The election of Beijing’s favored candidate, former Hong Kong chief secretary for administration Carrie Lam (林鄭月娥) as the territory’s new chief executive shows that China’s “one country, two systems” framework, which guarantees a high degree of autonomy to the territory, is an empty promise, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) caucus said yesterday.
Despite her low popularity, Lam won Sunday’s election with 67 percent of the votes cast by the Election Committee.
There are 3.7 million registered voters in Hong Kong, but the chief executive is elected by a 1,194-member committee, making the vote a “bird cage” election, whereby Hong Kongers are represented by a small number of individuals, DPP Legislator Wu Ping-jui (吳秉叡) said.
The election bankrupted the “one country, two systems” framework and weakened the little confidence Taiwanese had in Beijing, Wu said.
The unfairness of Hong Kong’s electoral system in 2014 led to the Occupy Central movement that sought universal suffrage, and Taiwanese, accustomed to universal suffrage, were sympathetic to the movement, Wu said.
Had the Hong Kong election been a direct one, the result would not have been the same, as Lam had an approval rating of 29 percent ahead of the vote, while her main rival, former Hong Kong financial secretary John Tsang (曾俊華), had 56 percent, Wu said.
“Why was there such a ridiculous election? Because the Chinese Communist Party puts its hands into Hong Kong and deprives Hong Kongers of the opportunity to seek freedom. This serves as a clear reminder for Taiwanese that we must ensure that opportunity for future generations,” Wu said.
Hong Kong used to be a leading society in Asia in terms of democratic development, but its democracy has diminished as Beijing has tightened its grip on the territory, DPP Legislator Lee Chun-yi (李俊俋) said, questioning whether Beijing has failed in its promise to protect the territory’s autonomy for 50 years.
“Without the opportunity to have fair elections or freedom of speech, is the so-called ‘one country, two system’ the way of the future?” Lee asked.
Former premier Jiang Yi-huah (江宜樺), who had been sympathetic of Hong Kong’s electoral system, said “one country, two systems” was being emptied out, Lee said.
In addition to its inability to reflect public opinion, Hong Kong’s electoral system screens candidates in Beijing’s favor, as a prospective candidate needs to be endorsed by at least 150 members from a nominating committee, which is dominated by pro-Beijing elites, DPP Legislator Yeh Yi-chin (葉宜津) said.
“Do Taiwanese want a system that limits candidacy and only generates undesirable candidates?” Yeh said. “The Hong Kong system shows that what ‘one country, two systems’ stipulates is fake democracy.”
A small number of Taiwanese this year lost their citizenship rights after traveling in China and obtaining a one-time Chinese passport to cross the border into Russia, a source said today. The people signed up through Chinese travel agencies for tours of neighboring Russia with companies claiming they could obtain Russian visas and fast-track border clearance, the source said on condition of anonymity. The travelers were actually issued one-time-use Chinese passports, they said. Taiwanese are prohibited from holding a Chinese passport or household registration. If found to have a Chinese ID, they may lose their resident status under Article 9-1
Taiwanese were praised for their composure after a video filmed by Taiwanese tourists capturing the moment a magnitude 7.5 earthquake struck Japan’s Aomori Prefecture went viral on social media. The video shows a hotel room shaking violently amid Monday’s quake, with objects falling to the ground. Two Taiwanese began filming with their mobile phones, while two others held the sides of a TV to prevent it from falling. When the shaking stopped, the pair calmly took down the TV and laid it flat on a tatami mat, the video shows. The video also captured the group talking about the safety of their companions bathing
PROBLEMATIC APP: Citing more than 1,000 fraud cases, the government is taking the app down for a year, but opposition voices are calling it censorship Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) yesterday decried a government plan to suspend access to Chinese social media platform Xiaohongshu (小紅書) for one year as censorship, while the Presidential Office backed the plan. The Ministry of the Interior on Thursday cited security risks and accusations that the Instagram-like app, known as Rednote in English, had figured in more than 1,700 fraud cases since last year. The company, which has about 3 million users in Taiwan, has not yet responded to requests for comment. “Many people online are already asking ‘How to climb over the firewall to access Xiaohongshu,’” Cheng posted on
A classified Pentagon-produced, multiyear assessment — the Overmatch brief — highlighted unreported Chinese capabilities to destroy US military assets and identified US supply chain choke points, painting a disturbing picture of waning US military might, a New York Times editorial published on Monday said. US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s comments in November last year that “we lose every time” in Pentagon-conducted war games pitting the US against China further highlighted the uncertainty about the US’ capability to intervene in the event of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. “It shows the Pentagon’s overreliance on expensive, vulnerable weapons as adversaries field cheap, technologically
RSS