Hong Kong’s push to reimpose strict COVID-control measures suffered an embarrassing setback after it emerged 10 government officials had gone to a large party attended by a person believed to have COVID-19.
Chief Executive Carrie Lam announced the probe into a party of more than 100 people — including some of her government’s top officials — a day after outlining new measures to curb an omicron outbreak in the city. Home Affairs Secretary Caspar Tsui apologized on Facebook after being sent to a quarantine camp, while health authorities sought to determine whether another cabinet official, Immigration Director Au Ka-wang, was also a close contact to the infected party-goer.
“I must say I’m disappointed,” Lam told a news briefing Thursday. “We have been mounting an all-out effort in fighting the epidemic. As top government officials, there is all the more reason for us to set a good example and avoid attending private gatherings that may pose a major hazard.”
Hong Kong is rushing to defend its status as one of the world’s last COVID Zero safe havens, after discovering evidence that the omicron variant may be spreading in the community. On Wednesday, officials imposed strict new virus controls, including banning dining-in after 6 p.m., the closure of bars, beauty parlors and beaches and halted all flights from eight countries, in hopes of quashing the outbreak and preventing another delay in efforts to reopen the border with mainland China.
The scandal risks feeding further public resentment against Lam’s Beijing-backed government, which has maintained some of the world’s toughest travel curbs, jailed scores of pro-democracy activists, forced newspaper closures and installed a new opposition-free legislature. The incident also comes at an inopportune time for Lam personally, since she must soon decide whether she’ll seek China’s blessing for a second five-year term as leader.
“The public grievances are already very high, especially after the government announced no dine-in eating after 6 p.m. starting tomorrow,” said Ivan Choy, senior lecturer in politics at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. “This will definitely undermine the governance of the administration, if it’s planning to set out more harsh policies, given containing COVID-19 has remained its priority.”
The South China Morning Post newspaper reported that the party Monday was a birthday celebration for Witman Hung, head of a mainland Chinese economic agency in Hong Kong. The paper said Lam wasn’t among the guests.
Lam said Tsui was quarantined because he remained at the event past 9:30 p.m., when the person believed to have been infected with COVID-19 arrived. He was sent to a government camp in Penny’s Bay, where an increasing number of travelers arriving in Hong Kong have been forced to serve the first leg of quarantines that last as long as three weeks.
“I will take responsibility for my wrong behavior,” Tsui said on Facebook. “I will follow the restrictions to get quarantined. I will also learn from this and not make this mistake again.”
Authorities were still investigating whether Au had close contact with the infected person. Eight of the 10 government officials who attended the party left before 9:30 p.m., Lam said, sparing them the need to quarantine. The government’s headquarters would be disinfected, she added.
This isn’t the first time that top Hong Kong government officials have flouted the guidance that they’ve asked members of the public to follow. In July, three Hong Kong officials — including Au — were fined for attending a hotpot dinner that breached virus measures, inflaming resentment a large part of the public already harbors toward the government over a Beijing-drafted national security law that’s been used to crackdown on dissent.
On Thursday, Lam criticized officials for failing to heed Health Secretary Sophia Chan’s New Year’s Eve call for the public to avoid mass gatherings.
“So my colleagues apparently have not taken the advice of the secretary for food and health,” Lam said. “How could they set a good example for the people of Hong Kong?”
She stopped short of calling for their resignation, saying a distinction should be made between those who spent the whole night at the party and those who “just dropped by to say, ‘Hello.’”
“For the undesirable behavior of top officials, I will take appropriate action,” she said. “But at this point, I will not announce what that action will be.”
