The Standing Committee of the Chinese People’s Congress is holding a meeting in Beijing, and both the director and deputy director of the Legal Affairs Commission refused to respond whether they would discuss the reported disqualification of 117 district councilors from electing Hong Kong’s Chief Executive, but some Hong Kong pro-democracy district councilors said that Beijing’s disqualification of district council seats in the Election Committee responsible for electing the Chief Executive is expected, reflecting Beijing’s absolute control over the Chief Executive election at the expense of weakening the Chief Executive’s representation.
The Election Committee, which is responsible for nominating and voting for the election of the Chief Executive of Hong Kong, is currently composed of 1,200 members from four sectors, of which 117 of the 300 members from the political sector are from the 18 District Councils in Hong Kong. The democratic camp may control nearly 500 votes and have great influence on the CE candidate. Subsequently, some politicians predicted that Beijing would change the election system to consolidate its control.
Yesterday, several pro-establishment media quoted sources as saying that Beijing intends to abolish the District Council seats in the CE Election Committee and require District Council members to take an oath, and those who do not meet the qualifications will be disqualified as District Council members. The matter will be discussed at a meeting of the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress (NPC) being held in Beijing.
In response to the unconfirmed news, former legislator James To, who still retains his status as a Yau Tsim Mong District Councillor, said that the wind may not be without cause, and believes that someone is brewing the incident, believing that it is the Beijing government’s intention to hold absolute control over the EC to ensure that their “blessed” candidate can win, but at the cost of weakened representation. He explained that, as the number of DC members in the past was mostly from the pro-establishment camp, Beijing also wanted to increase the representativeness of the CE by electing representatives from among the DC members elected by the 3 million voters, so there was an arrangement for DC members to represent Hong Kong in the CE election. In short, it is the Chinese Communist Party itself “playing with the sun”.
In addition, there are also reports quoting news that the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress will deal with the issue of the qualifications of District Council members, the prescribed District Council members need to take an oath, and it is expected that there will be a large number of democratic District Council members will be accused of failing to meet the contents of the oath and be disqualified (DQ), the vacancy is filled by the Hong Kong Government appointed persons. In this regard, Tsuen Wan District Councilor Sham Aohui said this morning in a radio program, this is expected, I believe Beijing will be imperative to extinguish the voice of the opposition in the system, to ensure that the security factor to the highest.
Shum Ao-fai predicted that more than 100 district councilors might be disqualified, but he ridiculed Beijing for targeting them because district councils are only a layer of advisory structure, and it is difficult for district councilors to endanger national security, if the authorities disqualify democratic district councilors, it only reflects that those in power cannot accommodate half of the opposition voices, and are trying to drive them to extinction.
He is worried that if appointed people become DC members, residents’ opinions will be ignored because appointed DC members are only accountable to the one who appointed them, not the voters.
Another pro-democracy member, Yuen Ka Wai, also said in a radio program that the Hong Kong government has been “moving the red line” and has long anticipated that it would be difficult to complete the four-year term.
She estimated that once she is disqualified from DC membership, it will have a huge impact on the residents, including the lack of resources to continue to follow up on the cases at hand, but she will still try to continue to serve the public in a feasible way.
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