Hong Kong Bids Final Farewell to First Post-Colonial Leader Tung Chee-hwa in Rare State Funeral

Mourners arrived to pay their respects to Tung Chee-hwa, Hong Kong's first leader after the city's return to Chinese rule, at the Hong Kong Funeral Home in North Point, Hong Kong, on September 19, 2026. Hong Kong recently held a state funeral for Tung Chee-hwa, marking only the third time the city has granted such an honour since Britain returned it to Chinese rule in 1997.

Senior Chinese and Hong Kong officials gathered to bid farewell to Tung at the Hong Kong Funeral Home in North Point on Sunday. This followed a public vigil held a day earlier that drew dozens of political and business figures. Tung, Hong Kong’s first chief executive, passed away on September 8 at the age of 89. Members of the general public were able to pay their respects by signing condolence books at three community halls until Sunday noon.

The funeral committee, consisting of 87 members, was chaired by Shi Taifeng, a senior Chinese Communist Party Politburo member and vice chairman of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), which is the top political advisory body. This arrangement highlighted the significant level of official backing from Beijing. Shi attended the funeral alongside Xia Baolong, Beijing’s top official for Hong Kong and Macau affairs; current chief executive John Lee; and former chief executives Leung Chun-ying, Carrie Lam, and Donald Tsang, alongside other political and business figures, as reported by government-funded Radio Television Hong Kong (RTHK).

John Lee and Leung Chun-ying served among the pallbearers who carried Tung’s coffin—which was draped in China’s national flag—from the hall to a hearse destined for Cape Collinson Crematorium. Originally a shipping tycoon with limited political experience, Tung was selected in 1996 by a Beijing-appointed committee to become the city's inaugural leader following the 1997 handover from Britain.

Throughout his tenure, Tung led Hong Kong through major challenges including the 1997 Asian financial crisis, the 2003 SARS outbreak, and mass protests that same year which ultimately forced him to shelve proposed national security legislation. Although he was re-elected unopposed in 2002, he resigned in 2005 midway through his second term, citing poor health. That departure was widely interpreted as the result of Beijing losing confidence in his leadership. He later served as a vice chairman of the CPPCC until 2023.

Historically, two other business leaders—industrialist Ann Tse-kai and tycoon Henry Fok, both of whom served as vice chairs of the CPPCC—received state funerals in 2000 and 2006, respectively. Chinese state media remembered Tung as a 'renowned patriot,' while his successor, Donald Tsang, praised him as 'an easy-going, gentle and refined man with a broad-minded outlook and far-reaching vision.' Meanwhile, critics reflected on his time in office as a period defined by governance struggles and public discontent that failed to fully recover after the financial crisis.