Letters | District council election: Hong Kong must show we care about our voting rights

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The district council election is one day away. Should we care? With the reforms to district councils, only 88 out of 470 seats will now be directly elected by Hongkongers.

To be eligible for election, candidates for a district need to secure nominations from each of three district-level bodies (the District Fight Crime Committee, the District Fire Safety Committee and the Area Committee). These committees mostly consist of pro-establishment political figures, hindering some parties in securing enough nominations to participate.

Although most of the eligible candidates are from the pro-establishment camp, competition still exists. For example, for Sha Tin district, 14 eligible candidates are competing for votes to win eight seats.

Although they are all considered patriots, their respective political parties often seek to represent voters from different backgrounds, ideologies and social classes. In contrast with the highly politicised 2019 election, candidates are no longer evaluated merely on their political stance on the extradition bill, which is irrelevant to district administration.