Wednesday, July 2, 2014

• Uphill Fight Ahead for Hong Kong’s Democracy Movement By KEITH BRADSHER


On Tuesday, hundreds of thousands of people held one of the largest marches in Hong Kong’s history to demand democracy.

HONG KONG — A pro-democracy march held Tuesday by a huge crowd of mostly young demonstrators underlined the determination of many of this autonomous Chinese city’s residents to preserve and expand the freedoms that they inherited from British rule. 



 

But it also brought to light more challenges that may lie ahead.

The protesters remained peaceful and did not resort to violence, which would have given the local government a pretext to respond much more firmly and probably would have hurt broader public support for the demonstration.
But at an overnight sit-in that followed the march, the police also showed that they could efficiently remove and arrest 511 protesters in less than four hours — a brisk pace suggesting that they may be ready to respond to larger sit-ins that some democracy advocates are contemplating for later this year.
The calm and poise of the demonstrators Tuesday seemed to help reassure the business community that future protests would not severely disrupt commerce, resulting in a 1.55 percent rise in the Hong Kong stock market on Wednesday.
But while the protesters disproved government warnings that their activities would lead to chaos, their civil behavior could also lead to an impression that they are manageable, which could limit the pressure they are able to bring to bear on the government for changes.




The preponderance of young people among the demonstrators may also make it much harder, rather than easier, to reach any compromise with the local government and its backers in Beijing. 

The key question is who may run to become the territory’s chief executive in the next elections, in 2017.
That issue was front and center for Tuesday’s march, as well as the subject of an informal vote last month in which nearly 800,000 Hong Kong residents participated, and which Beijing dismissed as illegal.



Students and people in their 20s have overwhelmingly supported a plan calling for the general public to be allowed to nominate candidates for chief executive — so-called civil nomination, an idea completely dismissed by Beijing and its allies.

By contrast, older Hong Kong residents have tended to support a compromise that would retain the nominating committee mandated by the Basic Law, the territory’s mini-constitution, but make that nominating committee more diverse and open to a wider range of candidates than Beijing wants.


Asked after a speech on Wednesday afternoon whether the political center was eroding in Hong Kong, Anson Chan, the second-highest official in the Hong Kong government in the years immediately before and after the British returned the territory to Chinese sovereignty in 1997, bluntly replied, “I have to say that I agree.”


Mrs. Chan, one of the most influential advocates of democracy here, noted that a key pro-democracy member of the city’s legislature, Ronny Tong, had even withdrawn his own plan for reconstituting the nomination committee, after concluding that support in the democratic camp for civil nomination was overwhelming. 


She said that she still favored a nominating committee with broad rules that would make it possible for a full array of candidates to appear on the ballot, not just those approved by Beijing.


She contended that such a procedural compromise would still make it possible to achieve full democratic goals.
“Hong Kong people have demonstrated that we want the whole loaf, not half a loaf, and we certainly don’t want a loaf rotten through and through,” she said at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club.


Mrs. Chan noted that foreign countries and their citizens and companies in Hong Kong had a large stake in the issue as well. 


If the many individual and political liberties that define Hong Kong are eroded, then the city could eventually lose its separate, preferential status from mainland China for the purpose of many international agreements, covering everything from airline routes and international trade to taxes, cross-border investments and visa requirements, she said.


Michael DeGolyer, the director of the Hong Kong Transition Project, a 26-year-old coalition of academics who have been studying the territory’s political evolution from a British colony to a Chinese territory, expressed caution about whether Tuesday’s march had been large enough to change political calculations in Hong Kong’s government and in Beijing.


“It wasn’t this enormous, overwhelming turnout that everyone would be stunned by — it was big,” Mr. DeGolyer said.


Organizers estimated that 510,000 people joined the march, while the police calculated that the largest number of people simultaneously participating at any one time during the eight-hour march was 98,600.
The police did not attempt to estimate the total number of participants.
The Hong Kong University Public Opinion Program estimated that 154,000 to 172,000 people had taken part in the march. 


Since 2003, a sizable pro-democracy march has been held every year in Hong Kong on July 1, the anniversary of its return to Chinese sovereignty; the turnout Tuesday came closest to rivaling that of the enormous 2003 march.
One lingering question Wednesday, after the police had removed and arrested participants in the sit-in, was whether future sit-ins would be as peaceful. 


A small but noticeable number of elderly residents and people in wheelchairs chose to participate; one of the many subthemes of the march had been a call for better social benefits for the elderly and the disabled.


The young protesters treated the elderly and wheelchair-bound protesters among them with respect and even deference, resulting in a calmer tone to the sit-in than most had expected. 


The police also treated those protesters with great caution, and reluctantly arrested them while showing a clear awareness that every move was being followed by numerous television cameras and cellphone cameras.
“Nobody wants to be a granny beater,” Mr. DeGolyer said later.


But the participation of elderly and disabled protesters at future protests is uncertain.
At the same time, the police showed Wednesday morning a new willingness to formally arrest large numbers of people, not just carry them out of the downtown road they were blocking.


“This was not an illegal assembly; it was a peaceful and legitimate protest under international law,” said Mabel Au, the director of Amnesty International Hong Kong.
“The police action was hasty and unnecessary and sets a disturbing precedent.”


The backdrop for the protest was an increasingly repressive political environment in mainland China, where detentions of human rights advocates and others have increased as Xi Jinping has rapidly consolidated power. 


