John Tsang

Graduated from normal schools, Tsang Chuek-ho and his wife Li Pik-sheung planned to move to the United States, where his sister was living, through Hong Kong in the 1940s.

While waiting for the immigration process, the family settled in Hong Kong and had four children.

Tsang Cheuk-ho and his children adapted the surname Mui when he was adopted by a relative in Hong Kong; they reverted to their original surname after emigrating to the United States.

John Tsang Chun-wah, GBM, JP (born Mui; born 21 April 1951) is a Hong Kong former senior civil servant and government official who was the longest-serving Financial Secretary in the Special Administrative Region period to date.

Born in Hong Kong and raised and educated in the United States, Tsang worked in the Hong Kong government for more than thirty years.

Tsang was born on 21 April 1951 at Maternity home in Dukes Street, Kowloon Tong in Hong Kong, his great-grandfather was from Taishan, Guangdong, who made his fortune beginning as a labourer in San Francisco.

His grandfather was a well-off Chinese physician-turned-businessman.

His father, Tsang Chuek-ho, was the eldest child of eight siblings.

John Tsang, the eldest child, was born as Mui Chun-wah in Hong Kong on 21 April 1951 and lived in Sai Yeung Choi Street in his childhood.

Tsang was a primary and secondary school student at La Salle Primary School and La Salle College in Hong Kong.

When he was 13 in 1965, Tsang and his family moved to the United States.

He first resided on the 8th Street in Lower East Side, Manhattan, New York City.

He enrolled in Stuyvesant High School the following year, from which he graduated in 1969.

Eric Holder, the first African-American Attorney General of the United States, was his classmate.

During the early 1970s in the United States, he was involved in the defend the Diaoyu Islands movement.

He then studied architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

He also holds a master's degree in bilingual education from Boston State College and a MPA from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

Through his teens and twenties, Tsang lived in the United States and worked as an architect.

In November 1982 he returned to Hong Kong after working with the Boston Public Schools Board as a special advisor, at the midst of the Sino-British negotiation over Hong Kong sovereignty, and joined the civil service under the encouragement of Donald Tsang, with whom he became friends when they were at Harvard together.

He started his civil service as an Administrative Officer, in which his first position was a two-year stint as Assistant District Officer for Shatin, serving under Donald Tsang, the District Officer.

He went on to serve in the former Finance Branch, Monetary Affairs Branch and the former Trade Department.

From 1987 to 1992, he was first Administrative Assistant to then Financial Secretary, Sir Piers Jacobs.

He was Assistant Director-General of Trade from 1992 to 1995 and Private Secretary to the Governor, Chris Patten, from March 1995 to June 1997.

In July 1997, Tsang was appointed Director-General of the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office in London.

In 1999 he returned from London and assumed the office of Commissioner of Customs and Excise, appointed by then Chief Executive Tung Chee-hwa.

Tsang was Secretary for Planning and Lands from 2001 to 2002.

After the Principal Officials Accountability System was introduced in July 2002, his title was changed to the Permanent Secretary for Housing, Planning and Lands (Planning and Lands), Permanent Secretary having become the highest ranking in the Hong Kong Civil Service.

He was the private secretary to the last colonial governor Chris Patten and was promoted to Secretary for Commerce, Industry and Technology in 2003.

From August 2003, Tsang served as Secretary for Commerce, Industry and Technology.

In this role he was also Chair of the Sixth Ministerial Conference (MC6) of the World Trade Organization (WTO), held in Hong Kong from 13 to 18 December 2005.

For his outstanding performance in the WTO, he even earned the praise of Hu Jintao, general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party.

Tsang then became the director of the Office of the Chief Executive, working directly for his friend Donald Tsang.

He worked as director of the Office of the Chief Executive under Donald Tsang administration from 2006 to 2007.

He held the post from 2006 to June 2007.

In July 2007, he was appointed Financial Secretary by Donald Tsang.

He proposed the Scheme $6,000 tax rebate to all Hong Kong residents in his 2011 Budget.

He continued to serve in the Leung Chun-ying administration until January 2017, when he resigned to run in the 2017 Chief Executive election.

Despite his lead in the opinion poll by large margin throughout the campaign, he lost the bid to Carrie Lam.

Tsang is currently engaged in a number of diverse activities.

He is the Founder of Esperanza, a non-profit organisation, the Vice Chairman of Ion Pacific, a financial institution that specialises in technology investments, the Senior Advisor of Bowtie, a virtual insurance company, the host of a weekly music programme on Commercial Radio and the fencing coach of La Salle College.