Hong Kong's flawed poll on
democracy By Gary LaMoshi
HONG KONG - Hong Kong goes to the polls on
Sunday in its most crucial election since the
territory's 1997 return to Chinese sovereignty. The
election will be the best barometer to date of how Hong
Kong's 3.2 million registered voters view
anti-government, pro-democracy sentiments expressed in a
series of mass rallies since July last year.
Pro-democracy candidates, including members of
the Democratic Party, Frontier and affiliated
independents, want to make the election a referendum on
the future of democracy in Hong Kong. In April, Beijing
ruled that it would not permit direct election of the
chief executive in 2007 or the full Legislative Council
(LegCo) in 2008, decisions that the democrats hope to
reverse.
"Political review and constitutional
review in the years ahead is the biggest issue," says
Ida Tse, campaign manager for five democratic-camp LegCo
candidates. "We urge voters to show they're ready for
universal suffrage."
Pro-government parties -
the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment of Hong Kong
(DAB), the Liberal Party and their affiliates - want the
election to be about stability and unity, code words for
support of Beijing's policies. "We emphasize the need
for a stabilizing force," DAB spokesperson and District
Councilor Kenny Lee says. "Other parties want to speed
up democratic elections. Eventually, we'll fight for
democracy. But before that, we need a more mature voting
group."
These parties get much support from the
business community, but their support for Chief
Executive Tung Chee-hwa's largely unsuccessful battles
against long-running deflation and repeated recessions
have undermined their traditional strong credentials on
the economy. "We stress our harmonizing effect," DAB's
Lee explains. "A stabilizing force is needed for Hong
Kong to develop its economy and for China to develop.
And China's development will be good for Hong Kong. We
are pro-China."
Democratic-camp strategists try
to counter claims that they can't work with Beijing or
Tung's administration. "We must emphasize that we're not
trying to block or paralyze the government," Democratic
Party campaign coordinator Chan King-ming says, noting
that the party has supported many government proposals.
"In real life, we're trying to build a better Hong
Kong."
Some votes are more equal than
others Voters will select members of the 60-seat
LegCo in two separate sets of votes. Thirty members will
be selected by universal suffrage in geographic
constituencies, up from 24 seats in the election four
years ago. The other 30 legislators will be selected in
functional constituencies (FCs), a remnant of British
rule embraced by the current government, representing
business and professional groups. The FCs have an
electorate numbering 200,000 voters (the smallest has
146 voters, the largest 70,000), including companies and
other groups. FC elections are first-past-the-post, and
11 FCs have only one candidate.
The geographical
constituents have returned a majority of democrats (16
of 24 seats in the last vote), while the functional
constituencies generally return government supporters.
The larger number of geographical seats, plus more
vigorous democratic campaigning in some functional
constituencies, gives democrats a chance of controlling
LegCo for the first time. But the voting mechanics and
events of the past month have dimmed that hope.
"The election system is skewed to thwart the
will of the people, thus it cannot serve as a referendum
[on democracy]," Christine Loh, who left LegCo to found
local think-tank Civic Exchange, believes. "The
pro-democracy camp can do well in terms of numbers of
votes cast in their favor, but they won't win majority
in terms of seats because of functional votes and the
proportional representation, non-transferable vote
system. In [this system], you can have relatively few
votes and still get elected."
In Hong Kong's
five geographic constituencies, allocated one seat for
each 100,000 registrants, each voter casts a single vote
for a party list. Under the proportional-representation
system, the number of ballots cast is divided by the
number of available seats. Any party with more than that
number of votes wins a seat and has that number of votes
deducted from its total. Parties with the highest total
of voters after the round of deductions get the
remaining seats. The system makes a clean sweep by any
party virtually impossible.
Money, sex
scandals The democratic camp has been hit by a
pair of high-profile scandals. James To, a senior
Democratic Party figure, failed to disclose ties to a
company that owned premises rented for his offices on
his LegCo financial forms, though he regularly disclosed
the connection on a District Council form.
In
early August, Democratic candidate Alex Ho was arrested
on the mainland on charges of using a prostitute and
sentenced to six months' detention. Party officials
charged that Ho had been framed and that the sentence
was disproportionately harsh. (A Hong Kong police
officer snared for a similar offense received a 15-day
sentence.) Democrats also hoped the incident might
redound to their advantage by showing how poorly the
Hong Kong government protects constituents when they're
on the mainland, but that issue has not gained traction.
"Our support has dropped significantly in the
past two weeks," Democratic Party strategist Chan
concedes, because of what he called the "smearing". Chan
still believes the democratic camp can win "approaching
30" seats in the full LegCo.
The Ho incident
underscores suspicions that China's central government
is taking a more active role in this campaign. After the
July 1, 2003, march of a million people to oppose the
draconian security law backed by Beijing and now on hold
for possible reintroduction, and the democratic gains in
last autumn's District Council elections, Beijing took a
harder line toward Hong Kong's democrats. China-camp
politicians publicly questioned the patriotism of
democrats early this year. Democratic Party patriarch
Martin Lee was called a traitor for testifying before
the US Congress about the lack of political reform in
Hong Kong, and he was jostled by protesters upon his
return to Hong Kong.
The pressure rose when
Beijing rejected direct elections in 2007 and reached a
peak in May after radio talk-show hosts received
threats, and in one case an assault, from what they
suspect were Beijing supporters. Since then, Beijing
accepted an offer to resume dialogue with the democrats
and ended the patriotism debate, and the political
atmosphere has eased. "China's government is moving
toward a more open-minded approach toward Hong Kong
issues," Democrat Chan says.
China
dolls Still, incidents such as the Ho arrest and
the barring of Democratic Party legislator Law Chi-kwong
- forbidden entry to Shanghai, which Beijing admitted
was a mistake - feed doubts about Beijing's neutrality
in the election. One democratic strategist believes
Beijing is behind the tactic of running fewer
pro-government slates, to concentrate votes on the
remaining DAB and Liberal candidates.
Beijing is
also using its soft power to build nationalistic
feelings that could boost pro-government candidates,
though no one will admit it. Last week, mainland
officials visited Hong Kong to sign a new round of
Closer Economic Partnership Agreements (CEPAs) with Hong
Kong.
This week, 50 mainland medalists from the
Athens 2004 Olympic Games are touring Hong Kong in a
whirlwind of public appearances. A "Glory of China"
tribute sold out 40,000-seat Hong Kong Stadium. Hong
Kong and Beijing officials and mainland media,
increasingly seen in Hong Kong, have taken pains to
point out that Beijing's Olympic heroes have
traditionally visited Hong Kong since the 1980s. Their
arrival on Monday was marred when tour officials snubbed
a reporter affiliated with Falungong, a spiritual
movement that is barred on the mainland but tolerated in
Hong Kong.
Another highlight of the Olympic tour
is a diving exhibition by gold medallists Guo Jingjing
and Tian Liang at Kowloon Park's public pool. Discovery
of bloodworms in the water shut down the pool on August
24 and subsequent revelations of contaminants in other
pools has led to more closures and a campaign to clean
and refill all pools that will send HK$6 million
(US$771,000) in taxpayer money down the drain.
The incident underscores Beijing's and Hong
Kong's increasing frustration with Tung Chee-hwa's
government, something democrats hope to capitalize on
and loyalist parties hope voters will ignore on Sunday.
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