With the Court of Appeal set next week to hear the right of abode case of a Filipino maid, the city's top human rights watchdogs have raised worries that the government's appeal may stoke ethnic tensions, and called for calm from the public once the judgment is handed down.
The government's appeal against the ruling in favour of Evangeline Banao Vallejos will be heard on February 21.
'Given recent events, we wonder if a verdict in favour of Ms Vallejos would trigger ethnic hatred. We want to address this so that it does not happen,' Fernando Cheung Chiu-hung, a social policy professor at Polytechnic University, said at a forum on right of abode issues yesterday.
Dr Cheung's view was supported by Law Yuk-kai of the Human Rights Monitor; Equal Opportunities Commission chairman Lam Woon-kwong; Vallejos' lawyer, Mark Daly; and Doris Lee of Open Doors, a group of employers of foreign helpers.
'[Daly] meets the criteria [for residency] and so do the domestic helpers ... there should be no discriminatory arrangements,' Law said.
The issue of granting foreign helpers abode ignited a public outcry over jobs and fears it would further strain the city's medical and public housing systems. A similar furore has erupted in recent weeks over the issue of mainland mothers giving birth in Hong Kong and the behaviour of visitors from the mainland.