won any awards for what they said or did. Director Yee ought to think about why such a film won the Best Film award at the association that he chairs instead of making pathetic digressions."

    - (HKG Pao) Director John Woo had served five years as Hong Kong Film Awards Association chairman. He said that Ten Years should not have won Best Film. He speculated that a small number of people manipulated the process. "Because Ten Years drew certain critical comments beforehand, so certain people like to vote as contrarians. The more you don't like it, the more they will vote for it. When a small group of people vote this way, and the rest of the votes are objectively voted among other movies, Ten Years took the award. Not even the Hong Kong Film Awards Association can control this voting system."

    - Pity the other four Best Film nominees: Little Big Master; The Taking of Tiger Mountain; Ip Man 3; and Port of Call. All the efforts that they put into their work meant nothing in the face of a political decision. Especially Port of Call, which was clearly the Best Film given that it swept most of the other major categories.

    - Let me tell you the latest joke:

    Once upon a time, the gay director Kenneth Ip (Shu Kei) encouraged a group of students to produce five student film exercises and used language to package this into a movie. At a famous film award, it was able to win the Best Film Award in spite of not being nominated in any of the professional categories. Isn't this a joke? Isn't this child's play?
    It is even funnier when one of the young directors who went on stage to pick up the award admitted that he was technically unskilled.
    The funniest part was that even the chairman of the film awards ceremony said that the small circle of judges was acting emotionally when they gave the award to this micro-movie.
    If you should ever come across this Film Award show again,  you should remember how much it was like kindergarten.

    - (Headline Daily) I admire the courage and bearing of the organizing committee of the Hong Kong Film Awards. When they let Ten Years become a nominee, they never considered the price including the revenue from the mainland Chinese broadcast rights, the foresaking of tens of millions of viewers and appearances from topline mainland directors and actors. Even many award-winning Hongkongers chose to be absent, so that the hosts had to present the awards and receive them at the same time.

    I support the Hong Kong Film Awards for not bowing down to the power of money in order to protect the freedom of artistic creation. But if the judges know very well that Ten Years is not worthy to be Best Film but nevertheless voted for it, they are bowing to politics and therefore sacrificing art to it. If the Hong Kong Film Award judges really thought that Ten Years should be praised for its boldness but inadequate in artistic quality, they should have given a special award instead. If they sacrificed the other deserving Best Film candidates just to make a political point, they have given up their own objectivity. Ultimately, this is the Hong Kong Film Awards and not the Hong Kong Politics Awards.

    - (HKG Pao) Some people say that Ten Years was a serious film. But its simple linear narrative technique makes it no different from those micro-movies on RTHK television. If a television show can become Best Film, it only shows that Hong Kong movies have stooped to the level of television. Should people celebrate when the film industry retrogresses?

    Film-making is an art but also a business. Without a market, there is no investment. Filmmakers can win major film awards by making anti-communist films, but in the end they have to put food into their hungry stomachs. How far can the Hong Kong film industry progress without investment? If independent short films continue to win the Best Film awards in future years, the Hong Kong Film Awards will be as useless as the Hong Kong film industry.

    Ten Years is not a commercial film. It made about HKD $6 million at the box office. Of course, it also costs very little. Compared to movies that make a few billion, this type of film will find it had to attract investors. After the film finished its run, it was immediately arranged to be shown at the twelve tertiary institutions of education in conjunction with discussion forums. So this film was never intended to make money. Rather this is a model film to be used as a political brainwashing tool. Sustainable development of such films require commercially viable conditions. I can say that this film is not repeatable. Hereafter you can only have such micro-movies given away for free over the Internet.

    - Who is in the small circle of voters? Here are the qualified voters (HKFAA):

    HKFA voters must be Hong Kong residents at or over the age of 18, holding Hong Kong Permanent Identity Cards, and fulfill one of the following criteria:

    1. Hong Kong film workers whose names have been listed in a Hong Kongs roller credits under the following position(s):
      Film Producer, Executive Producer, Production coordinator, Line Producer, Administrative Producer, Director, Deputy Director, First Assistant Director, Production Manager, Assistant Production Manager, Scriptwriter, Actor/Actress, Dubbing Artist, Cinematographer, Assistant Cinematographer, Gaffer, Film Editor, Assistant Film Editor, Art Director, Assistant Art Director, Costume Designer, Assistant Costume Designer, Action Choreographer, Assistant Action Choreographer, Audio-effect Designer, Sound-man, Post- Production recording and mixing technician in chief, Computer Effect Designer, Film Score Composer and Lyricist / Composer for film songs.
       
