The Equal Opportunities Commission has responded to a formal complaint issued by the Refugee Union about a racist joke Hong Kong LegCo President Jasper Tsang’s made in November last year.
In a letter posted to the Refugee Union’s Facebook page, the commission noted the concerns of the union and restated their view that anyone making race-related comments in public, regardless of context, should be sensitive to the feelings of others to avoid misunderstanding.
The Union lodged a formal complaint last week in response to a leaked recording of comments Tsang made in November about how best to clear the Occupy Central protest sites.
His full quote:
“I had lunch with a number of my… schoolmates last Friday. One of them is a doctor. And he said: ‘I tell you how to get people off the street. There are many Africans staying in Chungking Mansions. You go there. Get half a dozen Africans. Tell them – look, go there. Go to Harcourt Road, you have beautiful tents there, you can go sleep there without paying any rent. Get three meals every day. Free. Tell them to go there.’ … Just a joke.”
Attached to the letter was a newspaper clipping of the same EOC statement in Chinese, which was published in the Hong Kong Economic Journal on July 4.
Photo: LegCo via Flickr
