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HONG KONG: Hong Kong voters headed to the polls Sunday, with the
city’s pro-democracy parties scrambling to avoid heavy losses and
several high-profile politicians facing potential defeat.
The polls opened at 7:30 a.m. across the
southern Chinese city with all 60 legislature seats up for grabs.
The vote was expected to provide a barometer for
the state of the pro-democracy parties in Hong Kong in the face of
growing Chinese patriotism.
In the 2004 elections and against the background
of huge anti-government sentiment, pan-democrats secured about 60
percent of the vote, although it only earned them 25 legislative
seats due to the vagaries of Hong Kong’s political system.
Despite the plummeting popularity of the current
government, the pan-democrats have not been able to harness the
dissatisfaction, with polls suggesting their number of seats could
fall.
In addition to the retirement of heavy-hitting
democracy figures Martin Lee and Anson Chan, several other leading
lights could be shunted into political obscurity.
Two of the highest-profile—Emily Lau, a former
journalist and staunch government critic, and ceaseless activist
“Long Hair” Leung Kwok-hung—could lose their seats, a Hong
Kong University poll showed.
“Hong Kong will not remain fair, open and
democratic unless we are willing to fight. I am willing to fight and
I ask you now for the greatest privilege of all: to fight for
you,” Leung said in a last-ditch advert in the Sunday Morning
Post.
Only 30 of the 60 legislative seats were being
chosen by the city’s 3.37 million registered electors. The
remaining 30 “functional constituencies” represent various
businesses and industry interests chosen by select electorates.
Polls close at 10:30 p.m. Results were expected
to be in by 4 a.m. Monday.
Although the election was promoted under the
slogan, “Shape our future, cast your vote,” the legislature has
very limited power.
If the pan-democrats slip below 21 seats they
will lose the ability to veto government legislation, which they
successfully used in 2005 to block controversial constitutional
reforms.
Hong Kong was promised universal suffrage for
both its legislature and chief executive when colonial power Britain
handed back the territory to China in 1997, but no specific
timetable was set.
While the city’s Chief Executive Donald Tsang,
who was elected by a small group of mainly pro-China figures last
year, is slipping in the polls after a number of blunders, the
pro-Beijing parties appear in good health.
The Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and
Progress of Hong Kong (DAB) has a much-admired grassroots
organization and could also get a bump from the city’s growing
patriotism, reinforced by a recent visit by China’s Olympic gold
medallists.
It may also benefit from Beijing’s
announcement late last year that universal suffrage could be
introduced here from 2017, neutering the democrats’ key election
asset.
But Michael DeGolyer, a politics professor at
Hong Kong Baptist University, said his pre-election poll showed
growing patriotism would not necessarily translate into more
pro-Beijing votes.
“People are starting to treat their votes in
the same way they deal with their investments,” DeGolyer said.
“I do not know what the ‘China factor’ is.
If the definition is ‘support your country, vote for the DAB,’
that is not the case anymore,” he added.
-- AFP
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