    2. Current members of the following associations who have participated in Hong Kong film productions (his/her name is stated in the roller credits list):
      Hong Kong Film Directors' Guild, Hong Kong Screenwriters' Guild, Hong Kong Stuntman Association, Society of Cinematographers (H.K.), Hong Kong Performing Artistes Guild, Society of Film Editors (H.K.), Hong Kong Film Arts Association, Hong Kong Movie Production Executive Association, Hong Kong Cinematography Lighting Association, Association of Motion Picture Post Production Professionals , members of other film associations invited by the Hong Kong Film Awards Association or affiliated members referred by Society of Cinematographers (H.K.).
       
    3. Current film critics whose critiques have been published in Hong Kong printed media within the past year by the time application received.
       
    4. Any person invited by Hong Kong Film Awards Association whose profession is related to film culture/ education or be the executive of Artiste Management/ film association.
       
    5. Any person who has been working for film distribution or promotion for not less than 3 years or his/her name is included in roller credit list of a Hong Kong film.

    - The Hong Kong Directors' Guild voted The Taking of Tiger Mountain its Best Film, while the Hong Kong Film Critics Society voted Port of Call its Best Film.

    - (NOW TV) Two of the Ten Years directors said that the award was made through a democratic system and they won because they got more votes than the others. So they don't understand why people are saying that there was a political hijack. They also said that they are not worried that their careers will be impacted. They said that they are trying to get the film shown again, but they haven't gotten any response yet.

    - The news reporting seems to suggest that Ten Years was a runaway hit at the box office at HK$ 6 million over 58 days. Furthermore, the film was pulled due to political intimidation of the exhibitors when it was still selling out every show.

    Let's look at the reality.

    During the 2015-2016, Ten Years made $6.07 million. Is that a lot? It is a lot when the cost to produce this student exercise was merely $500,000. It is not a lot when compared to the other Hong Kong movies at around the same time.

    During 2016, the most popular Hong Kong movie was Stephen Chow's Mermaid at HK$57.48 million.

    From Vegas to Macau 3 was subjected to a boycott called by Civic Passion because the director Wong Jing is pro-China. The film grossed $27.25 million in Hong Kong.

    Even a film that nobody has heard of: Anniversary starring Stephy Tang and Alex Fong grossed $20.64 million.

    So you get the idea that anyone who puts out any movie will automatically get $10 million plus at the box office. In that context, $6 million is worse than average.

    It is not limited to Hong Kong films. Here is the list of recent Hollywood films: Deadpool $61.71 million; Batman vs Superman $30.83 million; The Revenant $22.65 million; Kung Fu Panda 3 $20.65; London Has Fallen $15.63 million; Zootopia $14.88 million; The Danish Girl $14.29 million; Gods of Egypt $14.06 million; ...

    - Hong Kong films are not in the doldrums. In fact, they have never done better. During the 2016 Lunar New Year, three Hong Kong films dominated the mainland Chinese market. Together they accounted for more than a 90% market share there. Here they are: Mermaid 3.29 billion RMB; The Monkey King 2 1.19 billion RMB; From Vegas to Macau III $1.11 billion RMB. Whatever you want to think, the reality is that Hong Kong films are doing great in mainland China. However, the brouhaha over Ten Years may cast a shadow. If Hong Kong film professionals voted a film like Ten Years as their best film of the year, it shows that they are suspect professionally and ideologically. Would you hire them for your next mainland Chinese film? Without work on mainland China, most Hong Kong film professionals won't make enough for a living.

    - The Hong Kong film industry is doing fine. It is just that the Hong Kong Film Awards Association has just killed its own brand.

    - (HKG Pao) For one moment, they had a moment of joy because they thought that they had given the middle finger to the Chinese Communists. But what next? By forsaking professionalism, this Best Film award is a watershed for the Hong Kong film industry. The industry will hereafter be divided into two parts. In terms of capital, technology, producers, directors and actors/actresses, only those who are "qualified" will be able to access the world's largest film market of mainland China. The rest of the politicized local film workers will only have Hong Kong left.

