CY Leung refutes student’s claims, says Beijing always had power to appoint Hong Kong’s leader

In a recent article, a university student said the central government had contravened the ‘one country, two systems’ policy

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Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying has hit back at a university student who claimed that Beijing had encroached on the city’s autonomy. Photo: Sam Tsang

Published: 4:45pm, 6 Apr 2017Updated: 9:01pm, 6 Apr 2017

Hong Kong Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying has taken aim at a fourth-year university student who accused Beijing of contravening the “one country, two systems” policy and encroaching on the city’s autonomy.

In a post on his official blog on Thursday, the city’s outgoing leader argued Beijing had always enjoyed the power to appoint Hong Kong’s chief executive.

On Wednesday, the Chinese-language Ming Pao Daily newspaper published an article written by fourth-year Education University student Alan Ho Kwan-lok.

Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying’s response to Alan Ho's article. Photo: Screen capture

In the article, Ho said Hongkongers used to understand “one country, two systems” as a framework under which the central government would deal with only the city’s defence and foreign affairs matters, as well as other areas outside the limits of Hong Kong’s high degree of autonomy.

But Ho argued that since Leung took office in 2012, the central government’s “substantive power to appoint” the chief executive had been mentioned more frequently in the media, proving that Hongkongers’ understanding of the city’s autonomy had been redefined by Beijing.