Hong Kong’s Democratic Party poised to skip election for first time in decades after window closes on nominations

A two-week internal nomination period has come and gone, with members either staying away or failing to meet a new threshold for running

One party source maintains the lack of nominations ‘shows that no one is interested in running’

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Democratic Party chairman Lo Kin-hei tells reporters no decision has been made on whether to contest the coming Legislative Council poll after a meeting last month. Photo: Dickson Lee

Published: 12:18am, 12 Oct 2021Updated: 2:32am, 12 Oct 2021

Hong Kong’s biggest opposition party appears set to skip the coming Legislative Council election, with none of its members stepping forward to run as an internal deadline for applications came and went.

The party had set a two-week application period for the December general election, but the window closed at 6pm on Monday with no nominations received, according to a brief statement, which stopped short of mentioning what the next move would be.

If the party ultimately does not field candidates, it will be the first time Democrats are absent from a local election since Hong Kong’s 1997 return to Chinese sovereignty.

The party was supposed to decide whether to contest the poll at an extraordinary general meeting last month, but decided to delay making a formal decision at the last minute, saying it was not necessary as no one had expressed a desire to run.

Democrat Fred Li (pictured) accused party leadership of creating an unreasonable threshold for nominations. Photo: Dickson Lee

Instead, the party’s leadership devised a new mechanism for members wishing to throw their hats into the ring: potential candidates would need to secure 40 nominations from fellow members, and get a green light from the leadership at a subsequent meeting to qualify.

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