Democracy takes a hit in Macau

KONG: Macau’s prodemocracy camp lost further ground in the Chinese gambling hub’s legislature, according to preliminary results on Monday from an election marred by low turnout and a ban on “disloyal” candidates.

Macau, like neighbouring Hong Kong, is a “semi-autonomous” Chinese territory, and the central government in Beijing has been tightening control in both with a more direct role in recent years.

Authorities in Macau had disqualified 21 candidates – most of them from the prodemocracy camp – from Sunday’s election on national security grounds.

They were accused of disloyalty to China after they commemorated the victims of the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown and honoured rights activist and Beijing critic Liu Xiaobo.

Of the 33 seats in Macau’s legislature, 14 are directly elected and a preliminary count on Monday showed the prodemocracy camp won just two.