While Hong Kong’s influence over Guangzhou, capital of neighboring Guangdong province, is perhaps to be expected, it is now clear that people across China are seeking to make use of the freedoms of the largely autonomous city, carrying their grievances there. And, where mainland activists go, its security personnel are not far behind.
Ever since 2003, pro-democracy rallies have been held on July 1, which is a holiday to mark the reunification with the mainland.
While individual mainlanders may have marched alongside Hong Kong people in the past, this year there was a very visible mainland contingent, some of whom held up banners that identified themselves not only as being from the mainland but from various provinces and cities.
Subsequently, at least two of them were arrested when they returned to the mainland. The two, Song Ningsheng and Zeng Jiuzi, both of Jiangxi province, were sentenced to labor camp for 14 months. This is the first known instance of mainlanders being punished for protesting in Hong Kong.
Under the Chinese policy of “one country, two systems,” it is lawful for people in Hong Kong to hold such demonstrations. Under Hong Kong law, visitors can also take part. But evidently, China considers it illegal for mainlanders to join Hong Kong protests.
Mr. Song became a rights activities after his wife died in 2008 as a result of a medical blunder. Ms. Zeng’s husband died in mysterious circumstances while working in Shandong province. She had been petitioning without success for the reopening of an investigation into her husband’s death.
Liu Zhonghua, Ms. Zeng’s son, was quoted as saying that she went to Hong Kong because “there’s absolutely no way to fight for one’s rights here in mainland China.”
Another female activist, Li Guizhi, who is blind, was prevented from entering Hong Kong to publicize the death of her son in 2006. She says he was cremated without her permission and she has been demanding an investigation.
Ms. Li was held in a so-called “black jail” by the security authorities but managed to escape. However, she was recaptured after only a week of freedom.
All these people are desperate. They sought justice in Hong Kong because there were no avenues for doing so on the mainland.
Liu Weiping, leader of a group called the People’s Rights Union of China, said at a press conference in Hong Kong that he had helped about 100 mainlanders take part in the rally. He said that the two Jiangxi residents had been approached by someone who pretended to be a local reporter and asked where they were from and who had organized their visit.
This means that mainland security people are operating in Hong Kong, contrary to the rules of “one country, two systems,” under which the mainland has no police jurisdiction in Hong Kong.
Unless China provides avenues for redress of grievances to its citizens, they will continue to try to do so in Hong Kong. And the former British colony will continue in China’s eyes to be a base of subversion against the mainland.
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Bill Bailey
It's 2012, and we're already 15 years along the road (almost 1/3 of the way) from 1997 to 1997+50 and the advent of " one country one system". Chinese long-term planning does pay off.
Leave my people alone
Hey Dude, John.
Are you from HK? If not, you and all these other people here do not have the right to meddle with our affairs. This is for my people, the people of Hong Kong to deal with. If you are a mainlander, then you can stay on your mainland side.
@Lee. Ditto for you too.
I have lived in both Hong Kong and China, and we have probably some of the least violent crime rates in the world. Communism works, it might not be the best, but it works. The same is for the Hong Kong government. In fact, Hong Kong has an even better system with far fewer violent deaths than China's, but if China is to stay united, we must remain united in communism. Anything else would result in a second civil in less than a century. I am against this war you westerners are pushing us to go against.
OBVIOUSLY, those who haven' lived in china will never understand. It's the same for those who have never lived in the Iraq or Afghanistan, which is not just about terrorism, although any talk about either of them normally brings those two subjects up. I mean, if you think about it, living in America is very bad. When I lived in Chicago, people died all the time because of violent murders. When I was in China, this never happened.
Yeah, I made no friends on this subject, but hey, the Westerners have been discriminating us for decades, so I will handle it with my people. People here commenting on how bad China is should seriously live in China for just one month and see if what they say is true. I have met hundreds of Americans who came to China expecting some sort of rubble heap cities and villages (and yes there are a lot of those), but there is also a lot of Westernized ideas, and trends over here. I wish you people could see from the eyes of the people actually dealing with this issue and not just say all this crap about how China is an evil communist country.
If that was true, then the Middle east would be made up of terrorists, and the US would be the biggest terrorist of all.
The first is what a lot of Americans think, and the second is what quite a number of people believe all over the world.
Again, I'm not trying to make enemies, I'm just saying that you guys should look at it from our point of views instead of making what you think be the absolute truth.
slim
Were you brainwashed — oops, sorry, "Patriotically Educated" — in Hong Kong or in the PRC?
Tseng Kin-Wah
@Slim: Brainwashed just like you only the other way around. I live in HK & China too & I love the improving standard of living & the way my country is heading. Come & visit us & see for yourself how we've been brainwashed & how "miserable" we are.
