The Hong Konger

The world has pretty much forgotten about Jimmy Lai, time to change that

As a child I grew up with the names of freedom fighters or dissidents like Nelson Mandela, Natan Sharansky and Vladimir Bukovsky. These were household names, everyone knew and talked about them. Activists and indeed often the public at large would not rest until progress was made to get them released and have these brave men taste freedom again. It succeeded, often, but it required long and relentless international campaigns. It also helped that the former Soviet-Union and South Africa were economically isolated countries where all sorts of pressure tactics could be made to work. One thing I could not have foreseen that decades later a wealthy Hong Kong business icon would join the ranks of these famous political prisoners. Yet when compared to these heroes from the 20th century there is one glaring difference today: the world at large does not seem to care one bit about the fate of this Hong Konger.

During my years in Hong Kong - a period we now consider as the happy and roaring nineties - I became a devout client of a local Gap like retail chain called Giordano. It was odd to see one of Asia’s premier retail brands leaning so heavily on an Italian identity, but it really worked. Colourful, quality fashion and in particular indestructible t-shirts that became the staple of my wardrobe were available for a few bucks at any outlet, not just in Hong Kong where it all started, but in most large Asian cities. The story behind the retail empire was one of rags to riches. A young immigrant from Guangzhou province with a background in textiles launched Giordano in Hong Kong and in the process became both wealthy and quite famous. This was Jimmy Lai.

Lai was a charismatic and interesting character and did not stick to just pumping out jeans and t-shirts and raking in the dollars. He was someone who realized early on that his wealth came to him as a result of the freedoms and rights that Hong Kongers enjoyed, but also that wealth in itself was meaningless. A catholic himself, his focus on life became defined by a search for meaning and the course of history would present that to him. He entered publishing, with a new entertainment magazine in Hong Kong called NEXT. It was a success and based on that he ventured further by actually launching a newspaper: Apple Daily. It was a tabloid style publication which mixed news and political commentary, and in no time it became one of Hong Kong’s leading dailies. More crucially is that after the territory’s handover to China in 1997, the newspaper became a major irritant for the new rulers. Lai had become a noted pro-democracy voice strongly opposed to the Chinese leadership with unvarnished opinions that through his media empire had a vast reach into the lives of the people of Hong Kong. It was a brave, almost sacrificial, position to take as Hong Kong’s business elite was pretty much unified in its support for the new rulers.

The post-handover years in Hong Kong were marked by a steady erosion of democracy and freedoms for the territory. There were two watershed moments during this period. First, the pro-democracy protests of 2014 - the launch of the Umbrella Movement - and then the protests of 2019-20. The latter escalated to a point where the Hong Kong government under its leader Carrie Lam cracked down violently on the mostly young protestors and with the help of both Covid and the Beijing authorities were able to completely shut down and neutralize the rebelling city. So while the pandemic helped locking everyone down, the Beijing-led and rapidly implemented National Security Law, suffocated whatever life was left in the vibrant and open society. It is a document that is so far reaching that even the merest expression of interest in anything foreign could be interpreted as collusion or subversion under the law and lead to long prison sentences. As of today, almost all key figures in Hong Kong’s pro-democracy movement are in prison, sentenced or awaiting trial. And if convicted under some local statute or some criminal sub-section hailing from the colonial British days does not lead to the desired prison sentences, the National Security Law will see to it that most voices are shut down for good.

And that is exactly the fate that has befallen Jimmy Lai. As a key figure in the protests and as the publisher of the Apple Daily he was one of the voices that had to be silenced. The Hong Kong government wasted no time to indict him under various statutes, the Apple Daily for instance was shut down completely for allegedly using its offices for activities that did not meet the requirements of the building lease. Lai is currently serving a few concurrent sentences. A new trial under the hated National Security Act is forthcoming, a course of action clearly designed to lock up seventy-five year old Jimmy Lai for the rest of his life.

Lai has looked the threats that he and his family have been subjected to directly in the eye and never budged. In this moving interview on CBC (watch until the end) a few years ago Lai points to how the world’s optimism of the 1990s with regards to China was ultimately deeply flawed: we all thought openness, trade and commerce would bring democracy to China, but the reverse actually happened. A wealthy and authoritarian elite in Beijing decided the way forward was to steamroll all dissent and subjugate democracy. Worse, by implementing the National Security Law, China broke its commitments under the Basic Law and the Joint Declaration, the two key documents whereby Britain and China agreed to have the city-state remain a self-governing entity within China for fifty years.

In one of his last interviews Lai professes to have no fear of what will happen to him. He is grounded is his belief that the people of Hong Kong deserve to speak their minds and seek out what is best for them. Not only has Lai internalized the core human principles of liberty and freedom, his deep and emotional attachment to Hong Kong has given him no other choice than to accept the terrible fate of potentially spending the rest of his life in prison. The parallels with Nelson Mandela who after a long international campaign walked out of prison at age seventy-one are endless. Up to a point, of course. The world today is extremely reluctant to stand up to China and seek the release of a great and compassionate human being. Time is running out: time to speak up.

Free Jimmy Lai.

Note: tomorrow a documentary on Jimmy Lai called The Hong Konger produced by the Acton Institute will be released worldwide. Check it out, it is good.