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Following is the speech by the Chief Executive, Mr Donald Tsang, at a reception hosted by the Consul-General of Japan to celebrate the birthday of His Majesty The Emperor of Japan at Island Shangri-La Hong Kong, Admiralty, this evening (December 14) (English only):
Consul-General (Shigekazu Sato), Distinguished Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen
Konbanwa ("Good Evening" in Japanese).
It's indeed a great pleasure to come to the Japanese National Day Reception. This year is no exception. Ambassador Sato, Consul-General (of Japan) in Hong Kong, has been a very important political figure here from my point of view. Your length of stay reflects the affection we attached to your tenure of service in Hong Kong. Your slide show demonstrated the strength of bilateral relationship and the achievement you have made for furthering the ties between Hong Kong and Japan. You said three years seemed to be a long time, but we must reflect to the Japanese Government that this position is so important that diplomat coming here should be promoted in situ here. If you allowed me to come back to Japan again for an official visit, this would be the first plead to the Japanese Government.
It is also a privilege to celebrate with you the 20th Anniversary of His Majesty the Emperor Akihito's accession to the throne.
First, allow me to congratulate to the Japanese team on its performance at the East Asian Games. You have been so gracious to let us win the soccer game. It was really a marvelous moment for us. But I'm sure this is through good cooperation and good competitive spirit among very young players on that occasion that we have seen both our players doing so well, and of course, in overall terms, the Japanese team did a lot better than ourselves in the games. But we did not do poorly. We got more than one hundred medals. It's out of my personal expectation. Winning the soccer game is absolutely unexpected, but was good. We hope we will be able to do it again but not easily.
Your delegation has helped to make the Games a truly memorable event for everyone involved and a resounding success for Hong Kong as the host city.
It gives us encouragement to host more sporting events on the international level in the years to come. This is a time for us to reflect further whether we should make a firm bid for the Asian Games. But this is something we have to consider carefully.
There is a Japanese proverb that says, and I quote: "Fall down seven times, get up eight times", or, in Japanese, "Nana korobi ya oki".
You don't have to be an athlete, or indeed a politician, to be motivated by these words of wisdom. Falling down means an opportunity to rise again and do better.
In recent times, each of our economies has been knocked off course by various economic crises including the global financial crisis. It is important to remember that we can, and we will, get back on our feet. We should also remember that recovering from a fall is often made easier with a helping hand from our friends.
By promoting free trade, open markets and closer co-operation, Hong Kong and Japan can help each other recover from economic crisis. And by extension, we can play a greater role in the economic recovery and future prosperity of our region as a whole.
Japan is our third largest trading partner as well as our third largest source market for tourism after the Mainland and Taiwan.
In February, during my official visit to Japan, we launched "Hong Kong-Japan Tourism Exchange Year 2009". Various initiatives under this joint programme have helped to support our respective tourism industries during the economic storm.
Also, in October, Japan and Hong Kong established a bilateral working holiday scheme. From January 1st next year, up to 250 people from each side will be able to remain in each other's territory for up to a year and work to support their stay. This is a great way for our young people to experience each other's culture, make friends and promote Japan-Hong Kong ties.
Of the more than 6 400 non-local companies in Hong Kong, about 1 100 are Japanese firms. Hong Kong will continue to provide all these companies with a stable, effective and low tax platform to do business and to explore markets in the mainland of China.
I am confident that we will not only recover from the global financial crisis, but we will all be a little stronger and a little wiser from the experience.
Once again, congratulations on your National Day Reception and I look forward to even stronger ties with Japan under your consul-generalship.
Thank you very much.
Ends/Monday, December 14, 2009
Issued at HKT 20:47
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