Judging by the commentary “posted by Beijing’s top office for [Hong Kong’s] affairs on its website,” China is none too happy with the decision by CK Hutchison Holdings to sell off most of its ports around the world, including those near the Panama Canal (“ ‘Which side are you on?’: Beijing’s top Hong Kong office shares scathing piece on Hutchison over Panama deal,” South China Morning Post, March 13, 2025).
Hong Kong tycoon Li Ka-shing’s company CK Hutchison Holdings, which recently sold its Panama Canal ports, should think twice about which side it wants to stand with, according to a scathing newspaper commentary posted by Beijing’s top office for the city’s affairs on its website.
Citing criticisms calling the deal a “betrayal of all Chinese people”, the commentary was first published by pro-Beijing publication Ta Kung Pao and shared in full by Beijing’s Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office on its official website on Thursday night….
CK Hutchison Holdings, which had come under pressure for months after Donald Trump won his re-election to the White House and demanded that the Panama Canal be freed from what he saw as Chinese control, dropped a bombshell earlier this month by announcing it was selling all its port stakes, except for those in China.
This amounted to 80 per cent of the Hutchison Port Group, a subsidiary that owns 43 container ports in 23 countries, including a 90 per cent stake in the Balboa and Cristobal docks at either end of the Panama Canal.
The reaction suggests that James Roth’s suggestion in these pages that “worldwide port management may not be an element of the communist grand strategy” may need to be amended.
If the Chinese Communist Party really was blindsided by this sale—it’s a question—and its caterwauling is in earnest, the idea may be to pressure Hutchison into changing its mind about selling the ports to BlackRock, a U.S. company.
If so, and if the transactions have not yet been finalized, perhaps China will manage to blow up the deal. Hutchison’s officers probably don’t want to spend time in prison for sedition or foreign collusion or port-selling or whatever charges the CCP would come up with.
Also see:
StopTheCCP.org: “We Are Being Surrounded”
“The larger the Chinese threat in the Caribbean, the more U.S. forces, including its navy, will be required nearer home and away from the South China Sea.”
