Three popular radio talkshow hosts have been invited to attend a special meeting on freedom of speech at the Legislative Council (LegCo) next Thursday.

The meeting, jointly organized by LegCo's Panel on Security and Panel on Home Affairs, came after three famous talkshow hosts -- Allen Lee, Albert Cheng and Raymond Wong -- announced, one after another within a month, that they would stop hosting their programmes.

They claimed that mounting pressure has made them unable to "speak their minds freely".

Lee, who announced his departure on Wednesday, said he would attend the meeting next week to take questions from legislators and clarify the reasons behind the departures. Cheng and Wong did not say whether they would attend the special sitting.

Lee, a delegate of the National People's Congress (NPC) since 1998, also said he had sent a letter to the NPC Chairman Wu Bangguo seeking resignation from the country's top legislature.

Lee told local radio Thursday that he was under pressure from someone who wanted him to resign.

"After less than a week (after I took the hosting post) there were people who wanted to talk to me -- they wanted to come down to Hong Kong to talk to me," he said.

"I didn't want to talk to anybody. So I got out."

But tycoon Li Ka-shing said Thursday he did not feel Hong Kong's freedom of expression and room of constitutional development were under threat.

"The freedom of speech and room for political reform in Hong Kong now are not less than before 1997," Li said at a press conference Thursday.

Hong Kong remains a city with sufficient freedom and people are able to express their criticisms freely, he said, adding he did not believe the city is polarized due to recent political events.

Speaking of the resignations of the three radio hosts, Lau Siu-kai, head of the Central Policy Unit, said on another occasion that both the government and the public had obligations to safeguard the freedom of speech.

"Anyone who expresses their views publicly will face pressure, and how they deal with this pressure is their own personal choice. Meanwhile, there are still sharp criticisms of the government voiced every day," Lau added.

Chairman of Hopewell Holdings Gordon Wu said on the same occasion he had discussed the issue of universal suffrage in Hong Kong with Lee, but he denied the conversation aimed to lobby Lee to stop speaking of controversial topics.

"The suppression of freedom of speech is unhealthy. But I don't think this is happening in Hong Kong," Wu said.

(China Daily HK Edition May 21, 2004)