CONFIDENTIAL
10.
WALDEN CALLS FOR CHANGES IN GOVERNMENT:
Former civil servant, Mr. John Walden, in a speech at HKU on 7 February, proposed what he called long term measures designed to prepare HK for 1997. Beginning with the assumption that China wished to regain sovereignty over HK while preserving the territory's administrative structure largely intact, he warned against presuming that Beijing would tolerate sweeping constitutional reforms designed to give HK people a greater say in government. While the Chinese Government had not opposed the partial democratisation of local administration in 1981, he thought it would be a mistake for anyone to assume that Beijing, in not objecting to the small step in democratic participation represented by the introduction of partially elected district boards, was giving the nod to far reaching constitutional reform. The Chinese Government's sharp reaction to suggested changes in Macau's constitution was an indication of this. Beijing would not put up with constitutional or institutional reform in HK that might eventually lead to a third China. But changes which would entail more public participation in government, greater social equality, freedom from the excesses of capitalism and the development of a feeling that the Government really cared for the governed could be introduced without compromising HK's prosperity and stability. The greater the improvements that could be made to HK's system of government now, the greater the chance that China, for both practical and cosmetic reasons, would not want to intervene in HK's internal management. The latest edition of Pai Shing Semi-monthly carries Mr. Walden's speech in full.
11.
OTHER ITEMS:
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China had admitted that the foreign exchange it obtained through HK amounted to one third of its total earnings, Sing Tao Jih Pao reported, quoting an AP despatch from Guangzhou. The story quoted the officer in charge of the HK and Macau Economic Research Centre in Beijing, Mr. Ku Lian-liang, saying it was 31 per cent. But he failed to give a figure in dollar terms. The story also appeared in the Asian Wall Street Journal.
Both the SCMP and the HK Standard carried a report from London that HK's Commissioner, Sir Jack Cater, had urged members of the HK community in Britain to listen only to official statements about the current Anglo-Chinese negotiations. Speaking at a Commission reception, Sir Jack said, whatever one might hear about 1997, "all I can do is recommend that you don't listen except to those words coming from those meetings in Beijing with an official stamp on them." He had no doubts that the result would be satisfactory to HK, as well as to China and Britain.
Ta Kung Pao played up on its front page that, at a UN anti-narcotics conference in Vienna, China had accused drug peddlers in HK and Macau of exploiting the country's open policy in trafficking drugs to Asian and Western markets via China. Couriers went to China disguised as tourists and home visitors.
CONFIDENTIAL
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