Tung Chee-hwa’s task as Hong Kong’s chief executive was without precedent

The farewell to former chief executive Tung Chee-hwa was moving because it marked the passing of a figure who stood at the beginning of a wholly new chapter for Hong Kong, a city to which he devoted so much of himself.

For many, Tung will always be associated with the formidable demands of the early years after the return to the motherland – the Asian financial crisis, the bursting of the property bubble, severe…