Hong Kong Young Writers Anthologies Non-Fiction 2020 | Page 31

Hong Kong Young Writers Awards 2020
and other infrastructure projects which all help to significantly reduce travel time between the
cities. The provincial capital, Guangzhou, which is located at the heart of major railway lines
across the GBA will be turned into a transport hub, with plans to extend its rail and subway
network further. For connectivity with the rest of the world, three of the world’s top container
ports, Shenzhen, Guangzhou & HK are in the Greater Bay Area, with established shipping
lines making scheduled visits for exports and imports. The air freight traffic across the Greater
Bay Area at close to 8 million tonnes per annum is already greater than the combined figures
of the bay area of San Francisco, New York and Tokyo. Still there are further plans to turn the
GBA into an airport hub by expanding existing airports’ capacities and transport links.
The Greater Bay Area blueprint thus seems like a very well-thought out and feasible plan.
However, there are still many challenges the Chinese government has to overcome if it wishes
to make a success of its plans given the many inherent differences that exist in the various
cities. Let’s analyse what these challenges mean and if they can be overcome.
One of the biggest challenges is the existence of three different legal systems (Macau,
Hong Kong, China) and three different customs zones unique to the GBA. Macau and Hong
Kong are two separate special administrative regions with their own legal and taxation systems
and currencies. There are also two hard borders that travellers and goods would have to cross.
This makes the execution of policies a lot more complicated.
Some of these obstacles can be overcome with certain Central Government initiatives. For
example, to solve the problem of there being different currencies, digital currencies or online
payments can overcome this issue fairly easily, while Hong Kong can take over the primary
role of external financing / RMB exchanges. In terms of the difficulty of having different
customs zones, the Central Government could coordinate regional policies so as to streamline
the process of crossing the borders, hence easing the movement of goods, workers and capital.
Thus, these challenges do not seem insurmountable initially. That was the case until the
anti-extradition bill protests in Hong Kong began…
Will these protests compromise the picture-perfect utopia? Have they already caused
irreversible damage to the role Hong Kong will play in the GBA?
Over the past six months, Hong Kong has faced a whirlwind of protests, unrest and
violence which have threatened its position as an international financial centre. Hong Kong
has many well-educated, competent young people, with 5 of its universities being ranked
among the top 100 worldwide. Before this, the trilingual youth of Hong Kong would have
naturally provided a pool of talent for the GBA plan. However, these protests have shown that
these university graduates are not exactly keen on integrating with the Mainland.
These protests have also led to lawlessness within HK. Whether we are looking at the
behaviour of the radicals or the law-enforcers, violence has now become the norm. This means
that Hong Kong’s tourism has been adversely affected, potentially even for the longer term if
unrest continues.
A recent ban on face masks has added even more fuel to the fire as it invokes a colonial-
era emergency law. The Hong Kong High Court later passed a judgement that the ban was
not constitutional and did not comply with the Basic Law. However, a spokesperson from the
National People’s Congress (NPC) issued a statement that only the National People’s Congress
Standing Committee (NPCSC) has the authority to make any decision on whether any HK
law complies with the Basic Law.
Stuart Hargreaves, an associate professor at CUHK says it is not clear whether this statement
is meant “to totally deny HK courts ability to interpret the Basic Law in course of decisions” or
whether “it is just a ‘helpful reminder’ that NPCSC has final say on Interpretation, then that’s
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