Hong Kong electoral changes: no more than 30,000 voters will take part in Election Committee race, authorities estimate, down from 246,000 in 2016

Many Election Committee members are either appointed or granted seats based on other offices they hold, and changes to how the remainder are chosen has further reduced the voting pool

Told of the reduction in voters on Monday, lawmakers questioned why polling places in this September’s elections for the body needed to remain open so long

Reading Time:2 minutes

Following a shake-up of the city’s electoral system, the number of voters in this year’s Election Committee polls will be drastically reduced. Photo: K. Y. Cheng

Published: 9:37pm, 21 Jun 2021Updated: 6:52pm, 17 Sep 2021

Only some 20,000 to 30,000 voters will be eligible to cast ballots for competitive seats on Hong Kong’s revamped Election Committee this year, a mere fraction of the 246,000 registered in the last race.

Following a drastic, Beijing-led overhaul of the city’s electoral system, about a third of the newly empowered Election Committee’s members will either be appointed by the authorities or granted their seats by virtue of other offices they hold. Changes to how the remaining two-thirds of electors are chosen have also reduced the voting pool.

At a constitutional affairs panel meeting at the Legislative Council on Monday, Alan Yung Ying-fai, chief electoral officer of the Registration and Electoral Office, told members that the number of eligible voters in the coming Election Committee polls, scheduled for September 19, was expected to be between 20,000 and 30,000.

“It is our initial estimation. Voter registration is being conducted and we will have a clearer picture of the number of voters later,” said Yung. Voter registration is to be closed on July 5.

The establishment-dominated Election Committee was originally only tasked with picking the city’s chief executive, but after the electoral shake-up, it now enjoys the power to select 40 members of the 90-seat legislature and to nominate all the rest.

The overhaul also expanded the committee from 1,200 members to 1,500, while curtailing individual voting in favour of a corporate mechanism in its professional sub-sectors, including ones where the opposition used to prevail. Of the nearly 1,000 members to be chosen by elections of some kind, many will be hand-picked by pro-establishment groups.

In the body’s 2016 elections, there were just over 246,000 registered electors – 230,000 individuals and 16,400 corporate voters.

The Election Committee selects the city’s chief executive, and now enjoys the power to elect and nominate lawmakers. Photo: Sam Tsang

Select Voice

Choose your listening speed

Get through articles 2x faster

1.25x

250 WPM

Slow

Average

Fast

00:0000:00

1.25x