Opinion | If China hears the Hong Kong people, it must let Carrie Lam go

The furore over the extradition bill has metamorphosed into generalised civil unrest permeating all corners of Hong Kong. At the fundamental level, it is no longer about the bill, or Hong Kong-Beijing relations. It is about Hongkongers’ relationship with our government, which only Hong Kong itself can repair. 

An indiscriminate attack by triad members on train passengers in Yuen Long on July 21 and the police’s inexplicable response have dissipated almost all the trust Hongkongers placed in our government and law enforcement. Violent clashes between protesters and the police have turned into a biweekly inevitability. Their intensity in dense residential neighbourhoods – Yuen Long on July 27 and Sheung Wan on July 28, in particular – was reminiscent of a civil war.

The umbrella, a symbol of our desire for democracy, is now a shield against the police’s tear gas as well as triads’ wooden sticks.

The police’s approach to quelling protests, and their hostility to any notion that they may have failed or committed wrongdoing in any way, as evidenced by their denunciation of Chief Secretary Matthew Cheung Kin-chung’s apology to the public, have raised concern that they may have become a law unto themselves.

None of the 12 persons arrested for unlawful assembly in the Yuen Long attack on July 21 have yet been charged. Meanwhile, 43 persons arrested in the Sheung Wan protest on July 28 were arraigned on July 31 on charges of rioting. Such inconsistent treatment by the police and the Department of Justice cannot plausibly be said to conform to the rule of law.