Lee
everybody hates China – including Chinese people. When i say China im referring to it's Communist Gov and their followers/slaves.
John Chan
@Lee,
Just based on the bloggers on this site, there are plenty of people do not hate China; it proves you are not telling the truth. Smearing and bashing baselessly like you is exactly the problem the Westpac has, not trustworthy.
a_canadian_observer
@JC: A lot of people on this site are just chinese in disguise. Don't look at their names, just look at the way they write. Are they embarrassed about their real names? Inferior complex?
C
No real surprise, given the way the goverment behaves, bullying both its own people and the international community.
John Chan
@C,
Have you read the article “Who defines the international community?” It is the shameless autocratic authoritarian West tries to hijack the International community and call themselves “international community,” so they can suppress the rest of world on the moral high ground.
The West and its lackeys are a very small group on this world; they are less than 15% of the world population. A minority claims it is the international community a sign of autocratic authoritarian.
Arthur Borges
Yes, John, it is fun to hear western politicians speak of how the "international community" condemns Iran for this or that — and then Iran hosts a NAM meeting with delegates from 120 of the 195 members of the United Nations.
Arthur Borges
"Not working", Franco? Taiwan and the Mainland are already effectively functioning as a single economy and, from 1970 onwards, it became increasingly obvious that if Taiwanese industry did not connect with Mainland industry, then the latter would be looking to Western companies to found joint ventures that would compete directly with Taiwanese industry to produce the same products at lower cost. In short, the Mainland and Taiwan decided to keep the money "in the family." Finally, the big secret today is how much of the Taiwanese economy is actually owned by Mainland interests: the only thing that is clear is that everybody is flouting the Taiwanese legal restrictions on investment from the Mainland.
If you also read carefully, Beijing and Taipei have been coordinating on the defense of Chinese claims to South China Sea islands, given that both governments subscribe the same list of territorial claims, Tibet and Xinjiang included.
On Macao, the casino economy is heavily dependent on Mainland gamblers, some of whom have been playing with public funds and, well, there are the moneylaunderers whose presence goes back to the days of the Opium Wars, i.e. the "drug wars" that Britain fought to legalize a hard drug and successfully addict millions of Chinese for over a century.
On Hong Kong, at heart, they are torn between the upside of the legacy of British rule which has helped change an unknown island of fishing villages into a world-class metropolis (for which they are grateful) and the downside of knowing that Britain exploited China when she was weak as well as years of government that was about as nice as, say, the IDF in Gaza. At another level, Hong Kong would be deep in smog were it not for all the factories that Hongkongers operate across the border in Guangdong Province.
As for "democracy", there was never any "one man, one vote" system in Hong Kong because, as one business leader and Legco member member put it: "Less than half the people pay tax and the taxpayers don't want the non-taxpayers telling them what to do."
On Cantonese, almost every Hongkonger felt a twinge of pride in the early 1990s to learn that schools in Beijing had started teaching Cantonese — both Han and British rulers had always treated Cantonese as inferior and unfit for use in polite society. The news of Beijingers studying Cantonese could not fail to move hearts.
It's not really about gratitude, Franco: it's about money, heritage and the concept of family.
nirvana
Those who are knowledgeable in Chinese folklore know that Sun Wukong, the Monkey King of the children tale "Journey to the West", has the power to change his appearance in 72 ways, depending on his need to deceive the enemy.
One country, two systems? Rather, "as many systems as you want, but one party at the helm". How can this work? With money, heritage and a sense of family affair. But can you reduce the concept of COUNTRY to this simplistic definition of China? How many versions History do they teach their children?
Octavian
When thinking of Modern China I am often reminded of a quota from The Sopranos: Some people are so far behind in a race, they actually believe they are leading.
franco
One Country Two system Policy? It's all tools of Propaganda and likely to win divisiveness in one Country with a Maverick Province in this case is Taiwan and Democratic SAR like HK and Macau, Chinese Government Specially the Communist Hypocrite They all Using Unbelievable Words to win and integrate non Communist Chinese by using One Country Two System. Don't work. Were is the Gratitude of China From Taipei, HK and Macao which most of Investor come from. thick face it is.
seventhseal
OK, it's obvious this is biased. I just subscribed. Well, it would be nice to see many educated sources here. Just saying. I'm just a fart in Ohio. Email me about what is real in "China".. Seriously. It is very confusing – What I have as news is that Ping threw his back out on some sex throng, and some girl scratched his face.
Jaques666
Yeah John Chan is right! How could people from a 1.3billion population possibly protest in both the mainland AND Hong Kong??? Either they must all be protesting in the mainland, or they must all be protesting in Hong Kong. John Chan's logic is clear.
