HONG KONG: Voters turn against pro-Beijing party

BY EVA CHENG

The pro-Beijing Democratic Alliance for the Betterment of Hong Kong (DAB) had only 62 of its 206 candidates elected in Hong Kong's District Council elections on November 23. In the last DC elections in 1999, 83 DAB candidates were elected.

The slump for the DAB triggered an immediate resignation of DAB founding chairperson Jasper Tsang from the Executive Council, a chamber of appointed advisers to Hong Kong chief executive Tung Chee-Hwa.

In contrast to the decline in support for the DAB, parties in the so-called democratic camp scored 161 seats, better than expected, of which 95 seats went to the "middle class"-oriented Democratic Party. This represents a success rate of 70% for the "democratic candidates", as opposed to the DAB's 30%.

The contrasting outcome reflects the growing popular resentment against Beijing which, through its handpicked chief executive (technically "elected" by a 800-member committee), sought to impose an "anti-subversion" law on Hong Kong which would have severely curtailed civil liberties. The draft law was shelved indefinitely after repeated mass protests against it and Tung's administration in December 2002 and in July this year.

Two Marxists who openly campaigned on anti-capitalist platforms also did well. Chan Cheong, a member of the Revolutionary Communist Party, was re-elected to the Ping Tin district of working-class suburb Kwun Tong, with 48.92% of the vote (1738 votes).

Leung Kwok-Hung, member of April 5th Group and a campaigner for the democracy movement in China, came second in the Kam Ping district of the eastern suburbs. Leung scored 35.71% of the vote, losing narrowly to a DAB candidate. In the election for Hong Kong's Legislative Council in 2000, Leung scored an 8% of the votes.

From Green Left Weekly, December 3, 2003.

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From GLW issue 564