Democrats urged to unite and 'rethink'
Pan-democrats should form a new political party to present a united front and dispel impressions that they are divided, veteran politician Allen Lee Peng-fei says.
Mr Lee, a delegate to the National People's Congress, also urged the pan-democratic camp to explore ways of establishing mutual trust with Beijing, and he recommended they have their responses ready if Chief Executive Donald Tsang Yam-kuen puts forward a timetable for democracy.
'The pan-democrats have given the public the impression that they are split and have no unity. The members attack each other.
'They should rethink, be reunited and form a political party that is acceptable to all,' he said.
This was an expansion on ideas he put forward at a meeting between democrats and former chief secretary Anson Chan Fang On-sang on Tuesday night - and which have already received a cautious response.
Some pan-democrats have insisted they have been co-operating all along while others said it was Beijing that had turned its back on them.
Mr Lee said he believed Mr Tsang had already ruled out universal suffrage in 2012 by referring during his election campaign to a road map for democracy and that the pan-democrats should be ready for any proposal.
'If Donald really gives out a road map and timetable for universal suffrage, how are they going to react?'
Mr Tsang has pledged to issue a green paper on universal suffrage by mid-year comprising a detailed 'design, road map and timetable'.
Mr Lee said that until now the pan-democrats had been unable to establish mutual trust with the mainland.
'Instead, they have given the public the impression that they aim at causing trouble for the mainland.'
Asked if Mrs Chan could play a role in the trust-building process, Mr Lee, who is a member of her core group, said that was up to her.
Responding, Democratic Party chairman Albert Ho Chun-yan, who was at the meeting, said the party had repeatedly expressed its wish for communications with Beijing but it had fallen on deaf ears.
'It's not something that can be achieved by a few words or by one side only,' Mr Ho said, yet he added they would not rule out having pan-democrats run in the National People's Congress election next year as a way of enhancing communications.
Mr Ho - who has said that he would not rule out a merger with the Civic Party - said it was not easy to establish a new party and it was better to allow things to take a natural course.
Fellow Democrat Yeung Sum insisted there was no problem with the pan-democrats' co-operation.
He said the fact that some were members of the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China - branded subversive by Beijing - had made people in the capital sceptical of them.
