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Next Tuesday will mark the 10thanniversary of the promulgation of the Basic Law. A territory-wide survey by the Hong KongFederation of Youth Groups found that although young respondents generally recognized theimportance of the Basic Law, they were not too familiar with its contents. In evaluatingtheir understanding of the contents of the Basic Law on a scale of 0 to 10, more than 20per cent of respondents said that they had no knowledge. The remaining respondents showedsome understanding, with an average of 3.3 points
Slightly more than 45 per cent of respondents were satisfied with theGovernment's performance of enforcing the Basic Law, while 30 per cent thought otherwise.A similar percentage of respondents believed that the SAR Government had upheld theprinciple of One Country, Two Systems; Hong Kong People Ruling Hong Kong and High Degreeof Autonomy. Around 22 per cent, however, disagreed while the remaining 38 per cent saidhalf-half.
The survey found that an overwhelming majority (93.5%) ofrespondents agreed that citizens have a responsibility to make themselves familiar withthe Basic Law. As many as 84 per cent expected to learn more about it. Respondents with ahigher educational attainment seemed to have more interests than those with lesseducational attainments.
The survey also noted that two-thirds of respondents agreed that theBasic Law was closely related to their daily lives. Only one-third said that no knowledgeof the Basic Law did matter. 60 per cent of respondents thought that the ways schoolstaught the Basic Law was insufficient. The findings suggest that young respondentsgenerally recognised the importance of the Law.
The telephone poll, conducted by the Hong Kong Federation of YouthGroups from 14 to 17 March 2000, successfully interviewed 526 young people aged between 15and 29. Two-thirds of respondents said that the contents of the Basic Law were boring.Although half of the respondents said that they had paid attention to the Basic Law, mostof them did so rarely. Less than half of the respondents knew the date when the Law becameeffective in Hong Kong.
84 per cent of respondents agreed that social issues related to theBasic Law would help them understand more. Among the 266 respondents who had paidattention to the Basic Law, more than half said that it was social issues that arousedtheir interest. TV and radio programmes, newspapers or magazines were the most popularchannels through which respondents learnt about the Basic Law.
The Federation position is, that as the Basic Law is the miniconstitution of the HKSARG, it should become an important part of civic education. Youngpeople, as the future masters of Hong Kong, should pay more attention to the Basic Law andmake themselves more familiar with it. The Federation also suggested the governmentdepartments concerned, should continually work on the promotion of the Basic Law.
In response to the finding that young people found social issues ahelpful way to understand more about the Basic Law, the Federation suggested theorganizations concerned encouraging young people to pay more attention to Hong Kongsociety and its social issues. The Federation hoped that it could make learning about theBasic Law more interesting, and eliminate the thought that such learning was boring.
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Youth Opinion Polls No.
79
