'SAR governments should defend Beijing's authority'

The People's Daily newspaper on Sunday said the management team of the SAR government and public officials should be aware that they ought to defend the central authority and shoulder their duty to govern.



In an op-ed, the state newspaper said all executive branches of the Hong Kong and Macau governments should unswervingly defend the central government's "comprehensive jurisdiction" over the two SARs and safeguard the "complementary combination" with high autonomy of the SARs.



It said the two cannot break apart or stand against each other.



The newspaper said the One Country Two Systems principle is a new thing that needs to be tried and tested to improvise, and in its development stage it was inevitable that various problems may surface. But it said that shouldn't be an excuse to challenge the bottom line of the principle. It stressed any attempts towards "full autonomy" and remarks about "self-determination" would not succeed.



The sole Hong Kong member of the National People's Congress Standing Committee, Tam Yiu-chung, said it's a reasonable request for accountable ministers and public officials to do things that are only beneficial to the government. He said people who work within the government have no reason to attack or cause damage to the administration.