"Beijing Puppet": Carrie Lam must do her accounts in Hong Kong | News from the world

Carrie Lam, Hong Kong's first woman leader, has no lack of self-confidence. A dedicated Catholic who believes she has a place in heaven because "I do good things," she showed equal faith in her judgment on earthly matters.

After a harsh and widely criticized police crackdown on protesters this week, she caused outrage by crying over the sacrifices she made for the city, before comparing opponents hit by a tear gas barge , rubber bullets and pepper spray for spoiled children. need discipline.

Lam has cast his authority over the extradition bill that has brought so many people to the streets this week. His relentless sense of conviction – critics call it arrogance – first helped him to take him to a modest house located in the central Wan district. Chai at the pinnacle of power in Hong Kong. But she and Hong Kong could be particularly vulnerable, as the city faces one of the most serious problems since the handover by British rule.

"She is a pretty arrogant leader. She likes to remind people that she always comes first in clbad. If people do not agree with her, she tries to fix them, she likes to prove that she knows better than anyone, "said Kenneth Chan, professor at the government department of Baptist University in Hong. Kong. . "She does not take the opposition or dissent well. And his intransigence caused a serious crisis of governance. "

The protests were a response to her efforts to get the extradition bill pbaded in the territory's parliament. The law is extremely unpopular, not only among democracy activists, but also in most business circles in the city, as it is seen as a frontal attack on the judicial firewall that separated Hong Kong from the China and allowed its economy to prosper.

Critics fear that under the law, anyone, whether it's dissidents or entrepreneurs, is not left with Chinese partners is likely to be sent on the continent, where he will be tried before a notoriously opaque judicial system.

Lam became a lightning rod for the demonstrators, many people criticizing her or asking her to resign.

The controversy surrounding the bill saw Lam's support drop to a record high. According to the public opinion program of the University of Hong Kong, it is less popular than its predecessors for two years.

This public frustration was not inevitable, although Lam was much less popular than her main rival when she ran for the board of directors in 2017 and won only because she was Beijing's favorite candidate. .

Ordinary Hong Kong residents do not have a vote on their leader. Instead, pro-Peking interests dominate the 1,194-member committee that elected Mr. Lam.

One of five brothers and sisters, Lam excelled at school, joined the colonial civil service under British rule, and then continued his rise after Hong Kong's handover to Chinese power, as part of a system "one country, two systems" intended to ensure a certain degree of autonomy. .

The reputation of efficient operator has won the support of Beijing and ultimately the first job. In her previous role as chief secretary, actually deputy head of the territory, she was nicknamed "the nanny", in a misogynistic tribute to his role to clean the damage of other officials.

Since the beginning of her term, she has struggled to refute accusations that she would respond more to Beijing than to Hong Kongers.

She alarmed many people last year when she named China's President, Xi Jinping, the most admired leader. China's most authoritarian and powerful leader since Mao Zedong has led a harsh crackdown on civil society, the reintroduction of mbad internment camps in western Xinjiang and a cult of personality.

Lam told the Financial Times: "I find President Xi increasingly charismatic and admirable in the things that he does and says." However, she insists that she is politically independent.

"To say that I am only a puppet, that I won this election because of the pro-Beijing forces, is a failure to recognize what I have done in Hong Kong over the past year." past years, "she told the BBC after a campaign in which she tried to focus on the consensus.

This message, with the slogan "We connect", has given him a lot of leeway. "People were willing to give her the benefit of the doubt, she had very good approval ratings at the beginning of her term," Chan said.

But this support has long since disappeared. While the protests are gaining momentum, the woman who once said that God had called her to lead Hong Kong could now pray to find a way out of the crisis that she herself has provoked and to which she was confronted.