Opinion | Legco elections: Benny Tai’s ‘35-plus’ strategy will take Hong Kong nowhere

The weekend primary election was part of his plan to coordinate the pan-democratic camp to maximise votes in the September poll

The aim is to win a simple majority in Legco, but the threat to weaponise this advantage is overstated. Playing a game of chicken with Beijing has never worked

Reading Time:3 minutes

People line up to vote in a primary election on July 12 aimed at selecting pro-democracy candidates for the Legislative Council election in September. Photo: Reuters

Published: 9:00am, 13 Jul 2020Updated: 9:05am, 13 Jul 2020

The nomination of candidates to run in the upcoming Legislative Council elections begins at the end of the week. Many people, from across political lines, expect the results of the September poll to be a game changer for Hong Kong – so much so that the pan-democratic primaries held over the past two days became not only the focus of political junkies, but also that of Erick Tsang Kwok-wai, the new secretary for constitutional and mainland affairs who has been in the job for less than three months.

Holding primary elections is the idea of co-founder of the Occupy Central movement, law professor Benny Tai Yiu-ting, who also co-organised the weekend event. It’s part of Tai’s “35-plus” campaign to win a majority in Legco.

Ahead of the primaries, Tsang warned that the “candidates” could be in breach of the new national security law as well as the city’s election laws.

Surely, winning a majority in the legislature constitutes no crime and, to be fair, Tsang didn’t say it would. What he did do was warn that pledging to vote down the government’s budget and paralyse the government may land primary candidates in trouble.

University of Hong Kong associate law professor Benny Tai Yiu-ting speaks to the media on June 9 about his plan to hold primary elections for the pro-democracy camp. Photo: Nora Tam

Why would Tai want to take a stab at coordinating the pan-democratic camp? Historically, pan-democrats have not been very good at working together in delivering the greatest good. The camp’s infighting, which was most destructive during “Mad Dog” Wong Yuk-man’s heyday in the legislature, resulted in unnecessary electoral losses.

Wong eventually suffered a humiliating defeat in 2016, losing his Legco seat as an incumbent to a novice, becoming a victim of his own narrow-minded and uncompromising politics.