My Take | Nothing positive in a negative question

Nelson Wong Sing-chi, alas, is not the late Szeto Wah.

The long-time core member of the Democratic Party has broken ranks over the pan-democratic stance on the government's electoral reform package.

He argues, not unreasonably, in support of the reform package because the pan-dems have offered no viable alternative. Their rejectionism, he points out, will simply send us all back to where we started. The government package, however flawed and compromised, is at least a step forward.

Rewind back to 2010 when the Democrats reached a deal with Beijing over the electoral reform plan then on offer.

For enabling its passage in the legislature, the Democrats were branded as traitors. Nevertheless, the vocal support of Szeto Wah, who was dying from cancer, gave the Democrats the necessary ideological cover they needed to cut a deal. Szeto essentially made the same arguments about the reform package then as Wong is making now.

Unfortunately, Wong does not have the same prestige and influence as Szeto. It's the same with Ronny Tong Ka-wah, who has taken on his fellow Civic Party comrades for being even more hardline and intransigent than the Democrats.