Opinion | CY is no agent of change after all
Philip Bowring says any hope that CY Leung might be the one to take on the city's entrenched interest groups for the greater good has all but evaporated in light of his performance
If one cannot be bold when enjoying the advantage of being new to office, can one ever be? Leung Chun-ying has undermined the belief of many that he would be an agent of change.
His policy speech demonstrated not simply that time is needed to put some flesh on the bones of the promises in his election manifesto. It also showed a lack of willingness to grasp the nettle and the continuation of the tendency to use the words "consultation" and "consensus" as ways to avoid making enemies.
Take the small house policy, acknowledged even by Leung to be unsustainable. Although its abolition should play a central role in housing policy, any decision seems miles away. The administration surely knows enough about this situation and already has options for ending it. If not, what have the likes of Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor and the advisory boards been doing all these years? By failing to take on the Heung Yee Kuk, Leung is showing himself to be a wimp.
His resistance to real change is further indicated by his advisory appointments, such as to the Commission on Strategic Development. David Akers-Jones, the very man who as secretary for the New Territories was most responsible for the small house policy, is, in his 86th year, supposed to help guide the future. It would have been better for Hong Kong if he had done what senior British colonial officials were supposed to - get their noses out of local public affairs after retirement.
Another classic appointment to this body is Abraham Razack, the developers' man in the legislature who has straddled public and private roles in real estate. Intriguingly, Razack, as former chief executive of the Land Development Corporation (predecessor of the Urban Renewal Authority), is now backing Cheung Kong in its court battle with the URA.
Cheung Kong is alleged to owe the corporation HK$23 million. Cheung Kong boss Victor Li Tzar-kuoi was passionate in his defence of its refusal to pay it. But whatever the truth of Li's assertion, which is backed by Razack, it reveals a belief that the company could verbally renegotiate and seal with a handshake a written deal with the corporation that had gone sour for Cheung Kong.
As a public body, the corporation has no right to act against the public interest. The case reinforces perceptions of government/big business collusion.