ImperiumVita
One man's "logic" is another man's intellectual vacuum.
nirvana
John Chan's logic is simple (as always). In the "Westpac", you do not wee in public, you do it in the toilets. Similarly, only in Hong Kong are Chinese allowed to "disturb public order".
John Chan
@nirvana,
You must have never been in the “Westpac,” there are plenty of people there pee, vomit, etc. in the public, particular around the pubs and over the homeless peoples’ heads while they are sleeping.
It seems both you and Cam are stressed out after being exposed to so many ugly facts of the “Westpac,” because both of you are commenting incoherently.
John Chan
Hong Kong should be praised that it can play such honourable role in the modernization of China, a venue for the mainlanders to tell Beijing their points of views that they cannot express them easily in the mainland due to the suppression of the corrupted, incompetent and traditional officialdom inertia of local bureaucrats.
On the other hand it was reportedly said there were tens of thousands protests held in China all over the place, it was the source consistently cited by the West and the anti-China bloggers as an evidence to support their bashing and smearing of China as constructive criticism. It makes one wonder the real motives of those mainlanders and the author’s accusation that China is going to endanger Hong Kong’s freedom of “one country, two systems.”
Albert Martinez
We are still praying that God intervenes to Mainland China and should realized that Communism is a cancerous disease in our society and now God hates Communism which eventually termed as Satanism of modern world. Time will come as per God's will that Communism elsewhere in the world would be wiped out like a rubbish in a bin.
Dan Pendleton
Well, gee, I would really hate for China to convert to democracy for then, what would WW3 be fought over if not ideology?
John Chan
@Dan Pendleton,
WWII is a disgusting power struggle among the western (including the Fascist Japan) imperial powers; it has nothing to do with liberty, freedom, justice, democracy or human rights. If the WWII was about democracy then those imperial powers won’t rush back to re-occupy their former colonies and ruled them suppressively again; it took the suppressed another 40 years bloody struggles to kick those suppressors out.
Perhaps WW3 is the chance to liberate the world from the iron claw of the global authoritarian that is bombing and killing non-stop since WWII to impose its will on the others, and return the world to real democracy, that all nations are equal and free from the fear of being bombed and killed into total destruction in the name as a gift from the West.
John Chan
@Albert Martinez,
God wants human beings to follow it blindly, and it hates human beings to have their own wisdom on reasoning, liberty, freedom and justice in the expression of capitalism and communism, regardless the faith of Christianity, Islam, or Hinduism. Humanity has fought hard at great cost to shack off the suppressive and regressive yoke of the God’s will in the last hundreds of years, so that we can have modern civilization today; definitely no soul on this planet wants to relive in the era of dark age when God’s intervention was everywhere.
Linking God a capitalist is an ultimate insult and smear of God, because you are subjugating the eternal Almighty to a definitive miser creature’s authority on wisdom. On the judgement day, your arrogance will be a worrisome burden on the Almighty’s mind.
Cancer starts with a small group of wicked cells, they spread toxin to other innocent healthy cells for the nutrition to sustain their growth, finally the cancer cells suck the host’s healthy cells dry and kill the host as well as the cancer cells themselves.
The 1% of the capitalist is the small group of wicked cancer cells, the 99% of innocent population is the rest of the cells of the host, 2008 global financial meltdown was the first alarming symptom that the wicked cancer cells was endangering the host (humanity), indeed it is the time the humanity to have a surgery to cut off the cancerous capitalism and wipe it out like a rubbish in a bin.
nirvana
@John Chan,
You my need a huge bin in China.
Jaques666
It's astounding. Almost as if he wants to give a bad name to those defending China – blind or just dumb. China's "socialism with Chinese characteristics" is in fact perhaps one of the most extreme capitalist systems on the planet. Real socialists in Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Cuba, France just laugh at that term.
An economic and political elite who are amassing huge amounts of wealth whilst the vast majority of the population remain relatively (and often absolutely) poor.
An economic and political elite who are drastically opposed to any real political representation for the majority.
Corruption and rent seeking running riot.
Very low upward mobility for the majority.
btw, I am talking about France before her revolution…in case for some reason you thought I was talking about Cuba 1952, or Russia in the early 1900s, or China in 1911, or China..in 2011
Cam
The funniest thing is those of little emperors in Beijing are the ones who represents the poor, farmers and workers in class struggle as they claimed since the day PRC was found. No doubt, those little emperors without clothes are 1% and John Chan is just one of loyal wumaoers, good job Johnny.
John Chan
@Cam,
Please take it easy, you are talking incoherently, it is worrisome.
Zorro
Hi Martinez,
That country is not Communist no matter what is being said. Communism has been long gone. ( a Communist state is a state in which the means of productions belong to the state not to the individual). Now is just a dictatorial system in which a bunch of people are holding to the power.