‘BAD BOYS’ RAISE EYEBROWS AT LEGCO
Analysts believe new lawmakers are trying to show political backbone to Beijing and local residents
Several Beijing loyalists adopted an adversarial stance as self-styled “bad boys” daring to hold the government accountable at the inaugural meeting of the new legislative term in Hong Kong yesterday.
Analysts said the legislators, newly elected under Beijing’s “patriots-only” electoral overhaul, were keen to prove to the central government and residents that they were willing to challenge Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor at a time of mounting dissatisfaction with government performance.
During a question and answer session that lasted two hours, a number of lawmakers criticised the government for its anti-pandemic strategy which they said had failed to contain a growing outbreak fuelled by the Omicron variant.
While Chan Hoi-yan, of the new Election Committee constituency, slammed Lam’s approach as riddled with holes, veteran lawmaker Michael Tien Puk-sun pressed the leader twice for an apology over the government’s quarantine policy of cargo aircrew members, who are at the centre of an emerging fifth Covid-19 wave.
A combative Lam squarely dismissed alternative strategies proposed by Chan to keep the virus in check and even mocked Tien for his “election” slogan.
“I understand and agree with your attitude of ‘not blindly support or blindly oppose’, but you cannot blindly criticise anti-epidemic officials for not performing their job just because of violation of rules by one individual,” she said, in an apparent reference to the Cathay Pacific aircrew members who flouted home isolation rules and brought Omicron into the community.
Chinese University political scientist Ivan Choy Chi-keung said the pro-establishment lawmakers were trying hard to display their political backbone to both Beijing and residents following the electoral overhaul.
Political analyst Derek Yuen Mi-chang, who previously served as the New People’s Party’s policy research director, said some members of the camp were exploring a new “bad boy” model in the absence of competition from the opposition that would allow them to win media attention and prove themselves.
He pointed to a petition that 15 lawmakers, all but four of whom are newcomers, signed earlier this week urging Lam’s administration to require people to supply their names to use the official “Leave Home Safe” app that tracks potential exposure to Covid-19.
Some of the signatories were among the 20 lawmakers who attended a birthday party of a local delegate to the national legislature, Witman Hung Wai-man, last week. The event snowballed into a public health scandal after two guests later tested positive for Covid-19 and photos surfaced that suggested social-distancing rules were broken.
Lam has vowed to take “appropriate actions” against the senior officials involved if they were found to be breaking the rules.
The 20 lawmakers who attended the party also adhered to calls by Legco president Andrew Leung Kwan-yuen to watch the meeting online rather than take part in person.
During the session, 17 lawmakers asked questions, but none raised the issue of the birthday party.
As many as 39 others waiting in line for their turn missed out due to the time limit during question time, including centrist Tik Chi-yuen, the sole non-establishment lawmaker in the legislature now expanded to 90 members.
Expressing his disappointment, Tik said: “Following all the incidents involving officials, [Lam] gave no mention of the problems in the existing political accountability system … that’s the elephant in the room. The system should not exist in name only.”
Speaking after the meeting, Starry Lee Wai-king, chairwoman of the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong (DAB), defended the decision not to bring up the incident.
“I believe we already raised issues our supporters cared about. It should be the government who takes the incident forward by conducting the probe,” she said.
The Election Committee’s Chan, who drew the ire of Lam, later told the that the leader
Post had misread her remarks as she was neither trying to undermine the contribution of the medical workers nor suggesting the government’s anti-pandemic efforts were “full of loopholes”.
Chan also said it was discouraging that the chief executive spent as much time as she did delivering her speech and making remarks that were emotionally charged, but added it was good lawmakers were doing their best to monitor Lam’s work. “We weren’t doing it deliberately to show we are keeping Lam on her toes. We are reflecting our constituents’ views,” she said.
Lam appeared willing to engage with the legislators throughout much of the session, which ran half an hour longer than scheduled due to her extended opening speech.
While several of the exchanges were fiery, the legislature is likely to be largely cooperative with the government over livelihood issues, according to analyst Choy. But it would be too optimistic to expect the relationship would drastically improve, he said, pointing to Lam’s combative style and the rift between her and the pro-establishment camp following the birthday party saga.
Yesterday’s meeting was just the first in a legislative season that is expected to be extremely busy, and the lawmakers have plenty of time to decide which approach they want to take with the executive branch.
Additional reporting by Tony Cheung