TNAG-2293-FCO40-3305-Official-visits-from-Hong-Kong-to-China-1991 — Page 166

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7.

НКМАО,

The most

MFA.

Zhao

ill-prepared,

disappointing briefing was given by the

Jihua,

the Director, was either

too new to the post or not prepared to say

anything at all. I had a strong hunch (later confirmed by

Janet Rogan in the Peking Embassy), through the very

different impressions I got from officials of the two

HKMAOS, that the HKMAO, MFA was very much subordinated to

the HKMAO, State Council.

8.

Mdm Wang Zhuqian of the Legislative Affairs

Committee talked and behaved like a party cadre. Her

presentation of 'democracy' in the PRC (eg. voters have the

power to force a delegate to resign at any time; if the

number of candidates greatly exceed the number of seats

available in an election to local People's Congress, the

number of candidates will be reduced through consultation

people prior to the election etc.) worried me.

She also left no time at all for us to ask questions.

amongst the

9.

The

visits to the Beijing Hospital and the Beijing

Number One Welfare institute were the usual 'show your

best'

tours and far from representative of the real general

situation in China. I would have preferred to visit some

down-to-earth places, eg. housing estates.