Courtroom battle over estate of Asia's richest woman

The alleged lover of Asia’s richest woman has been telling deliberate lies in defending his claim to her entire estate, a lawyer said today.

The remarks came during a sensational courtroom battle over the multibillion-dollar estate of the late real estate magnate Nina Wang that has gripped Hong Kong for months.

Two wills have emerged since Ms Wang died of cancer in April 2007 at the age of 69.

A July 2002 will bequeaths her estate to the Chinachem Charitable Foundation set up by Ms Wang and her late husband.

The other was put forward by feng shui adviser Tony Chan, who claims the two were lovers and contests that Ms Wang left him her fortune instead in a will written in 2006.

In his second day of closing statements, lawyer Denis Chang, who represents Chinachem, accused 49-year-old Mr Chan of telling “deliberate and blatant lies” that were “self-serving, unbelievable and self-contradictory” as he vied to be Ms Wang’s sole heir.

“It’s so long to list all the untruths and lies that were told,” Mr Chang said, adding that he had included in his closing submission to Judge Johnson Lam “pages of lies” told by Mr Chan.

Dubbed “Little Sweetie”, Wang was famous for her girlish outfits and pigtails. Her husband, Teddy Wang, disappeared after he was abducted in 1990. He was declared dead in 1999.

Nina Wang inherited his Chinachem Group after an epic, eight-year legal fight against her father-in-law. She built the company into a major property developer with office towers, shopping malls, hotels and apartment complexes throughout Hong Kong.

It is not clear how much Ms Wang’s estate is worth. In 2007, Forbes magazine ranked her as the world’s 204th richest person with a fortune of $4.2bn (€2.8bn).