Hong Kong lawmaker Horace Cheung Kwok-kwan hopes the Legislative Council of Hong Kong will amend its Rules of Procedure to prevent the opposition camp from exploiting loopholes and wreaking havoc again.
During an interview with China Daily on Monday, the vice-chairman of the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong predicted that most opposition lawmakers will stay on for the extended term, as they make the most of the huge financial resources and political platform at their disposal.
Horace Cheung Kwok-kwan predicted that most opposition lawmakers will stay on for the extended term, as they make the most of the huge financial resources and political platform at their disposal
The Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, China’s top legislature, on Aug 11 adopted a decision to continue the operation of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region’s sixth LegCo for no less than one year, as the election for the seventh term was postponed for one year because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
ALSO READ: New LegCo session to begin on Oct 14
While referring to the House Committee election fiasco that lasted over six months, Cheung said opposition lawmakers will continue to create trouble in the legislature as they pander to the violent and radical factions within the opposition camp.
Opposition members in the legislature stonewalled the House Committee chairperson election process for over six months from November 2019, forcing 14 bills and more than 20 subsidiary regulations to be put on hold because of the deadlock, which severely disrupted the legislature.
Eventually, Starry Lee Wai-king was re-elected to lead the powerful House Committee after 15 opposition legislators were ejected for clashing with security guards protecting Chan Kin-por, the man appointed to run the proceedings.
Cheung proposed that the neutral LegCo Secretariat should run future elections, and not the most senior legislator, saying it was unimaginable that the opposition could manipulate a procedure as simple as a chairman’s election.
“After the House Committee fiasco, the opposition even got the nerve to filibuster the election of chairman for a subcommittee on the development of textbooks and teaching materials,” he said.
READ MORE: Opposition should heed public wish and abandon confrontationist tactics
Cheung said that the pro-establishment camp needs to discuss whether to allow any opposition lawmakers to serve as deputy chairmen of committees or panels, as they have done in the past — and if the answer is yes, how many posts to make available to them — after the problems they caused.
Cheung, who is also a non-official member of the Executive Council — Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor’s cabinet — wants the government to work proactively in LegCo’s extended tenure in the coming year.
During the interview, Cheung said in addition to fighting COVID-19 and resisting economic sanctions by the United States, Hong Kong’s government should resolve to tackle such longstanding problems as Radio Television Hong Kong, education and civil service issues.
He believes that reform is needed at RTHK, a publicly funded media organization, as some of its reports are “very biased” and often go in the “opposite direction” of the government.
Regarding education, he pointed out that parents’ concerns over teaching materials and teachers with strong anti-China political beliefs should be addressed. Parents are particularly concerned with demonstrations held in schools, such as class boycotts and human chains, and the bullying of students whose parents are police officers, he emphasized.
ALSO READ: Schools in HK urged to uproot separatism on campuses
Cheung also rues the bureaucratic nature of senior and lower-level civil servants, and how they shirk having to make difficult decisions.
He said he backs the government to “require civil servants during their probation period to take an oath to uphold the Basic Law and pledge allegiance to the Hong Kong SAR. I also agree that on-probation civil servants arrested during unlawful activities should be sacked whether or not they are prosecuted,” he said in response to the latest civil service policy proposals.
