Bank regional head tells Agnes Chow that she can now only withdraw money from her account, not make deposits, the activist claims
DANNY.MOK@SCMP.COM
UPDATED : Tuesday, 12 April, 2016, 10:05am
Hang Seng Bank places severe limits on how Agnes Chow can use her bank account. Photo: AP
Newly established political party Demosisto hit another hurdle in its bid to open a bank account to handle its savings and donations.
The party’s co-founder and deputy secretary general, Agnes Chow Ting, said on her Facebook page that she had received a verbal notice yesterday from a Hang Seng Bank regional head that all the functions of her personal account except fund withdrawals had been cancelled from Monday, meaning the party would no longer be able to use it to collect donations.
The reason cited was that the account was not being used personally.
The Hang Seng account was recently set up by Chow for the sole purpose of fundraising, and has been under the scrutiny of lawyers and accountants.
Chow – formerly from the now-suspended Scholarism – said the bank had refused to issue a written notice of the move.
The new political party publicised the account recently when it appealed for public donations.
“It remains unknown whether we will be able to accept public donations with a new account. It was so difficult for us to open an account at the beginning. And now it will be even more difficult after we disclosed this incident,” Chow said.
The public can still only use online payments system PayPal to make donations.
Chow’s personal account had been used temporarily to take public donations after the party failed last month to open a joint current account at HSBC.
HSBC said the decision was made for “administrative” and “business” reasons. It added: “Due to our policy of confidentiality regarding issues relating to customers, we are unable to comment.” But he added: “Applications with appropriate information and documentation will be handled according to our standing procedures.”
The party’s secretary general, Joshua Wong Chi-fung, also formerly with Scholarism, accused HSBC of exercising “political censorship” in rejecting his request to open the account.
The party said it would try to find a solution to the financial problem.
http://m.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/1935329/tied-down-hong-kongs-hang-seng-bank-places-limits-use
