ENG-1999 — Page 32

HONG KONG GEARS UP FOR A WORLD WITHOUT WALLS

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without fear or favour. Decisions must be taken in the public interest, not vested interests. The watchwords for civil servants should be: "Speak Truth Unto Power". This will involve strength of character, clarity of purpose and leadership. These are the qualities expected of them from the public they serve. They will be helped in this by further developing their spirit of openness and transparency.

Apart from the economy, the issue that has created the most interest—and controversy in and outside post-Handover Hong Kong has been the rule of law. This is hardly surprising as the community instinctively understands, perhaps more than most, that the rule of law is the guarantor of its way of life. It is the dividing line, if you like, between one country and two systems. It protects the high degree of autonomy mandated to the SAR by the Basic Law.

The landmark constitutional case involving the right of abode in Hong Kong of Mainland children with one Hong Kong parent led to an impassioned debate over the whole question of the SAR's legal autonomy and the authority of Hong Kong's supreme appellate judicial body, the Court of Final Appeal (CFA). Because of the Government's decision to seek an interpretation of the relevant Basic Law provisions from the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPCSC), the SARG's.commitment to the rule of law and legal autonomy came into question.

This was the perception of some, not the reality. In the right of abode case, there is no doubt that the Government's action was legal and constitutional. Nor, despite concerns in some quarters, has it eroded the rule of law or undermined the independence of the Judiciary, as evidenced by unequivocal public statements on this question by a number of Hong Kong's most eminent judges.

However, lessons of the recent past suggest that the SARG has to do more to remove doubts about where it stands on these matters. It must be hoped, for example, that circumstances do not arise again that prove so wholly exceptional-as they did in the right of abode case that the SARG is left with no option but to make a referral to the NPCSC.

The self-evident but powerful truth about the rule of law has been argued eloquently in an end-of-millennium essay by the British historian, Paul Johnson. His analysis of the last thousand years 'emphasises the importance of the establishment of the rule of law as the only secure basis for efficient government, under which men and women can go about their business in peace'. He added that: "Human beings are fantastically ingenious creatures, and usually industrious too. Given reasonably stable and just government, there is no limit to what they can achieve in time."

Johnson goes on to cite Hong Kong as one example of how small places with virtually no resources have created stability, and the good life for most of their citizens, by using their brains, not least by devising minimalist systems of government which work.

All of this is well understood and fully shared by the SAR Government from top to bottom. This will not of itself put an end to controversy and public debate over contentious legal and constitutional issues. Such differences, honestly argued by men and women of goodwill, are the meat and drink of a plural society.

It is fitting and somehow very Hong Kong-that the end of the millennium and the beginning of a new century should see a turnaround in the economic fortunes of the SAR. The remarkable year-end and first quarter GDP growth figures signalled a