Posted: Feb. 27, 2014
Yesterday afternoon’s post was too accurate for humor. Unfortunately the lead paragraph does signify, for better and for worse, the environment settling over Hong Kong’s media. Mainland-style physical assaults against journalists here have increased during the past year although no one anticipated anything as extreme as the attack on Kevin Lau Chun-to [ 劉進圖 ].
Lau was in critical condition yesterday afternoon after being waylaid on the street by two men near a restaurant he frequents. It was a Chinese underworld Triad-style hit, not with guns but meat cleavers, meant not to kill but to punish, warn, and intimidate. He suffered serious stab wounds to his legs and back, executed with surgical precision. Nerves in both legs were severed and the back wounds were deep but manged not to puncture anything vital. Since the attack occurred only about 15 minutes by ambulance from a major hospital and he himself called for help immediately before losing consciousness, everything proceeded like clockwork. So far, there are only questions but no answers: who ordered the hit and why?
Kevin Lau is the liberal journalist whose sudden transfer, from chief newsroom editor at Ming Pao Daily to the company’s digital publications unit, sparked a rare staff insurrection in January. Ming Pao is Hong Kong’s leading pro-democracy Chinese-language newspaper. Concern about his replacement, a Malaysian editor with little Hong Kong experience and a conservative background, was one of several issues that provoked last Sunday’s rally in defense of press freedom organized by the Hong Kong Journalists Association (Feb. 26 post).
Neither Lau nor anyone at the paper has yet explained the transfers but management stood firm in the face of staff protests. Word circulated that the paper’s founder, Louis Cha, had given his blessing to Lau’s demotion, which was allegedly sparked by a disagreement between him and the editor-to-be for which Lau was responsible. The editor-to-be is a friend of the paper’s current owner.
While editor-in-chief, Lau oversaw among other things investigative reporting on the two main candidates in Hong Kong’s 2012 Chief Executive selection campaign. The reports helped destroy Henry Tang’s candidacy and later embarrassed Chief Executive-elect Leung Chun-ying as well. More recently Lau was allegedly responsible for playing up a controversial Leung administration decision on television licensing.
Not surprising, then, that the Chief Executive was among the first on the scene at Hong Kong’s Eastern District Hospital. He was blamed at Sunday’s demo for failing to concern himself in any way with the growing threats to media freedom and tried to redress the balance yesterday with some strong words of condemnation for the “savage act.” The police also made brave statements about leaving no stone unturned in bringing the culprits to justice. They are no doubt already long gone across the border and the apparent Triad link will only add to Leung’s embarrassment. One of many items in the case critics have built against him is the support he enjoys from borderline “water margin” types whose underworld associations are always assumed.
The authorities unfortunately don’t have a very good track record in apprehending those responsible in such cases. Several have gone unsolved or the masterminds have disappeared leaving only underlings to take the rap. This case has a curious twist though. Triad societies don’t usually concrn themselves with anything as esoteric as press freedom, or political news coverage whether cross-border or here. So if it really was a political hit then the beginning of the end for Hong Kong’s freedom of political expression is already upon us. But if it was a political hit, why attack Lau who was the loser in Ming Pao’s personnel shakeup … and had already accepted his punishment by agreeing to be sidelined instead of quitting in protest? Leaving such questions unanswered is, of course, what political thuggery aims to do: punish one to intimidate others.
Students at the Chinese University were among the first to organize a protest. Their slogan: “We are all Lau Chun-to and they can’t kill us all.”
You recently have described the Ming Pao owner as “a Malaysian lumber magnate who has the usual business interests and connections in China.” This is a serious under-statement!
Sir Tan Sri Tiong Hiew King (knighted by Queen Elizabeth) aka Zhang Xiaoqing (???) is 79 years old and bought Ming Pao back in 1995. Residing in Sarawak, he is one of the richest men in Malaysia and Singapore. In addition to timber he is into a dozen other major business areas including gas and oil, hospitality, advertizing and manufacturing as well as being a media magnate (also owns Sin Chew Jit Poh = ????). He almost always is the first one in line greeted by the top Chinese leadership when it meets overseas Chinese in Beijing. His natural gas and oil interests in Sichuan and Jilin have come as a result of a connection to Zhou Yongkang (among others) and his plan to make Chongqing the center of his China-based empire was due to friendship with Bo Xilai. Jia Qinglin, who was the Standing Committee member responsible for united front matters under Hu Jintao, convinced Zhang to pony-up and provide through Malaysian proxies and the Asia Pacific Exchange and Cooperation Foundation (run by Xiao Wunan ???) a significant amount of the estimated US$3 billion to convert Lumbini in Nepal into an international religious hub with 5-star hotels and an international airport . . . the very thought of which, needless to say, drives India crazy. When Bo Xilai went down, Tiong/Zhang had to quickly back pedal politically and now as the net tightens around Zhou Yongkang he probably is again feeling the heat and the need to be politically flexible in deference to the needs of Beijing.
Remarkably and unexplainably, much of the above has been written in Ming Pao itself and probably is the reason the Ming Pao journalists reacted so quickly to the news of a new editor replacement. What is equally remarkable is that Zhang Xiaoqing did not start meddling in editorial policy long ago and apparently allowed Ming Pao’s liberal tradition to carry on as before.
Yes, it is remarkable. Maybe the original owner made that a condition of sale in 1995 … ? If so, everyone can only hope the condition still holds. But the managing editor’s promise to “personally bear the whole burden” of press freedom at Ming Pao is not very reassuring. Isn’t he about to retire? Who will pick up the burden then? Without editorial back-up, the staff can’t do it on their own …