With just a few hours left of voting time in the Hong Kong Legislative Council elections, only 25% of the 4.5 million eligible voters turned out to vote this Sunday (19). The percentage, at that point, reached 39.6% in the last election, held in 2016, when China’s communist regime had not yet promoted widespread repression in the semi-autonomous territory.
The high abstention result was already projected. However, it does not cease to worry Beijing, as popular participation is considered a ruler for legitimizing an election in which pro-democracy candidates are absent, as only those considered “patriots” by the Chinese regime could become apply.
The leader of the Conservative People’s Party, Regina Ip, described the voting scenario as “extremely terrible” in the Hong Kong newspaper South China Morning Post. She was distributing leaflets on the streets of the Sai Wan region in an attempt to speed up the slow voter turnout. “Many people traveled to other places by public transport instead of voting; the transport systems are full.”
The government sent text messages to Hong Kong residents on Saturday, urging people to vote, while some opponents called for people to stay away as a protest against Chinese censorship and control — even though it is a crime to incite someone not to vote in semi-autonomous territory.
Security was massive on the streets, with around 10,000 police officers and more than 40,000 government election officials deployed. The election results should be released this Monday (20), Sunday night, BrasÃlia time.
These are the first elections since Beijing imposed new rules in response to the massive pro-democracy demonstrations that took over the streets of Hong Kong in 2019. The Chinese regime instituted the National Security Law, effectively ending the autonomy regime enshrined in the so-called Law Basic, which stipulated the rule of “two systems, one country” — establishing Hong Kong as an island of unregulated capitalism, free judiciary and free press.
The repression also advanced to the electoral regime, which was reformulated in order to prevent candidates considered unpatriotic from running. In total, 153 candidates — mostly pro-Beijing figures and emerging elites from Chinese companies — are vying for 90 seats on the Legislative Council.
Only 20 of the seats, however, will be filled with the names that received the most votes in the direct elections. Of the rest, 40 seats will be chosen by the Electoral Committee, a group of 1,448 members seen as part of Chinese instrumentalization in local politics and composed almost entirely of pro-Beijing members. The remaining 30 names are chosen by local business representatives.
“The government’s aim is to ensure high turnout because otherwise it could delegitimize the election,” Jean-Pierre Cabestan, a political science professor at Hong Kong Baptist University, told Reuters news agency.
John Lee, current head of the semi-autonomous territory administration — second-highest in the regional hierarchy — and former secretary of security, urged the population to attend, arguing that those who didn’t would be traitors who wanted to see the elections fail.
Jack Ng, a fruit seller in his 20s, told Reuters he would not participate in an election he considered neither fair nor democratic. “I do not understand why [os partidos pró-Pequim] they’re campaigning, after all, they’re definitely going to win,” he said. “It’s absurd.”
Hong Kong chief executive Carrie Lam told reporters that the local government had not set any attendance rate targets and had not received any related orders from Beijing. “I don’t have any particular expectations.”
Also during the election race, at least 10 people were arrested for allegedly inciting people to vote blank, including people who reposted other people’s posts with such content on social media. Of the 153 candidates, only about 12 say they are not aligned with the Chinese Communist Party regime, according to information from Reuters.
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