SCMP's scoop of nothing on China Resources
26 April 2014
In a sensational front-page story in today's SCMP, "Leaked files show Song's link to tax haven companies", journalist Tanna Chong reports that former China Resources chairman Charley Song Lin (Mr Song) was a director of two BVI companies along with another senior executive, Wang Hongkun (Mr Wang), "who is also being probed for corruption". She writes:
"The authorities have not linked the cases of Song and Wang. But documents seen by the Post show that they developed business ties more than a decade ago. They held directorships in two BVI-registered companies, Dragon Progress and Dragon Rider Development... it raises questions about why Song and Wang - both senior executives at a state-owned conglomerate that controls huge public resources - should set up offshore firms in an overseas tax haven."
In the words of poet Alexander Pope:
A little learning is a dangerous thing;
drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring:
there shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,
and drinking largely sobers us again
Ms Chong should have drunk largely from the HKEx company news search (or even, just use Google). There she would quickly find, in an announcement dated 24-Jul-2003 (and in several later documents, most recently on 28-Jun-2012), that Dragon Rider Development Limited (DRDL) is a wholly-owned subsidiary of China Resources (Holdings) Company Limited (CRH) and it owns a godown in Kowloon. Webb-site Who's Who, which covers all HK-registered companies, shows that DRDL has been registered as a foreign company for business in HK since 9-Jan-2002.
Even the ICIJ database of leaked BVI documents from Portcullis TrustNet shows that DRDL is owned by CRH. It also shows that the other company, Dragon Progress Limited, was owned by DRDL. And by the way, everyone has access to that database, so if phrases like "documents seen by the Post", "documents provided by ICIJ", and "SCMP has learned" make you think that they have exclusive information, well, they don't.
Given that both men worked for CRH, it is entirely normal that they would be directors of subsidiaries of CRH. Mr Wang joined CRH in 1993 and Mr Song was there since 1985. There's no news in that, let alone front page news. It does not indicate that they were somehow in cahoots with each other - although we are not saying that they weren't.
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