China | Signal failure

Border checks at a railway station in Hong Kong spook locals

Suspicions of the mainland’s government run deep in the territory

The thin end of the wedge
|HONG KONG

GRANDIOSE development projects are so numerous in China that superlatives have been exhausted. But the “Greater Bay Area” scheme, embracing a large chunk of Guangdong province as well as the neighbouring enclaves of Hong Kong and Macau, deserves a special mention. Chinese officials tout it as a “megacity cluster” in the making, which will surpass the bays of San Francisco and Tokyo in economic might. In his speech at the congress of China’s ruling Communist Party in October, President Xi Jinping said the project, involving big spending on transport links, would be a national “priority”. But there is grumbling in Hong Kong.

The former British colony is already well connected with the Chinese mainland by road, rail, sea and air. Next year it will have two new links that will make travel even easier: a 40km-long bridge joining Hong Kong, the mainland and Macau; and a high-speed rail service between Hong Kong and Guangzhou, the capital of Guangdong (see map). The new railway will reduce the journey between Hong Kong and Guangzhou to 50 minutes, from two hours at present. Hong Kong’s share of the project, including a massive new terminus (pictured) under construction in Kowloon, a central neighbourhood, will cost more than HK$84.4bn ($10.8bn).

Officials would like to make the rail journey even smoother by stationing border police, customs officers and quarantine inspectors from mainland China in the new building. That may sound fair enough—Hong Kong is, after all, a part of China. But under the policy of “one country, two systems”, it has what amounts to an international border with the mainland. Non-citizens must show passports and visas to cross it; locals must produce passes. Some people in Hong Kong complain that the proposed arrangement at the station permits security agents of a one-party dictatorship to work openly in a place that, for all China’s efforts to restrict its democracy, remains remarkably liberal.

The immigration proposal requires Hong Kong’s government to lease part of the station and the train tracks themselves to the mainland authorities, whose security personnel will have full criminal and civil jurisdiction over them. On November 18th Hong Kong’s chief executive, Carrie Lam, and the governor of Guangdong province, Ma Xingrui, signed an agreement to kick off the project—a moment which was delayed for three weeks after opposition politicians filibustered a non-binding vote to approve the step by members of Hong Kong’s Legislative Council. Next month China’s rubber-stamp parliament is expected to ratify the arrangement. After that, a law will need to be passed in Hong Kong allowing the mainland officials to work there. The government hopes that will happen in time for the line to open around a year from now.

The railroading of these measures will not quell dissenters. Distrust of the central government is intense among pro-democracy legislators in Hong Kong. They fear that people might be arrested by mainland officers at the station in Hong Kong if they break any of the mainland’s often ill-defined laws, not just ones relating to immigration. A poll in August found that 55% of Hong Kongers supported the scheme but 48% were worried that it would lead to more bits of the territory being surrendered to the mainland’s control.

It is likely that the issue will be hotly debated in March during campaigning for four Legco seats left vacant by the recent expulsion of pro-democracy legislators for deliberately mangling their oaths. Candidates demanding more autonomy for Hong Kong will play to the public’s fears. New connections may ease travel around the Greater Bay Area, but they will not erase its political divisions.

This article appeared in the China section of the print edition under the headline "Signal failure"

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