Price to pay for HK protests

As assorted "Occupy Central" activities continue in Hong Kong, the question has once again arisen: How many of the resources that could bolster the development of Hong Kong are being spoilt by the demonstrators?

The series of political struggles Hong Kong's Civic Party has organized over the past years, from the cases that sought to challenge the legal interpretation authority of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, China's top legislature, and created for the region the troublesome problem of the "children" whose parents are both non-Hong Kong residents and the legal dispute involving whether non-Hong Kong helpers should enjoy the right to permanent residency in Hong Kong, which almost led to the addition of 500,000 aliens who do not identify themselves as Chinese to the region, to the inciting of opposition among some local residents against the privatized listing of a commercial mall at a public housing parking lot and the building of the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge, a key investment project of 70 billion yuan ($11.4 billion) of the central government, have caused enormous economic losses to Hong Kong.

For example, the problem of the "children" whose parents are both non-local residents has brought an extra fiscal, educational and traffic burden to the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. The forced postponement of the Hong Kong section of the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge for two years resulted in the construction costs increasing by HK$6.5 billion ($838 million), equivalent to HK$1,000 for every Hong Kong resident or three months rent for all public housing offered by the Hong Kong SAR government.

Given that the latest "Occupy Central" demonstration have culminated in the flagrant violation of relevant national and Hong Kong laws and provocative confrontation against the Chinese central and Hong Kong SAR governments, Hong Kong will inevitably end up paying a higher price the longer it takes to rein in the ongoing political chaos.