ARTICLE 19 and The Hong Kong Journalists Association
Telecommunications usage is extremely heavy in Hong Kong. More than three million telephones, one for every two people, are in operation in homes and businesses. Facsimile machines are also abundant, matching the density of usage in Japan; and all sorts of paging and mobile phone systems, which legally are outside the two franchises, vie in a highly competitive market. Regionally as well as internationally, Hong Kong is linked by a series of land and undersea cables, copper and optical, to Singapore, China, the Philippines, and in the near future to Japan and Korea. A satellite land-station also operates in the territory.
5.3
THE PRINT MEDIA
The publication of newspapers, magazines and books is regulated by the Newspaper Registration and Books Registration ordinances, the former replacing the controversial Control of Publications Consolidation Ordinance (COPCO) in 1987. There are no provisions for censorship of a political nature in the new ordinances. Under the Newspaper Registration Ordinance an editor of a newspaper is required to register with the authorities for purposes of liability in cases of libel or other legal actions against the newspaper.
5.3.1 Newspapers
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More than 45 newspapers are published daily, over 40 of these in Chinese and six in English, though only 20 or so are available regularly from the news-stands.12 The top 10 newspapers command nearly 90 per cent of the daily readership, with the top five of these, including one English-language daily, the fifth-ranking South China Morning Post, taking the lion's share. The bottom five share just 13 per cent of the readership, and struggle to break even financially. On an average day, over 3 million people, or 61 per cent of those of a reading age, will read at least one paper," though in 1990 only 13 per cent read more than one paper daily compared with more than 30 per cent in 1982.14
The general newspaper market is occupied by three groupings; the China-backed dailies, the opposing Taiwan-backed (nationalist) dailies, and the commercial independents. Those owned or controlled by Beijing now number four, Ching Pao having folded during 1991. Their total readership amounts to just 6 per cent,15 mostly absorbed by the Shanghai-derived Wen Wei Po and Ta Kung Pao, both of which act as the unofficial mouthpieces in the territory of the Chinese Communist Party (and its various factions). None of the four are commercially viable
12 Chan Kai-cheung (1991), supra note 3, at 472. According to the government, 66 newspapers were registered in 1992. A number of news agency bulletins were also registered as newspapers.
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14
"Paper price rise heralds new war", South China Morning Post, 30 Sept. 1990.
Chan Kai-cheung (1991), supra note 3, at 474.
15
Joseph Man Chan and Chin-chuan Lee, supra note 2, at 12.
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