Vicious Rants of an Angry Yellow Man

Surprise, surprise!   The Hong Kong government actually backed down and suspended an extradition bill.  Chief Executive Carrie Lam actually apologized to the public for her mishandling of the bill.  This was after two massive protests in the past two weeks.  I did not see the government backing down as they did not back down during the Umbrella Movement of 2014.

I am also surprised that the protests this year is much bigger than in 2014.  The protesters estimate 1.9 million showed up on Sunday while the government estimated about 338,000 showed up.  Either one side is using Donald Trump to do the counting or the real number is somewhere in between.  I think the government did lower the true estimate but 1,9 million is also unrealistic.  That would mean a quarter of all the people in Hong Kong showed up.  I don't think the average person in Hong Kong is big on politics.  Making money is the goal, especially for the older people who knew about the time Hong Kong was not that prosperous.  But there maybe a change this time.

As in most democratic protests, this one is led by young people.  So was the Umbrella Movement.  But this one was more successful because more older people are involved.  In 2014 there was a generation divide where the older folks did not want to rock the boat.  Perhaps the older people now realize that the autonomy of the former British colony is being slowly eroded.  Maybe they don't want their children become second class citizens like they were under British rule.  There is more solidarity between the generations this time and the government has taken notice.

But of course the government is backed by China and that means things can go in reverse very quickly.  Beijing could have tell the Hong Kong government to use force to shut down the protest.  They did not seem to have done so.  One reason is that Beijing is in a trade war with the U.S. and it did not want negative publicity that would give Trump the upper hand.  China may want the world to see that Hong Kong has freedom as China had promised.  It wants to tell the world: See we are for freedom and by extension, free trade.

Whatever the reason, it is good for now that the government has backed down.  What will happen next time is anyone's guess.