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Ernest Kao

Joyce Ng

The co-founder of the Occupy civil-disobedience movement, Benny Tai Yiu-ting, confirmed that a mock public vote on the city’s next chief executive will be held ahead of the election in March.
The news came on Thursday as New People’s Party’s Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee resigned from her Executive Council post and declared her bid for the city’s top job.
 Former judge Woo Kwok-hing was the first to declare his intention to run.
Meanwhile, Financial Secretary John Tsang Chun-wah, who resigned earlier this week, is understood to be preparing to join the race while Chief Secretary Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor has said she will reconsider running.
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Hong Kong Monetary Authority chief executive Norman Chan Tak-lam, seen as a dark horse, on Thursday declined to comment on whether he planned to run.
Tai, an academic from the University of Hong Kong and member of the Election Committee, which will select the next Chief Executive in March, said he was working with HKU pollster Robert Chung Ting-yiu to establish the mock public vote. The vote will operate similar to the one held prior to the 2012 chief executive election.
“In that political climate [in 2012], over 200,000 people voted,” Tai said on RTHK.




“Following the umbrella [movement], I believe more people will have an impetus to come out and express their thoughts in the chief executive election.”
Tai said they were also discussing a mock civic recommendation exercise, which would gauge the popularity of candidates. He added it would be up to Election Committee members to decide whether they wanted to use the results of the exercise as reference.
The exercise, floated by Civic Party’s Margaret Ng Ngoi-yee, suggested that aspirants canvass in public for general votes. Pan-democratic members of the committee would then automatically nominate an aspirant who can acquire the support of at least 50,000 citizens.
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Chief executive hopefuls must first secure 150 nominations from the Election Committee before being allowed to run. They need 601 votes to win.
In response to the idea of civic recommendation, Woo said he was interested, and aimed to gain sufficient public support to secure the pan-democrats’ nomination.
“In fact that’ll be easier for me than looking around for nominations, because many people I meet in the streets say they back me.”
Woo’s comments came a day after he announced his election platform, which prioritised political reform. He vowed to broaden the electoral roll of the Election Committee from 250,000 to one million voters, and then to three million over the next two terms of government to cover all eligible voters.
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But pan-democrats said the plan lacked detail and did not equate to universal suffrage.
The pan-democratic camp won an influential 326 out of 1,194 seats on the Election Committee, but has yet to reach a consensus on who to endorse. The camp will meet on Saturday to find common ground.
Meanwhile, former lawmaker James Tien Pei-chun, who kept his seat in the Election Committee’s commercial (first) subsector in Sunday’s election, said Woo did not stand much of a chance as he had been outside of political circles for a decade.




“As a judge, your job is to listen to what the plaintiff and defence have to say and make a judgement. You don’t have or need a support base … your ability to govern is bound to be quite limited,” Tien said.
He added the business sector was inclined to support John Tsang Chun-wah as he was best positioned to heal the divide in society and could communicate with pan-democrats.
He said however that Tsang would also have to make clear to pan-democrats, and those more inclined to support welfare-minded Carrie Lam, that he would be prepared to loosen his grip on the purse strings if he became the city’s leader.


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Chief executive election 2017

Hong Kong chief executive hopefuls to face mock public vote ahead of March election

Woo Kwok-hing during Thursday’s RTHK programme. Photo: Xiaomei Chen

News

Hong Kong

Politics

Occupy Central’s Benny Tai Yiu-ting believes more will come out to express their thoughts in wake of umbrella movement protests for universal suffrage


Regina Ip

John Tsang

Woo Kwok-hing

Carrie Lam