Beijing Very Concerned About HK Impasse: Academic

A political commentator says he feels Beijing is very concerned about the situation in Hong Kong and one way out for the central government is to restart political reform talks to end the current political impasse.

Wilson Wong from Chinese University's department of government and public administration said on Thursday that the current saga shows Chief Executive Carrie Lam had totally failed to understand the minds of the people and that the public sees a huge gap between what she says and what she actually does.

Wong said Beijing should seek feedback from more people in Hong Kong and not rely solely on communication with principal officials. He said the pro-Beijing lawmakers should also be channelling information to the central government.

"The pro-establishment camp in Hong Kong also has a duty to report what is happening in Hong Kong to Beijing directly," he said. But all those lawmakers were supporting the Chief Executive during the legislation process of the extradition bill without considering the general public's feelings, he said.

"They should change a little bit and report directly to Beijing what they heard or what they had seen instead of just listening to the Chief Executive," he said.

Wong said one way out for Lam now would be to restart the debate on constitutional reform.

He told RTHK's Candice Wong that Beijing could also take a stance that it welcomes the idea of restarting discussions about political reform in a bid to solve the current political impasse.