Building's owners object to Tiananmen Square museum over fears of trouble
Neighbour of exhibition on Tiananmen Square crackdown admits political sensitivity is behind objection to its location in Tsim Sha Tsui tower
Political considerations are behind property owners' objections to a June 4 museum in a Tsim Sha Tsui commercial building, the has learned.
The revelation came from a member of the owners' corporation which oversees Foo Hoo Centre, on Austin Avenue, after it sent a lawyer's letter of objection last month to stop the opening of the world's first museum dedicated to the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown.
Running a museum on the premises might breach property deeds as the space should be used only for offices, the owners' group wrote in the letter to the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China.
They are only trying to give Beijing a helping hand in suppressing us
But tenants also indicated their discomfort with being associated with the Tiananmen Square incident, given its political sensitivity.
"[The operation of] a June 4 memorial museum is definitely a political problem," Yeung Cho-ming, a member of the owners' corporation, said. "The [June 4 incident] is sensitive and contentious. We are afraid the museum will bring us trouble. Someone might protest here and affect our daily operations."
Yeung, who is also secretary general of the Chiu Chau Plastic Manufacturers Association, feared controversy could not be avoided even if the alliance took special care to resolve the security problems and nuisances caused, "as political problems cannot be settled".
His manufacturers association, located on the second floor of Foo Hoo Centre, has a Beijing-loyalist background. Its president, Lam Chun-hung, is a member of the Yunnan provincial committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, the country's political advisory body.
Despite the concerns, a woman who runs her business Toyroyal from the tenth floor said she believed the museum would not create much nuisance. But as a tenant, she did not have voting rights in the owners' corporation.
