Whenever Ng Kai-Yeung goes abroad, he is at pains to tell people that he is a Hongkonger, not Chinese.

"Identifying who I am to them means a lot to me. It is not discrimination, but my identity," he said.

Ng is a member of a Facebook page called "We are Hongkongers, not Chinese." While many believe it is a pro-independence page, Ng said he is not actually trying to fight for independence, just for the freedom to say it out loud.

"Freedom of expression is what I want to protect at all costs. I don't need to worry about being jailed if I call for independence," he said.

The Facebook group, set up in July, claims that its membership has grown from a mere 300 to 18,000 people in just three months. Members complain about a host of issues, mainly related to the influx of mainlanders, and in protests against certain policies from the central government, they took to the street holding British colonial flags.

 But does this translate into a rising pro-independence movement in Hong Kong? An editorial in the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post said "to most locals, the answer is unequivocally no."

In response, Rita Fan Hsu Lai Tai, a member of the NPC Standing Committee and former president of the Legislative Council of Hong Kong, told the media that "the 'One country, Two Systems' will not be broken just because of some comments from a few people."

Overstating the problem?

While relations between the mainland and Hong Kong have always been smooth, there have been occasional tensions.

A few residents often express their discontent by waving the British flag during protests, including ones against cross-border parallel traders and when schools were asked to include controversial "patriotism" lessons in their curriculum.

Hongkongers protest against mainland parallel traders who cross the Shenzhen-Hong Kong border every day to buy products to resell at a profit on October 23. Photo: AFP

Hongkongers and political groups generally believe Hong Kong does not have the right conditions for independence.

Tam Yiu-chung, chairman of the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong, told the media that he does not understand why some young people feel the need to wave the flag of its former colonial ruler.

"I don't think the old days are better than now. At least Hong Kong people are administering Hong Kong now," the Oriental Daily quoted Tam as saying.

Wong Kwok-kin, chairman of the Hong Kong Federation of Trade Unions, agrees.

"Hong Kong has no conditions to be independent, so there is no need to worry just because a small number of people waved the British flag on the street," he said.

However, some Chinese officials view the situation as a sign of growing opposition to China's sovereignty.

Chen Zuo'er, the former deputy director of the State Council's Hong Kong and Macao Affairs Office who was part of the team that negotiated Hong Kong's return to Chinese rule 15 years ago, told mainland media that "the rise of a pro-independence force in Hong Kong is spreading like a virus."

Following Chen's comments, his former director Lu Ping told the SCMP in an e-mail, "Those who do not recognize they are Chinese should look at what is written on their passports or they should renounce their Chinese nationality."

However, Chan Tsz-chun, spokesman of the Facebook group, has been keen to play down any idea of secession. "We never advocate independence for Hong Kong," he argued at City Forum, a public forum held every Sunday in Victoria Park on October 28, which Radio Television Hong Kong broadcast live.

He added that the group's aim is to defend Hong Kong's autonomy and urge the central government not to "interfere in Hong Kong affairs."

When asked why the actions and words of Chan's group seem to contradict others - some of their members carried a placard with the slogan "Chinese scram back to China!" during a recent protest - Chan responded, "I can't really control what they say."

Lew Mon-hung, a delegate of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, argued that they are trying to make Hong Kong an independent country.

"Hong Kong was, is and always has been an inseparable part of China.  It is written in the Basic Law," he said. "Such calls for independence should be seen as treason and banned."

After the forum, tensions grew when supporters from both sides began verbally assaulting and spitting on each other. Chan left under police escort.

According to a recent poll released by the University of Hong Kong in June, 46 percent of 1,001 respondents said they see themselves as "Hong Kong citizens"; another 34 percent said they are either Chinese Hong Kong citizens or Hong Kong Chinese citizens; only 18 percent said they were "Chinese citizens."

Stephen Sze Man-Hung, a professor at the Taiwan-based Kun Shan University, told the Global Times that it reflects the fact that many Hongkongers do not consider themselves Chinese subjects like those on the mainland, but that does not mean they are fighting for independence.

"They knew too well that Hong Kong is totally dependent upon the mainland, economically and materially," he said.

