Opinion | Hong Kong independence activist Andy Chan is neither a martyr nor a threat to Chinese rule
Peter Kammerer says the overreactions to the Foreign Correspondents’ Club talk go both ways: Beijing may have made an international celebrity out of a nobody, while those coming to Chan’s defence are blowing the threat to ‘free speech’ out of proportion
You've got to be bemused by the fuss over Hong Kong independence advocate Andy Chan Ho-tin's talk at the Foreign Correspondents' Club. Beijing has turned a nobody into a somebody by making him out to be a pariah and provided the freest of publicity to a boozy place to meet friends and contacts. Neither deserve the attention. Wrapped around it all is an outcry that the special administrative region's freedom of speech and press are being trampled on.
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Let's get some basic facts in order. Chan and the Hong Kong National Party he founded aren't a threat to Chinese sovereignty, as nobody takes them seriously or ever will. The idea that Hong Kong can stand on its own feet is fantasy.
Surely those foreign policy experts from the Chinese foreign ministry learned something about the debacle over Joshua Wong Chi-fung and his pro-democracy activism? Guys, it's simple: unnecessarily making a martyr out of somebody attracts international attention and, the next thing you know, he's on the cover of Time magazine and the haters are out in force condemning you. Do it in front of a gaggle of foreign journalists and the outcome is as predictable as the rising sun.
Next, to the FCC. It's a nice place to drink, but I wouldn't want to be a member. I've been there a few dozen times or more, to meet this colleague or that, to hear someone in the news speak, to pick up awards for my writing; a dearly departed friend, Ian Stewart, was president in what I think of as its heyday during the Vietnam war in the 1960s and early 1970s.
It's good public relations for the government to provide a venue for journalists to hang out, even if it's at market rent rates, but there are plenty of places in town to get a cold beer and gossip. What's most special about the club is where it's housed – in a grade one historic building from Victorian times, one of the best examples in Hong Kong of a protected structure being preserved and put to good use.
An exterior view of the Foreign Correspondents' Club in Central on August 6. Photo: Reuters
