Feisty Hong Kong leader defends Omicron handling, lays out details for revamped bureaus and Northern Metropolis in testy opening session of overhauled legislature
- Chief Executive Carrie Lam opens meeting with ambitious speech laying out vision for new government structure and massive border town
- But she is also forced to defend her handling of the emerging fifth pandemic wave to lawmakers, who question if the government’s approach is lacking
Hong Kong’s leader opened the new legislative term on Wednesday with a speech that resembled a policy address in ambition and scope, as she mounted a stout defence of her handling of the Omicron outbreak and announced details of a plan to restructure government bureaus.
The quarantine violations along with a scandal that erupted when about a dozen of her senior officials attended a birthday party with hundreds of guests amid the widening outbreak have created a political crisis for the chief executive, who has not said whether she will seek a second term in March.
Lam told lawmakers that the official monitoring system had been working well but individuals were now breaking the rules.
“You can’t blindly criticise anti-epidemic officials for not performing their job just because of violation of rules by one individual,” Lam told Roundtable lawmaker Michael Tien Puk-sun at the first meeting of the revamped Legislative Council following Beijing’s “patriots-only” electoral overhaul.
In a break from past practice, the first session began with a 90-minute question and answer session with the chief executive, rather than lawmakers taking their oaths, a ceremony which Lam presided over last week.
While most legislators focused their questions on the pandemic, Chan Hoi-yan, of the new Election Committee constituency, lambasted Lam for the government’s preventive measures, which she said was plagued by loopholes.
