Slow start to DB polling

Updated at 11.15m on Sunday:
In Discovery Bay, few voters had turned out in overcast conditions at the polling station at Wei Lun Primary School an hour after voting had started.

At 8.30am election outnumbered voters by about two to one and there was no problem finding an empty booth to cast votes. The process was brisk and efficiently handled by election officials.

An election official said that the polling station had been set up early on Sunday morning and there were a few voters to cast their ballot at opening time of 7.30am.

One voter who asked not to be named said she had not made up her mind who to vote for until Saturday. 'There are no outstanding candidates in this constituency (New Terrorities West) she said,' so I decided to go for a party based vote.' She said that she had previously been registered as a voter on Hong Kong island for the last legco election in 2000 where she had voted for Martin Lee chu-ming. 'This time I have also stuck with the democrats', she said.

There are a large number of undecided voters - up to 30 per cent of the electorate in the New Territories West constituency according to opinion polls.

Political analysts expect the Democratic Party's Albert Ho Chun-yan and Lee Wing-tat, the Liberal Party's Selina Chow Liang Shuk-yee, unionists Lee Cheuk-yan and Leung Yiu-chung and Tam Yiu-chung to win seats barring any unexpected voting trends.

The final two seats will be a closely contested tussle between independent democrat Albert Chan Wai-yip and DAB's second candidate, Cheung Hok-ming, Yim Tin-sang of the ADPL and the Democratic Party's Cheung Yin-tung.

The polling station, like all others, will close at 10.30pm this evening.