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Hong Kong Basic Law
Hong KongPolitics

Hong Kong Legco president and two more lawmakers’ oaths under legal challenge by ex-civil servant

Kwok Cheuk-kin is seeking yet another judicial review, this time against Andrew Leung’s nationality and the allegiances of Lo Wai-kwok and Regina Ip

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Kwok Cheuk-kin is known for his legal challenges against the government. Photo: K. Y. Cheng
Chris Lau

A retired Hong Kong civil servant known for his legal challenges against the government has taken on two pro-establishment lawmakers and the president of the Legislative Council in a new twist to the oath-taking saga.

In two writs filed on Monday, Kwok Cheuk-kin argued that Legco president Andrew Leung Kwan-yuen should be considered “stateless” and not of Chinese nationality, therefore failing to meet the requirement of his Legco job.

Lawmakers Lo Wai-kwok and Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee, Kwok further argued, once pledged allegiance to the United Kingdom and its queen, suggesting that they could not be “truthful” when they undertook their Legco oath to serve Hong Kong and Beijing.

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Kwok acted after Beijing interpreted the Basic Law to pre-empt the city’s court ruling on two localist lawmakers: Yau Wai-ching and Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang. The review of the Youngspiration pair was launched by Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying and Secretary for Justice Rimsky Yuen Kwok-keung.

Yau and Leung, with student activist Joshua Wong Chi-fung, have urged America’s president-elect Donald Trump to keep an eye on the city, although he is set to take a US-centric approach to global affairs. At the height of the Occupy protests in 2014, Trump tweeted: “President Obama should stay out of Hong Kong protests, we have enough problems in our own country! Can’t even properly police White House.”

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