Update | Democrat Albert Ho will quit to spark de-facto Hong Kong political reform referendum

Democratic Party heavyweight Albert Ho Chun-yan confirmed this afternoon that he plans to resign from his “super lawmaker” seat to trigger a de-facto referendum on the city’s political reform.

Speaking at a 3pm press conference, Ho announced that he would ask his party to approve his resignation after he voted against the government's political reform package.

Ho said that he was resigning so that Hongkongers could have a chance to express their anger about the national legislature's August 31 decision that while Hong Kong can pick its leader by popular vote, it must choose from a slate of two or three candidates backed by half of a 1,200-strong nominating committee.

That committee has to be modelled on the 1,193-member Election Committee which nominated and picked Leung Chun-ying as chief executive in 2012.

Ho also demanded that the government relaunch the "five-step" political reform process.

His resignation would trigger a by-election in which more than 3 million voters would be eligible to participate.