New Territories towns plan a battle for hearts and minds
Proposal to develop three towns near the border have not gone down well with a wary public who suspect ulterior motives are at work
A controversial plan to develop three new towns in the northeastern New Territories highlights distrust between the people and the new government, as well as public resistance against greater integration with the mainland.
Opposition to the project is peaking as the public consultation ends today.
The controversy erupted only after the new administration took over in July, although consultations began four years ago. Such a sudden change in public sentiment is not new. The government, led by Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying, has already handled one on national education over the past few months.
Both schemes were a leftover of the last administration. Such was the anger at plans to make national education compulsory in public schools by 2016 that the idea was scrapped.
In order to ensure the residential and industrial developments in the new towns were compatible with the environment, planning officials at the initial stage of consultation cut the housing density by 36 per cent. But two years later, officials came under pressure to raise the density again to meet housing demand.
But various opposition voices and public discontent erupted towards the end of the last of the three-stage consultation. Activists question the government's thinking behind the plan to promote social and economic integration with Shenzhen, claiming it is not for Hongkongers but for mainland visitors and investors.
Earlier this week, Chief Secretary Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor dismissed these "false claims", but such feelings are not surprising if one looks at the context and recent social sentiment.