Ma Lik

Ma Lik, GBS, JP (23 February 1952 – 8 August 2007), was a Legislative Councillor, and was the Chairman of the Democratic Alliance for Betterment of Hong Kong (DAB), a pro-Beijing political party in Hong Kong.

Ma Lik attended the Pui Kiu Middle School.

He graduated with a bachelor's degree (with Honours) from the Department of Chinese from United College, Chinese University of Hong Kong.

He was born in Guangzhou and is of Xiamen, Fujian ancestry.

was a teacher in the Pui Kiu Middle School, a pro-Chinese secondary school in Hong Kong.

He was a deputy publisher of the Hong Kong Commercial Daily and a local Deputy to the National People's Congress.

Ma also asked the Education Department to define massacre as events where over 4,000 were dead, which would make Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 not a massacre under the new definition.

He later withdrew the redefinition request.

Democrats and relatives of victims all attacked Ma for his comments.

Szeto Wah called Ma "shameless", questioning if killings had to be on the scale of the Nanking Massacre to qualify.

He said that "facts written in blood cannot be twisted by lies".

Democrat Cheung Man Kwong criticised the attempt at "whitewash", and denounced Ma as "cold-blooded".

Student leader of the protest, Wang Dan, said Ma was "utterly devoid of a conscience".

Albert Ho said: "Ma's remarks have put salt on the open historical wounds".

Outraged by Ma's comments, 127 "Tiananmen Mothers", led by Ding Zilin, demanded a retraction and a public apology for the humiliation he has heaped on those who died.

The day after the remarks appeared in the headlines, Ma attended an RTHK radio phone-in, where he apologised for making "frivolous and giddy" remarks.

Ma was formerly the Secretary General of the DAB, and became the Chairman of the DAB in December 2003 when Jasper Tsang resigned following the poor performance of the party in the November 2003 District Council elections; in those elections, the pro-democratic camp won 150 seats, while DAB secured only 62 seats out of the 205 DAB candidates fielded.

Ma announced in 2004, prior to standing for election to the Legislative Council, that he had been diagnosed with colon cancer.

He left for treatment in Guangzhou soon after the Tiananmen controversy he sparked (see below).

Ma was re-elected leader on 25 April 2007.

Ma served in the Basic Law Promotion Steering Committee, Hong Kong Cheshire Home Foundation, and Committee on the Promotion of Civic Education.

He was formerly the Chief Editor of the Hong Kong Commercial Daily, Deputy Secretary General of the Hong Kong Basic Law Consultative Committee, Director of Treasure Land International Property Consultants, General Manager of The Hong Kong Institute for Promotion of Chinese Culture, and member of the Selection Committee for the First Government of HKSAR.

Ma was active in the political circles in Hong Kong and Mainland China.

Ma wrote weekly and daily columns that appeared in Hong Kong Economic Times, Ming Pao and The Sun.

He died on 8 August 2007 at 2 pm in Guangzhou Sun Yat-sen University.

His body was transported back to Hong Kong on 11 August 2007.

The funeral was held on 23 August.

He was cremated according to his wishes.

Ma's death precipitated the 2007 Hong Kong Island by-election, which was won by Anson Chan on 2 December 2007.

On 15 May 2007, during an informal meeting Ma had with journalists to discuss political reform, Ma was asked on his views on the "Tiananmen massacre".

Ma caused huge furore which hit radio broadcasts, the front pages and editorials of several of the local newspapers, which cited him denying that clampdown of the protesters was a "massacre".

He said of 4000 students at the scene, not everyone was killed; certain student leaders, namely Chai Ling, Wuerkaixi, Feng Chungde, and Hou Dejian, were able to leave the protest site without incident, therefore it is not a massacre.

Comments which appeared to cause the most offense related to the alleged army tanks' rolling over protesters, and the PLA's cremation of victim's bodies on-site:

How could people say bodies were minced under the tanks?

Has anybody tried mincing meat under tanks?

Try doing this with pigs and we will know!

....It takes 1000 °C to cremate bodies.

If [the army] could burn bodies this way, there would be no backlogs at the cremation chambers, would there?

Ma questioned whether "Gweilos" (a racial epithet for Caucasians) should be the ones to interpret the truth about Tiananmen, and asserted that Hong Kong was "not mature enough", for believing a massacre took place.

Hong Kong lacked patriotism and national identity, and would thus not be ready for universal suffrage until 2022.