A Nepali student said the government's secondary school financial assistance agency discriminated against him by replying to his school fee subsidy application in Chinese.
The case highlighted a pattern of government insensitivity to the needs of ethnic minority students and a flawed bilingual policy, said Fermi Wong Wai-fun, the founder of Unison Hong Kong for Ethnic Equality.
She estimates her group has handled about 20 similar complaints from its 200 members in the past year.
'The Nepalese student would not have been able to find out whether he received full or half subsidy if he hadn't contacted me,' she said.
Ms Wong said there were many occasions when non-Chinese speaking people threw away government letters because they did not understand the contents.
'It is outrageous that the government writes to ethnic minorities in Chinese, especially when it concerns important information,' she said. 'They can easily tell by their names and applications that they are not Chinese. The government officials cannot assume that these people can understand Chinese.'
