Protesters want leader Lam to quit – TheNigerialawyer

*Hundreds of thousands fill streets in march against
extradition bill and call for it and chief executive to
go.

Hong Kong – Hundreds of thousands of protesters have marched on
Sunday in opposition to the government and a controversial bill,
despite the city’s leader, Carrie Lam, shelving the proposal
indefinitely a day earlier.

Crowds filled Hong Kong’s Victoria Park early on Sunday
afternoon, filing into orderly zones to wait for their turn to
embark on an almost four-kilometre route to Admiralty, a downtown
business district.

Protesters were largely frustrated with the way the government
and Lam, the chief executive, had handled the bill.

Lam has promised to widely consult the public about the bill
before making any attempt to resurrect it

Protest organisers say they have five demands: To have the bill
dropped entirely; to release protesters arrested on Wednesday
during and following clashes with police; to withdraw the
characterisation of Wednesday’s protesters as “rioters”; for the
police who used violence to be held accountable and for Lam to step
down.

Vehicles honked their horns in support as the first groups,
largely black-shirted and peaceful, completed the march at the
city’s Central Government Offices (CGO) complex.

Tens of thousands had waited patiently for hours under blue
skies and a baking hot sun as the crowds shuffled slowly out of the
staging venue. The city’s subway system was mobbed with crowds
still looking to get to the start, hours after the first marchers
had departed.

At the end of the route, many stopped by a makeshift memorial
for a protester, surnamed Leung, who fell to his death on Saturday
while hanging a protest banner outside a shopping centre not 500
metres from the CGO complex.

Marchers wore white ribbons and carried white flowers in his
memory.

Protesters also paid their respects and took selfies next to the
so-called “Lennon Wall,” a relic from the 2014 Occupy protests
where thousands of messages of hope and solidarity had been left on
colourful post-it notes along a stairwell on the side of a
government building.

Almost five years later, new notes of encouragement about the
current protests have appeared with the city again in political
crisis.

About-face
Lam had completed a stunning turnaround on Saturday, announcing
that the unpopular legislation, called the Fugitive Offenders and
Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters Legislation (Amendment)
Bill would be mothballed for an indefinite period of time.

That statement came days after she had vowed to push ahead to
ratify the bill, despite huge public opposition.

Those marching on Sunday, however, were sceptical of the move,
calling it a stalling ploy. Protest organiser Bonnie Leung told
journalists that it was “a tactic by the Hong Kong government to
relieve pressure” on the embattled chief executive.

Former legislator and pro-democracy activist Lee Cheuk-yan
argued that the bill could be “revived any time Carrie Lam
wants”.

One protester, a 32-year-old events planner who asked to be
identified only by his English name, Keith, told Al Jazeera:
“Obviously we’re not happy with Carrie Lam’s decision. Otherwise we
wouldn’t be here.”

The protesters ranged in age from schoolchildren to
retirees.

One 14-year-old student, who asked to be named by only her
English name Hermione, said that Hong Kong’s autonomy is threatened
by the law.

“Hong Kong has ‘one country, two systems’,” she said, referring
to the distinct set of laws that the territory enjoys. “If the
extradition law exists, there is no division any more. Hong Kongers
have already lost confidence in China. Hong Kong people are wary of
China.”

Controversial law
Critics argue that, if enacted, the bill would cede vital freedoms
enjoyed by those living in the territory, undermining the
independence of Hong Kong’s legal system and putting citizens and
foreign nationals at risk.

It would allow the government to send anyone accused of a
serious crime across the border to mainland China, where the
justice system is widely perceived as opaque and politically
motivated. It reportedly has conviction rates nearing 100
percent.

Opposition to the legislation was so great an estimated one
million people demonstrated against it on May 9.

The contentious bill was scheduled for debate last Wednesday,
but mass protests around the site of the city’s Legislative Council
complex left legislators unable to enter the building and the
reading was cancelled.

Those demonstrations turned violent, with police in riot gear
taking on protesters with tear gas, pepper spray, water cannon and
batons in one of the worst incidents of violence seen in the
territory since its return to Chinese sovereignty.

Several people were injured in the clashes, with some protesters
reportedly arrested in hospital by police after the demonstrations
were quashed.

While the territory is part of China following its return from
British rule in 1997, it enjoys a high degree of autonomy from
Beijing, thanks to an agreement signed by the outgoing British
administration and the Chinese government.

Article 4 of the Basic Law, the de-facto constitution which
forms the basis of Hong Kong’s autonomy, promises to “safeguard the
rights and freedoms of the residents of the Hong Kong Special
Administrative Region and of other persons in the region in
accordance with law”.

Part of this autonomy comes in the form of Hong Kong’s
independent judiciary, which, critics of the proposed changes
argue, would be eroded if Beijing had the right to request that
those accused of crimes in the mainland be turned over.

Beijing insists it was not instrumental in the former British
territory’s decision to try to change the law, but earlier in the
week indicated that it supported the amendment.

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA NEWS

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