Ivan Ko speaks at Free Cities Foundation Conference in Prague

Prague, October 15, 2023 – Victoria Harbor Group's CEO delivered a speech at the Free Cities Foundation Conference, outlining the company's vision to reshape the network of free cities and communities. Focused on developing new cities in countries that have seen an influx of Hong Kong migrants, the CEO highlighted their initiative in the UK, where over 160,000 Hong Kong residents have applied for the BNO visa in the past two and a half years.

In a groundbreaking proposal, the CEO introduced the concept of a global citizen passport, envisioning a scheme where individuals can freely move between a network of free cities to pursue a lifestyle aligned with their values. He cited the rise of digital nomadism and the growing acceptance of remote work as a foundation for this idea, suggesting that the passport could initially be implemented across the 14 sites already that are part of the Free Cities Foundation network.

Victoria Harbor Group is actively looking for sites to develop 21st Century New Cities and will continue working closely with the Free Cities Foundation to pursue its plan.

Transcript: Global Citizen Passports: A Lifestyle without Boundaries – Ivan Ko, CEO of Victoria Harbor Group

Look who we are, we are the dreamers

We make it happen cause we believe it

Look who we are, we are dreamers

We make it happen cause we can see it

Here’s to the ones that keep the passion

Respect, oh, yeah

Here’s to the ones that can imagine

Respect, oh, yeah

(Dreamers by Jungkook, FIFA World Cup 2022)

Good afternoon friends!  

Look who we are, we are the dreamers, dreaming of changing the world the way cities are set up and operate.  Our company Victoria Harbor Group is a community builder targeting to develop new cities or new communities in countries where a lot of Hong Kong people have migrated to.  We have been working on this initiative over the past two and a half years in the UK.  Since then, there has been over 160,000 Hong Kong people applied the BNO visa to start a new life in the UK.  We believe more and more Hong Kong people will keep coming to the UK and to other free and democratic countries in the near future as Hong Kong’s situation is spiralling down every day.  In fact, it is in a free fall mode.

Hong Kong was one of the freest cities in the world.  Economically, it was Milton Friedman’s cup of tea.  He once declared Hong Kong as the best world example for free economy.  Hong Kong was full of entrepreneurial spirit, with laissez-faire governance (or the positive non-intervention), common law system and a disciplined commitment to social policies.   Culturally, Hong Kong was the place where east meets west, where foreigners fit into it in no time, where information from around the world exchanged, where protests happened every weekend all year round peacefully.  Actually, Hong Kong people once proudly called ourselves the City of Protest.   Hong Kong can be described as an open and free society, the best hybrid of east and west.    

With such a free and open environment, Hong Kong rose from a fishing village to an entrepôt and quickly turned into one of the Four Asian Tigers in manufacturing in the 70-80s.  Albeit the manufacturing moved to mainland China in the 80s after China launched its open door policy, Hong Kong didn’t stop growing.  Hong Kong evolved to be the third international financial centre after New York and London and maintained this position over the past three to four decades.  

However, all these stopped when Beijing imposed the National Security Law onto Hong Kong in July 2020.  There is no more freedom of speech, publication, assembly, protest or anything the government doesn’t like.  White terror is all over Hong Kong and is threatening to overseas Hong Kongers as the NSL applies to everyone on earth, including you and me here.  Since 2019 anti-extradition protests, more than 10,000 people were arrested including protestors, legislators, councillors, journalist, lawyers, academia, students and even housewives.  Over 50% of those are under 25 years old and 15% are minors.  Many of them were detained for months without trial, some of them have been in remand for over 3 years.  

In fact, most Hong Kong people’s ancestors fled Chinese Communist Party’s ruling from 50s to 70s in the last century.  My two uncles were among hundreds of thousands of young people who swam across the sea from the mainland to Hong Kong in the 50s and 70s, risking being eaten by sharks, drowned in the cold dark sea at night in deep winter or being put into education camp starving for months if get caught.  

(Video of 3 young swimmers from the mainland China intercepted by the Hong Kong marine police in Hong Kong water in 1978.  Three young swimmers were intercepted by Hong Kong Marine Police in Hong Kong water.  They have walked 10 days before they reached the coast, hiding in daytime and walking at night.  During those 10 days, they just lived on biscuits and milk.  Then, they swam for 10 hours before intercepted.  But unfortunately, not like those who have reached the land in Hong Kong, they will be deported back to mainland China as they have just reached the Hong Kong water, not the land.)

As the second generation in Hong Kong like me, we have never thought of having to flee Hong Kong.  But now, we are doing the same like what our ancestors did.  Being born and having lived in Hong Kong for 61 years before I moved to London 2.5 years ago, my observation is - as long as we are provided a free and open environment, Hong Kong people, in fact, most people will work it out ourselves and thrive.  The key here is freedom. 

The loss of freedom is scary and can be fatal.  Freedom can be preserved by the rules of law in a free and open society and it can also be destroyed by the rule by law under an autocracy or tyranny regime. In today’s world, authoritarian regimes, oppressive governments and dictatorships are everywhere and they are expanding quickly, targeting freedom as their top enemies.  People’s lives, thoughts, creativity, rights are being suppressed and crushed, from east to west, from north to south.  Freedom needs to be promoted, protected and enhanced, otherwise, it will diminish day by day, bit by bit or being gobbled up without a sign.

For us, being the champion for free city, private city, international city and charter city, we have a primary role to play in terms of promoting, protecting and enhancing freedom and a caring lifestyle.  The creation of new city is no longer about rural population migrating to urban areas.  We are in the new trend in which people choose lifestyles which can reflect and echo their values, ethos, principles and priorities in life which they aspire, to follow their heart, of which their children can grow up proudly.    To increase our degree of freedom, to further our journey around the globe, to connect like minds along the way, it is the right time to create a global citizen passport which can allow people to move from country to country freely in their pursuit of free and caring lifestyle, to choose cities they like to live and work and to participate and contribute to the local community.  

You may wonder if this can happen in reality.  I am amazed to witness the trend of digital nomad on the rise globally.  Thanks to the work-from-home culture, the widely used video conferencing apps, the acceptance of talents from around the world.  Even more encouraging is to see, over the last few years, more and more countries are providing special visa to digital nomad.  Today, there are more than 22 countries, 12 of them in Europe have joined in.  Most of these countries allow or in fact want to attract digital nomads to stay and work in their countries from 6 months to up to 5 year without being their own citizens, some offer reduced tax or even tax free.  

Then, what can we do?  I would say, now is the time to start small by beginning with the 14 sites we already have globally.  Let’s create a common passport for residents of these 14 sites for granting free access,  providing residency, allowing participation in community activities and to establish a common platform for sharing of jobs and business opportunities plus resources and ideas.  We can start creating a like-minded global community right here right now.

Once established with success, this global citizen passport can be promoted to sovereign countries, states and cities around the world.  Holders of this global citizen passport will be welcome as we represent people who trend setters, treasure freedom and caring lifestyle, having our own jobs or businesses no matter where we are, contributing and participating in local affairs, promoting ideas, values and principles which lead to a better world for human and for the earth.

Let me use John Lenon’s Imagine to conclude.  As the song in the beginning said, we have the vision, we have dreams, we believe in what we are doing and we have passion.  So, let’s do it together.

Imagine there’s no countries

It isn’t hard to do

Nothing to kill or die for ….