    - The directors of Ten Years say that the Hong Kong Film Awards have a democratic system. Well, it is a small circle of voters. If you want to see the people of Hong Kong vote with their wallets, you can look at the box office receipts.

    Here are the top 10 movies in Hong Kong in 2015.
    1. Avengers: Age of Ultron -- $133,061,397
    2. Jurassic World -- $96,295,976
    3. Minions -- $78,404,191
    4. Inside Out -- $66,016,979
    5. Star Wars: The Force Awakens -- $65,511,534
    6. Fast and Furious 7 -- $59,634,515
    7. Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation -- $52,970,115
    8. Ant-Man -- $50,719,129
    9. Stand by Me: Doraemon -- $46,891,675
    10. Little Big Master -- $46,729,492.
    The first nine movies are foreign. The most popular 2015 Hong Kong film is Little Big Master, as voted by the most democratic manner possible.

    - Some people say that film-making is artistic creation, so why should China be upset about a film? After all, it's only a movie. Right? Well, why don't you make <The Joys and Sorrows of Young Hitler> in Europe, or <The Life and Times of Osama Bin Laden> in America, or <The Concubines of the Prophet> in the Middle East? Do you think that the people there might get upset?

    - Visual Artists Guild: Congratulations to the film "Ten Years" for winning Best Film at the Hong Kong Film Award. Salute to the Hong Kong Film Award Association! You are one of the engines that will save Hong Kong. Standing up for the "One Country Two Systems" in refusing to succumb to Beijing's threats is what will bring global confidence in Hong Kong. One must recognize that when Moody's and Standard & Poor's downgraded Hong Kong's credit ratings from stable to negative last month, it shows that China's blatant kidnappings of the booksellers has affected Hong Kong's global economic status while the Umbrella movement in 2014 did not despite dire warnings from pro-Beijing entities.

    - Chop suey is a Chinese American dish that originated in Taishan county, Guangdong province. At the end of the day, the farmers would stir-dry their unsold vegetables of the day into one dish. So you toss Ten Years, Moody's/S&P and kidnapped booksellers in the wok, stir-fry and you get your dish of the day.

    - (Oriental Daily) Hong Kong Film Awards Association chairman Derek Yee Tung-sing has these things to say. About the controversy over the nomination of Ten Years, "There is no much controversy within the Hong Kong Film Awards Association. The whole program was designed to appeal to many young people who are not familiar with the award system. Next year, the number of voters will be increased to 1,200. Even if a controversial film is nominated, we'll just let it be ... This time, Ten Years may not meet the standards on stage this time. But the judges appreciate the film for its boldness. Or maybe this was a form of encouragement."

    Was this award being given out of spite? "Actually this is not the first time, but I won't mention the name of the other film or else people will think that I don't approve. But we creative types are very emotional and can easily let others influence our emotions. I don't think that there is a problem with the system. But it is the people who have problems. This time, they voted according to their emotions and they need to be professionalized ... Some people will vote for a film that they haven't even seen. So  what is this except emotionalism? As chairman, I am here to reform matters."

    Will this affect next year's awards? "No. Don't be so pessimistic. I am very sure that such movies cannot be shown, because there is a regulation said that films must not affect relations with our neighbors. But who dares to say now? I hope that the Hong Kong Film Awards won't change its nature. At the next meeting, I will call on everybody to stay rational. Actually, when the Ten Years team went up to receive their award, they admitted that they were not sufficiently professional. If even they can get the award, then what is this award worth?"

    - There are two good snippets of dialogue in Ten Years. The first one is: "Over the past ten years, what we learn the most are conspiracy theories and what we lost the most was mutual trust." The second one was: "Do not repeat what others say." How many of us are really able to reject conspiracy theories and put our faith in genuine mutual trust? And how many of us say that we support democracy/freedom because everybody else says so?

    - What an amazing awards show with so many of the winners being absent! Of course, they all knew that Ten Years was rigged to become Best Film so they chose to be absent. Of those present, very few applauded and many were expressionless and even contemptuous.

