According to Ching Cheong, the agency representing the official government has just released the first local history of Hong Kong, thus blocking out the civil discourse that truly records history, leaving Hong Kong history with only one narrative from the Chinese Communist Party. File photo.
Recently, Hong Kong has been under suspicion of “blocking” the Internet, and the website “Hong Kong Chronicle”, which records information against China, cannot be viewed in Hong Kong. According to Ching Cheong, a veteran media personality and current affairs commentator, the official body has just released the first local chronicle of Hong Kong, thus blocking private discourse that truly records the history of Hong Kong, leaving only one version of Hong Kong’s history to the Chinese Communist Party.
Civilian version of local chronicle “Hong Kong Chronicles” blocked
The “Hong Kong Chronicle” website, which recorded information about the anti-China movement, was recently blocked from being viewed in Hong Kong. The editor-in-chief of the “Hong Kong Chronicle” website, Chen Yan Yan, also issued a statement saying that since the evening of January 6, many Hong Kong users have reported that they cannot connect to the website when using the services of some Hong Kong Internet providers; statistics also show that the number of users from Hong Kong has dropped significantly. The incident sparked suspicions of Internet blocking, fearing that under the national security law, Hong Kong people have been unable to browse any dissident websites.
The Hong Kong Police Force responded that it does not comment on individual cases, and that according to Article 43 of the National Security Law, the police may require service providers to take action against electronic messages posted on electronic platforms that are likely to constitute a crime against national security, or are likely to cause a crime against national security to occur. That is, it is implied that the police may have asked telecommunications service providers to block websites that allegedly endanger national security.
Official version of Hong Kong’s local history distorts history
On December 28, 2020, the Hong Kong Centre for Local History, established by former Chief Executive Tung Chee-hwa’s Hong Kong Solidarity Fund and responsible for compiling the Hong Kong Chronicle, published its first “General Chronicle of Events”, which records more than 6,000 events in Hong Kong from the Neolithic period to July 1, 2017. Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor and Liaison Office Director Gary Lok Wai-ning are the honorary patrons of the center.
Ching Cheong said that the “Hong Kong Chronicle” represents the official discourse of Beijing, while the “Hong Kong Chronicle” is written by the private sector, the two compared, the private version can more honestly reflect the history of Hong Kong. For example, the official version says “the way forward for Hong Kong is to deepen the community of destiny with the mainland”, which “can be seen from the wording of the entire book’s political orientation”.
Although Bernard Chan said at the press conference for the publication of the official version of the local chronicle, the principle of writing the book is to “tell but not to forget”, Ching Cheong said, on the surface seems to be very objective, but what to “tell” and “not to tell” itself has been different, in addition, when “telling” a matter, what words to use, what words to use, these are in itself “bring the wind direction”.
For example, he pointed out that the official version of the local history tells how Sun Yat-sen used Hong Kong to overthrow the Qing dynasty, without mentioning how the Chinese Communist Party used Hong Kong to subvert the Kuomintang government, “the Chinese Communist Party always accuses others of ‘subverting state power’, it is the real subversive! Therefore, the so-called “narrative regardless”, prefer not to mention these important historical facts against the Chinese Communist Party.
Ching Cheong continued, saying that the official version of the local history tells how China supported Hong Kong after 1949, such as providing Hong Kong with water and water supplies, but not a word about how Hong Kong people spontaneously shipped supplies to the mainland to help the mainland people during the Communist Party’s three-year famine.
The official version of the local magazine also said that “one country, two systems” is based on the Constitution of China and the Basic Law of Hong Kong as the constitutional basis. Ching Cheong said that when the Basic Law was drafted, the Chinese Constitution was not considered at all, and that “Annex III of the Basic Law was established to make it clear that the Chinese Constitution does not apply in Hong Kong”, and a member of the Basic Law Drafting Committee wrote an article explaining why.
Ching Cheong pointed out that what the official gazetteer said was not true, stressing that as an older generation of Hong Kong people who had experienced the handover of sovereignty, he had the responsibility to restore the historical truth, otherwise biased accounts would be passed on to the next generation, and “in the future, there would only be one set of narratives of the Chinese Communist Party in the history of Hong Kong”.
Shortly after the launch of the official version of the Chinese Communist Party’s local history, the website of the Hong Kong Chronicle, a local history written by Hong Kong citizens, was blocked, and certain ISPs prevented users from browsing the website, which, according to Ching Cheong, is blocking all unofficial discourses; and The “Hong Kong Chronicle” was painstakingly established by young people in Hong Kong during the anti-sending campaign, when the community felt the need to record the true history of Hong Kong for the next generation with the power of the private sector. He claimed that the content of the civil version is objective and does not evade the facts, “which makes a discrepancy between the civil discourse and the official discourse, in this case, the Chinese Communist Party has to block the civil discourse and seize the right to speak”
Will the Chinese Communist Party further ban the Internet in Hong Kong? Ching Cheong thinks it is absolutely possible that after the implementation of the national security law, the authorities will block all websites that supposedly endanger national security in the name of national security.
Allegations of pro-democracy arrests are groundless
The 709 case on the mainland, the public security overnight arrests the country’s human rights lawyers, Ching Cheong said that the Hong Kong police also learned a lot, using more than 1,000 police officers in one day, arrested 53 pro-democracy activists in Hong Kong, it can be seen that “Hong Kong is becoming more and more mainland”. The 53 people arrested this time were accused by the police of organizing, planning and participating in last year’s Legislative Council primary election, which violated the national security law of subversion of state power.
Ching Cheong believes that the authorities’ reasons for the charges are totally unfounded, because the Basic Law provides for elections in Hong Kong, which is part of Hong Kong’s political system, “but the Chinese Communist Party has chosen to call pro-democracy legislators ‘hostile forces'”, and he questioned why, if so, the original drafting of the If so, he asked, why was the electoral system established when the Basic Law was drafted? Since elections are allowed, there are bound to be democrats elected. If primary elections are illegal, “then what is the point of the elections stipulated in the Basic Law? This is simply trampling on the original intent of the Basic Law.”
In addition, Ching Cheong pointed out that any camp will organize primary elections before the general election, which is a normal procedure; and the purpose of the primary election is to select the candidate with a greater number of wins to enter the Legislative Council to monitor the government on behalf of the people of Hong Kong, “absolutely legal and reasonable, and Article 49 and 50 of the Basic Law is also written very clearly.” He wondered why the primary election could be regarded as a crime and the election of a pro-democracy legislator as a “power grab”.
Recently, the pro-democracy activists who were released on bail generally said that Hong Kong is now under the iron fist of totalitarianism and in the middle of a cold night. In response, Ching Cheong encouraged them to “uphold our conscience and not to give up our insistence easily”, and “if what we do is legal, reasonable and just, then we should continue to insist on it”. He also stressed the importance of not being united by the Chinese Communist Party, “If you accept the united war, all that you hold on to will collapse.
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