Hong Kong legislator Ronny Tong set up potential successor in secret talks months before resignation
Alvin Yeung recounts an emotional meeting at which his mentor talked of giving up Legco seat
Up-and-coming politician Alvin Yeung Ngok-kiu keenly recalls the feeling of being hit by a bolt from the blue when, in early September, his mentor, Ronny Tong Ka-wah, quietly asked him to mentally prepare for a potential Legislative Council by-election.
For months afterwards, Yeung kept secret the fact Tong, a "rock star" in his eyes, was considering cutting short his legislative service before the end of his term next year.
Tong finally dropped the bombshell on Monday, announcing his resignation from Legco and from the party he co-founded nine years ago, and tipping his protégé as the right person to take over his New Territories East seat.
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Back in September, the pair had met just days after the National People's Congress Standing Committee rolled out a restrictive blueprint for Hong Kong's political reform in August. To Tong, that sounded the death knell for a democratic Hong Kong even before the government presented its election model for the 2017 chief executive poll that conformed to the blueprint and was voted down in Legco last week.
"The news [of his possible exit] came all of a sudden," Yeung, 34, said. "I have always seen Tong as a democracy fighter who will be the last to give up. Seeing tears roll down his face made me think if it was really the end of Hong Kong's democracy."