TRANSCRIPT

Governor Patten, thank you very much for joining us.

THE RIGHT HONOURABLE GOVERNOR CHRIS PATTEN: Nice to be here

CHINOY: In three and a half months Britain is going to hand Hong Kong back to China. The Chinese have already appointed a new chief executive, Tung Chee Hwa. He’s already selected his own group of advisors and Beijing has also set up a provisional legislature to take over after the handover. Do you feel that power is ebbing away from your administration, that there is already a shadow government calling the shots here?

PATTEN: Inevitably, since we are only a little over 100 days away from the transition, and people look to Mr. Tung for reassurance about the future. They don’t think we are going to make a mess of things in the next 3 and a half months. According to the latest poll I saw, 73% of them were satisfied with the government and 90% of them with their lives in Hong Kong. So as sunsets go, it’s a pretty golden one. But inevitably, we are coming to the end of our period of responsibilities. Still we’ve got some things to do, and I still want to make sure Hong Kong is going to be handed over in good order.

CHINOY: But you don’t feel that your own authority is on the wane, that makes it harder for you to do the job?

PATTEN: I guess I am in much the same position, perhaps more dramatic version of it, as an outgoing president, his successor is being chosen, when his successor is starting to put together his team and his ideas, we’re about that stage, I guess, in the transition. I am still responsible for the good government of Hong Kong. Mr. Tung has made it clear that he doesn’t believe there should be a second source of power. I certainly think some of the activities in the Provisional Legislature are tiresome and rather embarrassing for Hong Kong, but I don’t feel threatened by them. My main concerns about what they are going to do to the reputation of the Special Administrative Region government.

CHINOY: Let me ask you about the Provisional Legislature. Would you support a legal challenge in the courts of Hong Kong to its legality and its legitimacy and what do you think of the impact of any such challenge, whether you support it or not, might be on the political scene here now, and after the handover?

PATTEN: I doubt whether there would be such a challenge before the 30th of June, it depends on what they get up to, but I don’t want to answer a hypothetical question about that. What I am concerned about is the position after the 30th of June. Whatever you say about the Provisional Legislature I don’t think anybody doubts that if it does anything before the 30th of June, there are going to be challenges to that. There are legal question marks raised about that. They are raised among others, by some of the most distinguished senior lawyers in Hong Kong. So my main feeling about the Provisional Legislature -- this rather embarrassing thing that meets on an occasional Saturday mornings in Shenzhen -- my main concerns about it are for the future administration of Hong Kong because I can imagine circumstances if this body tries to legislate, the Special Administration Region (SAR) government will be tied up with legal challenges after the 1st of July and nobody wants to see that. It is completely unnecessary, whatever you think about the necessity for the Provisional Legislature, you know exactly what my views are on that. There is no necessity for a Provisional Legislature before the 30th of June. It is simply and solely a political act and I think it’s damaging and bad for Hong Kong.

CHINOY: China says that after the handover, whatever happens to Hong Kong, it’s China’s internal affair in which outsiders have no right to meddle. Do you believe that after the handover Britain or other countries have a moral right to speak out, to criticize, even to bring pressure if they find what China is doing is questionable?

PATTEN: Of course, but lets distinguish between Britain’s position and that of others. Britain has a clear interest as one of those countries which has made a considerable investment in Hong Kong's success, but more importantly Britain has continuing moral responsibilities. The Chinese signed a treaty for 50 years after 1997 which guarantees Hong Kong's way of life. If China appears to be resigning from the obligations in that treaty, then plainly it’s incumbent upon Britain to speak out. So Britain’s position is absolutely clear and Britain has made it plain that the government will be reporting every 6 months to the Parliament on how the Joint Declaration has been implemented. Plus that, Britain will make those reports available to the UN treaty monitoring bodies in Geneva. What is the position of other countries? It’s simple. They are going to look at Hong Kong, the way Peking handles Hong Kong, as a sort of test of the way China is going to behave on the international stage in the future. They recognize I think, that the way Peking handles Hong Kong goes right to the heart of a lot of issues which are going to determine what China is like for the foreseeable future. So you bet people are going to look at what happens in Hong Kong. A lot of Canadians, Americans, Australians, Japanese and so on will be very concerned whether people in Hong Kong remain politically free as well as economically free.

CHINOY: Your successor as Chief Executive Tung Chee-Hwa, has defended Chinese’s move to repeal sections of the Bill of Rights and to amend other laws here, on a number of grounds. One of them is that it is simply a procedural issue that won’t really endanger human rights and political liberties. The other argument is that until a few years ago when the laws were changed under your administration, this was how Britain ruled here for so many years and that ....why all the fuss? Would you concede that

he has a point?

