2 in 3 Hongkongers want curb on mainland Chinese visitors

City residents call for limits on visitor numbers but say no to protests, new survey shows. And 70 per cent want special Shenzhen visas axed


About 70 per cent of the interviewed Hongkongers want to see all multiple-visit visas for Shenzhen residents cancelled.



Two out of three Hongkongers want to see restrictions on the travel scheme which has opened the city up to mainlanders - but the protests that have erupted against visitors from across the border have little support, according to a survey released yesterday.

Of those calling for restrictions on the individual visit scheme - which allows 270 million residents from 49 mainland cities to visit Hong Kong without joining tour groups - nearly 90 per cent don't care if there is a negative impact on Hong Kong's economy.

About 70 per cent of the respondents also want to see all multiple-visit visas for Shenzhen residents cancelled.

But nearly 55 per cent are opposed to "the actions recently taken by the public against individual travellers" from the mainland. Fewer than 17 per cent supported the protests in Yuen Long, Sha Tin and Tuen Mun.

The protests resulted in violent clashes with police and counter-protesters. Pepper spray has been deployed and arrests made.

The Chinese University survey questioned 740 people and was conducted last week. Some 63 per cent said that the number of individual travellers from the mainland had exceeded Hong Kong's capacity.

At a press conference in Beijing yesterday, National People's Congress spokeswoman Fu Ying said mutual respect was needed to resolve the conflict between Hongkongers and mainland tourists.

Fu said Hong Kong and the mainland were "brothers" and she had been touched by Hongkongers' donations and volunteer work after the 2008 earthquake in Wenchuan, Sichuan province, which left nearly 90,000 people dead or missing.

"Everyone should look at things from a positive side," she said. "If we focus on the negative side, the conflict will not be resolved."

Fu added that as an international city, Hong Kong was responsible for protecting the dignity and safety of tourists from the mainland.

Pro-Beijing newspaper Ta Kung Pao yesterday reported that there were 5,000 Shenzhen residents using multiple-visit visas to travel to Hong Kong.

Citing unspecified sources from Shenzhen customs, the newspaper said this number accounted for only 10 per cent of the more than 40,000 parallel-goods traders active between Hong Kong and Shenzhen.

It also said cross-border parallel traders from Hong Kong numbered 5,000. The paper did not say where the remaining 30,000 traders were from.

It said that since 2007, 6,084 parallel traders stopped at Shenzhen border checkpoints were found to have been crossing the border at least three times a day.



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