Incoming Chief Executive John Lee’s ‘election’ ‘campaign’ announces an ‘advisory committee’ of mainly male, mainly elderly, wealthy pro-establishment stalwarts including tycoons Li Ka-shing, Lee Shau-kee and Henry Cheng.
To the naive, it looks like the new CE will be in the pocket of developers. But anyone who knows how these things work (and that the CCP distrusts these plutocrats) will understand that the aim is to make the tycoons publicly align themselves with Lee. Any advising will be from the regime to the old shoe-shiner ‘elites’ – not vice-versa. A separate ‘presidium’ contains similar figures, but mostly with NPC/CPPCC membership. Lee, of course, will be answering to ‘advisors’ from Beijing. (Standard story.) Bear this in mind when CE Lee (or his ‘advisors’) pick Executive Council members.
Two people get suspended two-month sentences for sharing a Facebook post by exiled activist Ted Hui urging a boycott of the December Legislative Council election (turnout: 30%). This now counts as ‘incitement’. The next step presumably will be to prosecute people merely for reading a Ted Hui post.
Wow – this’ll work. Hong Kong Correctional Services are attempting to deradicalize political prisoners by making them watch TVB documentaries about the glorious motherland. Former inmates…
…told VOA Cantonese that while serving their sentences, authorities forced them to watch video clips praising China as government social workers tried to change their political views.
Cruel and unusual punishment? Or a cunning subversive plot to reinforce dissidents’ hatred of the CCP (or at least TVB)? (Is it ethical for social workers to take part in this? Do the authorities use pro-Beijing social workers?)
Will the same fate await Mainland expert Zhong Nanshan, who published a short article in National Science Review saying that China cannot continue with ‘zero Covid’ in the long term and recommending the use of Western vaccines? Authorities have censored it in translation in local media. Dry, academic article here. More Mainland Covid censorship here.
“ Any advising will be from the regime to the old shoe-shiner ‘elites’ – not vice-versa.”
It certainly was vice versa in the Bow Tie days. I miss those days. Even though he was in the pocket of property developers, that was a huge improvement to being in the pocket of Beijing and at least BowTie as CE had some agency unlike now where it is pure CENO.
Wait a minute….. I thought social workers weren’t supposed to be political… that’s what the CCP told me.
Also, I pissed at a urinal next to Ted Hui once (he didn’t take a glance at mine). Should I worry? I did take a glance at his.
If Wacky Jacky Chan is backing Lee, you KNOW he’s a shoo-in.
Oh, and I LOVE HKFP’s headline that said: “12 Quotes From Hong Kong’s Unopposed Leadership Hopeful”.
Nice, subtle dig.
@donkey
I think you’re safe unless you shared it on Facebook.
Sure locking people up in reeducation camps and making them watch films about the glorious motherland worked in Xinjiang, why wouldnt it work in HK?
Love the ‘accidentally’ cruel picture caption suggesting John Lee is a vase (a standard cantonese insult for someone who is decorative but hollow and empty) in the Standard story.
The Vase was spurned by YouTube…
“The termination reflects the flagrant hegemonic tactics employed by the U.S. government. Imposing the so-called sanction on Mr. Lee so as to intimidate him will not in any way affect his strong determination to continue to safeguard national security,” it said in a statement.
https://apnews.com/article/technology-business-beijing-hong-kong-carrie-lam-12c997ed2a8cc455f2f0d6a92d8fa3b8