Asian Games 2023 will be an expensive folly HK can ill afford

Legislator Tanya Chan of the Civic Party was absolutely right when she said she feared hosting the Asian Games in 2023 would be 'like burning money on fireworks' ('Games bid estimates loss of HK$13.8b', September 22).

Hong Kong is too small a city for such an event. Land is terribly scarce and property prices are skyrocketing, even in the more remote parts of the SAR. The Games would require a lot of land for an athlete's village, new stadiums and other facilities, some of which would become redundant afterwards.

Our self-serving and greedy property developers would want to get involved and this would not be right.

Of course, building projects would create employment for some and benefit the construction industry in the short term. But we would have a problem with an increase in the number of illegal immigrants. They would enter under the pretext of watching the Games.

We might even see the government proposing some Games venues to be located in Shenzhen or Guangzhou. In this case there would be no gains for Hong Kong people. Besides, we have more pressing needs and the money for these projects should instead be spent on hospitals, housing, social welfare, education and countering air pollution.

Some Hongkongers have to wait years to get a tiny flat or a minor cataract operation. And yet home minister Tsang Tak-sing remains unfazed, despite heavy public criticisms. He considers the HK$30 billion to HK$40 billion that could be spent on the event as a long-term investment, while ignoring the basic needs of Hong Kong people and the importance of investing for the long-term benefit of the community ('Minister shrugs off criticism of Games bid', September 25).

Given the expected deficit in next year's budget, it is not wise to earmark such large sums.