None of the 116 Filipino witnesses called to testify in the Hong Kong inquest over the Manila hostage tragedy has agreed to give evidence in court, and only 18 of them have given a written statement.
'At this stage we don't know if any of the Filipino witnesses are coming,' coroner's officer Jat Sew-tong SC told a jury as an inquest into the deaths of eight Hong Kong people held hostage by former police officer Rolando Mendoza on a tour bus last August opened yesterday.
The inquest is expected to last 25 days. Witness statements from the Philippines will include former police chief Rodolfo Magtibay, three police officers who shot Mendoza, reporters Michael Rogas and Erwin Tulfo who interviewed the gunman over the phone, and the driver of the tour bus, Alberto Lubang.
More than 30 witnesses from Hong Kong will give evidence, including survivors of the siege, ballistic experts, a psychologist who will speak about Mendoza's state of mind and police officers who took part in the investigation.
Those killed were Hong Thai Travel tour guide Masa Tse Ting-chunn, 31; Fu Cheuk-yan, 39; Doris Leung Chung-see, 20; Leung Kam-wing, 58; Jessie Leung Song-yi, 14; Wong Tsz-lam, 51; Yeung Yee-kam, 46, and Yeung Yee-wa, 44.
Jat said Jason Leung Song-xue, 19, who suffered brain damage in the hostage tragedy, was recovering in hospital but was not well enough to testify. His mother, Amy Leung Ng Yau-woon, who lost her husband and two children in the tragedy, would not give evidence either.
The court heard from a statement by Melencia Gonzales, who was a close friend of Mendoza, that the disgraced police officer went to her home at 6.10am on August 23 and they drove to Manila. She asked him why he was in uniform. 'He told me: 'I'm carrying a gun, that's why I am in uniform'.' Before she dropped him off at Fort Santiago, they ate shark's fin, congee, beef broccoli and chicken feet at a restaurant.