Experts urge MTR board changes
Management and transport specialists say high-speed line's woes expose weakness at the top and firm's unclear mission as minister vows reform
Reforming the board and clarifying the mission of the MTR Corporation will help the government reassert control over the rail company after a delay to the high-speed rail link exposed its weak oversight, transport and management experts say.
The comments came after transport minister Professor Anthony Cheung Bing-leung's pledge on Monday to reform the corporation. Cheung apologised for the government's failure to monitor the MTR more closely in the wake of a public outcry over news that the HK$66.9 billion high-speed link to Guangzhou would be two years late.
The company is managed day-to-day by nine executive directors, led by American CEO Jay Walder. But the majority of the board is made up of government-appointed non-executive directors with no background in railways, including Cheung, chairman Dr Raymond Chien Kuo-fung, Jockey Club chief Brian Stevenson, financial services minister Professor Chan Ka-keung and lawmakers Abraham Razack and Ng Leung-sing.
Polytechnic University transport expert Dr Hung Wing-tat advised giving individual board members an enhanced role.
He suggested the reforms take their cue from the structure of KCR, the rail operator that merged with the MTR in 2007. Each KCR director used to chair one of its committees. "In that way, the power would not be only in the hands of a few," he said.
By contrast, the MTR board was kept in the dark when projects director Chew Tai-chong discovered that measures to mitigate difficulties the scheme was experiencing would not help recover the delay.