‘This is my home’: Hong Kong’s foreign residents say they have no plans to leave because of national security law
- Some long-time residents say security law helped restore order after chaos of 2019 social unrest
- Foreigners understand why some Hongkongers have left, but remain optimistic about city’s prospects
Judith Mackay arrived in Hong Kong in 1967 to find the city engulfed in pro-communist riots, and recalls the posters with large letters that screamed: “Imperialists, go home.”
A young doctor from Yorkshire, England, she worked in Hong Kong hospitals until she became an anti-tobacco lobbyist in 1984.
Mackay, 78, has seen changes in the city over the decades, including its 1997 return to Chinese rule, the 2003 Sars outbreak which claimed 299 lives, the social unrest of 2019 and through to the present day.
Married with two sons settled in Britain, she says from her spacious home in upscale Clear Water Bay: “I’m staying in Hong Kong, because it is my home.”
While there have been reports of Hongkongers leaving in the wake of the national security law imposed on the city by Beijing last year, many foreign residents are choosing to remain.
The Post interviewed 10 foreigners working in banking, architecture, the arts, the legal sector or retired, and almost all said the new law had not affected their daily lives or work. Five long-time residents believed the law helped restore stability after the chaos of the 2019 anti-government protests.