    - When it came to the Best Film award, they showed a collection of clips including "Hatred does not keep the faith"; "Nothing to watch here because there wasn't a single bullet"; "Is it illegal to speak Cantonese?"; "Don't say it because others are saying it; don't do it because others are doing it"; "Over the past ten years, what we learn the most are conspiracy theories; what we lost the most was mutual trust." Tsk tsk tsk. Clearly these clips were selected to make fun of Ten Years.

    - Famous words from Joshua Wong on a previous occasion:

    It is a trend for politics to override professionalism.

    - (EJ Insight) April 5, 2016.

    Chinese moviegoers have no idea which movie topped the Hong Kong Film Award on Sunday night.

    Not that they could care less but even if they did, they would not know that Ten Years, a dark foretelling of Hong Kongs not-too-distant future, was the judges pick for Best Movie.

    Chinese censors scrubbed all news about the awards ceremony and the compliant state media was only too happy to oblige.

    Ten Years is banned in China, so youd be hard-pressed to find anything remotely related to it in the Chinese press.

    Not content with the news blackout, Beijings censors tried their best to pressure the Hong Kong Film Award (HKFA) board into freezing the movie out of this years ceremony.

    Chairman Derek Yee can tell you how much pressure he had faced since Ten Years was nominated for the award in January.  

    Someone told me we have to avoid mentioning the words ten and years due to their sensitivity, Yee said at the awards presentation.

    Then he quoted US President Franklin D. Roosevelt (the only thing we have to fear is fear itself) and defiantly announced the winner.

    Thanks to a voting panel of more than 100 industry professionals, politics lost out to the creative process make that freedom of expression.

    A small-budget movie about Hong Kong with a predictable but gutsy theme showed up the powerful mandarins in Beijing.

    But trust their Hong Kong allies to find a way to disparage it.

    Hong Kong Tourism Board chairman Peter Lam, a movie investor, said the win was unfortunate because Ten Years flunked at the box office and was not nominated for any other category.

    It was a joke, said Pegasus Motion Pictures boss Wong Pak-ming, adding any film with a political theme can win an award in Hong Kong.

    And former HKFA chairman Crucindo Hung belittled its production values, saying a low-budget film like Ten Years could not possibly win Best Movie.

    By contrast, young Hong Kong filmmakers gave the movie a lusty clap and a standing ovation.

    That said, the jury is still out on what impact the award might have on ordinary moviegoers who have not exactly embraced it, judging by its showing at the box office.

    Ten Years had a short general release and some cinemas refused to screen it.

    In the run-up to its debut, state newspaper Global Times called it totally absurd and a virus of the mind. 

    The withering attack is not so much about the movie itself but what it represents to the business of filmmaking.

    Increasingly, Hong Kong movies are joint productions with mainland interests, more than the other way around.

    The underlying unease over a production that angers the central government is exacerbating fears Beijing might pull the plug on these joint ventures.

    Industry veterans, ever conscious of spiralling costs, are leading the pushback against politically charged productions.

    But as Ten Years shows, you dont need a mainland backer to make an award-winning movie if you can work within your budget.

    And we can all thank heaven we are in Hong Kong where freedom of thought and expression was alive last time I checked.

    The movie painfully depicts an inconvenient truth that some day soon, our freedoms will be history.

    Theres nothing about it we dont already know, which is perhaps why moviegoers have not been dying of suspense.

    But remarkably, Ten Years is excellently timed.

    Pick a time in recent months or years that the movie is not spot-on about Chinas increased tinkering with Hong Kong from the reinterpretation of one country, two systems, the attempts to introduce patriotic education and a national security law, the crackdown on pro-democracy activists, the failed election reform bill, police overreach in the hunt for dissidents, tighter grip on the local media, etc.

    Give up?  

    - Chris Wat Wing-yin

    ... I am not a film expert, so I can't judge. I will use common logic instead. An athlete who won the 100m sprint, the 110m hurdles, the long jump and the discus throw was not selected as the Best Athlete. Meanwhile another athlete who did not finish among the medals in any of the individual events was named Best Athlete. How is the public going to be convinced? Where is the fairness?

