Hong Kong’s first forbidden song? Hong Kong government seeks ban on ‘Glory to Hong Kong’

Hong Kong’s Department of Justice on Monday (June 6) applied to the court for an injunction and a temporary injunction banning four “unlawful acts” related to the song “May Glory Be to Hong Kong”, requiring anyone not to broadcast, perform, publish or display the song and lyrics in any way, including on the Internet, while adaptations of the song and songs substantially similar to the song are also banned.

The plaintiff in the petition for an injunction is the Attorney General and the defendant is “any person engaged in the relevant prohibited conduct.” At present, the Department of Justice is awaiting the direction of the court and the date of the hearing is to be fixed. The Attorney General’s complaint also attached 32 YouTube videos related to “May Glory Be to Hong Kong”, including the song MV, pure music videos, as well as different languages such as German, and asked the relevant people to stop the dissemination.

Hong Kong does not have a specific national anthem, and the official representative song uses China’s national anthem “March of the Volunteers”, but since 2022, several international sporting events have played “May Glory Be to Hong Kong” as the national anthem for the Hong Kong team, or mistakenly written “May Glory Be to Hong Kong” when playing “March of the Volunteers”.

At the end of 2022, the Hong Kong government asked Google to display “correct results” when users searched for “Hong Kong national anthem”, saying that Google was responsible for removing “May Glory Return to Hong Kong” and placing “March of the Volunteers” at the top, but Google refused. Google said at the time that it “will not artificially manipulate” the natural rankings on the Web and refused to remove “May Glory Return to Hong Kong.”

The Hong Kong government issued a statement saying that “May Glory Return to Hong Kong” has been widely circulated since 2019, and the connotation of the lyrics has been ruled by the court to have slogans that can constitute incitement, and recently it has been wrongly regarded as “national anthem” for many times, “causing insult to the national anthem and causing serious damage to the country and the SAR”, and the ban order has been applied under consideration.

The Hong Kong government spokesman said that the government has always respected and attached importance to the rights and freedoms guaranteed by the Basic Law (including freedom of speech), but freedom of speech is not absolute, “for the legitimate purpose of safeguarding national security, the relevant application is necessary, reasonable and lawful, in line with the requirements of the relevant bill of rights”, “the public should not test the law”.

In this regard, former Hong Kong District councillor Lau Jiaven, who is in exile in the UK, commented in an interview that since the implementation of the “Hong Kong National Security Law”, the Hong Kong Government has continuously suppressed the cultural and art circles with tangible or invisible hands, including removing “sensitive books” from Hong Kong public libraries and making many well-known films unable to be shown in Hong Kong. However, this is the first time the Hong Kong government has formally applied for a court ban on a specific song, and Liu Jiawen believes it will set a “very bad precedent.” In addition, some media pointed out that injunctions issued by Hong Kong courts generally only apply within Hong Kong and cannot be enforced outside the territory, “the actual effectiveness of the Hong Kong Government’s new injunctions is doubtful”.