Executive councilor slams unlawful public gathering

Executive Councilor Tommy Cheung Yu-yan rebuked the irresponsible behavior of some Hong Kong people, which he said not only sets a bad example for others but also puts the city closer to a more serious local outbreak.

Cheung was asked whether opposition lawmaker Tanya Chan Suk-chong from the Civic Party had violated the ban on gatherings of more than four people in public places when she and about 40 other people stayed in a pub, which had its metal gate lowered, late at night on April 2. The group was very loud, being a nuisance to nearby residents and sparking police intervention.

Chan was not apologetic, claiming she was doing a public service and was entitled to an exemption, but both Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor and the government have rebuked her because meetings not held in the Legislative Council Complex are not exempted.

“As a lawmaker and barrister, Chan was brainless to say she had an exemption,” Cheung said. “In a society governed by the rule of law, can a legislator be innocent after breaking the law? The pub concerned was definitely a public place because it was not fully closed while other customers could go inside and were served by the staff.”

Cheung also said that the LegCo House Committee is being hijacked by Dennis Kwok Wing-hang, also of the Civic Party, which failed to elect the committee chairman after a dozen meetings. He predicted Kwok will obstruct voting until the end of the term in July.

“The Civic Party is not the same party as it was over a decade ago. From the moment its Alvin Yeung Ngok-kiu, a rookie lawmaker at that time, used a bullhorn to shout at a Finance Committee meeting in 2016, it was no longer a party that safeguards the rule of law and the LegCo Rules of Procedure,” he said.

He also criticized the political agenda of the opposition camp, which pressured the government to ban mainland residents from coming to Hong Kong. “Why didn’t they ask to close the airport to ban foreign people from arriving in Hong Kong?” he said.

While expressing sympathy for Hong Kong students who desperately wanted to return home in March before the introduction of tighter quarantine control measures, Cheung slammed people who traveled overseas in February and March while the coronavirus was out of control in foreign countries.

People who insisted on going to faraway places like Peru and Morocco should be responsible for the risks and they should pay their own flight expenses instead of using taxpayers’ money to bring them back, he said. Cheung’s wife dropped her annual plans to visit Malaysia in February on his advice.

He criticized the parents of the returning students who had breached quarantine orders and risked passing along the disease if they had unknowingly contracted the virus overseas.