    Not the Best Director, not the best screenplay, not the best actor/actress, not the best editing, not the best music ... not even the best artistic design, nor the best costume, nor the best newcomer, nor the best visual effect ... nothing whatsoever, and yet it became the best movie. It goes without say that politics had trumped ability and technique. Films are not for dreams anymore; they are for expressing political attitudes. You can try to deny and deny, but it is undeniable. We are in the midst of a Cultural Revolution.

    One of the competitors is <The Taking of Tiger Mountain> directed by Tsui Hark. This story is based upon a model opera from the Cultural Revolution era. Tsui Hark removed the revolutionary aspects and turned it into a tightly scripted fictional story. That is drama.

    I have seen both versions of <The Taking of Tiger Mountain>. It is a good adventure story in the manner of the Indiana Jones series, or else Tsui Hark would not have bothered to adapt the screenplay to make this movie. Why is the old <The Taking of Tiger Mountain> no longer talked about nowadays? Why couldn't it become a classic like the Hollywood adventure movies? Very simple -- it was a political tool and nobody considered it to be a film.

    For the same reason, Hong Kong movies are being turned into political tools. When this particular film is awarded the Best Film, how can all those who put their hearts, souls and money into creating their works of art not be thoroughly despondent? How can the Hong Kong audience not be discouraged?

    It took Chinese films 50 years to escape the political clutches of the Cultural Revolution. Meanwhile Hong Kong films have plunged headlong into the abyss of 50 years ago. I can only say: Stupid!

    - Who was the best Track & Field athlete at the 2012 London Olympics? You would think that Usain Bolt would be the automatic choice with three gold medals (100m, 200m and 4x100m) won in dominating fashion? What if they decide to give the Best Athlete award to Tetyana Filonyuk (Ukraine) even though she was unable to finish he marathon but the judges want to express solidarity with little Ukraine against hegemon Russia? How much respect would you accord this Best Athlete award?

    - (Ming Pao) Earlier it was rumored that TVB has purchased the television rights for Ten Years. However, TVB issued a denial. More recently, Internet users report that a high-definition copy of Ten Years has been uploaded to YouTube for free viewing. The Ten Years team said that this unauthorized uploading was disrespectful to the five directors and all those film workers who contributed to the film. "We are very disappointed. We will immediately ask YouTube to remove the video and follow through." They said that YouTube will deal with this, but it takes time. So far there has been no result. According to information, the five segments of Ten Years were uploaded separately this morning and so far there has been more than 28,000 viewings already.

    - Well, you're the same guys who were celebrating the demise of the Copyright (Amendment) Right earlier. What happened to the inalienable right of Internet users to view whatever they want whenever they want?

    - (SCMP) Ten Years can be tedious but its theme about Hong Kongs paranoia is not far off the mark. By Alex Lo. April 8, 2016.

    Movies with an overt political message that smack you in head to make sure you get it are typically tedious. To this end, Ten Years does not disappoint. Practically every scene is a display of some Hongkongers paranoid anti-mainland sentiment, from a taxi driver being forced to speak Putonghua to a store owner berated by children for advertising his eggs as local.

    Its not really a movie with a clear narrative but a series of vignettes about what life would be like in 10 years as imagined by localists and separatists. It suffers from the humourless literalism of the unartistic.

    But, despite all that, it fully deserves winning the top prize at the Hong Kong Film Awards. Its a perfect product of our time, capturing many peoples anxieties and fears about creeping mainland dominance, whether real or imagined.

    It is, therefore, by definition, a serious movie. None of the other competing movies remotely approach Ten Years social relevance and political importance at this time.

    So, its been a bit like watching the theatre of the absurd when so many of the industrys great and good come out to denounce the film winning the award.

    Politics has kidnapped filmmaking: Media Asia head Peter Lam slams Ten Years win at Hong Kong Film Awards

    The awards voting system has been criticised as irrational and unrepresentative by Crucindo Hung Cho-sing, chairman of the Hong Kong Motion Picture Industry Association, and Daniel Lam Siu-ming, head of Universal International, a large film production company.

    Tourism Board chairman and billionaire businessman Peter Lam Kin-ngok said: Politics has kidnapped the profession and politicised film awards.

    Clearly the movie touches a raw nerve. But lets not bury our heads in the sand by denouncing a political movie for being political and dismissing the fears and concerns it depicts.

