New Year's Day march will target 'fragile' economy
A New Year's Day protest is being planned to highlight the state of the economy following controversy over the listing of the Link Reit.
A police spokeswoman said two applications had been lodged to hold rallies on New Year's Day. One was submitted on Saturday by a concern group seeking to uphold free-market values.
A spokesman for the group said: 'We just feel that the unstable political situation is having a serious impact on Hong Kong's economy. The economy is already fragile and will collapse with further instability.'
He said the group had no expectations on the number of people who would join the rally.
'We are just a group of working-class people. We are not very knowledgeable about politics, but we feel that we have a duty to support and assist the government. Recent events have shown certain parties to be magnifying and exacerbating problems. We are like one big family that is always arguing. How can we be happy?'
The concern group consists of 10 people who met for the first time last Saturday.
The New Year's Day rally will start at Chater Garden at about 11am. Protesters will leave for the Central Government Offices at 12.30pm and disperse there at about 2pm.
The spokesman said that the rally was a one-off event and the concern group would be disbanded afterwards. The group's website, ilovehk.monstor.net, would also be shut down at that time.
The spokesman denied the marchers would target the home of lawmaker Albert Cheng King-hon, who agreed to bear the applicants' legal fees during the Court of First Instance hearing into the Link listing.
Mr Cheng last week said he was not the 'smoking gun' behind the applicants' legal challenge.
He said yesterday: 'I'll report them to the police if they come. I'm a politician. There are always people who don't like me so I'm not affected by the protest. I'm not sure how many people will join.
'I do what is right. I don't care whether it affects my votes. There are politicians who just have votes on their mind. In the end, they are not doing anything constructive,' he said.