The Facebook group declined the Global Times' request for an interview. But according to their statement titled "Why I want HK to be independent/autonomous" published on August 4, it said they believe Hongkongers and mainlanders do not feel like they are part of one family.

"Just like no matter how much you respect Koreans or Japanese, you only think they are a very 'respectful foreigner'," it said.

But Stephen said that the younger generation's resentment is part of global phenomena that can be seen all over the world.

"With the increasing discrepancy between the rich and the poor, the younger generation has lower incomes, fewer job opportunities and fewer prospects. Certainly they have reasons to complain," he said.

"However, they are blind to the fact that Hong Kong experienced a bubble economy, not prosperity, before 1997, and it has not been faring worse than other countries since then," he continued. 

Mixed messages

James Lung, chairman of the Southern Democratic Alliance, a political organization dedicated to protecting the interests of ethnic minorities in Hong Kong, told the Global Times that this thinking does not represent mainstream ideology.

"There is no so-called rising pro-independence force in Hong Kong.  The message that demonstrators are sending is they are trying to defend the city's autonomy promised by the Basic Law, not independence," he said.

However, political commentator Lau Yui-Siu told the Global Times that the moves have added to Beijing's worries that the movement for independence is growing.

According to government statistics, some 300,000 Hongkongers moved to Canada, United States, Australia and other countries between 1992 and 1997, the year of the handover, due to skepticism over the mainland's "One country, Two Systems" promise.

"The Chinese government was much more tolerant about the mass migration, as they believed it was because Hongkongers didn't really understand China," he said. While handover official Chen called the reappearance of the British flag "heartbreaking," some Hong Kong netizens said Chen's lament was unnecessary.

"The flashing of the colonial flag is not unlike mainlanders waving Mao's portrait at demonstrations. Whether it's in Hong Kong or the mainland, you will get people who miss a bygone era that symbolizes something for them," a netizen commented.

Lau said Chen's worries are "nothing coming from nothing.""For example, some mainlanders wave the five-star flag in Taiwan but nobody stops them," the commentator said.

"What I am saying is, don't make a mountain out of a molehill, otherwise your judgment and reflexes will be negatively affected."

Concerns over influence

"Mainlandization", a word that has surfaced in recent years, is one that can sum up Hongkongers' concerns over mainland influence.

Hostility toward Beijing steadily grew after waves of mainland tourists flooded into Hong Kong to buy milk powder and pregnant women took up hospital beds to deliver their babies.

"There is growing political tension over fears that Hong Kong is becoming like the mainland," said James Lung.

Many Hongkongers contacted by the Global Times admit that their negative feelings stem from inconveniences caused by the influx of mainlanders to the region.

In 2003, the Hong Kong government attempted to introduce legislation to implement Article 23 of the Basic Law to outlaw treason, sedition and other national security offences. The law prompted people to take to the streets. The government indefinitely shelved its draft law, even though the draft was within the framework of the "One Country, Two Systems."

Since the handover, the pace of integration has quickened. The mainland provides daily supplies to Hong Kong of a variety of goods, from drinking water to vegetables. So when Lu Ping said, "Hong Kong could have been a dead city without the support of the mainland," many Hongkongers said it hurt their feelings."Try to block the supplies and ban the tourists from coming to Hong Kong. Let's see if we can survive or not," asked James Lung.

Professor Stephen Sze said he believes this undercurrent of social resentment does not destabilize the Hong Kong government, and certainly cannot challenge the central government in Beijing. To ease the tension, a better social and political consensus concerning the region's development is needed.

"The Hong Kong government should try its best to reduce the social discrepancies, provide a better social safety net for the general public, create more opportunities and better prospects for the younger generation and emphasize the need to come to a better social and political consensus concerning the development of HK," he said.

"The reappearance of the colonial flag is not so much nostalgia for the old days but dissatisfaction with society," Elsie Leung Oi-sie, Hong Kong's former Secretary for Justice, told the Global Times.

"Hong Kong society is lacking positive energy. Some people can only see the negative things, and the positive thinkers keep silent," she said, adding that she longs for more rational voices in Hong Kong.