Since assuming the post of principal representative for the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office in Tokyo a little more than a month ago, I have found tremendous interest here in what has been happening to Hong Kong following its reunification with China on July 1, 1997. About five years before reunification, I was posted in the United States as the director of the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office in New York. At that time, people questioned whether Hong Kong's political autonomy would survive as promised under the principle of "one country, two systems." Under that arrangement, the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, or SAR, would run its own affairs with the exception of defense and foreign affairs, which would be the responsibilities of China.

Five years after reunification, a strong consensus exists in Hong Kong that the "one country, two systems" arrangement has become a working reality and that the essential qualities that have made Hong Kong such a unique city in the world have been protected. These qualities include political, economic and social freedoms that are safeguarded by the rule of law and the SAR's efficient and clean civil service.

Now, Hong Kong is entering a new era. As Chief Executive Tung Chee Hwa begins his second five-year term of office on the solid foundation built up over the past five years, he will introduce a new accountability system for the principal officials of the SAR to make the government more accountable to the people.