Opinion | Macau and Hong Kong are too different for Beijing to treat them like peas in a pod

Their different colonial histories bequeathed to Hong Kong and Macau different legal heritages that influenced their populations’ expectations of the government

While Portugal offered Macau residents full citizenship, it also paved the way for Beijing to embed its officials in Macau’s postcolonial civil service and legal system

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Tourists take photos at the Ruins of St Paul's in Macau on December 13. In addition to religion and culture, Portugal brought to its colony a continental European civil law system. Photo: Nora Tam

Published: 2:00pm, 21 Dec 2019Updated: 7:48pm, 21 Dec 2019

Hong Kong and Macau have never been twins. Yet, despite the huge differences between the two former European colonies, China has long sought to treat them like peas in a pod.

Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to Macau to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Portugal’s handover of the territory to China is an occasion to consider why the “one country, two systems” formula that has been applied so smoothly to Macau has led to a depressing disaster in Hong Kong.

This occasion also highlights the importance of the legal system, especially the criminal justice system, in the implementation of one country, two systems. After all, it was the opposition to the Hong Kong government’s proposed extradition bill, which would have subjected anyone within Hong Kong to the mainland’s criminal justice system, that sparked the present conflagration.

It is the Hong Kong government’s refusal, presumably backed by Beijing, to allow an independent investigation into the conduct of the Hong Kong police that prevents progress towards moderating the prevailing strife.

Hongkongers are the products of their distinctive legal history, which has left them with experiences, values, institutions, norms, procedures and expectations that are very different from those of their Macau neighbours.

The English did not bring political democracy to Hong Kong, but they did bring the common law and its belief in and practices for subjecting government to the rule of law. Colonial administrators were controlled by officials in London, who were themselves accountable to an increasingly democratic domestic legal system that illustrated to their colonies the expanding freedoms of expression and protections against arbitrary detention that the common law came to guarantee.