Record Low Turnout for "Patriots-Only" District Council Election

Voter turnout at 27.5 percent, with a computer glitch near end

The day after the District Council elections, the government and the liaison office insisted the "patriots-only" election was "a success in improving governance structure", and that it was a "real, functioning democracy", even though there was a record low turnout.

Of the 4.33 million registered voters, only 1,193,193 or 27.5 percent came out. However, of those who voted, 22,045 residents cast blank votes which were invalid, representing 1.85 percent of the overall figure. This compares to 0.56 percent invalid votes four years ago, when 71. 2 percent of voters came out during the height of the 2019 protests.

Most of the voters this year were the elderly who were bussed in, as well as public servants who had to cast ballots.

Ip says "extending hours was completely useless"

Despite the low participating figures, Beijing claimed the election implemented the principle of "patriots governing Hong Kong".

"The district councils have restored their proper nature and functions, freeing the election from politicisation, populism, and pragmatically focusing on solving real problems in the community," the State Council's Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office said in a statement.

"Residents can deeply feel that the elections are related to their interests and that this is real, functioning democracy."

How about a "functioning democracy" with Chinese characteristics? Pro-democracy candidates were barred from running, even centrist pro-establishment parties could not get enough nominations.

Nevertheless, some pro-Beijng lawmakers were not pleased with the turnout, like Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee, founder and chairperson of the New People's Party.

There was a computer system glitch two hours before voting was supposed to finish, so in a bid to get more voters in, the time was extended by another 90 minutes past midnight.

Ip said afterwards "extending hours was completely useless", the extra one and a half did not yield a significant uptick in voters.

But Tam Yiu-chung, vice president of the Chinese Association of Hong Kong and Macau said the election turnout was in line with expectations.

He claimed residents cared more about the Legislative Council elections than District Council ones, and that people were out of town so they couldn't cast ballots.

However, Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu hailed it as a "high-quality" election, but surely there are questions as to why so much money was spent on getting people to vote but the end result was so few.

Was the turnout really in line with expectations? The spinning will continue for days to come...

Starry Lee to Exit Stage Right

Lee has announced she will step down as head of the DAB

Starry Lee Wai-king, chairwoman of the largest political party in Hong Kong has announced she will step down due to workload concerns.

Lee who headed the pro-Beijing Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong for eight years, made the announcement on a Facebook post on Tuesday.

Remember this striking image from May 2020?

"With limited time and limited work capability, I am starting to realise that it may not be conducive to the development of the party [if I continue]," Lee, 49, said.

"After careful consideration, I have decided not to run for election as DAB chairman. I am pleased to see that there is much talent in the party and I am certain that the future chairman will be more successful."

She was the first female DAB leader when she succeeded party veteran Tam Yiu-chung in 2015.

But we remember her most for her power grab in May 2020 when security guards removed 15 pro-democracy lawmakers, including Lam Cheuk-ting from a meeting room regarding the election of the House Committee chairperson.

Pro-democracy politicians like Lam were ejected

The sight of masked security personnel surrounding her as she sat in the chairperson seat was a sign of things to come...

And three years later she is giving up all this power?

Seems like an unceremoniously early exit for this ambitious woman.

Where Did Mainland Visitors Go?

Around 11K mainland visitors come daily to Hong Kong

It is day eight of the Lunar New Year and the windfall of Chinese tourists flooding Hong Kong did not happen.

There had been reports before the Year of the Rabbit began that some 1 million people applied for visas to travel to Hong Kong and Macau.

Shops did not see flood of tourists as expected

Perhaps the majority of them decided to stay closer to home instead?

So far 64,000 people visited Macau on average everyday during the Lunar New Year, of which 37,800 were from China. In contrast, during the same period, only 23,000 people visited Hong Kong daily, and only 11,000 of them were from the mainland.

Newspaper editorials like the one in the Hong Kong Standard are complaining that it took Hong Kong much longer than Macau to settle a deal with Guangdong to drop PCR tests, and the daily cap of visitors coming in either increased or scrapped entirely.

Hong Kong's outgoing deputy at the National People's Congress Standing Committee, Tam Yiu-chung, says he expects Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu to announce the removal of the PCR test mandate for those traveling between Hong Kong and the mainland tomorrow.

Macau seeing way more mainlanders than HK

If that happens, that could help salvage the last few days of the Lunar New Year, or looking long-term,  hopefully entice more people to come back to the city.

Vote for the Only Candidate

Lee reveals his softer side during an election rally yesterday

Yesterday the sole candidate running for chief executive, John Lee Ka-chiu, made a last push for votes at a highly choreographed rally at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre.

Sort of modelled on the US presidential elections, several people came up on stage to endorse Lee, including his campaign director Tam Yiu-chung, the sole Hong Kong representative of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, and former chief executive Leung Chun-ying, who is the chief convenor of the Election Committee with his peer, Tung Chee-hwa.

Leung made a pitch to endorse Lee

Interesting Leung made a pitch for Lee when Leung himself had expressed interest in becoming CE again. But perhaps this was the instruction from above, to play nice and support the only person running...

Meanwhile journalists were totally baffled by the slogan for Lee's rally: We and Us A New Chapter Together.

"We and Us"? 

In Chinese it literally says "Me and We", but that's also grammatically weird too, and besides his copywriting team has made many mistakes throughout his entire campaign that is basically a slam dunk.

Finally the man of the hour (if elected), arrived on stage. The emcee even asked people to turn on the lights on their phones and wave them in the air as if Lee were a rockstar about to sing a ballad.

He talked about his humble beginnings, living in Sham Shui Po, and how his family was poor, but his father managed to scrape together enough money to buy a television set. 

"We and Us"? What does that mean exactly?

After dinner they gathered around the TV and opened the wooden door, but closed the iron gate to allow the breeze in, and neighbours would stand nearby to watch the TV behind them. Lee said they later turned up the volume so they could listen and then eventually invited neighbours to come in to watch TV with them.

Then he quickly went over his four or five items on his election platform, including housing, security for stability, and develop the economy among them, and then that was it.

So this is the man Beijing wants to lead Hong Kong, from one of the poorest neighbourhoods in the city to becoming one of the highest paid leaders in the world at over HK$400,000 (US$51,000) a month -- apparently in cash.

What a rags-to-riches story.

He told about when he was robbed by older classmates once and was punched in the chest for not having any money to offer them, and felt angry he didn't dare speak up and decided to become a law enforcer instead, entering the police force at the age of 19. 

That's the reason why the almost 1,500 people on the Election Committee should vote for him.

Do they have any other choice?