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Hong Kong politics
OpinionComment
Alice Wu
Alice Wu

Opinion | Even with election safeguards, why does John Lee still not trust voters?

  • The chief executive said during his policy address he has faith in the people, but the actions of his government tell a different story
  • Stripping power from district councils, cutting directly elected seats and barring the opposition from running don’t appear to be enough

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A pedestrian passes a large promotional poster for the 2023 district council elections, at Tsim Sha Tsui Pier on November 1. Centrists and the opposition have been all but frozen out of the upcoming election, leading to fears of reduced political diversity and representation. Photo: Jelly Tse
Alice Wu
Hong Kong Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu said in his most recent policy address that he has “faith in you, the people of Hong Kong”. Call me negative, but I don’t think he does.
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This is evident in the fact that no opposition or centrist candidates received sufficient nominations to run in the upcoming district council elections, for which the nomination period ended last Monday. Even Michael Tien Puk-sun’s Roundtable group had a hard time securing enough. Tien’s group had hoped to field five candidates in the direct election, but only one received enough endorsements.

Maybe Lee just doesn’t have faith in politicians? To his credit, not many do – and that appears to be the case across the globe.

But the problem is that Lee is also a politician. He has political power as the city’s chief executive, so it has to be more than that. Is it that Lee is suffering from a crisis of faith in the very system he has been instrumental in putting in place?

National security laws are already in place, with more to come; Lee promised to complete the legislative exercise for enacting national security laws, as stipulated by Article 23 of the Basic Law, by next year. After stripping any real power from the district councils, why is there not enough faith in a revamped electoral system that has more than enough safeguards against non-patriotic forces?

Lee said himself that the law on safeguarding national security in Hong Kong had addressed the “near-vacuum of national security laws for [Hong Kong]”. And the improved electoral system “safeguards the HKSAR’s governance system. Hong Kong is back on the path to progress.”

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