ZIM CITY

from Southside September 2020

SOUTHSIDE SECRETS

Vigilante war on property sales agents

Paul Zimmerman on the influx of commercial banner and bills around Southside

Prior to elections, the Lands Department instructed the removal of all banners from the roadside to make way for campaign banners by the candidates.

With the September Legislative Council elections postponed, Hongkongers have a rare opportunity to enjoy clean streets. No more broken and sagging banners spoiling the view of our pavements, planters and shop fronts.

However, what also stands out is the mess of bills and posters glued to all manner of street furniture, lamp posts and traffic signs. Despite this being illegal nothing is hidden. Phone numbers are visible in large fonts.

The law is clear. Under Section 104A(1) of the Public Health and Municipal Services Ordinance (Cap.132), any person displaying or affixing a bill or poster on Government land without permission commits an offence, and is liable to a maximum penalty of $10,000 and a daily fine of $300 upon conviction.

The Food and Environmental Hygiene Department (FEHD) officers can remove the commercial publicity materials and even recover the removal costs from the persons concerned. But they hardly do. I have written to the FEHD pointing out the obvious: The phone numbers identifying the property sales agents, the dominant culprits, are right there. It is claimed that these are often disposable phone cards and that agents argue they are being framed by their competitors. Only when FEHD catch a person in the act of posting bills will they issue a meagre fixed penalty of $1,500 under another law, the Public Cleanliness and Obstruction Ordinance (Cap. 570).

This is no deterrent for these agents hoping to cash in on hefty commissions. We wrote to the Estate Agents Authority on numerous occasions, but they replied lamely that they can only control licensed agents and that a phone number alone is no evidence.

So the mess continues. Once in a while cleaners can be seen scraping the posters off. But as fast as they clean up, new ones appear with ever greater amounts of glue and tape.

That is, until they meet my ‘friends’, residents who are determined to clean our streets. They sent me pictures of people hanging bills. They take down every commercial poster, banner and bill from railings, lamp posts and traffic signs, dumping them in the nearest bin (after they sent me a picture or two). Legal or not, until the Government gets its act together and prosecutes the people who answer the phone numbers, vigilante clean ups appear to be the only way forward. Please help my ‘friends’ and keep Hong Kong clean by removing any estate agents posters.