Hong Kong district council election: 2 polling stations set for border town to help locals living in mainland China vote
- Government says it will turn two schools near Sheung Shui MTR station into polling sites for December 10 vote
- Move marks end of arrangement used in 2021 Legislative Council election that allowed Hongkongers to vote at border crossing facilities
Two polling stations will be set up in the border town of Sheung Shui for Hongkongers living in mainland China to vote in the district council election next month.
The Hong Kong government on Tuesday said it would turn two schools near Sheung Shui MTR station into polling facilities for the December 10 vote, instead of setting up voting sites at border crossings, as was the case in the 2021 Legislative Council election.
Authorities said they had received calls to continue the 2021 arrangement to help Hongkongers living on the mainland, but conceded it was no longer possible following the full border reopening earlier this year.
“In view of the fact that the epidemic has now passed and the control points have resumed normal operations, and that all the control points are currently very busy in operation … there is not adequate space to set up polling stations,” the government said.
The voting stations set up in the Hong Kong Taoist Association Tang Hin Memorial Secondary School and the Tung Wah Group of Hospitals Kap Yan Directors’ College can handle a maximum of 38,000 voters initially, with the former mainly catering to those from Hong Kong Island and Kowloon constituencies, and the latter serving those from the New Territories.
Hong Kong district council election ‘to be as politically diverse as past polls’
Voters will need to register online between 9am on November 20 and 6pm on December 5. The quota of 38,000 will be filled on a first-come, first-served basis, and subject to increases if the turnout is “very high”, according to the government.
But it stressed the arrangement would only apply to those who had registered to vote in the geographical constituencies, as electors for the district committee constituencies are asked to cast their votes at the 18 designated polling stations across the city.
Welcoming the government’s arrangement, lawmaker Bill Tang Ka-piu from the Federation of Trade Unions urged the government to raise the quota to at least 100,000, as he expressed concerns over whether the 38,000 would be sufficient.
“The quota should be increased given that more than 500,000 Hongkongers live in the Greater Bay Area,” he said, calling on the government to further promote the arrangement to avoid confusion.
According to Census and Statistics Department estimates, in mid-2022, about 529,500 Hong Kong residents usually stayed in Guangdong province, where nine bay area cities are located.
On Tuesday, Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Erick Tsang Kwok-wai said the government’s 16 offices on the mainland would promote registration and voting for Hongkongers across the border.
“Hongkongers reside across the country,” he said. “We will spread this message through relevant organisations and communities to encourage more people to return to Hong Kong for voting.”
Tsang also told lawmakers at a Legco panel meeting on the same day the nomination arrangements for the coming election were more difficult compared with previous ones because past requirements were “too easy”.
“[The easy requirement] had allowed many individuals who were not patriotic and had not engaged in district work to deceive their way into obtaining seats by purely chanting political slogans and employing unethical campaign tactics,” he said.
Aspirants for the December 10 poll are required to secure at least nine nominations from the three district committees.
Centrist lawmaker Tik Chi-yuen asked if the committee members had prioritised party interests over those of voters by nominating their own teammates, which resulted in narrowing room for independent candidates in the district councils.
But Tsang said society should trust members of the three committees would consider the overall situation and not hand out nominations for individual gains.
In 2021, three polling stations were set up at Heung Yuen Wai, as well as the Lo Wu and Lok Ma Chau Spur Line border crossings in an unprecedented arrangement prompted by the coronavirus pandemic to allow Hongkongers living on the mainland to vote in the Legco election.
Hong Kong district council poll to be ‘fierce contest’, despite opposition absence
The coming district council poll is the first community-level election to be held after the city overhauled its electoral system to align with Beijing’s “patriots-only” principle.
The proportion of directly elected councillors will be slashed from nearly 95 per cent to just 19 per cent. Only 88 of the 470 seats are returned by popular vote, while 176 will be elected within three district committees across 18 districts, which are dominated by Beijing loyalists.
Hong Kong opposition figures face big task to get district council poll go-ahead
Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu will appoint another 179 seats and the remaining 27 will be held by chairmen of rural committees of the respective districts.
A low turnout is widely expected for the December 10 poll. The city logged a 1.87 per cent year-on-year drop in its electoral roll and a record-low turnout rate of 30.2 per cent in the 2021 Legco race, which was the first citywide poll following the electoral overhaul.
Ministers including Tsang have repeatedly played down the importance of voter turnout, saying that many factors, including the weather and transport, could affect numbers.