Some demonstrators in Hong Kong, particularly the limited number of older demonstrators, voiced an awareness that they were seeking a greater political voice at a time when the political climate, if anything, may be darkening.


“I just try my best by marching even though it may not be of much use,” Gary Fong, a 45-year-old metalworker, said during the march on Tuesday. 


“Who knows, this may be the last year that we will be allowed to march.”



Huge Crowds Turn Out for Pro-Democracy March in Hong Kong, Defying Beijing
By KEITH BRADSHER, MICHAEL FORSYTHE and CHRIS BUCKLEYJULY 1, 2014


HONG KONG — The appeal of democratic ideas drew thousands of protesters into the streets of Hong Kong on Tuesday in a defiant but largely peaceful march advocating free and open elections for the territory’s chief executive.

A nearly solid river of protesters, most of them young, poured out of Victoria Park through the afternoon and into the evening, heading for the skyscraper-lined canyons of downtown Hong Kong, Asia’s top financial center. There, hundreds staged two sit-ins past dawn, prompting the police to remove and arrest 511 people on charges of obstructing the police and unlawful assembly.

Shouting slogans in Cantonese such as “change comes from the people,” the demonstrators largely stood their ground even after the police warned them that they were in violation of the law. Through the day, the protesters showed their determination by waiting unflinchingly and with barely a complaint under a succession of deluges for a chance to walk through downtown Hong Kong, carrying banners calling for the introduction of full democracy and reading “Say No to Communist China.” And even as organizers boasted of record crowds, they insisted that the protest was merely a dress rehearsal for much larger sit-ins that may happen this year if the Chinese government refuses to allow free elections in this former British colony.Photo


Protesters waited unflinchingly and with barely a complaint amid intermittent tropical downpours to walk through downtown Hong Kong.CreditDale De La Rey/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

The march came days after nearly 800,000 residents participated in an informal vote on making the selection of the city’s top official more democratic, a vote Beijing dismissed as illegal. It also followed the Chinese cabinet’s release three weeks ago of a so-called white paper that asserted broad central government authority over Hong Kong, angering many residents.

Beijing had promised Hong Kong a “high degree of autonomy” before Britain returned the territory to Chinese sovereignty in 1997, and the bluntly worded white paper set off a furious backlash. That backlash has coincided with a contentious debate over how to introduce universal suffrage — one person, one vote — for Hong Kong’s chief executive, to be chosen in elections in 2017.

Tuesday’s protest appeared to rival in size the largest democracy march in Hong Kong’s history, which was held in 2003 when the deadly SARS virus outbreak and a six-year decline in the housing market produced widespread discontent. The 2003 protest, which lasted seven hours, drew at least 500,000 people, according to organizers, while the police estimated that 350,000 were on the streets at the peak.

The organizers of Tuesday’s march put their estimate at 510,000 people, though they said the crowd was fluid, with a continuous stream from Victoria Park to the heart of downtown for nearly eight hours. A police spokeswoman said late Tuesday evening that the maximum number of people marching at any given time was 98,600, though she did not have an estimate for the number of participants over all.

July 1 is a public holiday in Hong Kong, and large-scale protests on the date have become an annual tradition since the giant march in 2003.Photo


A protester waves a flag of colonial Hong Kong, a gesture of rejection of mainland authority.CreditVincent Yu/Associated Press

The current demonstrators, drawn out by social media, are younger than previous Hong Kong protesters. They are also more skeptical of the mainstream news media and less interested in legal compromises.

“We believe to change society, we need not our words to appeal to politicians, but to use activism to pressure them,” said Joshua Wong, the 17-year-old leader of Scholarism, a student activist group.Continue reading the main story
RECENT COMMENTS

Eugene Gorrin 17 minutes ago

Political freedom isn't the only impetus for the hundreds of thousands of pro-democracy protesters who marched through central Hong Kong. ...
Wayne 6 hours ago

It's ironic that the "violation of the law" is mentioned. Last year there were people protesting in the streets against mostly Filipino...
Hemendra A. Mehta 12 hours ago

Why can't HK be turned into a City state, a la Singapore?Beijing doesn't expect the whole generations grown up under British freedom for...
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The Hong Kong government issued a statement late Tuesday saying it would take the desires of the protesters into account as it considers ways to introduce universal suffrage. But the statement reaffirmed the government’s position that Hong Kong’s mini-constitution, the Basic Law, requires that a nominating committee control who will appear on the ballot for the 2017 election.

The protesters have called for “civil nomination,” arguing that the public should be allowed to propose candidates who would automatically be approved by the nominating committee. By contrast, Beijing wants a powerful nominating committee with a carefully chosen membership that will vet candidates based on their “patriotism,” a term used to reflect loyalty to the Chinese Communist Party. 


CONTINUE READING THE MAIN STORY 
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Several people said they had made a special effort to come to this year’s march, despite having stayed away in past years. “It’s because of the actions done by the Chinese government,” said Ian Tseng, an office worker in his 20s. “The white paper, everything, makes us all feel unhappy.”

Occupy Central With Love and Peace, another pro-democracy group, has been threatening to fill the streets of downtown Hong Kong later this year and engage in a campaign of civil disobedience until the government issues a broadly acceptable plan for greater democracy.

“If the government refused to seriously consider the demand, this group of people, more of them will change from sympathetic to active support, and the sympathetic people may also start all kinds of noncooperative actions,” said Benny Tai, the leader of Occupy Central. “And just think about, how can a government govern if the whole society refuses to cooperate with you?



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