Monday, August 11, 2014
Demonstrators staged a rally in Mong Kok to protest against mainland visitors who they accuse of overstretching the transport network and flooding tourist destinations.
The rally came after the Retail Management Association and allied groups warned of a ripple effect on the economy.
Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying has suggested that mainland visitor numbers under the individual travel scheme be curtailed.
Organizer North District Parallel Imports Concern Group spokesman Leung Kim- shing called for a limit on mainland visitors and the cancellation of Shenzhen multi-entry travel permits.
Leung said the profit made by tourism is exaggerated because a certain amount of money does not stay in Hong Kong.
"Hong Kong's retail industry was fine before 2003. It was even fine before 1997," he said.
Residents in North District who had been selling vegetables and other food have lost their shops to pharmacies keen to cash in on the influx of visitors
A Mong Kok resident, surnamed Wong, said the daily lives of everyone in the area have been seriously affected by the influx of mainlanders.
Rally participants held up placards declaring "MTR is so crowded. Why ask us to tolerate," and "Cancel multi-entry permits, and pharmacy and gold shops should disappear."
The retail industry had earlier warned of a loss of HK$40 billion a year with about 10,000 people losing their jobs if the individual travel scheme is cut by 20 percent.
QI LUO
http://www.thestandard.com.hk/news_detail.asp?we_cat=4&art_id=148257&sid=42786294&con_type=1&d_str=20140811&fc=1
