Pan-democratic candidates would still be among voters' favourites in the coming 2012 Legco election even if the camp vetoed the government's proposed political reform package next week, a survey shows.
According to an instant University of Hong Kong poll, 48 per cent of about 500 people who listened to or watched Thursday's historic televised debate between Chief Executive Donald Tsang Yam-kuen and Civic Party leader Audrey Eu Yuet-mee, said they would still vote for pan-democratic candidates for the district-based seats in the coming Legco election even if the reform package did not pass.
Thirty per cent of respondents said they would not vote for the pan-democratic camp under those circumstances, while 22 per cent said they did not know or were undecided on the issue.
Tsang and Eu were debating a reform package that includes plans to increase the election committee for the chief executive and increasing the number of Legco seats.
Baptist University assistant professor To Yiu-ming said growing opposition to the reform package was one of the many results of Thursday's debate.
This was despite lower audience numbers for the forum compared to figures for Tsang's two televised election debates in 2007 with Civic Party rival Alan Leong Kah-kit. Those debates attracted 1.75 million and 2.07 million viewers.
Free-to-air broadcasters TVB and ATV said the debate's audience rating averaged out at 19 points, or 1.21 million viewers, peaking at 23 points, or 1.47 million.