Five companies linked to the late rice-cooker tycoon William Mong Man-wai's Shun Hing Group are suing the executors of his estate for more than HK$1 billion which they say they are owed.
The companies said Mong took the money 'without proper authority' or that they had extended it in the form of loans between 2002, the year of his high-profile divorce, and 2010, when he died.
Bank of East Asia chairman David Li Kwok-po and lawyer Vic Choi Fan-keung, the executors of Mong's estate, are named as defendants.
Four firms that are part of the group - Shun Hing Holdings, Shun Hing Electronic Holdings, Shun Hing Electronic Trading and Shun Hing Technology - say in a High Court writ that Mong owed them HK$941 million. Liberian-registered Timmerton Company, which owns 40 per cent of Shun Hing Holdings, is seeking US$133 million, says a separate writ. Both writs were filed on Wednesday.
A Shun Hing Group spokeswoman said the legal proceedings had been instituted by agreement between both sides. 'They are normal and reasonable legal proceedings.'
The filings are the latest step in a long legal battle over Mong's fortune, which is said to be in the tens of billions of Hong Kong dollars.