Tough security law dims Hong Kong's lustre

There was no hint of dissent in Hong Kong's Legislative Council as its 88 members passed Article 23, a piece of draconian domestic Security legislation which "Complements" Beijing's own 2020 Security stamp on the Special Administrative Region. The once admired and vaunted Hong Kong "Brand" is now losing its lustre. When this writer was in Hong Kong just after the July 1997 handover to China, a common adage was the tale of the Golden Goose; the goose being rich and prosperous Hong Kong. Hong Kong's once booming stock market is now half its 2020 value! Equally the city faces the undertow of China's own slowing economy on which Hong Kong is economically intertwined. Hong Kong's once admirable civil rights and political freedoms are under assault from security legislation intended to safeguard the CCP's stifling monopoly on power and opinion. Hong Kong was once a government of laws; the clearly applied rule of Common Law ensured the region's security and prosperity. Today the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region is not a society ruled through the law but by the law.