Michael Rowse

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Mr Michael Rowse (盧維思) is currently the Director-General of InvestHK, a department of the Hong Kong Government.

Mr Rowse is one of the few foreign-born civil servants in post-handover Hong Kong. Since 1997, according to the Basic Law, government departments can only be headed by officers with no right of abode in a foreign country; this has resulted in the departure of some non-Chinese civil servants from the colonial administration. Rowse decided to stay on, becoming a naturalised citizen of the People's Republic of China and a Hong Kong permanent resident.

Rowse was formerly a close aide to Donald Tsang when he was Financial Secretary and Secretary to the Treasury. He held the post of Commissioner for Tourism until his appointment to head InvestHK as its Director General on July 1, 2000.

[edit] Harbour Fest controversy

In June 2004, a Legislative Council Public Accounts Committee report criticised InvestHK for improper stewardship of taxpayers' money over the organisation of Harbour Fest music festival, a post-SARS event held in an attempt to restore business confidence in Hong Kong. Rowse was charged with five offences:

failure to introduce provisions to give the Government power of approval over program and budget changes
failure to provide refund in a sponsorship agreement with the American Chamber of Commerce for events not held, and for the Chamber to regularly report on progress, and to consult with Government on ticketing strategy
failure to review ticket pricing strategy and free ticket distribution
failure to establish a mechanism for InvestHK to scrutinise budget and expenditure of the event

Rowse was held responsible only for the fifth charge of failing to ensure that InvestHK critically examine the HarbourFest budget, and fully and adequately advise the working group on the finances. Consequently, he was fined one month's salary when the government made a ruling in October 2005^[1].

He appealed, but on January 26, 2007, Chief Secretary Rafael Hui confirmed the October 2005 ruling, and the consequential fine. A member of Legco criticised the fact that there have been more reports of the disciplinary hearings in the media than to Legco^[2]. Legislator Cheung Man Kwong criticised the government for making Rowse a scapegoat for ministerial failure: "...ministers, including the Finance chief, only apologised without any punishment". Another one questioned the political motivation : "How come the timimg of the decision against the appeal is so coincidental [with the election for the Chief Executive]?"^[3].

Long-standing business columnist Jake van der Kamp commented that Rowse had been let down by Donald Tsang, whose responsibility as Chief Secretary it ultimately was to oversee the Harbour Fest expenditure^[4].

[edit] References

^ Cheung, Jimmy, Dennnis Eng. "Rowse punished for Harbour Fest failures", South China Morning Post, February 9, 2007.
^ Wong, Martin, Klaudia Lee. "Rowse to fight on over Fest penalty", South China Morning Post, January 28, 2007, pp. 3.
^ Cheung, Jimmy. "Lawmakers challenge Rowse punishment", South China Morning Post, January 28, 2007, pp. 1.
^ van der Kamp, Jake. "Shabby treatment of Rowse kills any hope of civil service initiative", South China Morning Post, January 30, 2007.