Vindication for pensioner, a decade after taking on the government and the Link Reit
Lo Siu-lan, now 79 years old, went to court to fight against the privatisation of malls and car parks in 2004
More than a decade after Lo Siu-lan took the government to court and temporarily derailed its plan to privatise its shopping malls and parking facilities, the 79-year-old still becomes fiery at the mention of the Link Reit.
“I found Tung Chee-hwa and knocked on the tiger’s head,” she said, using a Chinese colloquial expression to describe how one elderly woman took on the city’s top office holder, the then chief executive.
“I was not trying to knock him to death. I just wanted to wake him up. How could he sell everything when he felt like doing so without asking the public? That has wreaked havoc. Everything (at the malls) would become so much more expensive.
“Now people are finally telling me that I did the right thing.”
The Kwai Shing West Estate resident became the talk of town in December 2004 when she launched a judicial review to challenge the legality of the Housing Authority’s plan to privatise 180 malls and parks by listing the real estate investment trust on the stock market.