Hong Kong buildings inspectors to begin probe into suspected illegal structures at new justice chief’s home
Buildings Department officials to visit property on Tuesday morning as calls mount for Teresa Cheng to consider resigning over the debacle
Hong Kong’s Buildings Department was expected to begin a probe on Tuesday morning into suspected illegal structures at the house of the city’s new justice minister, as calls mounted for her to consider resigning over the controversy.
The government inspection comes four days after officials failed to access the home of Secretary for Justice Teresa Cheng Yeuk-wah to investigate on Friday – the day before she officially took up her post.
Local media revealed on Saturday that structures identified at the homes of both Cheng and a property next door belonging to her husband in Tuen Mun were suspected to be illegal. The structures at Cheng’s house included a basement, a rooftop glass house and garden pools.
A source said officers from the department, which initiated follow-up action after receiving a media inquiry late last month, would inspect Cheng’s house on Tuesday morning.
Cheng, who said on Saturday that she would cooperate with any probe, did not respond to media questions about the scandal at an event marking the beginning of the legal year on Monday, despite mounting calls for her to come clean about whether she, as a lawyer and chartered engineer, knew the structures concerned were illegal when she bought the house in 2008.