    Its too bad that Ten Years has been reportedly banned on the mainland. Watching this movie will help mainlanders, or any foreigner, understand better the angst of a typical youngish person in Hong Kong.

    Whatever Beijings real or supposed intentions towards Hong Kong, our paranoia and fears are real enough, and are increasingly being channeled into radical politics, even rioting. Clearly, things will only get worse before they get better. For that, Ten Years may even prove to be prescient.

    - (Hong Kong Free Press) April 18, 2016.

    The owner of a Hong Kong film company has criticised dystopian film Ten Years, after it was awarded best film at the 2016 Hong Kong Film Awards.

    Tycoon Peter Lam Kin-ngok who is also chairman of the Hong Kong Tourism Board previously said the award given to the box office hit was unfortunate for the Hong Kong film industry. He then appeared on a Now TV programme on Sunday criticising the decision once again.

    If I told you a wonton noodles shop is the best restaurant in Hong Kong, would you accept that? he questioned.

    The first film by a new director  is that better than Tsui Hark? The best directors? Is that better than those they make? he said. It is a matter of opinion, but to me, I do not accept that.

    Tsui Hark won the best director award for the film The Taking of Tiger Mountain at the film awards in early April. It was also nominated for best film.

    Lam added that a film should not be rewarded for the attractiveness of its topic. It is necessary for the film awards to discuss whether to change its review mechanism, he said.

    Lam is the chairman of Hong Kong listed conglomerate Lai Sun Group, and the owner of the Hong Kong-based Media Asia Film. He is also a member of the Chinese Peoples Political Consultative Conference.

    Despite Lams comments, a wonton noodle restaurant was named in the 2016 Michelin Guide Hong Kong/Macau. The acclaimed Wing Wah Noodle Shop was also featured on the official website of the Tourism Board.

    Local netizens were quick to criticise Lams comments over the weekend.

    Are wonton noodles not good enough for you? Please try to make a wonton yourself, a commentator who shared the news on Facebook said.

    If all high class restaurants lost to one selling wonton noodles, it should be those restaurants who need to reflect on themselves, said another.

    - (HKG Pao) At a forum, Cardinal Joseph Zen Ze-kiun said that he disagree with the viewpoint of the Self-Immolator segment. "If some Hongkonger sets himself on fire, will the director be held responsibility?" He emphasized that self-immolation should not be invoked lightly, because there are still many other things that can be done.

    The director Chow Kwoon-wai said that he was hesitant about the subject at first, because "it may lead to consequences." But he questioned whether a movie can cause someone to set himself on hire. He said: "If someone does it, then there has to be some other reason."

    Chow said that there are many instances of self-immolation in history. The <Self-Immolator> segment will hopefully use the example of the self-immolator's sacrifice to inspire more people to give themselves to Hong Kong. However, he contradicted himself: "But we are not asking you to set yourselves on fire."

    - Ten years later, Hong Kong achieves independence and here is the Apple Daily front page (spoof):

    Hong Kong declares independence
    Vast social changes take place

    Various factions vie for presidency (Chan Ho-tin, Raymond Wong, Audrey Eu, Lee Cheuk-yan, Joshua Wong, Wong Yeung-tat, Edward Leung, Wan Chin)
    Civil War ready to break out at any moment

    Drinking water service temporarily suspended
    The transitional government calls on citizens to drink their own urine
    Alan Leong says: "Bubbly urine tastes better than plain urine."

    The transitional government won't accept dissidence
    Mass arrests of dissidents
    Numerous pro-China individuals arrested and subjected to medieval torture
    Back to the dark ages with the many torture devices (see photo)

    Hang Seng Index plunges by 20,000 points
    Many blue chip stocks become worthless
    1,600 persons jumped off buildings to their deaths
    The IFC is raining people from the roof

    Food supply very tight
    Rioters loot supermarkets

    Lantau Island, Cheung Chau and Lamma Island ready to declare independence

    Falun Gong becomes state religion
    "Everybody will have to practice Falun Gong three hours per day"
    "You are guaranteed to become as pretty as I am" says Audrey Eu
    10,000 Falun Gong members celebrate 12th anniversary peacefully

    Foreign capital completely evacuated
    1,000,000 workers lose their jobs and become beggars
    "You deserve this! You voted for them!"

    You! Do you want this to happen?

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