Government report slams Hong Kong public broadcaster RTHK, accuses it of lack of editorial accountability; director to step down early

Hong Kong’s embattled public broadcaster was put on notice in a damning government report on Friday demanding an overhaul of management, editorial operations and work culture, while the veteran journalist in charge for the past 5½ years agreed to step down early.

Leung Ka-wing’s contract as director of broadcasting and RTHK editor-in-chief was due to expire in August, but Deputy Secretary for Home Affairs Patrick Li Pak-chuen will now take over on March 1, placing the broadcaster back under the leadership of a career bureaucrat.

The announcement, in a short statement in the morning that did not thank Leung for his service, was followed hours later by the findings of a six-month investigation that laid bare “serious inadequacies” including poor management and a lack of editorial accountability at RTHK.

“The agreement between the government and Mr Leung, which originally [was to] expire in August this year, will be resolved early by mutual consent,” the government statement said, adding that it had been unable to find a suitable successor through an open recruitment exercise.

While the new director of broadcasting promised that RTHK would fully abide by its charter, Leung, 68, thanked staff and bid them farewell. “These past 5½ years of serving RTHK and society with you have been indelible, and I am grateful for every moment,” he wrote in a letter to them.

Leung was already under pressure to rein in RTHK when he took over from bureaucrat Roy Tang Yun-kwong as editor-in-chief in 2015 and inherited a work force that bristled at the prospect of any perceived interference in editorial independence.