It is no secret that Hong Kong Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying (梁振英) has greater power and influence than his counterparts in a democracy, and sometimes much beyond what the Hong Kong Basic Law and other rules permit.
A recent scandal in which Leung pressured aviation workers into breaching airport security regulations for his daughter last month provoked widespread outrage in the territory.
When his daughter, Leung Chung-yan (梁頌昕), left a piece of carry-on luggage outside the airport’s restricted area as she headed for a flight to San Francisco, her mother asked Cathay Pacific to bring the luggage into the restricted area, but staff were reluctant to do so.
Leung Chung-Yan then called her father for help.
During the telphone conversation, the chief executive allegedly instructed the airline staff: “Call me Chief Executive Leung.”
After discussion, the airport authority backed down and assigned a staff member to deliver the baggage to Leung Chung-yan.
When the story was leaked to the local media, much attention was given to the various privileges that Hong Kong’s first family enjoys.
Faced with public outrage, denial was the first reaction of Leung Chun-ying. He mobilized local officials and pro-government politicians to defend his decision as an exception to the conventional airport security rules.
Yet, the more he explained, the less convincing he sounded. Subsequently, more than 2,000 aviation workers staged an unprecedented protest over the special treatment of Leung Chung-yan inside the airport, and more sit-ins are in the offing.
This incident only adds to the long list of scandals that have hardened the territory’s suspicion toward the integrity and competence of Leung Chun-ying’s administration. It has tarnished his self-constructed image as a populist, fighting for the little guy against the mainlandization of Hong Kong and the negative spillover effects of China’s economic slowdown. Contemplating his re-election bid next year, his mishandling of the outrage eroded the little legitimacy that he had in the eyes of Hong Kongers.
Worse still, this fiasco has not only institutionalized the dominant power structure in an autocratic system, but also advanced the interests of the current powerholders at the expense of the disfranchised majority.
Many Hong Kongers have come to realize that the post-colonial framework of “one country, two systems” is degenerating into that of “one Hong Kong, two societies.” The privileged classes like the chief executive’s family and his cronies are inviolable and immune from any legal process, whereas ordinary people are brought under as much scrutiny as criminal suspects.
Unless Hong Kong’s leaders are determined to prevent privilege and entitlement from destroying the principle of fair play, the territory will be vulnerable to the erosive effects of nepotism and cronyism.
Joseph Tse-hei Lee is professor of history at Pace University in New York.
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