District councilors Henry Wong Pak-yu and Timothy Lee Hin-long have been arrested together with the director of a creative company Jason Chan Tsz-him for exaggerating election expenses.
The two councilors ran in the Legislative Council “super seat” constituency, with Wong, 29, heading the list and Lee, 26, second in list.
They have declared election expenses of HK$4.89 million, which is the highest amongst all candidates within the constituency, among which HK$4.5 million was donated by a creative company “U Made This”.
Superintendent Yip Wing-lam from the fraud division of police’s commercial crime division said at a press briefing yesterday afternoon that the three were arrested for forging documents with an intent to defraud.
“Wong and Lee submitted a electoral expenses declaration to the Registration and Electoral Office, in which they claimed they have accepted a HK$4.5 million worth of electoral donation from a company owned by Chan,” Yip said.
“Police suspected they forged documents, including invoices and receipts, to falsify their electoral expenses and defraud the government for its reimbursement,” he added.
Yip said police officers also found imitation firearms and ammunition in Wong’s home during their raid, as well as a wooden bow, and arrested him for possession of imitation firearms and ammunition.
However, he denied allegations their arrests were due to the amount of money they are claiming from the government, but their intention to defraud by using forged documents.
The police might make more arrests in the future as the investigation continues, Yip added.
U Made This is a subsidiary of GLOs Company Limited established by international relations expert Simon Shen Xu-hui.
Chan, 26, heads the subsidiary as the creative director, and he knew Wong personally therefore proposed the election project, Shen said earlier.
Shen added that Chan has since resigned from his position as creative director, while denying his involvement in the incident, as he said he did not take part in the operations of U Made This, whose operations will be winded down.
