Selected by Beijing in ۱۹۹۶, Tung Chee-hwa’s tenure shaped post-handover Hong Kong during a turbulent political era.
Published On ۲۰ Sep ۲۰۲۶
Hong Kong has given a state funeral to Tung Chee-hwa, its first post-colonial leader, only the third time the city has granted such an honour since Britain returned it to Chinese rule in ۱۹۹۷.
Senior Chinese and Hong Kong officials bid farewell to Tung at the Hong Kong Funeral Home in North Point on Sunday, a day after a public vigil that drew dozens of political and business figures.
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Tung, Hong Kong’s first chief executive, died on September ۸ at the age of ۸۹.
Members of the public could pay their respects by signing condolence books at three community halls until Sunday noon.
The funeral committee, made up of ۸۷ members, was chaired by Shi Taifeng, a senior Chinese Communist Party Politburo member and vice chairman of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), the top political advisory body, underlining the level of official backing from Beijing.
Shi attended the funeral alongside Xia Baolong, Beijing’s top official for Hong Kong and Macau affairs; current chief executive John Lee; former chief executives Leung Chun-ying, Carrie Lam and Donald Tsang; and other political and business figures, reported government-funded Radio Television Hong Kong (RTHK).
Lee and Leung were among the pallbearers who carried Tung’s coffin, draped in China’s national flag, from the hall to a hearse, which headed to Cape Collinson Crematorium.
A shipping tycoon with little political experience, Tung was selected in ۱۹۹۶ by a Beijing-appointed committee to become Hong Kong’s first leader after the ۱۹۹۷ handover from Britain.
Tung led the city through the ۱۹۹۷ Asian financial crisis and the ۲۰۰۳ SARS outbreak, and mass protests that year forced him to shelve proposed national security legislation.
He was re-elected unopposed in ۲۰۰۲ but resigned in ۲۰۰۵, midway through his second term, citing poor health, in a move widely seen as driven by Beijing’s loss of confidence in him.
He went on to serve as a vice chairman of the CPPCC until ۲۰۲۳.
Two business leaders, industrialist Ann Tse-kai and tycoon Henry Fok, who both served as vice chairs of the CPPCC, were given state funerals in ۲۰۰۰ and ۲۰۰۶, respectively.
Chinese state media described Tung as a “renowned patriot”, while his successor, Tsang, called him “an easy-going, gentle and refined man with a broad-minded outlook and far-reaching vision”.
Critics recalled his tenure as marked by governance struggles and public discontent that never fully recovered after the financial crisis.