PATTEN: No, I wouldn’t, and let me deal with those points in sequence. First of all, is it just procedural? If it is just procedural, why have all the rumpus about it? The fact of the matter is, the chairman of the Bar association in Hong Kong, the leader of the legal profession here, has argued vigorously in an open letter to Mr. Tung, that the proposals that have been made, and the way they are being made, risk undermining the rule of law. That’s what she said very clearly, not me. Secondly, why have we made changes to some of our legislation on freedom of speech, on freedom of demonstration in the last few years? One reason why people in Hong Kong became concerned about issues like the right to demonstrate, the right to march and so on was because of Tiananmen.

CHINOY: I spoke with Tung Chee-Hwa some days ago and in the course of that interview he argued that laws here forbid certain kinds of attacks on the British Royal family and that it was entirely possible after the handover that the post colonial administration might amend those laws in a way that would then outlaw attacks on Chinese leaders. What was your reaction to that?

PATTEN: Well, I actually wrote to C.H. about those remarks and spoke to him personally about them as well, because I think somebody has given him the wrong information, given him a dud steer. And I think the same has been true about his proposed secretary of justice who’s a local lawyer. The fact of the matter is that if you put defamation on one side, the law on that applies to everybody. I don’t advise it, but you can be rude about me, you can be rude about John Major, you can be rude about the Queen, provided that you don’t do it with seditious intent. In other words, provided you don’t incite people to violence to try to achieve their objectives. That’s the position in our society. And anybody thinks that you can’t be rude about the Royal family should perhaps look at the British tabloid press or “Spitting Image” or “Private Eye”..... I’m afraid it shows rather less knowledge of the law in these matters than is ideal.

CHINOY: How much do you think Mr. Tung and the Chinese leadership really understand the nature of Hong Kong society today?

PATTEN: I think it’s for people to judge as far as Mr. Tung is concerned. He has lived in Hong Kong a lot longer than I have, to be fully fair, but if you are talking about the Chinese leadership, and I don’t know how much their views will differ from Mr. Tung on this. I think people do worry from time to time about the extent to which they understand the nature of a free society. I wish they could just relax about Hong Kong. I wish they wouldn’t give the impression that they want to see Hong Kong governed according to the “struggle” concept of Marxist-Leninism. They should stand back from Hong Kong, they should let Hong Kong get on with its way of life, they will find the people of Hong Kong want to make a success of the transition and want to see Hong Kong contributing to the next great step forward in Chinese history. But they really mustn’t risk stifling Hong Kong, through being absolutely obsessive with controlling everything here.

CHINOY: Let me ask you about another controversial subject. Both Mr. Tung and the Chinese foreign minister in recent days have said that they would support possible rewriting of the history books in Hong Kong after the handover. I know that’s an issue on which you’ve expressed your concern, but would you not acknowledge that in a China-controlled Hong Kong, that it might be legitimate to rewrite for example, the way history text dealt with the Opium War, under which Imperial Britain seized Hong Kong?...

PATTEN: A China controlled Hong Kong? Is that how one sees Hong Kong's much promised autonomy in the future? One of the areas Hong Kong is supposed to have autonomy is education. It’s supposed to be a position in the Joint Declaration and Basic Law, in which it runs its own educational policies and quite right, too. I totally recognize that people will want Hong Kong text books to reflect the fact that that China after 1997 is the sovereign power, reflect the fact that kids in school will need know about one county, two systems. But as soon as you talk about snowpicking some bits out of history, rewriting history, then I think you are on a very dangerous and slippery slope indeed. I don’t deny that children need to learn about the Opium War in the 19th century, just as they need to learn about the Great Leap Forward, and the Cultural Revolution and Tiananmen. What I’m absolutely convinced about is that in a modern sophisticated economy and society in Hong Kong, with Internet, with people who travel, with kids so many of them going abroad to university, you can’t stop doctoring history without it having a very substantial social implications.

CHINOY: How do you think Tung Chee Hwa in general is doing?

PATTEN: I don’t think it’s a fair question to ask me, I think the judge and jury are going to be the people of Hong Kong and that’s a point which he recognises, just as I recognise that they’re my judge and jury as well.. He’s got a very tough job, as I know from my own experience. He ‘s got a lot of challenges to overcome and I’m sure that he’ll have the support of the community in taking on these difficulties.

CHINOY: Do you think he is consulting with Beijing or is giving the appearance of consulting with Beijing too much? What do you think is the right balance, based on your own experience? How much should he be consulting with them? Should he be consulting with them as much as you consult with London.?

PATTEN: I’ve got as you know a politically quite strong position with London. I’m a close friend of the Prime Minister, of most of the rest of the cabinet. I was chairman of the Conservative Party. It gives me a good deal of independent authority in dealing with London.. I think people recognise that I’ve stood up for Hong Kong, that I’ve argued for Hong Kong. Even if they don't always agree with me I think they would say that of me. Obviously C.H., Mr. Tung, will have to demonstrate as well that he’s Hong Kong’s man in talking to Peking rather than the other way around. Nobody is suggesting that, either in my relations with London or his relations with Peking, that we should be endlessly involved, to borrow a phrase I was using earlier, in “struggle” sessions. Of course if you can get your way or Hong Kong’s way by rather more sophisticated means so be it, but at the end of the day people will reach a judgment about whether they think you’re a transmission mechanism for the sovereign power or whether you’re really trying to defend things for Hong Kong.

