CCTV clips raise doubts over Junius Ho's version on arson attack

Doubts have surfaced about the veracity of claims by a pro-establishment Legco candidate in relation to an arson attack on some property belonging to one of his supporters.

Junius Ho Kwan-yiu, who ran for a seat in New Territories West in the just-concluded Legislative Council election, said in a press conference over the weekend that two concrete mixer trucks owned by a supporter had been maliciously damaged in the early hours of Saturday.

Ho claimed that some people sneaked into a parking lot and poured gasoline onto the two trucks, which were worth a combined HK$5 million, and set them on fire.

The trucks were set ablaze by political opponents as the vehicles had election posters of Ho pasted on them, he alleged.

However, news website hk01.com has punched holes in Ho's claims.

It said that it has obtained CCTV footage that showed that there were no posters on the trucks before the arson attack took place Saturday morning.

However, three men were seen putting election posters onto the trucks after they were damaged by fire.

The report suggests that political color was given to an attack that may have taken place for other reasons.

When confronted by hk01.com reporters, Ho said his election posters were on the windscreens of the two trucks and hence they were not captured in the video footage in the morning.

In other comments, he said that he asked his supporters to temporarily remove all posters from the car park as he was afraid that other vehicles in the parking lot would also fall victim to the malicious attack.

Ho wrote on his Facebook page on Sunday that his supporters had in August offered to showcase his posters on the two concrete mixers.

But he learnt on Saturday that the vehicles were set on fire, he said.

As colleagues of the truck drivers feared there would be more attacks, they decided to take down all of Ho's posters.

However, the owner of the trucks later instructed his staff to put the posters back Saturday afternoon, Ho said.

According to am730, Ho was heard shouting at Apple Daily reporters and telling them to "shut up" when the candidate was cornered by the reporters and faced some questions.

The reporters apparently heard Ho talking in Putonghua on the phone, prompting them to ask the candidate if he was having discussions with someone from mainland China.

The question angered Ho, leading to a tongue-lashing against the reporters.

According to election data Monday, Ho won the New Territories West seat with a margin of 35,657 votes.

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