BY BAG
布政司署
港下亞
畢道
本署檔號 OUR REF.:
CR 8/1476/79
來函檔號 YOUR REF.:
CONFIDENTIAL
НКК сно
011
R D Clift Esq
HK & GD
FCO
REGIST
878
Елет
GOVERNMENT SECRETARIAT
LOWER ALBERT ROAD
HONG KONG
26 August 1980
ممه
t:
HKK
Dear Dick,
RAY
" Awake
TIN SHUI WAI CHINA RESOURCES PROJECI
Shui Wai.
2.
-
79
You wrote to me on 1 August about Wimpeys and Tin
The story, as far as we have it, is interesting and revealing. During 1979 Wimpeys were on the brink of signing an agreement with Jardines to buy their way into this development in a big way. At the last moment they were given advice that the existence of a small number of untraceable shareholders of the property they were after would frustrate the whole scheme. (As it happens this advice has proved unsound and the present development consortium has found a legal way of acquiring these few holdings and is likely to do so in the near future). without telling Jardines, Wimpeys pulled out, much to the chagrin of their prospective partners.
3.
So,
Subsequently Wimpeys re-entered the scheme surreptitiously by buying up part of the holdings of Clifford Wong, an architect who has played a mysterious but major role in all this. Later still, Wimpeys sold these holdings to China Resources at a very handsome profit. At this point last December and not recently as Donald Liao implied they seem to have finally bowed out, though the wheeling and dealing over the venture is such that one can never be sure who is going to emerge Or re-emerge.
This is all rather murky but not untypical of the development scene here.
4.
Yousserer
Im
cc D M March Esq OBE
SBTC HK
(I C Orr)
CONFIDENTIAL