Global Financial Market Review

Chief Executive Carrie Lam said on Tuesday that the central government has to get involved in solving Hong Kong’s political problems to ensure that “One Country, Two Systems” can continue.

She was commenting on remarks made by the head of Beijing’s Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office, Xia Baolong, who said the territory's electoral system needs to be reformed to make sure that the SAR’s leadership is composed only of “staunch patriots”.

The CE noted that Xia had cited a series of issues in Hong Kong over the years, including the government's failed attempts to introduce national security legislation under Article 23 of the Basic Law, the Occupy Central movement in 2014 and the social unrest of 2019, saying these problems had left the central government very worried.

“How did we come to this stage that the central government has to solve problems regarding Hong Kong’s political and electoral systems?...Whenever some controversial issues emerged, some people would incite hatred against the central government,” she said.

“The central government is very worried and that’s why it has to solve the problems to prevent the situation from worsening to a point where the ‘One Country, Two Systems’ principle can no longer be implemented in Hong Kong.”