How Many People Took Part on July 1st Considering Experience and Counting History Evan Fowler 方禮倫 主場新聞

Evan Fowler 方禮倫

不屬單一種族、國籍，土生土長香港人。

2014-7-2 18:11:14

（編按：Evan 認為遊行人數難以令人信服，充分體現了組織團體、港大民研計劃與警方的數字，自2005年以來已經改變，並讓讀者回想個人經驗，估計究竟有多少人參與遊行。 Finding the figures unconvincing, Evan highlights how the relationship between organisers, HKUPOP and police figures have changed since 2005, and asks readers to consider his personal experience on the day in making an estimate of how many people took part.）

The figures for yesterday’s pro-democracy march are out. According to the organiser, the Civil Human Rights Front, 510,000 people were counted; Hong Kong University’s Public Opinion Programme (POP) team counted 162,000; whilst the police put the figure at 92,000.

How are these figures derived? Two are counted — CHRF and POP deploy teams to count numbers at various locations along the route, with the CHRF taking an average and HKUPOP employing a flow rate method to calculate the numbers between two points. The police figure is only an estimate based on “how crowded the protest area appears”. The protest area is, one should note, an area that the police themselves define and regulate.

Analyzing the counts since 2005 the CHRF figure is consistently the highest, and the police estimate (and lets call it an estimate as it makes no claim to be a count) always the lowest. What is curious however is that the police figures tend to be far less as both a percentage of the CHRF and POP figures the larger the demonstration.

Between 2005 and 2011 when the POP figures were low, varying from 18,000 (2008) to 63,000 (2011), the police estimates were with the exception of 2007 consistently around 80% of this number. However since 2011, and as the protest numbers have increased, the police figures have been consistently in the 60s%, some 20% lower. This year the police estimate was on 56.7% of the POP count. The police estimates have been further off the POP count in more recent years and when protests are large. This is curious, given that the police have also been more disciplined in controlling marches and demonstrations one would have expected their estimates to be more rather than less in line.

Comparing the CHRF figures with those from POP we also see a consistency between 2005 and 2011. POP numbers were on average around 60% of those stated by CHRF. Since 2011 this figure has dropped to an average of 25% until this year when it increased to 31.7%. Clearly the organiser has in years in more recent years when the turnout has been underwhelming sought to inflate figures.

So by taking the POP count as a base it seems that both the CHRF and the police have veered more to the extremes in their figures since 2011. If this warrants criticism of the CHRF, a openly political group, what should we think of the police, who for the public interest are meant to remain neutral?

Further to the figures, as someone who marched there are a number of reasons why I find myself questioning what has been presented. I will begin by report my own experiences to allow readers to first consider the points and draw their own conclusions.

1. People Joining from the Front.

When I arrived on the island at around 1pm I first joined a group of well-heeled friends who were walking backwards from Admiralty. It was the first time that their families were joining a protest, and whilst they felt the need to support the march they were not prepared to join the lines forming around the official assembly point at Victoria Park. Like many of their friends they would be joining the march from the front. These people would have missed the POP count.

There were also also others I knew who were doing this, having had in the past experienced waiting for hours at the assembly point. They felt that having shown solidarity with the people in previous years they were now entitled to join the march from the front. Those counted by the police at Victoria Park, and those with whom I mingled as I waited patiently in line for nearly 4 hours, included many occasional protestor. For many it was there first large protest, or their first since 2003 and 2004.

2. Joining from Side Streets.

Most of those I knew who joined the march joined from side streets between Hysan place in Causeway Bay and Southorn playground in Wan Chai. Many could not devote the entire day to the protest, but wanted to join in for a few hours in the afternoon or early evening. My friends included members of several theatre troupes who had been working in the morning, as well as several students and recent graduates. When we spoke that evening and shared messages this morning they all knew that they would not have been counted.

