Travel industry chief considering surrendering Canadian document
A prospective Legislative Council candidate from the Liberal Party is considering giving up his foreign passport, amid controversy over political appointees with overseas citizenship.
Lawmakers hold diverse views on the issue. Some regard renouncements of foreign citizenship as a sign of commitment, while others say it is up to the voters to decide if candidates holding foreign passports are worthy of their support.
Twelve Legco functional constituency seats - including the tourism, commercial, accountancy and legal sectors - can be held by lawmakers with right of abode overseas.
This month, 51 per cent of 1,000 respondents to an SCMP/TNS survey agreed that the Basic Law provision allowing the 12 legislators to hold foreign citizenship should be tightened, compared with 36 per cent who disagreed.
Travel Industry Council of Hong Kong executive director Joseph Tung Yiu-chung, who is set to contest the tourism sector functional constituency in September's Legislative Council election, said he was considering giving up his Canadian passport, which he had held for more than 10 years.
'I got a Canadian passport because my family used to live in Canada, and I thought it would bring me convenience as I had to travel frequently for my work in tourism. Before the handover, I was not sure how many countries would recognise the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region passport,' he said. 'But now it's evident that the HKSAR passport is widely recognised and I no longer need my Canadian passport.'