Hong Kong lawmaker forcibly removed from legislature says he had 'no choice' but protest
Security steps in to break up fight about proposed bill criminalizing abuse of Chinese anthem
Beijing will use a proposed law criminalizing the abuse of the Chinese anthem to limit civil liberties and arrest dissidents, a pro-democracy lawmaker who was forcibly removed from the legislature says.
Clashes broke out in the Hong Kong's legislature Monday over the election of a chair for a committee that determines when a bill can be submitted for a final vote.
After pro-democracy lawmakers were kicked out, a pro-Beijing lawmaker was elected, which means the anthem bill may be quickly passed.
It is being compared to last year's extradition bill, which sparked months of protests.
Ted Hui is a Democratic Party politician in Hong Kong who had to go to the hospital after Monday's protest. Here is part of his conversation with As It Happens host Carol Off.
How are you feeling right now? Have you recovered from your injury?
It's a slight injury but it's serious what's happened ... because we were physically removed from the meeting room.
I think it's the first time that force is used so excessively, by not even police, but security guards of our legislature.
What happened first? What got this started?
[Monday] in our legislature, it's supposed to be a meeting to elect a chairperson of the house committee, which is an important committee because it controls the agenda setting of the plenary session of the legislature. It also controls the priority of legislation.
Under the rules, one member, called Dennis Kwok, he's supposed to be the chairperson to hold that meeting to elect the chairperson and ... he is from the Democratic camp.
And that's why I think the pro-Beijing camp is worrying that there will be delays. And that's why they ordered ... another member of parliament that's from the pro-Beijing camp.
So Dennis Kwok is one of your colleagues. He's a pro-democracy member of the legislature and he was to choose a new head of this very important committee. But a pro-Beijing, a pro-China faction, took over that process. Is that right?
Forcibly and with security guards.
They are supposed to be impartial, but of course they are so biased.
Before the meeting started, the person that's chosen from the pro-Beijing camp, called Chan Kin-por, he took the chairman panel and then all the security guards got at him, protected him, and that's why we were protesting.
There is a photo of you trying to jump onto the chairman's bench. So is that possibly why the security guard stepped in?
And I would say that it's peaceful at the beginning, but then they ordered the security guards to evict us and it started all the physical fights, and I have to say we have no other choices but to protest.
But there is one moment, there is a very large black cloth carried by pro-democracy lawmakers, and you attempted to cover something. And that's, I guess, when things got quite heated.
Not at all, and I think there is a confusion.
The black cloth itself is symbolic. We are protesting that now our legislature works under a black box. So it is part of a protest. It's a prop.
The pro-Beijing lawmakers say that that black cloth, which was quite large, you were attempting to cover up the violence. That's not the case?
No, not the case at all.
It's quite laughable because there are tons of cameras there and there's no way that we can cover anything.
Can you tell us a bit about this particular committee and some of the legislation that it's looking at that is of great concern to the pro-democracy movement?
The upcoming one will be the national anthem law.
And the law says that when the national anthem is played ... we have to respect it … but when there are people booing it or not standing up, then we can be sent to jail for three years.
Every bill and every legislation in Hong Kong that limits the civil liberty of our citizens will be used, will be very much manipulated by our governments to send dissidents to jail.- Ted Hui, Kong Kong pro-democracy lawmaker
Is it vague that way? It's up to the authorities to decide if you're disrespecting the anthem?
Yes, it's for the police, for the authority to decide. And they'll prosecute you and send you to court and you have to explain to the court. If it's not satisfied, then you're going to jail for three years. So it's unproportionate.
And you expect, you think, that this law might be used to process arbitrary arrest?
Yes, just like the law proposed [bill] last year, the extradition bill.
I think that every bill and every legislation in Hong Kong that limits the civil liberty of our citizens will be used, will be very much manipulated by our governments to send dissidents to jail.
We don't have democracy to monitor the whole process, so we cannot accept that from passing.
Written by Sarah Jackson with files from The Associated Press. Produced by Morgan Passi.