Asked whether the pro-Beijing camp’s criticisms had put pressure on him to take action against Tai, Hor shrugged off the issue, saying, “The question at the moment concerns the pressure on the prosecutorial authorities whether or not to prefer a charge.” 

Tai posted a message on his Facebook page on Tuesday night saying he believed he was being monitored by a “powerful law enforcement agency”.

That came after the pro-Beijing Ta Kung Pao newspaper published a photo of him leaving a car park in Central even though Tai said he had taken precautions to ensure he was not being tailed by anyone from the paper.

“For the record, if you see me ... about to cross the Hong Kong border to mainland China or Macau, please take the time to ask me if I’m leaving voluntarily,” he wrote.

“If you see me on the mainland or in Macau, I definitely would not be there voluntarily, since I have no intention of going there at all. If you see me on videos saying I returned voluntarily, I would have definitely done so under pressure or coercion.”

The row over Tai’s suggestion at a forum in Taiwan last month that the city could “consider becoming an independent state” some day in a “democratic China” intensified on Monday as Beijing mouthpiece People’s Daily demanded the Hong Kong government take legal action against him under the city’s criminal law.

Hong Kong ‘cannot prosecute’ Benny Tai for independence talk

The university is also under mounting pressure from the pro-Beijing camp to dismiss the law professor as his critics question whether Tai is still fit to teach.

A member of the faculty’s senior management, speaking on the condition of anonymity, told the Post on Tuesday that Tai, as a tenured associate professor of law, would not be affected by the controversy. 

“Nothing much has changed,” the source said, noting that it was “not the first day” Tai had come under attack, having faced a similar backlash when leading the Occupy protests. 

The source said there was “simply no good cause” to warrant an investigation or to dismiss Tai, as his remarks, similar to his Occupy role, were not related to his teaching. 

Neither the university nor acting president Paul Tam Kwong-hang could be reached for comment. 

41 lawmakers echo Beijing’s sharp rebuke of legal scholar Benny Tai’s independence comments

A defiant Tai earlier complained that Beijing was making an example of him to limit freedom of speech and pave the way for tougher national security legislation in Hong Kong.

Former pro-Beijing lawmaker Tam Yiu-chung, the city’s sole deputy to the National People’s Congress Standing Committee, the country’s top legislative body, earlier publicly “advised” HKU to consider whether Tai was suitable to remain in his post. 

Tam’s successor as chair of the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong, Starry Lee Wai-king, also weighed in, saying HKU should “look into” whether Tai had broken any rules since the Occupy movement.

“It cannot be ignored simply because Tai said he was having an academic discussion, this would fall short of people’s expectations of the university and the government … to leave all their responsibilities to the city’s law,” she added. 

Fabulist Benny Tai lacks simple common sense

The Hong Kong Federation of Education and several pro-establishment community groups also condemned Tai and urged HKU to fire him.

“What Tai said is not in any way in conflict with his role of professor of HKU,” O’Leary said, urging the university to stand firm against calls to fire Tai. “Just because it annoys the government, it’s obviously not a reason to stop doing that.” 

The Progressive Lawyers Group, comprising liberal barristers, solicitors and law students, urged the government to publicly apologise and to “cease its intimidation and attacks against” Tai. 

Kwok Cheuk-kin, a former civil servant known for regularly taking the government to court, argued those remarks were equally unconstitutional, in that they showed Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor had failed to uphold Basic Law articles that protect freedom of speech and academic activities.

As a result, Lam, who took an oath to uphold the Basic Law as the city’s leader, should be booted from the job, he argued.

Additional reporting by Tony Cheung and Chris Lau