Tai Po in flames

On 26th November 2025, around 2:50pm, a fire broke out in one of the 31-story buildings in Wang Fuk Court, a 42-year-old Home Ownership Scheme housing estate in Tai Po, Hong Kong. The fire quickly escalated to the deadliest in the city since 1947, spreading to six neighboring towers and increasing in intensity.¹ As of the time of writing, 128 people were killed, including one firefighter and seven migrant workers. 76 people are injured, over 200 people are still missing, and over 900 residents were evacuated. Nearly 40% of the Wang Fuk residents are over 65, and have lost the place they have called home for decades.

The fire was initially labelled as an accident. However, many accounts have been published to refute this claim. In this short article, we attempt to summarize these accounts, and point to how the Wang Fuk Fire was the result of using improper flammable protective nets during ongoing renovations, which is deeply connected to corruption, government collusion, and a capitalist system geared entirely towards the profit of parties preferred by the regime. We report in contrast how people are making a collective effort to rescue their community during a chaotic and traumatic time.

Bid-rigging and profit-making as true culprits of the tragedy

The Wang Fuk Court fires broke out while the housing estate’s exterior was undergoing a massive renovation. The renovation project was greenlit by the Owners’ Corporation in January 2024.² The construction company that won the tender for renovation was Prestige Construction & Engineering Co. Limited, for a total amount of HKD330 million. This amount would be distributed among 1984 homeowners, with each household paying HKD150,000-190,000.

There were several serious issues with this tender bid. The first is that Prestige Construction’s HKD330 million quote far exceeded those of the alternatives. Much of the quote was allocated to “miscellaneous” items, rendering it opaque and shielded from scrutiny. The second was that Prestige Construction had been mired in cases of misconduct since 2007. Not only was its former major shareholder convicted of bribery and corruption during a renovation project in Yuen Long, but the company itself had also engaged in bid-rigging (圍標). This is an illegal practice that has persisted for more than a decade, in which companies collude to submit non-competitive bids, the winner of the tender obtains the contract at higher prices, who then compensates the other parties through cash or subcontracting positions.³ Additionally, since 2016, Prestige Construction has been accused of 17 violations of occupational safety and environmental health regulations. The third issue was that residents’ rights to listen in to Owners’ Corporation meetings on the renovation project were repeatedly revoked. Their attempts to participate in the decision-making process were also consistently blocked or undermined. Over 5% of homeowners had signed a petition asking the Owners’ Corporation to have a meeting according to proper procedures, but the Corporation continued to override these procedures, and tried to discredit the homeowners who disagreed with them.

Despite winning the bid at HKD330 million, Prestige Construction appeared to cut costs at every turn. Since early 2024, the Wang Fuk renovation was flagged by construction whistleblower Jason Poon Cheuk-Hung, who argued that the scaffolding mesh that caused the rapid spread of the fire failed to meet fire-retardant standards. Regulations stipulate that any construction that exceeds 15m in height must use fire-retardant mesh. Fire-retardant mesh costs more than standard mesh, a HKD20/sq. m difference according to Poon. This would create a HKD4 million (approximately $510,000 USD) profit incentive for Prestige Construction to cut corners.

Failure to uphold safety standards

Poon and the residents of Wang Fuk had written to the government about their concerns. However, they were altogether ignored by the Labor and the Fire Services Departments. Residents also reported that the fire alarms did not sound, and that they had to rely on their neighbours to tell them what was going on.

Government collusion fanning the flames

In January 2024, when the renovation project was greenlighted, the pro-establishment district councillor Peggy Wong (DAB, “The Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong”) was one of the consultants for the Wang Fuk Owners’ Corporation, and assisted them in securing the funds for the renovation project.⁴ While Wong denied knowing about the use of poor construction materials, having stepped down from the position in September 2024, she was still implicated in the hiring of the construction company. Despite the many aforementioned issues plaguing Prestige Construction’s tender, Wong insisted that the bidding process was “in total accordance with the government’s mandate, and was passed by the Owners’ Corporation.”

In August 2024, Wong responded to a Democratic Party member who raised concerns about the Wang Fuk renovations. Wong called the concerns “malicious rumours designed to mislead the public,” and dismissed them, as the Democratic Party’s attempt to politicize the issue. Since the fire broke out, the DAB has endeavoured to distance itself from the renovation project.

