Governor's "Letter to Hong Kong'
Following is the full text of the Governor, the Rt Hon Christopher Patten's broadcast on RTHK's "Letter to Hong Kong" this (Sunday) morning:
In just over a week's time, I set out for Canada and the United States to talk about Hong Kong and to bang the drum for Hong Kong's interests. Just after my visit, Anson Chan will herself head for America. And both of us will, of course, be arguing the case in Washington to often sceptical audiences for renewal by the United States of Most Favoured Nation Status for China. What should we tell people? What should our message be?
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One reason why I pose these questions is that my basic confidence about Hong Kong was described by one newspaper in Britain 10 days ago as "Panglossian". I was - according to them far too starry-eyed about the future. It's worth reflecting on why many people outside Hong Kong take a similar view, and why (if for no other reason) Chinese officials should seek advice from a wider rather than narrower range of opinion when they come here.
A lot of the anxieties both outside and inside Hong Kong focus on the analysis which some Chinese officials have made of our city and which they have subsequently acted upon. We're not a political city, they say; we're an economic city and we shouldn't bother our heads about anything other than making money.
What on earth does that mean?
Hong Kong is no more a political city than anywhere else, but no less either. It's a city where economic success and progress have produced a better educated. better informed, better travelled, better off population. A population with views on more issues than horse-racing.
Hong Kong is also a city whose economic success is partly a result of things which you don't necessarily find in a list of economic variables. The rule of law. Good, clean administration. Personal liberty. Freedom of speech.
All those things are guaranteed under the treaty signed by Britain and China in 1984. If Chinese officials are now saying, "forget the politics and only bother about the economics", where does that place the guarantees given on all those non-economic issues? Does free speech come under the heading of politics or economics? What about freedom of assembly? Freedom of worship? Freedom of travel?