Jimmy Lai et al will be sentenced today. Statement from the Committee to Protect Journalists…
“Jimmy Lai’s trial has been nothing but a charade from the start and shows total contempt for Hong Kong laws that are supposed to protect press freedom,” said CPJ Asia-Pacific Director Beh Lih Yi. “Monday’s sentencing will go down in history as Hong Kong’s most shameful act of persecution of journalists and leave an indelible black mark on a city that was once the bastion of press freedom in Asia.”
Lester Shum’s first statement after being released from prison two weeks ago,
An HKFP explainer on Hong Kong’s bus seat-belt law mess. It seems the draft law gazetted in September specified that it would apply only to newly registered buses, and Transport Dept officials mentioned this to lawmakers. Yet in the following months, the department issued several statements saying it – and the HK$5,000 fine – would apply on all buses. No-one in the department or legislature seemed to notice this obvious inconsistency, until a lawyer and former legislator pointed it out. As the article puts it…
The reason for the authorities’ discrepancy was unclear.
I can think of two possible reasons. One is that there are actually two Transport Departments: one that knows what is in new legislation and one that doesn’t. The other is that the top officials in the department knew what the new law said, but wanted to scare everyone into putting on (allegedly unwieldy/uncomfortable) bus seat-belts anyway.
We can be fairly sure that none of the officials and representatives concerned regularly use buses themselves. Some recent all-patriots’ thoughts and deeds on such matters… New People’s Party lawmaker Judy Chan Ka-pui driving the wrong way on Jaffe Road in Wanchai. District council member Agnes Chau illegally parking (in fact blocking a fire lane) at Shek Lei Estate in Kwai Chung. Liberal Party legislator Peter Shiu suggesting that authorities issue fewer parking tickets at night to encourage people with cars to contribute to the ‘night economy’. Ex-lawmaker Chan Yuen-han proposing the banning of double-decker buses (because they’re ‘colonial’, no less) and of passengers standing on any buses.
Hong Kong’s latest transport strategy prioritizes the expansion of car-parking spaces. Cities like Paris and Madrid are finding that banning cars from downtown areas increases retail sales.
Twenty Years
Naïve credulity … is part of the recurring pattern of human history. … There seems to be a deep desire to look at our enemies and believe we are looking in a mirror – that, deep down, we are all the same …
– Andrew Marr ‘A History of the World’
I look at photos of the judges.
Not malign in these formal pics,
Only a little self-conscious
In their eighteenth-century wigs.
Their fancy dress has a purpose:
To summon respect for the court.
Respect? Twenty years? This is worse,
Worse than I thought.