Suspended Hong Kong student union chief will still try to go to classes, as Mandarin requirement row rolls on

Lau Tsz-kei admits students could have handled protest against language requirement differently, but insists none of them threatened staff

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Lau Tsz-Kei admitted his group may have been ‘a bit emotional and loud’. Photo: Winson Wong

Published: 1:00pm, 25 Jan 2018Updated: 4:04pm, 25 Jan 2018

The head of Baptist University’s student union said he would still go to classes despite his recent suspension from school over alleged threatening behaviour, if his teachers will let him.

Lau Tsz-kei maintained that he did not threaten teaching staff during an angry protest against a Mandarin language graduation requirement, at the school’s language centre last Wednesday. He said the decision to suspend him was “not in line with practice”.

Lau said he would continue fighting to scrap the requirement, and that the union would hold a rally against the policy on school grounds on Friday.

“I will try to attend classes as soon as I am able to ... I will have to see what teachers [think]. If they let me attend the class, I will. If they say no, I’d be interrupting other students, then I would leave,” he said on a radio programme on Thursday morning.

Lau and fellow student Andrew Chan Lok-hang, convenor of a Cantonese language support group, were temporarily suspended on Wednesday, pending the completion of disciplinary proceedings.

University president Roland Chin Tai-hong said the duo had posed a danger to staff at the institution during the eight-hour stand-off last week, which he said made staff feel threatened and insulted, affecting their work.