of constitutional litigation? Should Hong Kong establish a separate system of constitutional courts to deal with constitutional litigation? As this sort of constitutional litigation would involve the inter- pretation of the Basic Law, should such disputes be dealt with by the People's Courts of China, the NPC or its Standing Committee? After all, many people do think that it would be sufficiently effect- ive to safeguard human rights by the function of public opinion and political parties in opposition, which should exercise supervision over the legis- lators, and that therefore, there is no need to rely on a bill of rights, having the force of law, to protect the basic human rights of the Hong Kong people.
(7) The legal and judicial system of Hong Kong:
(a) Hong Kong should continue to adopt the existing legal system subject to appropriate amendments to all existing legislation or any parts thereof which are inconsistent with the sovereignty of China over Hong Kong.
(b) Within 20 years from 1997, the legal system should so far as possible adopt parallel use of both the Chinese and English Languages and wherever the use of the Chinese Language proves to be inappro- priate or where there is a or conflict in the use of the two languages, the use of the English Language should prevail.
(c) Hong Kong should maintain the tradition of judicial independence and all members of the judiciary
should be appointed by an independent judicial commission which is free from the interference of Government. To ensure judicial independence, provisions regarding the security of tenure and payment of salaries of judges should be entrenched in the Basic Law.
(d) The highest court of Hong Kong should have the jurdisdiction of final appeal and the existing right of appeal to the Privy Council in London should
be abolished in or before 1997.
(8) The authority to interpret the Basic Law:
(a) According to paragraph (4) of Article 67 of the Constitution of China, the Standing Committee of the NPC have the authority to interpret the law; but according to paragraph (11) of Article 62 of the Constitution, the NPC is entitled to review or repeal any inappropriate decision made by its Standing Committee which should include any decision on the interpretation of the law and the Basic Law of the HKSAR. Therefore, the NPC of China should be the highest authority for inter- preting the Basic Law of Hong Kong. Nevertheless, the NPC can expressly delegate part of such authority to interpret the Basic Law to the judiciary of Hong Kong by express provisions in the Basic Law itself.
(b) The authority to interpret the Basic Law can be separately exercisable by the respective judiciaries of China and Hong Kong:
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