The collusion between the DAB and Prestige Construction reveals a deeper structural problem in Hong Kong’s housing policy. The bid-rigging practices that led to the Wang Fuk fires, as well as the government’s long-standing intentional blindness towards it, show how market-driven logic prioritizes business interests over people’s basic safety and housing needs. Business interests make decisions about building developments behind closed doors, upcharging working-class residents while cutting corners by using unsafe construction materials. This lack of oversight is not an isolated accident, but a symptom of the market-driven logic and crony capitalism that undergirds Hong Kong’s housing and development policies. The DAB was more than happy to ram through this project against residents’ wishes.

Scapegoating in the aftermath

Although the police, the Fire Services Department, and the Independent Commission Against Corruption have stated they will launch an investigation into the cause of the fire, mainstream media outlets still say the cause is “unknown.” In the vacuum of true accountability and transparency, many have resorted to classist and xenophobic scapegoating. During the early hours of the fire, there was intense speculation that construction workers smoking on-site were the leading cause of the fire. While smoking on any construction site is prohibited, the enforcement is always up to contractors. In this case, it had been noted that residents had complained repeatedly to Prestige Construction—to no avail—that they felt unsafe with cigarettes from the workers so close to the mesh. However, this only pits workers against residents, and fails to acknowledge the responsibility of Prestige Construction in monitoring and making sure the construction site was safe for all.

There was also speculation that the reason for Wang Fuk catching fire was because of “cheap China-made construction materials,” which spurred xenophobic reactions towards Chinese nationals living in Hong Kong. In one instance, a community member we know, Kelvin, was talking in Mandarin about the Wang Fuk fires with his friend, Wing, at the back of a taxi when they were accosted by the taxi driver, who asked them again and again if they understood what was going on and why. When they responded that the fire started because big companies refused to follow regulations, the driver got angry and said it was all because of Chinese companies messing up Hong Kong. When Kelvin and his friend asked to get out of the taxi, the driver shouted, “Crawl back to the Greater Bay Area!” While Chinese companies should be held accountable to Hong Kong and international safety standards, it is not Chinese people who should bear the blame.

Mutual aid and the spirit of 2019 remain in Hong Kong

Government and corporate aid have been rolling in for the Wang Fuk residents in the past few hours. The government has pledged HKD300 million in disaster relief, and corporations such as Henderson Land and Sino Group have also donated millions of dollars. However, these are mere performances of charity. In the midst of intense state repression and failure of governance, the citizens’ society remains the most responsive agent during catastrophes.⁵ With the technological infrastructure and information habits developed during the uprising in 2019 and the Covid-19 pandemic, enormous resources were mobilized by individuals, small businesses, and NGOs within hours.

A. Online platforms for coordination

The app Telegram has been a popular means to communicate and receive information since the Umbrella Revolution in 2014. It plays a central role of coordinating actions, resource mobilization, information circulation, and propaganda in the uprising in 2019 (and also in Ukrainian’s defence against Russian invasion). 5 years after the 2019 uprising was repressed, many still remember this model and multiple groups and channels were set up with clear division of roles, such that people with different needs and capacities can match.

The larger groups have nearly 20,000 members. With collective efforts, lists of NGOs and shops that offer help were quickly compiled and frequently updated. The group members are constantly reminded to be aware of mental health conditions and lists of consultation services are circulated. There are also reminders on donation scams.

With technological advancements, this model continues to evolve. Within hours, mobile apps equipped with AI were launched, providing an interactive interface to accommodate the different needs of victims and provide instructions for people who wish to help. Chinese/English bilingualism on these platforms is also achieved with the help of AI, such that the non-Chinese-speaking communities are not left behind.

B. Community members as agents on the ground

A massive community effort is ongoing. People set up shelters and resource collection points that operate around the clock. They quickly reported in Telegram groups that the resource collected is more than enough, as there are too many people rushing to donate. Help from other parts of the city is also coordinated to avoid traffic congestion because too many people want to help.

