Kapok: For the people?

The contrast could not be more striking: while in Hong Kong two million residents were taking to the streets to express their dissatisfaction at Chief Executive Carry Lam, in Macao, slightly more than 5,000 happy few were taking part in an exercise of total perversion of democracy by choosing the electoral college that will select the next Macao Chief Executive on August 25.

On one side of the delta, a quarter of the population of the former British colony was marching and telling Mrs Lam that she had failed them and that the suspension of a much-derided extradition bill was too little and too late. Beyond the five precise demands — total withdrawal, retraction of the “riot” characterization, independent enquiry, charges being dropped and resignation of the CE — lies the idea of accountability, that one has to shoulder responsibility for his or her acts and that ultimately, if government could not be by and of the people, it had to be at least for the people.

On the other side of the delta, it was business as usual and the mockery of competition — 350 candidates for 344 positions — acted as a striking illustration of the political deadlock Macao has had to endure for the past twenty years. Same faces, or almost; same associations, or almost; same self-congratulations, always. All this for what? For Mr Ho Iat Seng to confirm the next day something everybody had already known for the past two years: that he would be the next CE. Only a handful of protesters led by legislator Sulu Sou, soon rounded up by policemen filming them from multiple angles at close range, dared disrupt the velvety process, denouncing the “small circle election” and the disenfranchisement of the vast majority.

On the next day, the cover page of the main Chinese daily in Macao, the Macao Daily News, was splashed with multiple photos of the successful voting exercise held the day before. The biggest ever peaceful demonstration in Hong Kong had no place on that first page. On June 10, only the “attack” on the LegCo had been reported on the cover of the same newspapers after one million people had taken to the streets the previous day. And on June 13, the full cover was dedicated to tear gas pictures and clashes between youngsters dressed in black and police in full battle gear, with a huge title splattered in the middle indicating that the “riot” (baoluan) had caused 72 people to be injured! Clearly, only a twisted, unfavorable and partial outlook gets reported.

What about these elections then? Why would they deserve the full cover the next day?

The 5,001 voters who turned out to the booths on June 17 actually represent very limited interests. Behind these voters, there are only 633 legal persons — associations — registered and authorized to vote. Each of these associations is entitled to a maximum of 22 votes, all of these votes entrusted in the members of the board of directors or managing bodies — regular members are excluded.

It is no secret that these associations vote as “blocks” and that voting instructions are discussed beforehand so as to make sure important figures of the community get the highest scores. Chui Sai Cheong, the brother of the present CE, made it first in the “professional” college, with 77% of the votes. He is also a member of the board in several dozens associations in Macao, even though not all of them are in the professional sector. Instructions are also made to exclude the very few who dare challenge the status quo, as Mrs Rita Santos just experienced in the “labor” college together with three others.

It is moreover clear that not all associations of a given sector are registered. If one simply looks at the “education” college, it is only made of 20 associations that select a total of 29 members of the Electoral Committee. And out of these 20, none of them has a connexion with catholicism, whereas there are 27 registered Catholic schools in Macao comprising about 37% of the non-tertiary educational service delivery in Macao!

Some are prevented from getting into the fray, others just renounced beforehand.

Hong Kong, standing for freedom and justice once more

On June 9, the march against the government sponsored extradition bill felt like a recast of the protest held on July 1 2003 against the enactment of a state security legislation that ultimately ended up with the bill being shelved indefinitely, the Secretary for Security resigning and the Chief Executive not being able to finish his second mandate for “personal reasons”.

Same main organizer: the Civil Human Rights Front gathering some 50 pro-democratic organizations. Same hot and clear-sky summer day. Same white t-shirts. Same mixed crowd of families and middle-class residents. Same upbeat mood with a different and yet echoing slogan: “Oppose extradition to China.”

Only this time was bigger, double the size actually, with more than one million Hongkongers taking to the streets in an uninterrupted human flow stretching from as far as Fortress Hill up to the government headquarters in Tamar and lasting for more than seven hours.

Only this time the loud and clear demand expressed by one out of seven residents fell on a deaf ear. Speaking only on the next day, Hong Kong’s Chief Executive Carrie Lam pledged to press ahead with the bill and insisted that further delays would only instill “more anxiety and divisiveness in society.” As calls for a second rally opposing the bill were starting to be heard, the LegCo president announced on June 11 that the bill would have to be adopted by June 20, tabling some 66 hours for debate with extraordinary sessions to be held on every single day of the week whereas the LegCo ordinarily convene only on Tuesdays and Wednesdays.

Rather than being delayed the legislative process was thus being sped up! All this while the proposed amendments to the Fugitive Offenders Ordinance and the Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters Ordinances had been heavily challenged right from the start in February.

