Make a note in your diary: November 27 – the day former Executive Council convenor CY Leung will officially declare himself to be a candidate for Chief 
Executive of Hong Kong. He rushed out the announcement yesterday just as former Chief Secretary Henry Tang was holding a press conference to state that he would declare his candidacy by the end of the month. For the record, November 27 is also the day that I will announce my intention to have my annual dental check-up early next year. Oh, and it’s Bruce Lee’s birthday. (And Jimi Hendrix’s.)
The conventional wisdom is that both men’s reluctance to state a simple fact directly is due to the Electoral Affairs Commission’s clumsy campaign regulations, which seem to be drafted by the same people who write the epic lists of rules on what you can and cannot do in a public park. They will have less leeway after they genuinely, officially, really-mean-it-now say they are running. But there is almost certainly more to it than that. Rita Fan, in her months-long will-I-won’t-I drama, clung to the same insistence on ambiguity, and Regina Ip is also doing it.
Everyone is waiting for The Sign. No-one knows what to say or do until Beijing gives them a hint. Following a process of elimination, it is unthinkable that the next CE is not going to be Henry, but there is still no positive proof it will be him. CY doesn’t know whether he will be allowed to play the role of good runner-up (better luck next time) or required to withdraw to maintain pro-establishment unity. With a few bold exceptions, the pro-Beijing figures who will sit on the rubber-stamp Election Committee and pretend to elect the CE next March refuse to express a preference between the two men. They say they want to examine the respective platforms, but the truth is Beijing hasn’t told them what to think. Everyone is helpless, flapping around, waiting to hear what to do. It’s quite amusing in a pitiful sort of way.
Anyway, the really important thing is this: how many women did Henry screw around with and for how long (and where, and when, and did she moan, etc) and is there an illegitimate kid somewhere out there as a result? Henry isn’t doing a bad job of gliding over the prurient media baiting with his apologetic ‘Aw, gee, shucks, you know me, I’m just a dumbass’ routine. It’s not a crime to be a bit dim.
What is unforgiveable, however, is being the sort of loser who was sitting on HK$300 million worth of his company’s stock and watched it shrivel away into nothing. That’s the subtext of a Sing Tao/East Week/Standard feature describing the self-made CY’s business misfortunes in a tone of mock-sympathy. Sing Tao group boss Charles Ho is, like Henry, a fully paid-up member of the inherited wealth club with apparently few doubts about how everything will work out after all the ritual equivocation is over.
If Leung cannot even look after his own money then he has no buisness looking after ours. He is out, as far as I am concerned.
Ever since the Horseman admitted straying I have been sitting in a dark corner aghast at the possibility of Edison Chen-style images of Henry and his long-past-nubile conquests going public. The horror. The horror.
I have a feeling that some sections of the press (Apple Daily) know there is a little Hank Jnr out there. I have also a feeling that it won’t be long before the little mite has his photograph in the papers with his tell tale long face.
The Horsesman’s shagging is going to be a decisive factor in Beijing’s imperial decree. They already know the extent of it and are waiting to see how much comes out and the whether Honkies care.
Do we?
Let’s start the Edison Chen for CE campaign. At least we can judge his efforts on Youtube unlike Henry’s (where the best we can expect is one of those Apple Daily infographics).
The horse is mearly doing what all current “leaders” do. Fuck who they can, when they can, whichever way they can and then tell us “its our responsibility….” move along folks, nothing here that’s new.
I’m sorry to go off theme … but what is going on at the SCMP. The content is thinning, more and more articles, including opinion pieces, are out of date having already appeared on Internet ( in one instance three days before). And why do they feel it’s important to tell me some cops had a hotpot meal in a police station in breach of some internal police rules. This is the best that they can do!