Rita Fan re-elected to NPC, but with fewer votes

Rita Fan Hsu Lai-tai was re-elected as a member of the National People Congress’s standing committee on Thursday, but with fewer votes than she got in 2008.

The veteran Hong Kong politician won 2,790 votes – down from 2,896 she obtained five years ago when she first won the seat. She also had 124 votes against her and 27 abstentions on Thursday.

More than 2,900 NPC deputies met in Beijing on Thursday to choose 161 members of its standing committee from 174 candidates.

After the voting, Fan, 67, said she believed the drop in support was due to her age and her outspokenness.

She said she was not surprised by the result and would continue to cling to her style.

“If there are issues on which I think I should not comment, then I would not comment. But I would not compromise what I have to say to make every one happy,” she said.

Fan, a former Legislative Council president, favoured Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying’s rival, Henry Tang Ying-yen, in the city’s leadership race last year, and she repeatedly criticised Leung.