1992-01-02 12:23
INFORMATION SERVICES DEPT
852 521 7725 P.01/13
MEDIA SUMMARY
Media Research Sub-Division, Government Information Services
From: DIS (Mark Pinkstone, OPRS)
To: All Overseas Offices
Date: 2 January 1992
Pages: /3
Log No.: OPRS/L/ |
A
THURSDAY, JANUARY 2, 1992
NIC
HKDO10/2
KS
JM
MS SH
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371
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Executary col death penalty.
2/1
OVERVIEW
on
PARA A
Many papers today published follow-up reports on the announcement of Sir David Wilson's retirement as Governor of HK and speculation his successor. The murder of a kidnap victim whose body was found on a Wo Hop Shek hillside drew prominent coverage. The rally staged by the All HK Alliance in Support of the Patriotic Pro-democracy Movement in China was given a good run. Also treated prominently by some papers was the petition to Government House by grassroot organisations against public utility fare rises. The SCM Post's front-page lead said that Britain had taken less than half of the 2000 VRs it promised to resettle by June this year. The Standard led with Chinese leader Jiang Zemin's call for more political reform.
CHINESE MEDIA
GOVERNOR
Interview: An interview with Governor Sir David Wilson by RTHK, TVB and ATV received wide coverage in the papers, including left-wing papers, yesterday. Many papers carried a transcript of questions and ∙answers at the interview. It was noted that Sir David said that the
decision to change the HK Governor had been made by the Prime Minister and Sir David agreed that if there was to be another Governor before 1997, it would make sense that the person took up the job earlier so that he had sufficient time to become familiar with the work. This would give the new governor a term of office of four and a half to five years.
New year message: The Governor's New Year Message received wide media coverage yesterday. The message was also reported in left-wing papers. It was noted that the Governor said that the Government was determined to implement the welfare and investment programmes in 1992. Sir David stressed that HK must carry out the new airport and transport infrastructure projects for the future.
Governor's resignation: Yesterday's lead story in the Express quoted authoritative sources as saying that Governor Sir David Wilson had submitted his resignation to the Prime Minister in early September in 1991 after the signing of the Airport Memorandum. This followed futile efforts to protect the interests of HK. The sources said that the Governor was ignored in the latter part of the airport negotiations with the Chinese side and a draft agreement was signed by Sir Percy Cradock in June, The Governor had resigned because he felt that the interests of the British and Chinese sides were not in line with those of HK. The sources said that Sir David had worked wholeheartedly for HK and was considered by the FCO as some sort of a local person who sympathised with a colony to stand up against the interests of Britain. This was a tragic flaw for a diplomat.
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in
oh dear
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