Can pan-democrats regain lost ground in NT West after infighting hurt camp in 2012 Hong Kong elections?

Pan-democrats returned only four of nine lawmakers in 2012, leaving them in a minority in the constituency for the first time even though they secured 54.6 per cent of votes.

The Civic Party adopted what was criticised as a selfish tactic by putting popular democracy icon Audrey Eu Yuet-mee in second place in a slate headed by Kwok Ka-ki, claiming they could win two seats while acknowledging this would be extremely difficulty under the proportional representation system.

Only Kwok was returned, although the slate canvassed 72,185 votes – 38,408 more than Leung Che-cheung, of the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong, who grabbed the last seat.

The Democratic Party, which used to have two seats in New Territories West, was completely uprooted, with veteran lawmaker Lee Wing-tat failing to retain his seat by a razor-thin margin of 985 votes. The DAB managed to split the votes evenly and won all the three lists it fielded.

This time the Democrats are fielding only Andrew Wan Siu-kin for fear of votes being split within the party, but Wan still faces an uphill battle given he is up against nine allies and localists.