Inside track
AS EVERYONE understandably focuses on Hong Kong's plummeting economic prospects, the scaling-back of Tung Chee-hwa's previous plan to use next week's Policy Address to unveil details of his proposed move to a more ministerial-like system has passed almost unnoticed.
A year ago, Mr Tung was perfectly clear on the point. Stung by public criticism of how no one in government had been held to account for some appalling blunders - such as public-housing estates so badly built they had to be torn down without ever being used - he announced it was time to study how top officials could be made more accountable. He said the results would be ready to announce in his 2001 Policy Address.
But it is always dangerous to give a precise timetable. Even before the September 11 terrorist attacks, it was clear the task of devising such a radically different system - which is likely to be more similar to the way ministers are appointed and removed in other countries - was proving harder than expected. And now the need to give priority to preventing the economy from stalling, as the world moves towards a recession in the wake of these terrible events, means no one is likely to complain when Mr Tung misses his self-imposed deadline.
That does not mean he will have nothing to say on the subject in his October 10 speech. But it does raise the question of when full details of Mr Tung's blueprint for a more ministerial-like system will emerge. Officials say the study of the issue, which started last October, is only slightly behind schedule, and now expected to last for a 'year and a bit' instead of the originally envisaged 12 months.
Yet it is difficult to see the Government announcing anything on this subject as long as the present economic gloom persists, which is likely to be for some time.
That is because any move to make top officials more accountable will involve persuading some career civil servants, who now enjoy near absolute job security, to switch to politically appointed positions where they can actually be fired if they make mistakes.
It does not take a genius to work out they would only agree to give up their iron rice bowl in return for more money, adding many tens of millions to the Government's wage bill. And spending more money on bureaucrats is something legislators, who must approve all such spending, are unlikely to accept while the economy stays in the doldrums.
But any delay in putting in place a more ministerial-like system is likely to have wider ramifications. For despite some dissenting voices within government - who had earlier tried to argue that the issue should be dealt with in tandem with more democracy because both involve constitutional development and are arguably closely related - Mr Tung's view on the matter is clear. Namely, that it makes more sense to settle the accountability issue first, before moving on to consider the issue of how to prepare for 2007, when the Basic Law allows Hong Kong the option of a fully directly elected legislature.
This determination to keep the two issues separate seems at least partly designed to emphasise that any ministerial-like system will entail officials being accountable to Mr Tung rather than the legislature. And also that these new politically appointed positions will not be filled by legislators, whom the Basic Law bars from holding any such posts.
Nonetheless, the end result is likely to be that the longer the proposed political accountability system is postponed, the longer it will be before Hong Kong can even start talking about the possibility of more democracy in six years.
Danny Gittings is the Post's Editorial Pages Editor
