HONG KONG - The government will begin taking back a large chunk of an exclusive golf course near the border with mainland China to build much-needed public housing, a move that has provoked an unusual schism between the city’s political class and its powerful business elites.will be taken back on Friday to build 12,000 apartments, a day after the Hong Kong Golf Club’s current lease expires.
Beijing directly exhorted local officials to fix the problems in the aftermath of the mass protests that rocked the city in 2019, demanding that Hong Kong get rid of so-called cage homes or subdivided apartments by 2049. One advantage of the plan is that building on government-owned land avoids problems that would arise from clearing and rehousing existing residents on private land.
A spokesman for the Hong Kong Golf Club said the Fanling course is “home to great heritage and ecological value” and hopes the government will retain the site in its entirety. “It is wrong in today’s climate” to take back part of the golf course, he added, at a time when Hong Kong desperately wants to attract businesses and people from overseas.