Money Matters | Tycoons not the boss anymore as Beijing calls the shots
Mainland grooming own crop of patriotic business leaders in Hong Kong as party paper continues bashing of ‘superman’
"Mainlanders now tend to see Li Ka-shing as a 'profit comes first' businessman, rather than 'a role model who loves the country and Hong Kong'."
When a Communist Party mouthpiece says that in its editorial, the message can't be any clearer. Li is no longer considered a "patriotic businessman" by Beijing.
Anybody with some knowledge of Xi Jinping’s leadership wouldn’t be surprised. This is an administration that talks politics, not money. It’s no longer donation to universities or charities that make a businessman “patriotic”, but obedience of Beijing’s orders – at all costs.
This is an administration that is determined to make Hong Kong Beijing-led instead of tycoon-led – or Li-led for that matter – as it has been the case in the past two decades. For the new rulers in Beijing, businessmen are there to serve, not lead.
While some of his peers have yielded to Beijing’s orders and publicly apologised to Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying for criticising him in the run-up to his election, the 86-year-old tycoon did not. The backlash was a matter of time. The corporate restructuring making Li’s empire a Cayman Island entity was the last straw.
