Selina Chow

Selina Chow Liang Shuk-yee, GBS, JP (Chinese: 周梁淑怡) (born 25 January 1945, Hong Kong) was a member of the Executive Council of Hong Kong and the Legislative Council of Hong Kong. She is the current chairperson of the Liberal Party. She is also well known in Hong Kong for her career in broadcasting.

Education

An alumna of St. Paul's Co-educational College, she obtained a bachelor's degree in English from the University of Hong Kong, and a postgraduate diploma from Rose Bruford College of Speech and Drama in the UK.^[1]

Professional career

Chow is unique in Hong Kong's broadcast television industry in that at various points during her career in television, she was employed by all three television stations that have existed in Hong Kong's television history. She started out as a weather presenter.^[2] She was first hired as an episodic drama director for Television Broadcasts Limited (TVB) and became its Assistant General Manager.

On account of her quality reputation, Chow was recruited from TVB by Commercial Television to be its new General Manager in an attempt to resurrect the ailing station in July 1976. Chow later became the director of Asia Television.

Political career

Executive and Legislative Councils

Chow was first appointed as member of the Legislative Council of Hong Kong by the then Governor Sir Murray MacLehose in 1981. She continued to serve on the Legislative Council as an appointed unofficial member until 1995 when she represented the Wholesale and Retail functional constituency in the 1995 LegCo elections. She was returned to the LegCo in 2004 in the New Territories West geographical constituency direct election, but lost her seat in the 2008 election. She then resigned from Executive Council, in which she had been appointed by Governor Sir David Wilson in 1991 for the first time and by Chief Executive Tung Chee-hwa since 2003.

She is the founding member of the pro-business conservative Liberal Party. She was the party's vice-chairwoman from 1998 until 2008 when she lost her seat in the LegCo elections. She became the vice-chairwoman for the second time in January 2011 after Tommy Cheung resigned from the office.^[3][4]

In December 2012, she was elected unopposed as Liberal Party chairperson, taking the reins following the party's exceptionally poor performance in the 2012 Hong Kong legislative election, and the consequent resignation of Miriam Lau. The leadership process had been slated for completion in October but in the event acting chairman Vincent Fang was required to keep the seat warm for a further two months.^[5]

Tourism Board and other positions

Chow joined the Hong Kong Tourist Association in 2000 as chairman, and continued to serve as chairman of the committee when the Association became the Hong Kong Tourism Board in 2001. During her chairmanship, she was criticised by the mass media by appointing her friend, Clara Chong as the executive director. Chong's leadership was severely questioned of maladministration and overspending.^[6]

She has also been a board member of the Hong Kong Airport Authority, honorary adviser to Against Child Abuse, and director of the Hong Kong Intellectual Property Society.

See also

• List of graduates of University of Hong Kong

References