David Wong Yau-kar, one of the National People’s Congress deputies who attended the NPC Standing Committee meeting last week, lauded the NPCSC for making “a very focused decision” when extending the current term of the Hong Kong Legislative Council for another year.
If the ‘pan-democratic’ legislators stay in LegCo for another year, they will face criticism from the radical and violent political sect, and those who won the opposition camp’s so-called primary election
David Wong Yau-kar
a Hong Kong deputy to the National People’s Congress
He said that at the meeting, deputies from Hong Kong raised concerns about the four legislators whom the city’s returning officers have disqualified from running in the seventh LegCo election, as well as two other lawmakers banned from elections for five years due to their respective criminal convictions, but the NPCSC did not address that.
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“Those issues were briefly discussed at the meeting, but the NPCSC did not rule on the eligibility of individual legislators because Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor did not make such a request in her letter to the NPCSC. It was a very focused decision, with nothing more and nothing less,” he added.
Wong also said that the NPCSC decision presents a dilemma for opposition lawmakers.
Wong said that if the “pan-democratic” legislators stay in LegCo for another year, they will face criticism from the radical and violent political sect, and those who won the opposition camp’s so-called primary election. In addition, they will also find it hard to eat their words because they were opposed to postponing the election.
But if they quit, they will lose the lucrative financial resources and a platform to spread their views, Wong said.
“I think the ‘pan-democrats’ are not all from the same mold, as there are rational ones and radical ones,” he told China Daily. “Yet they need to fulfill their duties as lawmakers. They need to adjust the definition of ‘fighting’ the government. If they think some government policies are not good, they can negotiate with the government, using reasonable, peaceful means, instead of breaking the meeting rules and paralyzing LegCo’s operations,” he said.
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“I think they need to be very careful with their words and conduct in the coming next year, which the returning officers will look at closely, if these legislators wish to run in the seventh-term LegCo election. In my opinion, their threat to veto all government motions and the (city) budget if they won majority seats amounted to subversion of State power in violation of Article 22 of the National Security Law,” he said.
Wong also said he hopes the government will act more proactively in the coming year, instead of adopting a “laid back” attitude or shrinking from controversial issues, adding that important issues are usually rather controversial.
“The government should conduct more virus tests for citizens to combat the pandemic despite resistance. Also, to solve the problems of inadequate land and housing supply, the government should be brave enough to push forward the Lantau Tomorrow Vision mega land-reclamation project, which has my support, to give people hope,” he said.