For many years, Tai Po, the region in which Wang Fuk is located, has had a strong, cohesive and proud identity. Different businesses provide help in their capacities. Tuck shops in the district have been delivering bento boxes to evacuees, and some other restaurants are providing free food and drinks. Stores selling electronic products are donating power banks, while a number of Chinese medicine practitioners are offering medical care. The shopping malls opened overnight as a shelter, providing food and electricity.

C. Helping migrant workers in need

Until now, it is confirmed that two migrant workers from Indonesia were killed in the fire. Various organizations have been setting up a booth at Tai Po and going from shelter to shelter providing information and resources to migrant workers who may face unemployment, homelessness, and loss of vital identification or immigration documents.

D. Monitoring ongoing maintenance projects

Also notable has been the grassroots monitoring of the maintenance projects by the residents themselves. After the outbreak of the fire, residents of other housing estates are trying to organize and alert each other about the construction materials being used on their own buildings and how the construction processes have also been grossly inadequate. Some of them have also uploaded footage of their experiments to test the flammability of the protective nets at their housing estate on social media platforms to raise awareness. Footage of experiments debunking the flammability of bamboo and the effects of cigarettes on protective nets have also been uploaded as well.

What we have documented here is just the tip of the iceberg. This goes to show that the mutual aid networks and practices that were part of everyday life six years ago still remain, and it will always be Hongkongers who protect one another.

Disaster management with PRC characteristics creeps in

Nine hours after the outbreak of the fire, President Xi Jinping spoke to pay tribute to the deceased and ordered the representatives of the Central Government to assist the Hong Kong government. Since then, we have observed the Chinese government’s typical disaster management measures, though with some deviations in this case.

When there are disasters of different kinds and on different scales happening in China, whether it is a severe traffic accident, railway accident, industrial disaster, flooding or something else, a clear pattern has been widely observed, which includes:

1. The Central Government manifesting its presence by issuing a statement of mourning and ordering the local government to focus on relief work
2. Local officials declaring the “cause” of the disaster within hours
3. Officials closing the site off from media access
4. Monopolizing relief work and preventing the participation of citizens
5. Strict surveillance of disaster victims and their families to keep them away from journalists and avoid collective action
6. Downplaying the casualties
7. Directing media to promote “positive energy,” especially orders to focus on “touching stories” and “good people, good acts,” such as the sacrifice of firefighters
8. Arresting people who spread unofficial information about the disaster

The media manipulation is so obvious that there is a widely circulated political joke among Chinese netizens: when there is a disaster in China, the casualties are always 36. There is also strong criticism against the “positive energy” line, calling it “turning a funeral into a wedding” (喪事當喜事辦).

In the case of Wang Fuk Fire, while it is impossible to restrict the media and public from reaching the site and contacting disaster victims in the context of Hong Kong, parts of this repertoire have been playing out:

First, while all the evidence points to the flammable substandard protective nets covering the buildings, the government put the blame on bamboo scaffolding and decided to accelerate its replacement with metal scaffolds. Such an abrupt policy change is inconsistent with another highprofile action, in which the police arrested the heads of Prestige Construction for severe negligence.

More importantly, this policy direction has been controversial in various aspects. Construction workers who specialize in working with bamboo worry about employment, while the general public views bamboo scaffolding as important cultural heritage. On the other hand, the Association for the Rights of Industrial Accident Victims, an important group that organizes victims and families of industrial accidents to advocate for industrial safety, has been actively advocating for replacing bamboo scaffolding for years. However, in the current political environment in Hong Kong, the government doesn’t seem to respect social dialogue or, and uphold the principle of “leaving no one behind” when pushing for changes in industrial processes.

Second, in contrast to the strong voices on the safety of maintenance and bid-rigging by individuals and online media on social media platforms, most of the mainstream media has focused on the speeches of Chinese and Hong Kong officers, corporate donations, and the voluntary work of citizens. There is limited coverage on safety policies and accountability.

Third, on the second day of the fire, after overnight mutual aid efforts, Care Teams (關愛隊) were deployed to “assist” with relief efforts.⁶ However, these efforts have been recognized as photo ops. At night, the Care Teams took over some of the shelters and demanded that citizen volunteers leave, trying to appropriate the resources collected by the community as well. Alice Mak, the Secretary for Home and Youth Affairs, even shamelessly thanked citizens for donating resources to ‘”shelters managed by the government’.” There have also been testimonies from volunteers about being harassed by the police. Similar operations were widely reported in mainland China at the early stage of the Covid-19 pandemic. But this time, citizen volunteers relocated the resource to prevent it from being robbed.

