Images of several candidates on display near a polling station in Hong Kong’s Wan Chai district on December 19, 2021 (AFP / Peter PARKS)
Hong Kong people largely shunned the ballot box on Sunday during the renewal of the city’s Legislative Council according to a new process imposed by Beijing, which drastically reduced the number of seats filled by direct universal suffrage and reserved for “patriots” the right to be candidates.
At 7:30 p.m. (11:30 a.m. GMT), after eleven hours of voting and three hours before the closing, only 26.5% of those registered had made the trip to appoint the 20 members elected by universal suffrage out of the 90 members of the Legislative Council (the “LegCo”).
The remaining 70 members are chosen by several committees made up of political elites acquired in the Chinese regime.
In the previous election, in 2016, the turnout at the same time was 43.6%. The “LegCo” then had 70 members, half of whom were nominated directly by the voters.
This year, to be allowed to run for a seat, each of the 153 candidates had to pledge political loyalty to China and “patriotism”.
As a result, pro-democracy activists have been barred from standing or renounced when they are not in prison or on the run abroad, and most candidates display a similar profile.
The participation rate, a thermometer of the adherence of Hong Kong people to the new electoral system, is therefore the only real unknown in the ballot.
The new rules were imposed by Beijing as part of Hong Kong’s takeover after the massive pro-democracy protests of 2019.
– Free transport –
Daniel So, 65, was among the first to line up outside a polling station in the affluent Mid-Levels district.
“Young people are not so interested in this election because they are misled by politicians and foreign media,” he regretted.
When the chief executive Carrie Lam arrived to vote, three demonstrators of the League of socio-democrats, pro-democracy, chanted: “I want a real universal suffrage”.
The government published advertising pages in newspapers, distributed leaflets in mailboxes and sent massive text messages to encourage Hong Kong people to vote. Public transport was free on Sunday.
Ahead of the ballot, Lam said a low turnout “wouldn’t mean anything.”
Police officers outside a polling station in Hong Kong on December 19, 2021 (AFP / Daniel SUEN)
“When the government does things right and its credibility is strong, voter turnout is lower because people don’t really feel the need to choose new representatives,” she told Chinese state media. last week.
Recent independent polls put Ms. Lam’s popularity rating at around 36%.
“My vote would be useless, because in the end, it is the people of Beijing who win,” told AFP a young accountant in her twenties who calls herself Loy and n ‘ had no intention of voting.
The “LegCo” is the body responsible for passing laws in the former British colony of 7.5 million inhabitants, whose legal system remains separate from that of mainland China.
A man at a polling station in Hong Kong for the city’s Legislative Council election on December 19, 2021 (AFP / Bertha WANG)
Even if the established figures in Beijing have always been granted the majority of seats on the Council, a minority of opponents was once tolerated there, which made it a place of often very lively debates. The new rules imposed by Beijing put an end to this tradition.
– “Anti-Chinese” elements –
More than a dozen elected officials in the previous ballot in 2016 are currently in prison under a draconian “national security” law imposed by Beijing last year, and three have fled abroad.
The emblem of the People’s Republic of China has “provisionally” replaced that of Hong Kong in the city’s Legislative Council (AFP / Bertha WANG)
Beijing says this “improved” electoral system will eradicate “anti-Chinese” elements, and ensure that the “LegCo” will pass the new laws more quickly.
It is legal in Hong Kong to abstain or to vote blank or null. On the other hand, to encourage these practices constitutes since this year a criminal offense, for which ten people were arrested. Western media which, in editorials, called for a boycott of the ballot box have been threatened with prosecution by the Hong Kong authorities.
“People don’t want to vote for a recording room and then pretend it’s okay,” Nathan Law, a former LegCo member who lives in exile in London, tweeted Sunday. “This is a bogus election and the worst setback in our electoral system,” added another opponent, Brian Leung, a refugee in the United States.
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