Hong Kong is indeed a unique place. Her mini constitution, the Basic Law, even make provision to allow foreign national to hold governmental office up to pretty senior level. For instance, up to 20% members of the legislative council maybe foreign national holding HK permanent residency.
Many senior judges and senior governmental officers of the current administration are either non Chinese themselves (this make them even less likely to become Chinese national) or they are Chinese who are themselves not exclusively Chinese nationals.
This phenomena is unique because China doesn't allow for dual nationality.
Partly it is a legacy of the history. Had it not the "one country two systems" conceived by the Deng Xiaoping, this would have been unthinkable.
The recent controversy regarding the deputy political secretaries and political assistant nationality is actually an easy one to solve and there is no question that Tsang administration scored an own goal.
One nationality defines one political allegiance. It is therefore apt that a political appointee shall owe allegiance to the polity of which he wishes to serve. The argument that the Basic Law doesn't prohibit such an appointment is simply a legal one and that alone doesn't make it political appropriate.
Tsang administration should be minded to have Taiwan as a constant reference to avoid making political mistake. It was not too long ago that Ma Yin Jeou's green card was made such a huge issue in the last Presidential election.
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Dear KY,
As you pointed out, Hong Kong's political system is a hybrid. Not merely resulting from "one country, two systems" but one that is transitioning from one run largely by technocrat civil servants to one where elected officials and their political appointees are increasingly calling the shots.
The former situation can be based solely on the rule of law (although in reality the top positions are never divorced from political considerations) So it goes, if the law does not consider nationality an issue then it is not. But the question of political apointees is governed - directly or indirectly, elected or not - by public opinion. What may be a justification in the former case (I.E. that it is according to the law) would not work as well in the court of public opinion.
It is a curious fact of life for many former colonies. In Brunei the Chief Justice is British as is most high court judges. For some years after independence, even the Chief of the Armed Forces was a British expat. Even today, there are British seconded officers in the Brunei military. The experience to some extent were similar after independence within the Malaysian and Singapore civil service. Now we can see that also in Hong Kong.
I remember in the 80s when the talks over the future of Hong Kong was underway, there was a little debate about 'who' will run Hong Kong. The fear then was that Mainland CCP appointee would rule Hong Kong. To placate the fears, the mantra from China was "kang Ren Zhi Kang" (Hong Kong rule by Hong Kongers) to which the counter-argument was "Kang Fa Zhi Kang" (Hong Kong rule by Hong Kong laws). That was the idea that the rule of law is more important than simply who is in-charge. Obviously, 10 years of slow but steady progress in democracy (there is no other way to describe it) is bringing a sensitivity to to question of nationality and allegience. It just shows that all politics are local !
KH
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