Leader embraces electoral changes ripped by activists
HONG KONG — Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam on Monday said the city’s government “fully welcomes” changes to the city’s electoral system that will substantially increase central government control over Hong Kong politics and exclude critics of Beijing.
Chinese authorities have said the draft decision before China’s National People’s Congress would mean the largely proBeijing committee that elects Hong Kong’s leader would also choose a large part of the legislature to ensure the city is run by “patriots.” The Election Committee would also have the right to vet candidates for the Legislative Council, weeding out any people suspected of being insufficiently loyal to China and the ruling Communist Party.
Currently, half of Hong Kong’s legislature is directly elected by voters, although the mass resignation of opposition legislators to protest the expulsion of four of their colleagues for being “unpatriotic” means the body is now entirely controlled by Beijing loyalists.
“There are loopholes in the electoral systems, there are also flaws in the systems in Hong Kong,” Lam said at a news conference after she returned from the National People’s Congress in Beijing. “I’m glad that the central authorities have, again, exercised its constitutional powers to help address this problem for Hong Kong.”
She declined to elaborate on the views she had shared with the central authorities regarding electoral reforms, and said many pieces of legislation in Hong Kong would have to be amended. The NPC, China’s ceremonial legislature, will all but certainly endorse the draft decision.
The planned electoral changes have drawn criticism in Hong Kong and abroad, including from the United States.
On Friday, State Department spokesperson Ned Price denounced them, saying, “These are a direct attack on Hong Kong’s autonomy, Hong Kong’s freedoms, and the democratic processes, limiting participation, reducing democratic representation, and stifling political debate in order to defy the clear will of the people of Hong Kong and to deny their voice in their own government and governance.”
Unconfirmed reports say the legislation will also expand the size of the Legislative Council from 70 to 90 and the Election Committee from 1,200 to 1,500. Seats on the Election Committee now reserved for directly elected district counselors will also be eliminated, further cementing Beijing’s control over the body.
Hong Kong has in recent months cracked down on dissent, and most of the city’s prominent opposition figures are in jail or in exile.