The Hong Kong Bar Association had published as early as April 2 a comprehensive review of the amendment bill that had been gazetted on March 29. Many voices from all corners of society soon joined — democrats of course, journalists, NGOs, foreign governments and politicians, businessmen with interests in China, and the many professional associations who felt threatened by the law. The same two main objections were repeated again and again, with various degrees of subtlety: why the rush? And why the absence of effective judicial and/or legislative safeguards? The Hong Kong judiciary would only be entrusted with checking the adequacy of formalities and ultimately, only the Chief Executive, himself or herself nominated by the central authorities, would be left to refuse case-by-case demands formulated by China’s courts.

On June 12, the mood of the crowd converging towards the LegCo had changed. This time around, the objective was not anymore to voice out a disagreement and quietly address it to the government but rather to forbid the convening of the second reading of the bill.

The power struggle had shifted from being symbolic and argumentative to meddling with the ugly reality of decision making. Inspiration thus came from the Umbrella Movement of 2014. Organizers were many, and, even though all progressive in essence, from every segment of society. The Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Union had called for a general strike. The Diocese of Hong Kong had implored the government to withdraw the bill. Even small businesses were closed, in different parts of the territory, with some leaving cardboards on their metal curtain reading “Busy being heroes.” And the crowd was young, very young, all dressed in black and geared-up to sustain a siege.

Contrary to September 2014, young people knew that the government would not hesitate to use tear gas, rubber bullets and pepper spray against them. If the effective withdrawal of the bill was to be achieved, nothing could be left to improvisation. Mistakes from 2014 would not be repeated if the success of 2003 was to be achieved.

Out of practicality — the LegCo being inaccessible — the second reading of the bill was officially postponed. But as the crowd refused to disperse and evacuate Harcourt Road, tear gas was fired and pepper spray splashed all over. This is unfortunately just the beginning.

Published in Macau Daily Times on June 13, 2019

Kapok: The politics of memory

Remembering and commemorating June 4, 1989 is not an easy task.

First and foremost as the government that sits in Beijing forbids and effectively prevents any attempt at commemorating what happened in Tiananmen Square and around that day. The official press is silent. People who were at the forefront of the movement are tightly monitored, if not under house arrest or gone for forced holidays. Sensitive places are not freely accessible, be it the Square itself, adjoining streets where most of the bloodshed took place or cemeteries where the ones who have killed that night rest forever. And even virtual candles cannot be posted online.   

Equally important is the fact that the regime has been systemically and thoroughly wiping off all traces of memory in connection with the events, and has refused to revise its judgement regarding those, even though what was once characterized as “a counter-revolutionary rebellion” has become mere “political turmoil” in official lingo. Actually, additional blurriness serves a purpose as it is one step further towards the completion of the erasing process.

And then, in places where it is actually possible to publicly pay tribute to June 4, what is it that we commemorate? The “massacre” so that unarmed students, workers and ordinary beijingers killed by the bullets of the People’s Liberation Army or crushed by its tanks do not fall into the oblivion of a mere “incident”?

But, in commemorating the tragedy and rightfully requesting a long-overdue vindication, aren’t we ourselves relegating to the background the hope and joy that existed beyond injustice and sadness? After all, the occupation of Tiananmen Square was the main stage of a social movement that initially started with a gathering of students from elite universities on April 15. That day they had come to the Monument to the People’s Heroes to mourn the passing away of a former general secretary of the very same Party that would ultimately order to fire on unarmed civilians on June 4.

In between these two dates, a tribute to a reformist communist cadre who had unjustly been sacked two years earlier had transformed over the course of almost two months into a resolute denunciation of rampant corruption and demands for greater political participation as well as democratic reforms, and spread to some 400 cities in China.

This year, as we were commemorating the thirtieth anniversary of the massacre, a lot of the commentaries focused on whether or not the official attempt at wiping out the memory of the events among Chinese citizens and especially the younger generations had actually been successful.

Foreign journalists going around the streets of Beijing with an image of the Tank Man, the most iconic picture in the West of the Chinese people’s heroic resistance to savage repression, and asking passers-by whether they had recognized the image verged on indecency as it produced mainly bewilderment and embarrassment, and clearly did not prove much given the general political environment of the capital city at this sensitive time.

Much more convincing was what Louisa Lim, a journalist turned scholar, has characterized as the “People’s Republic of Amnesia” and her more recent essay in which she remarked that “indoctrinating China’s young people with a utilitarian view of history is an even more powerful tool than censorship itself.”

But then, are these really certainties, even though documentation goes beyond the incidental? Another scholar working on Chinese millennials is now stressing that most of his interviewees were indeed the ones who had brought up the subject of the Tiananmen repression during the lengthy conversations he had with them. Another journalist-scholar emphasizes that a significant number of unabated writers, filmmakers, poets, artists, songwriters and public intellectuals have turned into amateur historians to preserve the memories of the country’s many upheavals. And then, what about the many private photos taken at the time?

In Hong Kong, there is no doubt that record numbers of participants turned up for the vigil this year also because of the ongoing debate over the extradition law. Ultimately, memories resurfaced when they resonate with the present. Sooner or later, they never fail to do so.

Published in Macau Daily Times on June 7, 2019