Reports that Hong Kong's democracy movement was dead appear to have been greatly exaggerated.
Just as Hon. Martin Lee, the leader of Hong Kong's democracy movement predicted to members of the recent Sovereign Society Far East Financial Expedition, yesterday, Dec. 4th, has turned out to be a decisive day in the city-state's history.
A turnout on Sunday of as many as 250,000 marchers is a clear repudiation of pro-Beijing policies that would stall, if not kill, democratic aspirations in Hong Kong. It also signals the vibrancy of a grass-roots democratic awakening that had been slumbering in China's most developed commercial city. Had Sunday's turnout been low, it could have sunk the democracy movement.
The protest, which filled Hong Kong's downtown to overflowing, was sparked by a Beijing proposal that would indefinitely delay introduction of a "one man, one vote" system. It was also fed by statements from Hong Kong's pro-Beijing business tycoons that the city wasn't mature enough to govern itself. As Martin Lee told us: "We are not children and Beijing must stop treating us as if we are."
"'This is make-or-break time," the pro-democracy movement's veteran leader said. "The more people that march, the more the government will have to do something about this." Lee charged that "the governments (of Hong Kong and China) in the past week have done everything they can to keep the numbers down and they failed."
The Christian Science Monitor reported from Hong Kong that: "The march was a culmination of growing polarization between popular desire for speedy democracy and the Beijing backed government of Donald Tsang. It sets the stage for future collisions between Tsang and the democrats. All sides were calling Dec. 4 a 'crossroads.' Indeed, Sunday's march may prove as significant as the July 1, 2003, march of 500,000 residents that ultimately drove Mr. Tsang's predecessor out of office and gave birth to a democracy movement centered in the legal profession."
Many business elites in Hong Kong have spoken disparagingly of rallies and protests by "rabble." Yet as Sin-ming Shaw, a well known Hong Kong writer puts it, "These are smart, accomplished people. This is the first globalized Chinese community. They live in an ...open economy that competes well with the best of the world. So to hear we aren't mature enough...it is ridiculous. It angers people."
The true threat, as the Communists in the Beijing government rightly perceive, is to them and their power -- and it is embodied in the growing spirit of democracy typified by the people of Hong Kong that some day will spread throughout all of China.
As our readers know, Hong Kong is one of the Sovereign Society's top picks as an offshore financial center. We will soon announce partnership with the Hong Kong branch of one of Switzerland's leading banking groups for Sovereign Society Convenient Accounts based there. We are also completing arrangements with Hong Kong's Zetland Financial Group Ltd. to provide our members who are active offshore investors with fiduciary services, investment management and corporate and trust advisory services.
Aside from the Communist curbs on democracy and their inequitable limits on representative government, Hong Kong's economy is one the world's freest. For the last eight years, the conservative Heritage Foundation in Washington, DC, has rated it the freest economy in the world. The Cato Institute, the leading libertarian research group, has rated it number one in economic freedom for nine years. And Hong Kong consistently ranks at or near the top of everyone's lists of free market economics around the globe. And it is the gateway to doing business with the 1.3 billion Chinese market.
Hong Kong has low taxes and a simple, predictable tax regime. The top corporate tax rate is just 17.5%. The top personal income tax rate is 15.5%. A personal income tax return is just two pages. Capital gains are tax-free. Double your money on a stock, pocket the full 100%. Sell an investment property for a million dollar profit, keep it all. There is also no tax on personal dividends or bank interest. There is no VAT or sales tax.
Setting up a new business is simple. Foreigners who invest are not subject to special regulations or requirements. You can register a company in Hong Kong in an afternoon, open a bank account the same day and have the business operating within a week. And the Hong Kong banking system is far more stable than that of mainland China, where non performing bank loans and government corruption abound. Sunday's outpouring of a quarter of a million marchers is a strong reconfirmation of Hong Kong's demand for freedom -- and it can only enhance this city-state as the financial leader of Asia.
Bob Bauman
The Sovereign Society
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