Blind in Logic

Blind in Logic                         Hu Han

The Chief Justice has spoken time and again Hong Kong must uphold judiciary independence, showing deep misgiving among the judges in Hong Kong.  Well, is the “storm” really coming?

In the Chong Fung Yuen case, the Court of Final Appeal held that the common law interpretation of Basic Law Article 24(1) supported that Chong was entitled to the right of abode.  I agree to that.  A literal reading of the section does mean that any Chinese citizen born in Hong Kong has the right of abode.  But what if it is a mistake? What if the Basic Law is wrong?  Any law can be wrong in the sense that it does not serve its fundament purpose – to protect the country and her people and their rights and interests.  In extreme cases, a legal system can be so wrong that it becomes a self-defeating system, that is, it overthrows or causes the overthrowing of the government it serves, usually in the form of an economic breakdown and a coup d’état.  If the law is wrong, it must be corrected.  Then it begs the question.  Who can correct the Basic Law for us?

Articles 158 and 159 clearly state that the power to interpret and amend the Basic Law rests in the hand of the National People’s Congress (NPC), and as a matter of fact, the NPC has exercised its power in four different occasions in the past to interpret the Basic Law, which were seen by many as intervention with Hong Kong’s autonomy by the Central People’s Government.  Those with such view fail to see a fundament flaw in logic in the proposition.  NPC’s interpretation an intervention?  May as well be true.  But the biggest intervention is not the interpretation, or even amendment of the Law.  It’s the drafting of the law instead.  Did Hong Kong people have any say in codifying the Law?  Hardly any.  The “one country, two systems” thing was proposed by the great Deng Xiaoping.  The drafting of the Basic Law, the constitution by which now we abide, were by a handful of people.  Did we have a choice?  The handover of sovereignty and the establishment of HKSAR were the biggest interventions to Hong Kong, which was decided by the leaders of the two countries.   The handover the other way round in the second last century after the infamous military encounters and signing of treaties was even bigger intervention.  However, we don’t complain about those. 

We have to face reality.  We rely on “one country, two systems”, the core spirit of the Basic Law, so we have to accept that the NPC can interpret or amend it as it sees fit.  As matured people we ought to know we cannot have everything going our way.  We can only hope that the central government care about our interest.  Perhaps that’s the sad thing about being Chinese.  Historically, hoping has always been the only thing we could do as common people.