Chui Sai Cheong struggles with Mandarin in Beijing

Chui Sai Cheong

A Macau lawmaker spe-­aking at the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) in Beijing has caught netizens’ attention for his strong accent.
A television clip, which has gone viral on social media, shows Chui Sai Cheong – the elder brother of Chief Executive Chui Sai On – struggling to express his opinions in Mandarin as he talked about Beijing’s “One Belt, One Road” initiative and the 13th Five-­Year Plan at the meeting on Sunday, according to a report by news website hk01.com.
The Macau delegate to the CPPCC was said to have slightly changed his Cantonese pronunciation to sound like Mandarin.
Netizens were seemingly more interested in his strong accent than the contents of his speech.
Other netizens who viewed the clip, which reportedly went viral after being broadcast by TV channels, admired Chui and his younger brother for being “courageous” enough to speak Mandarin on significant occasions despite their “very heavy accent.”
EJ Insight reported that one netizen said that the younger Chui seemed to be better at Mandarin than his elder brother. Other online forum participants jokingly credited Chui for showing his love for Cantonese by speaking in the dialect during the conference. Others lampooned the speech with fake Chinese “translations” in the subtitles. Staff reporter