CHINOY: Do you detect any signs that the Chinese have adjusted or moderated their policies here in the last couple of months in response to the chorus of criticisms from you, from other governments from business executives or in contrast, do you have any feeling that all the criticism has simply prompted Beijing to dig in its heels?

PATTEN: I think the extent to which the whole community has spoken out on civil liberties issues must have had some effect on Peking. After all they must want to win hearts and minds and not simply take over the real estate. Let me just be clear on two things that people will be looking at very closely, and it relates to what you were saying about autonomy and standing up for Hong Kong. First of all, people are going to be looking very carefully at what election arrangements are put in place to replace the ones that exist at present. People know that we’ve had in Hong Kong free and fair elections. They will look very beadily, they will look with a very close eye at whatever arrangements are put in place and they will want to be sure that those arrangements are made in Hong Kong, not imposed on Hong Kong from outside. Secondly, I think people will also be very concerned that the consultation on civil liberties which Mr. Tung has promised, is a genuine consultation . I think that if it is a genuine consultation, then we will find Mr. Tung and Chinese officials rowing back from the position that they’ve so far taken, because we know what people in Hong Kong think about these matters.

CHINOY: Looking back over the past few years, it seems pretty clear that the Chinese are determined to undo as many of your reforms as they can. So, when you leave here, what do you think will remain of your reforms if the institutions themselves, the arrangements and structures are substantially altered by China, what’s going to be left of the Patten reforms?

PATTEN: First of all it’s flattering of you to describe them as reforms. I think I’ve just been doing what I was obliged to do under the Joint Declaration, to give Hong Kong a decent election system and to give it decent protection for its civil liberties . Of course you can trash those things. Of course you can trash the Legislative Council. Of course you can try to design arrangements which will reduce the number of Democrats who can be elected, which I suspect is what they may try to do. Of course you can try to stop people exercising the freedom to speak out or occasionally to demonstrate, to march around with a petition. You can do those things. But what you can’t do is to dismantle the benchmarks which we’ve established in the last few years. People know what a free society is in Hong Kong. They know what free elections are like. They know what free speech is like. They know what government operating with a very light hand is like when it comes to their civil liberties. They know that that hasn’t resulted in economic failure. The economy has gone on getting stronger. They know that that hasn’t resulted in political turbulence. Crime in Hong Kong has gone down and Hong Kong is manifestly an extremely stable place, not the least when you compare it with other places in Asia. So they know the reality, that they’re... that they’ve been competent enough, mature enough to manage political change with the same degree of responsibility that they’ve managed economic change. They know all those things and I don’t think that anybody in 1997 is going to be able to turn the clock back or snuff out all those political aspirations, those legitimate aspirations that people in Hong Kong have. Maybe for a year or two people may be able to stop some things happening that we’ve taken for granted but I don’t honestly believe that you can turn the clock back in Hong Kong by five, ten, fifteen, twenty years.

CHINOY: But would you not acknowledge that in doing this, that Beijing saw that this was Britain shaping a political system in Hong Kong in a way that would allow Hong Kong to stand up and act more independently of Beijing and that China felt that this was not what it signed up to when it agreed with Britain in the mid-eighties on the handover terms?

PATTEN: What it signed up to was an agreement under which Hong Kong would have the same freedoms that it’s got now, and the agreement that it would have a steady process of democratic development. If you look back at what was said to people at the time that the treaty with China was signed, it was perfectly clear that Hong Kong’s autonomy was to be underpinned by increasingly democratic institutions. I think that something that made life a lot more difficult was Tiananmen, and I say that not because of the impact that it had in particular on attitudes in Hong Kong -- and I think it did have some impact. I think in a sense it had far more impact on Peking’s attitude to Hong Kong. Some of the cadres in Peking saw a million people on the streets in a Chinese city and I think that made them very nervous about Hong Kong’s freedoms and Hong Kong’s political development. But I think that China sooner or later will have to understand what a free society in Hong Kong means. Sooner or later they’ll have to trust Hong Kong otherwise they’ll risk the very political stability they so prize.

CHINOY: Finally what kind of emotions are you going to feel when the Royal yacht Britannia sails out of Hong Kong harbour and you look back on the place for the last time?

PATTEN: Well personal emotions and if you like emotions tinged by a sense of history. Personal because this will be the end of five years of my life and my family’s life. Secondly I will feel that I’m sailing away from one of the great cities in the world which has the opportunity to become even greater. I hope I can feel that we’ve done our best to ensure Hong Kong's future well being and it’s now going to be up to China and the people of Hong Kong and I hope they make a success of it.

CHINOY: Governor Patten thank you very much for speaking with me today. I’ve been speaking with Chris Patten, the last colonial governor of Hong Kong. I’m Mike Chinoy CNN in Hong Kong.

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