Letters | Beijing is sincere about ‘one country, two systems’ in Hong Kong, just not infinitely tolerant

I am responding to the letter, “Imagine a fresh start in political overhaul of city” (April 27).

I am inclined to agree with the first part of the letter, which said the Hong Kong government did not do a good job of looking after Hongkongers’ livelihoods, leading to runaway housing prices and a big wealth gap. The extradition bill thus acted as a spark that eventually set the forest afire. Government incompetence was surely partly responsible for the unrest.

However, your correspondent raised the question of the central government’s commitment to implementing the “one country, two systems” framework. I believe it has been sincere in doing so.

Over the past 23 years, Hong Kong has commemorated the June 4 Tiananmen Square crackdown without a break, while the pan-democrats, acting like “world saviours”, kept on blaming the central government for one thing or another. But tolerance was not infinite.

When they crossed a red line, the central government had no choice but to enact the national security law. It makes no sense for the central government to want to totally destroy Hong Kong. Why would it do that? We did have the opportunity to elect our chief executive but the pan-democrats simply said, back then, that the proposed plan was not their cup of tea.