What’s next

In painting the fire as solely a tragedy, the government downplays the need to tackle the issue at a monitoring and governance level, trying to settle the issue by scapegoating bamboo, trying to escape responsibility by cancelling activities related to the December 7th Legislative Council elections, and by offering “care” and humanitarian aid.

At this moment, people in Hong Kong are busy mourning the deaths and taking care of their own trauma. Online vigils, trauma hotlines, and web sessions are being organized for collective grieving. There is also continued mass self-organization and mutual aid. Given all this, there may be more mass vigils and victim commemorations self-organised by local people and the community going forward.

The uproar over bid-rigging and maintenance projects is spreading on social media platforms. The anger is pointing not only to contractors and owners’ corporations, but also the failure of monitoring of the government. Residents whose buildings are under maintenance are now worried about fire safety. Self-initiated information collection and experimentation with the building materials being used are ongoing, not only for safety, but also to keep the contractors accountable. This may grow into broader mobilizations for housing justice, as seen in the organizing that emerged from the Grenfell Tower Fire in the UK. Additionally, people are already making coherent demands; on a flyer passed around in Tai Po on 28th November, four demands were listed:

1. Continue supporting the affected residents to ensure proper resettlement
2. Establish an independent commission of inquiry to conduct a comprehensive and thorough investigation into entities benefiting from the Wang Fuk renovations
3. Re-examine monitoring and regulatory systems for such construction works and refuse to accept simply dealing with the incident solely through mourning
4. Investigate regulatory negligence and hold government officials accountable

It should be emphasized that since the passage of the National Security Law, there have rarely been such collective demands emerging from independent community members. Building on these demands, we should also specifically call for the banning of bid-rigging practices in Hong Kong.

On 29 Nov, the Office for Safeguarding National Security of the Central People’s Government of the People’s Republic of China in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region made a declaration to “punish those who disrupt public order in the name of relief.” On the same day, an initiator of the online petition calling for accountability for the fire was arrested for incitement. The petition was removed from the internet on the same day. It is quite obvious that “national safety” does not include fire safety in the eyes of the government’s security agents.

While many commentators outside Hong Kong have been repeating the mantra of “Hong Kong is dead” since 2020, the powerful mutual aid and calls for justice are solid evidence of the continuing agency of people in Hong Kong during this period of hardship. It is still too early to tell how it will evolve, and we will continue to document further developments. As things develop, we must continue to broaden support for the independent mass networks of mutual aid across Hong Kong in support of Tai Po residents, as well as the collective demands being raised by the people.

Please see this petition with more details on the four demands listed in this article.

Bic and Lichen are Hongkongers who work primarily at the intersection of labour and environment.

Footnotes

1. A Home Ownership Scheme housing estate is a type of public housing estate that sells flats at 70% of market price, with restrictions on resale. It is different from what is commonly called public housing estates, in which residents are tenants of the government.
2. An owners’ corporation is a legal entity elected by property owners of a building. The voting weight is proportional to the percentage of their property ownership.
3. For a decade, residents of many residential buildings have been acting collectively to fight against bid-rigging, which often involves corruption with the existing owner’s’ corporations of those buildings. Inmediahk has been covering this issue for years.
4. The District Council is an advisory body in Hong Kong with limited power to decide district-level issues. In the past, most of the councillors were democratically elected. After the landslide opposition victory in the 2019 election, in which the opposition took 388 of the 479 seats, the government drastically changed the system, appointing most seats and giving others to a small group of people. Ironically, members from the District Fire Safety Committee were added to the Council under this new system.
5. The citizens‘ society is different from the civil society. While some literature, especially from mainland China, deliberately uses the term citizens’ society to avoid the political implications of civil society, we chose this term because the use of civil society often assumes the presence of organizations, while in this case, the collective efforts are predominantly spontaneous and improvised by anonymous individuals, and organizations are only part of it.
6. Care Teams were newly set up after 2019 by the government in an attempt to replace the social welfare sector, which is perceived to be anti-government, because social workers played active roles during the 2019 uprising.