The Watching Brief : Annals of a lawmaker from British Colony to China’s SAR 
《拱心石下》英文版
 
吳靄儀女士以2018年出版的《拱心石下》為藍本，經修訂及增加了2018年後的內容後，翻譯成英文。
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| Contents |

Preface to the English Edition
 
Chapter 1 The Road to Politics 
Upbring of a New Territories Girl
Political Awareness in the 70s
The Awkward Brigade
Consultation Politics
Watching from Afar
We Take on the Challenge
Sino-British Joint Declaration
Law and Politics
Enter the Last Governor: Chris Patten
 
Chapter 2 Challenges of the Transition
The Last LegCo under British Administration
Law-making for the Transition
International Advocacy
The Handover
Ambush of the Provisional LegCo
 
Chapter 3  Right of Abode and Equality before the Law
Who is a Hong Kong SAR Resident?
How it started
Defeat of an Unlawful Change
The Empire Strikes Back
Beijing “Interprets” the Basic Law
TributetoMrsPamBaker——theLaw’sKnight-Errant
Challenging the Secretary for Justice
Punishment
 
Chapter 4 The Fight Against “Article 23” Legislation 
The Sword of Damocles
The Gathering Storm
The Rainbow Pamphlets
An Unforgettable Victory
The Long Shadow of Article 23
 
Chapter 5 Democracy for Hong Kong — the People and the Land
The Political Parties’ attempt to Win Political Reform
Origin and Founding of Civic Party
Challenging the 2007 CE Election
Attempts to Break the Ice with Mainland Officials
The Longest Debate
From Bilbao to West Kowloon
High Speed Rail and Choy Yuen Village
 
Chapter 6 The Three Buildings of LegCo
Déjà vu
Day and Night in the Old Building
New Software for the Old building
The Power of Committees
Farewell My Lovely
Bigger is Not Better
The Hazards of Filibustering
My Swan Song
The Long Goodbye
 
Afterword
Acknowledegments
Appendix
 
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Preface to the English Edition
 
Eighteen years is a long time to give to politics, especially when one is driven not by temptation of the glittering prize of power and glory but a grim sense of obligation. Hong Kong is the city of my birth. Her future under an untried promise of “one country, two systems” when Britain handed her back to Communist China after 150 years of colonial rule was my mission. I was no politician. I was a lawyer with a taste in the liberal arts. I stood for election in Hong Kong’s local parliament called the Legislative Council (“LegCo” for short) because the most politically active people shaping Hong Kong’s constitutional future were members of my profession. We believed that, whatever political views politicians may take, the fundamental values of freedom and democracy can only prevail under the rule of law. And so I served as a member of LegCo for 18 years from 1995 to 2012. I did not act alone. It was always the best of my profession working through me, and after I stepped down, I felt I owe it to them, and to the people who placed their faith in us, to put on record our endeavours for future generations. I wrote in Chinese because the wider public in this city was my primary audience. “Under the Keystone —— 18 years in politics”1 was published in 2018. “Keystone” because of the classical architectural style of the building in which LegCo was housed. My editor thought it symbolized the ability to withstand pressure from both sides and maintain balance and stability. I did not know then that my city was at the brink of drastic change, and a book such as that can never be written again.
 
This is the English version of that book, now clothed with new significance. I had always intended to produce an English version, because the non-Chinese-speaking community was an integral part of my city, and they are just as entitled to an account of those years and how we, on the mandate of the people, spent them. But the two halves of the city do not duplicate each other. Their cultural background, their habits and frame of mind are not the same —— indeed, this is what makes the city so uniquely interesting. And so the English version is not a literal translation of the Chinese. I have basically re-written the book bearing in mind these differences. Even as I was preparing the English version, a new protest movement shook the city: the mass protest against the government’s attempt to change the law to make it easier for the government to surrender people in Hong Kong suspected of having committed a crime to the mainland, to be dealt with under the Chinese justice system. The law that was sought to be changed was a law LegCo passed in my time in that form for the protection of all who live in Hong Kong. It was my issue. I could not just walk away.
 
I was arrested on 18 April 2020 for organizing and joining a peaceful protest march without police permission. I stood my trial together with 8 others. We were all convicted.2 I spoke before the sentencing court to give an account of myself and my life’s work in the defence of the rule of law and independence of the judiciary, and why that obliged me to stand with the common people. Later, reviewing my statement, I found that it summed up the whole of my political life. I told the court I came late to the law, and have grown old in the service of the rule of law. I concluded with these words paraphrasing Sir Thomas More’s last words: “I am the law’s good servant, but the people’s first. For the law must serve the people, not the people the law.” I hope this book bears these words testimony.
 
This book is not just about the past but also about the future. For, when darkness falls, only true understanding of the past can lead us forward.
 
Margaret Ng
August, 2022 
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