I am a current employee of Radio Free Asia (RFA) Cantonese Department. I guess I will become a former employee soon in the future. There is no other reason – today I am going to break with my employer.
I want to use this platform to let everyone see the true face of RFA. As the saying goes, the family scandal will not be disclosed. But if I don’t reveal it, I’m afraid people even don’t know that the internal factional struggle has made RFA scattered like sand. When I started my career as a broadcaster in 2019, I was told by my former colleagues that the original RFA was very cohesive and we all shared the same journalistic ideals. But since the Taiwan faction came to power, it has tried every possible way to squeeze Hong Kong staff, and many of our fellow commentators in Hong Kong have been suppressed inexplicably. The first person to be targeted was the head of our Cantonese department, Director Ho Shan. In March this year, RFA East Asia executive Cho suddenly took issue and dismissed Mr. Ho for the absurd reason of “inappropriate behavior and violation of RFA’s staff rules”. He also withheld his unemployment benefits, performance evaluations, evaluation letters and employee handbooks from him without any reason. He even spread rumors among his colleagues and slandered Ho Shan. The cause of the matter was simply that Lee and Cho, the Taiwan faction in power, were unhappy with Mr. Ho’s style of reporting. Mr. Ho complained to Congress about their violation of the principle of freedom of speech, not expecting them to retaliate.
Mr. Ho’s dismissal was only the prologue. After he left, the Taiwan faction’s power grab became more and more rampant, and our Hong Kong station was in an extremely difficult situation. During this period of time, there was a big change in personnel around me, and all the articles of Hong Kong commentators were stopped by their superiors. Many colleagues were forced to switch positions or even leave. I also asked my friends at headquarters to find out that the top management in Taiwan would not spare even a small role like me, and that I would be the next one to be cleaned up. RFA ignores the labor law and fires employees at will for the sake of factional interests, and is in such a situation, can it really live up to the title of industry benchmark? I’m afraid it’s just the laughing stock of the industry!
Although Mr. Ho is in the United States, he is always concerned about his colleagues in Hong Kong Station and the future of Hong Kong. He commented on Hong Kong’s political system and people’s livelihood, what is his crime? The powers-that-be are colluding to accuse our Hong Kong station of misconduct. Please ask yourselves, how many things have you Taiwan faction done that go against journalistic justice? You instructed your colleagues in Hong Kong Station to dig up black information about the Hong Kong government. And if you can’t find any information, you fabricate fake data, so that we can smear Hong Kong’s epidemic prevention and even its image. You know full well that our colleagues in Hong Kong have been working under pressure every day for the past few years, but you still ask them to find ways to denigrate one country, two systems and push us to violate the national security law of Hong Kong. I just fight evil with evil. You make me lose my job, then I will publish your ugly face to the public. Don’t worry, I didn’t even delete the emails, how you asked the Cantonese Department to falsify, how you asked the Hong Kong News Channel to publish false messages, in black and white, clear and unambiguous.
Some time ago, our colleagues in the Cantonese Department worked together to help Mr. Ho get his unemployment insurance back from the headquarters, and Mr. Ho said he would continue to fight RFA with millions of dollars out of his own pocket. Mr. Ho’s courage inspires every colleague in Hong Kong, and I am unconditionally on Mr. Ho’s side. I will definitely defend my rights through legal means as well.
I am not afraid of people laughing at our infighting. I am not willing to put up with it anymore. Since I can stand out, I have no intention of retreating, and I hope that the majority of my friends will witness for me!