In recent years there has been the impression that the police have deliberately delayed marches in the hope of turning people away. Whether it is a deliberate police tactic or, as they claim, the fault of the organisers, the result has still been to turn many people away from staying to the allocated route. Several lawyers and media friends I know turned away from the assembly points after waiting in line for over an hour to enter Victoria Park. Two others choose to leave after needing the toilet they found themselves having to rejoin the line.

3. Unofficially Channeling of People.

I joined the line to enter Victoria Park at 2.45pm. The march was to start 45 minutes later. Such were the numbers I did not actually enter Victoria Park until close to 4pm, and did not leave the park until 7.10pm. During this time there were two brief but heavy outbursts of rain that left most people standing in puddles and at least a little wet.

Around 6pm there was a rush of movement on the fringes of the gathered crowd. People were being asked to cut a new route outward from the park and along side streets away from Causeway Bay and Hennessy Road. It was unclear who was instigating this — those around me said it was the police though I can not be sure. Whilst I can’t be sure it looked as if about a fifth to a quarter of people gathered in Victoria Park exited in this manner. I would later find out that two groups of friends were among this crowd, who were then prevented from rejoining the march until beyond the bridge over Hennessy road where a POP count was situated. They were very angry when they spoke to me last night — having spent hours waiting they were convinced they were deliberately channeled away from the count.

So what do I make of the numbers? I am sad that I find little reason to believe the police estimate. This worries me enormously. One of the most important values upon which Hong Kong is built is public trust in the police. I have many personal reasons to maintain this trust, given that I have friends who have or continue to serve in a force that was rightly proud of being “Asia’s Finest”. However, there have been a few incidents in the last year when the stated line given by the police has not matched what I have seen with my own eyes. Whilst I would not say I am suspicious of the police as one may be in more openly authoritarian states (I have in the past been given a hard time by police in West Africa, North Africa and also in the Balkans, not to mention other places more closer to home) neither do I believe the force is neutral in its dealing with political dissent. Our police force is professional and have very high standards for which we should be proud, but are they apolitical? My fears may be ungrounded, but I am nevertheless not longer sure.

I have every reason to believe that POP accurately documented numbers in its targeted locations, and that the figure calculated is a fair reflection of what was recorded. However, it is also my belief that the march was both channeled, whether intentionally or not, and joined in a way that makes the figure it has calculated very misleading. 162,000 people represents less than twice the capacity of the old Wembley stadium. Having seen a crowd exit Wembley stadium and I do not believe the numbers compare. For 6 hours major roads from Victoria Park to Central were a mass of people, and at times crushed to immovability between Victoria Park and Hysan Place. Conservatively reasonable friends who were volunteering on stalls along the way, people who had in past years estimated figures in line with the POP count, were telling me that they estimated more than half a million people had passed in the first 4 hours. Whilst I could not be sure of numbers, neither did experience lead me to question this figure.

Finally, what do these numbers mean? The number may be symbolic, but public opinion remains as it was. This was best illustrated by what happened to me when I came home last night, where I was greeted by the security guards at my estate with a smile. The head caretaker came out of his post to ask if I was at the march. I said that I had been. He said, “I’m proud of you. All of us would have been there too if we were allowed.” I had never before spoken to them about their politics. Being elderly men who read certain papers I had assumed they would not want to talk. It only then occurred to me that they may, like many journalists, read these papers not because they agree with the opinions expressed but to look for signs as to how the establishment thinks. Fearful men seek comfort in knowing that which terrifies them.

But it was what one guard said to me last night, in the tone of an equal and yet with a genuine and deep respect, that made me think the hours waiting in the heat and rain was worth it:

“We’re old and scared. I know what the CCP can do. I see it when I return to visit family in our village in Dongguan. The police say repeatedly “you’re a Hong Kong person, remember this”. It is a threat. This is not the Chinese way. This is not being Chinese.

I am scared for my family if they march. I am scared for you, too. I am scared that the students will do something silly and China will crush them. But I am also, deep down, proud of them for doing what I dare not do.”

Beyond numbers, this is why we must march.