In the middle of one of the worst environmental disasters in
Philippine history, the Hong Kong government initially delivered a breathlessly
wrongheaded decision to continue to demand an apology from President Benigno S.
Aquino III over the botched three-year-old bus hijacking that took the lives of
eight Hong Kong tourists in August of 2010.
The government’s belated decision to seek approval to inject
an additional HK$40 million into the Disaster Relief Fund has gone some way to
limiting the damage done by politicians in persisting with a demand like this
in the middle of almost unimaginable suffering. Also, People Power lawmaker
Albert Chan Wai-yip, who tabled the bill in the Legislative Council earlier
this month to ban Filipinos from working in the city, later said he would
shelve the bill “temporarily” until rescue efforts in the country are
stabilized.
Displaying astonishing tone-deafness, Hong Kong’s chief
executive, CY Leung, said of the sanctions: “We have been in contact with the
Philippine government over the last couple of days and they have not raised the
question of extending the deadline” under which the government in Manila must
meet the demands of the families of the Hong Kong victims.
The storm that hit Leyte and Samar dwarfed the repetitive
litany of floods, death, destruction and mayhem usually visited on the
Philippines during the typhoon season. Haiyan’s storm surge, almost two storeys
high, whipped up and accelerated by 315 km/hour gusts, was one of the strongest
tropical cyclones in history. It took 2,500 lives in one sustained fury, leaving
little standing across the islands of Cebu, Leyte, Samar, Panay and Boracay.
The rest of the world rushed to help the survivors. Usually
a prompt and generous donor to Asian countries hit by natural disasters, Hong
Kong looked uncharacteristically hesitant. Its leader and politicians seemed
unwilling to respond. Meanwhile corporate Hong Kong mobilized relief aid,
putting the administration to shame. HK’s domestic helpers donated some of
their meager wages at a relief center in a local church.
For reasons that are unclear, Hong Kong’s media, including
the South China Morning Post, have been making almost daily demands to exact
revenge on the Philippines. The Leung government may be using the Manila bus
case as a diversion from his own low popularity, But in the light of the
current disaster in the Philippines it displays an attitude of outrageous
selfishness, hubris and insensitivity.
No other nation on earth maintains a travel alert warning to
its citizens like the “Black Alert” slapped on the Philippines when Aquino did
not apologize for the shooting of the Hong Kong tourists. That has festered for
three years. Not even neighbor Malaysia, which suffered an armed invasion
recently by agents of the descendant of the former Sultan of Sulu who claims historical
rights to Malaysia’s eastern state of Sabah has demanded an apology.
The bus tragedy is a highly populist issue for vote-hungry
politicians. All the usual opportunists have climbed on this bandwagon. Regina
Ip Lau Suk-yee, chair of the New People’s Party and Executive Council member,
contributed an amendment to scrap visa-free access to Filipinos.
CY Leung announced that The Philippines has until the end of
November to make an apology or face retaliatory measures (as yet not spelled
out). These measures are usually the prerogative of sovereign states. There
is suspicion that Beijing may be using Hong Kong to apply pressure indirectly.
Domestic helpers denied right of
abode, minimum wage
There are 160,000 Filipino domestic helpers in Hong Kong households. They have the most intimate relationship with local families: they care for babies, school-going children and ageing grandparents, they wash, cook, feed, clean-up and walk the dog, freeing Hong Kong couples to earn a living to survive in one of the world’s most expensive, stressed-out cities. They are denied the statutory minimum wage in Hong Kong. They are a distinct underclass of exploited worker in Asia’s ‘World City’.
They are here as their country is unable to provide them
jobs. They have to leave their own families behind – parents. siblings and
children, to earn a meager wage in often pathetically sad conditions, many
sleeping on kitchen floors.
When a domestic helper who had lived and worked in Hong Kong
for over 20 years was denied permanent residency, she sought a review through
the High Court in August 2011. All other workers up to then qualified routinely
after seven years. The Court ruled in her favor.
The Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of
Hong Kong (DAB), from its depths of paranoia, prejudice and barely disguised
race-baiting, raised alarmist scenarios of the territory being flooded by half
a million brown-skinned domestics from The Philippines if right of abode was
granted. DAB legislator Starry Lee Wai-King droned on to the media that “We are
only putting forward an estimate of the probable consequences to remind the
government.”
Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee upstaged that. She rushed to Beijing
to urge a pre-emptive interpretation by the National Peoples Congress (NPC)
Standing Committee. She declared on radio “It is better to seek the
interpretation from the NPC before the government loses the case!” She knew
that would be. The Hong Kong courts do not interpret the law selectively, on
race.
In the end the Hong Kong government sought the
‘reinterpretation’ of the Court of Final Appeal judgment from the NPC and got
it, perpetuating the destruction of the independence of the judicial system and
getting its citizens used to mainland justice. That is something HK residents
may come to rue down the road as feckless local ‘united front’ politicians
continue to chip away at judicial independence with the support of Beijing.
Some sane voices in government have tabled the HK$40 million
for the Legislative Council to debate and approve. Let’s hope it does so
without more cheap domestic political points
to be scored against a people already floored by overwhelming tragedy.’Asia
Sentinel’
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