Legislator Priscilla Mei-fun (fourth from left) and Gu Minkang (fifth from left), a senior consultant of the Hong Kong Legal Exchange Foundation, preside over the book launch of Lian Xisheng’s oral history on the drafting of the Basic Law, The Golden Word (Yi Zi Qian Jin). (PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY)

The Basic Law was drafted to safeguard the judicial independence of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region beyond 2047, or the 50-year period promised in the Joint Declaration to keep the city’s lifestyle unchanged, according to Lian Xisheng, a member of the Basic Law Drafting Committee. 

Lian, a law professor at the China University of Political Science and Law in Beijing, clarified that the “high degree of autonomy” stipulated in the Basic Law means that the SAR’s autonomy is authorized by the central government, making it a distinct common law jurisdiction under China’s sovereignty of a continental legal system. 

... by tracing the history of the Basic Law, the Hong Kong SAR will have a better understanding of its legal system and the “one country, two systems” framework

“The autonomy in the HKSAR has been authorized by the State, which is an evolving process in line with the social and economic development of the region and the rest of the State,” Lian, 92, said at the news conference on Tuesday for his newly published book on the Basic Law drafting process, The Golden Word (Yi Zi Qian Jin). The book outlines the oral history of the drafting process inaugurated 12 years before China resumed sovereignty over Hong Kong. 

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The book’s publisher, Basic Law Education Association, said it believes that by tracing the history of the Basic Law, the Hong Kong SAR will have a better understanding of its legal system and the “one country, two systems” framework, according to Priscilla Leung Mei-fun, a member of the Legislative Council and the Committee for the Basic Law of the HKSAR. 

Lian said the legislation of Article 23 of the Basic Law is the constitutional duty of the SAR, and that attaining “universal suffrage” in the election of the Chief Executive and LegCo in Hong Kong, as stipulated in Article 45 and Article 68, should remain the goals. “I see no need to amend the two articles or remove the universal suffrage away from the Basic Law,” Lian said.