In Hong Kong, the authorities are using all legal means to suppress dissent. Thursday, July 29, a pro-democracy activist DJ appeared in the first “sedition” trial initiated since the handover, in 1997.
Tam Tak-chi, 48, vice-chairman of the opposition People Power party and radio DJ, is one of the activists prosecuted for sedition under a text promulgated in 1938, when the territory was a British colony. This text is distinct from the drastic law on national security which was imposed in the summer of 2020 by Beijing on its semi-autonomous region and which is one of the main tools of repression.
Known in the Territory by his stage name “Fast Beat”, Mr. Tam is being prosecuted on five counts of “Sedition” for slogans he chanted or wrote between January and July 2020. He is also being prosecuted for inciting an illegal gathering in particular.
At the start of his trial on Thursday, the prosecution read a few of these slogans, as well as speeches made by Mr. Tam, which were often punctuated with curses in Cantonese. “Free Hong Kong, the revolution of our time! “, “Corrupt police, let your family go to hell!” “ are among the slogans for which he is prosecuted, as are “Dismantle the Hong Kong police without delay!” “ or “Down with the Communist Party of China! “.
This trial occupies an important place in the process of muscular recovery launched last year by Beijing, after the immense popular mobilization of 2019. It should make it possible to determine the sentences now prohibited in the eyes of local justice.
Blurred concept
On Tuesday, a court found Tong Ying-kit, a 24-year-old waiter from Hong Kong, guilty of terrorism and inciting secession in the first trial under the National Security Act. During this trial, the magistrates considered that the formula “Free Hong Kong, the revolution of our time! “, which was one of the main slogans of protesters in 2019, was a secessionist proclamation, falling under the National Security Act.
Mr. Tam’s trial had been delayed so that the judges could see the outcome of the waiter’s trial.
In Hong Kong, sedition is a vague concept that can be applied to any word of “Hatred, contempt or disaffection” towards the government. This law inherited from colonization is denounced by some as an attack on freedom of expression. No sedition convictions were handed down for decades before Hong Kong returned to China’s fold in 1997.
Five members of a Hong Kong speech therapists union have already been arrested for sedition for a series of children’s books about a village of sheep in resistance against wolves. Three of them were indicted and remanded in custody.