Forest City, the ghost town in Malaysia that dreams of becoming a tax haven
This luxury complex, opened in 2016 on an artificial island facing Singapore, was meant to delight China's middle class. But most of its 26,000 apartments are empty. Mired in the crisis, its Chinese developer promises to revitalize the project through special economic zones, reports the South China Morning Post.
Louis Li is bitter. Eight months ago, the father moved from Guangzhou to a luxury apartment in the Forest City complex in Malaysia to send his children to school. Before investing almost a decade ago, Li had visited the area during a period of "prosperity."
“When they put the houses up for sale, there were advertisements all over Guangdong province [in southern China]. So I came to visit them ,” he recalls. “There were a lot of people at that time, and all the shops, restaurants, and the hotel were open. ”
Today, his property still overlooks an outdoor pool surrounded by palm groves and reserved for residents of the complex. Further away, an artificial beach stretches along the calm waters of the Strait of Johor, facing Singapore. But Louis Li can no longer sing its praises.
The 26,000-unit Forest City complex, located on an artificial island off the mainland city of Johor Bahru, not far from the tip of the Malaysian peninsula, still doesn't have a single supermarket. This is far from convenient when Li and her 7- and 8-year-old children can't find what they need at the local grocery store. They then have to travel 30 to 40 kilos.
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South China Morning Post (Hong Kong)Hong Kong's leading English-language daily newspaper has been owned by Alibaba, the Chinese e-commerce giant, since 2016. This acquisition has sparked strong fears that the newspaper's outspokenness and journalistic quality will erode, or even disappear. In any case, the SCMP, which has maintained a monopoly on the English-language daily market in the former British colony, remains indispensable for anyone who wants to follow China. The daily provides comprehensive, factual coverage of Chinese and Hong Kong news. The magazine pages sometimes provide good reports on neighboring countries.
Previously, a notable editorial shift had already been observed under the leadership of Robert Kuok, a Sino-Malaysian businessman close to Beijing who became the main shareholder in 1993.
Once the newspaper of reference for "China watchers" , the paper gradually got rid of a number of journalists after the arrival of Robert Kuok, it toned down its opinion pages and began to rely increasingly on agency dispatches to cover information that did not show Beijing in its best light.
After the ouster of Willy Wo-lap Lam, head of the China pages, in 2000, whose analyses of Beijing politics were considered too independent, it was the turn of its Beijing bureau chief, Jasper Becker, to be dismissed in 2002. The editorial pages, where Hong Kong political figures usually exchanged the most diverse opinions, were becoming disappointing.
Courrier International
