Tung Chee-hwa's Resignation: More Than a Personal Failure

C. K. Lau (Eecutive Editor, South China Morning Post)

As Tung Chee-hwa draws the final curtain on his term as chief executive, the spotlight has once again focused on his personal failings over the past seven years.

His fall from grace has much to do with a string of decisions that, rightly or wrongly, has been attributed to his dogged determination to do it his way - sticking with the policy of building 85,000 flats after the property market plunged, awarding the Cyberport development to a consortium without public tenders, and trying to push through the National Security Bill even after 500,000 people marched against it.

To be fair to Mr Tung, there could be painful, but undisclosed, reasons why he felt he should stick with those decisions. But unless the inside stories are told, his record will remain tainted.

Compared with the voluminous coverage of his failings, however, there has been relatively little attention paid to how the faults of Hong Kong's political system have aggravated the pressure that any minor row could impose on him as the city's leader.

For reasons of history, Hong Kong is provided with a system that pits an unelected administration against an elected legislature. Whereas the administration sees its role as guarding the interests of the whole community, it is often subject to politically motivated attacks by elected legislators. It is not that the legislators are bent on causing trouble. But their frustration at being constitutionally barred from playing any significant role in policy-making has, at times, driven them to go over the top in criticising the administration.

In their push to fix the faults of the system by demanding that the chief executive be elected by popular elections, they have found Mr Tung an easy target, as he epitomises what is so wrong with the system.

In the words of University of Hong Kong professor John Burns, Hong Kong has a disarticulated political system that fails to translate the public will to become the mandate of its leader. Unfortunately, there are, as yet, no signs that the central government, though aware of the problem, is prepared to fix the faults of the system.

The pro-democracy camp's solution is to elect the chief executive and all legislators by direct elections. As they do not want to detract from their cause, they are not proposing other measures that could make the current system work better. It is disappointing, however, that even the pro-government camp has failed to make meaningful suggestions to improve its operation.

The Business and Professional Federation is the only body to have come up with a serious proposal. It has called for the introduction of a bicameral system as a compromise that answers the call by our national leaders for gradual and orderly progress.

In fact, our legislature has built-in features of such a system. Half the legislators are directly elected, while the other half are representatives of functional constituencies. Non-government bills and motions must be separately approved by the two batches of legislators.

The federation proposes to further formalise the division by having two chambers; one comprising directly elected legislators - which would bear the major responsibility of scrutinising policies and bills - while the other would comprise functional representatives and play a lesser role of providing checks and balances.

Whether the proposal will work deserves careful consideration. If nothing else, it is a timely reminder that the quality of governance depends on both the attributes of our politicians and the system in which they operate.

(Originally appeared in the March 11, 2005 issue of South China Morning Post in Hong Kong, reproduced here with permission.)