What Abraham Lincoln could explain to Hu Jintao

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See the Sol Sanders Archive By Sol Sanders SPECIAL TO WORLD TRIBUNE.COM

The Chinese scene is becoming increasingly convoluted as demands for modernity meet the stonewall of a one-party state. That is the explanation for President Hu JintaoÕs three-minute Òdressing downÓ of Tung Chee-hwa, chief executive of the Hong Kong Special Administration Region.

The incident occurred during the anniversary celebration of the return of the former Portuguese enclave of Macau to China. It came uncharacteristically publicly and with Tung in attendance. What Hu told Tung, and the world, was things havenÕt been going well in Hong Kong, Tung should learn from his mistakes, and pull up his bootstraps.

The almost ludicrous contradiction, of course, is the democratic opposition has been telling Tung [and Beijing] the same thing, almost from the 1997 reversion of the former British crown colony to China when the Beijing leadership chose him as the new chief executive. It could be, as so often happens in ChinaÕs feuding upper echelons, Hu was taking a crack at Party rivals; for example, former President, Party secretary, and chairman of the military affairs commissions Jiang Zemin who was said to have been TungÕs big backer when he was chosen. Jiang is supposedly out but he and his henchmen are still powerful figures behind the scenes.

But what brought on the episode, however, is more important and symptomatic of ChinaÕs larger problem as it heads into more and more complex decisionmaking.

Its powerful new, if fragile, liberalized economy demands BeijingÕs increasing participation in world politics and that includes Hong Kong, a world financial center. This interface gives Hu both exposure and responsibility beyond his predecessors. He is no longer in a world of autarchial economic decisions with everything from vast new investments in oil properties around the world to participation in UN peacekeeping from Liberia to Haiti.

Behind this outburst [if indeed it wasnÕt premeditated] was a Hong Kong government fiasco. In order to galvanize the property market, an important source of the former colonyÕs growth during the post-World War II period, TungÕs government set out to sell a bundle of government-owned public housing and business properties. The $3 billion package was to be the initial offering in a $14 billion privatization aimed at getting what has been a stagnating economy back on track.

In a manner too reminiscent of the way things are done on the Mainland, TungÕs little band set about the deal with little consultation with the partially-elected legislature. Even it might have warned of the rocks ahead. A little old lady, 67-year old public housing tenant Lo Siu Lan, decided the deal wasnÕt in her interest. Lo's repeated court appeals created such uncertainty over whether the public offering was legal, Housing Secretary Michael Suen had to pull it off the market. And in one of the greatest Malapropism of the season, Suen said TungÕs government was blameless because Lo's legal challenge was as unexpected as Òa 9/11-style attackÓ Obviously Hu & Co. in Beijing didnÕt think so. Quite rightly, they could have imagined in Hong KongÕs sophisticated investment market all the iÕs were dotted and the tÕs had been crossed.

Yet Beijing bears indirect responsibility: It was Beijing which antagonized the small band of Hong Kong reformers to the point where they could field half a million people in the streets [population: eight million] to protest Beijing policy. It was, of course, because Beijing had reneged on promises to move toward wider popular representation and an elected governor under the Basic Law which returned Hong Kong to China from Britain. Tung, repeatedly kowtowing to Beijing, has really only been taking orders. So asking him to go back and study his copybook was hardly advice anyone could take seriously. Shared responsibility, blocked by Beijing, would have alerted government to such bloopers.

There was a time when foreign observers ø and perhaps some reformers inside China ø hoped Hong Kong, ironically with its colonial history but a fundamental nugget of the rule of law, would be a model for what is generally agreed might have to be a slow progression on the Mainland to liberal government. [It was, incidentally, to be a model for the Òone country, two systemsÓ offered to the Taiwanese if they accepted BeijingÕs suzerainty.] But BeijingÕs paranoid fear of Hong Kong democrats turned out to be too great for HuÕs predecessors to overcome.

Now Hu telling Tung to shape up is a like Edgar Bergen spanking Charlie McCarthy [for my greying readers at least]. Banging the puppet isnÕt an excuse for the ventriloquist making the wrong noises.

Democrats everywhere can take some delight ø alas! it may be very temporary ø in a humble Hongkonger like Lo getting in her licks. But it may well be confirmation of that old Lincolnian adage that no nation can live half slave and half free.