Former RTHK chief Cheung Man-yee has launched an attack on the review committee on public broadcasting, saying it misled the public when explaining its opposition to turning the station into an independent public broadcaster. The panel, headed by veteran journalist Raymond Roy Wong, recommended creating an independent broadcaster but said RTHK could not be transformed into such a broadcaster because it was a government department and the staff wanted to remain civil servants. Ms Cheung said that was an oversimplification. 'The panel is very smart and put up some very clever reasons why RTHK does not fit with the new body, but people should not reduce this issue to a 'rice bowl matter' for a few hundred staff members. This is misleading,' Ms Cheung said. 'Some support staff want to remain civil servants, but a plan to resolve this problem has been in place for 20 years.' She said the panel should not use these technical problems to obscure the bigger picture. 'One of the panel members, Mathias Woo, was frank enough to state it was because of RTHK's political stance that it is not suited to the new structure. The issue is press freedom and the principle of 'one country, two systems'.' Ms Cheung said she agreed with the general perception that RTHK would shrink to a small department under direct government control. 'If the government kills RTHK, it will be a very unwise and provocative action,' she said. 'The image of the government will be severely undermined and they will leave Hongkongers with a bad memory. RTHK is one of the remaining yardsticks of Hong Kong's 'one country, two systems'.' Ms Cheung acknowledged RTHK was facing an 'uphill battle' for survival. 'We are now in a very passive situation. There is not much that we can do, but we have to work on it.' The former director said the government had decided to make RTHK independent as early as in 1986 in a review of its future, but the plan, including the transfer of staff from civil service, had been delayed when it was decided to give priority to the setting up of the Hospital Authority. The scheme was shelved in 1989 because of the Tiananmen Square crackdown and again in the 1990s because of the controversy over political reform. 'It was agreed a long, long time ago that there should be an independent broadcaster which should be free from political and commercial interests and that RTHK should be transformed into such a body,' Ms Cheung said. 'We have been waiting for this for over 20 years.' She said some of the criticisms of RTHK were unfair. 'People always argue over a government-funded broadcaster continually criticising the government,' she said. 'This concept is wrong. This is taxpayers' money, so what's wrong with a publicly funded body monitoring the government's performance? It is just like the Audit Department checking on official accounts. 'Hong Kong has had a public broadcaster for decades and it has contributed so much to press freedom. We should let it go on.' She again urged the government to conduct a public consultation over the future of RTHK as soon as possible and 'not to leave a knife hanging over' its head. The government has promised to consult the public on the issue for three months, but did not say when it would begin. 'We cannot keep waiting. There is an ageing problem within RTHK, both in the terms of equipment and general programmes,' she said.