Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam (3rd from right) and the five newly appointed secretaries of her political team met the media at a press conference in Hong Kong on Wednesday. Photo: AFP
 

China's State Council on Wednesday announced the appointment and removal of several key officials of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) government, and the chief executive of the HKSAR stressed that the reshuffle aims to push the economic recovery.

The new appointments to the HKSAR government include secretaries for Constitutional and mainland affairs, civil service, financial services, and home affairs, as well as innovation and technology. 

Analysts on Hong Kong affairs said that the performance of former officials in some of these sectors was not very satisfied in handling the political turmoil and social unrest since June 2019, as well as the COVID-19 pandemic, so the new appointments need to fix the problems and save the economy by empowering the professional and loyal officials.     

The decision was made in accordance with the HKSAR Basic Law of the People's Republic of China, and based on the nomination and suggestion of HKSAR Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor, the Xinhua News Agency reported. 

Lam said that with her new political team she hoped to start immediately planning for Hong Kong's economic recovery, according to the HKSAR government's new website news.gov.hk.

Nip Tak-kuen was appointed Secretary for the Civil Service, replacing Law Chi-kong. Tsui Ying-wai was appointed Secretary for Home Affairs, replacing Lau Kong-wah. Tsang Kwok-wai was appointed Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs, replacing Nip Tak-kuen.

Hui Ching-yu was appointed Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury, replacing James Henry Lau. Sit Wing-hang was appointed Secretary for Innovation and Technology, replacing Yang Wei-hsiung. Tsang Kwok-wai was removed from the post of Director of Immigration.

Tian Feilong, a Hong Kong affairs expert at Beihang University in Beijing, told the Global Times on Wednesday that according to the list of the new and replaced officials, we can find the central government has considered the appointments carefully based on the officials' loyalty, political reliability, governance capability, and professionalism.

Li Xiaobing, an associate professor at Nankai University in Tianjin, said that the newly appointed officials need to better implement the Basic Law more precisely and correctly in their daily work and better understand the ties between the Chinese mainland and Hong Kong, as well as the relationship between the central government and the SAR government.  

Lam said that the reshuffling of her political team was not in response to the recent social unrest in Hong Kong, according to news.gov.hk.

But Tian noted that some former officials in the relevant sectors of the HKSAR government didn't make a very satisfying performance in handling the turmoil in 2019 and the current COVID-19 pandemic, which has made the city's economy suffer a heavy damage, so in order to push the economic recovery in the future, the new appointed officials have to fix the problems and improve the governance. 

Meeting the media with the five newly appointed principal officials, Lam said Hong Kong needed to seize the opportunities presented by the development of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area.

She noted that this round of appointments could ensure the city grasped those opportunities to help the economy rebound.

"Hong Kong is in a very difficult situation now, apart from the pandemic, we are going into a major economic recession with high unemployment and so on, so we really need to start immediately to plan for Hong Kong's economic recovery," she said. 

"Especially in the several sectors which we attach importance to, and that is Hong Kong's financial services, Hong Kong's innovation and technology, Hong Kong's professional services and creative industries, and the many opportunities that will be available to Hong Kong under the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area," Lam noted.

Tian said currently the opposition group and violent extreme separatists are still trying to seize political power through creating chaos and political election, so under this kind of challenges, the HKSAR government needs to be united to safeguard the public order, and this is the precondition for the economic recovery, and the new appointments this time also aim on organizational construction of the political team of the HKSAR government. 

Hong Kong stocks ended Wednesday on a positive note, with the Hang Seng index up 99.81 points, or 0.42%, at 23,893.36 after news of the reshuffle and with the market hoping for further fiscal stimulus from the central government.