Eva Cheng
Veteran pro-worker and pro-democracy activist Leung Kwok-Hung was elected on September 12 to Hong Kong's 60-member Legislative Council — the ex-British colony's quasi-parliament. Leung, 48, is best known as "Long Hair".
Since Britain handed the colony over in 1997, Hong Kong has been a special administrative zone of China. Accordingly, only 30 of the Legislative Council's 60 seats were elected through popular vote — up from 24 popularly elected seats in 2000 and 20 in 1998. The remaining 30 seats were elected by narrow "functional constituencies", mainly based on professional groups.
Some 1.784 million people, 55.6% of eligible voters, cast a ballot. Leung won with a 60,925 votes, 14.1% of the votes in his seven-seat electorate.
A persistent activist for workers' rights and democracy in Hong Kong and China since the 1980s, Leung has been jailed four times for his campaigning, and has been arrested numerous times. Leung stands out for his bold readiness to expose the lies and hypocrisy of the previous colonial government and the Beijing-appointed government.
Rather than ignoring him outright, the mainstream media has scornfully reported Leung's protest actions, portraying him as a nut case. However, such regular coverage has earned Leung growing respect among the local population, reflected in the vote that he has gained. Leung has become an icon of struggle. He narrowly missed winning a seat in 2000.
Leung's election platform demanded an end to Beijing's one-party control in China, universal popular elections in Hong Kong and the creation of unemployment benefits and livable minimum wage. These are all issues that Leung and his comrades of April 5 Action have been campaigning for for years. His group originated through actions in solidarity with the democracy movement in China and has maintained such campaigning, especially since the 1989 Tiananmen massacre of pro-democracy students in Beijing.
In the wake of his victory, Leung has clearly stated that, while he intends to make the best use of parliament to fight for the rights of workers and the unemployed, he will not be detered from participating in street actions when needed. Shortly after his victory was confirmed on September 13, Leung and three other activists staged a noon protest outside the government's main office, condemning the sloppy organisation of the election. Some voting booths were temporarily closed because they ran out of ballot boxes.
According to the September 14 Sun newspaper, Leung intends his first motion in the Legislative Council to be a demand to halt the cuts in welfare payments. According to the September 14 Oriental Daily News, Leung will retain a modest HK$12,000 (A$2400) a month of his parliamentary allowance, donating the remainder to the democracy movement and other grassroots struggles.
The election resulted in a reduction in the seats held by the Democratic Party from 12 to nine. The DP is the biggest force in the broadly defined democratic camp. However, the Article 45 Concern Group, also in the democratic camp, doubled its positions to four. The pro-Beijing Democratic Alliance for the Betterment of Hong Kong increased its seats from 10 to 12 while the pro-business Liberal Party's seats grow from eight to 10.
The broad democratic camp increased its seats from 22 to 25, though lower than expectations. The pro-Beijing and pro-government forces' seats declined from 38 to 35, but they still hold enough to control the 60-seat chamber.
Of the democratic camp's 25 seats, 18 were directly elected while seven came from the "functional groups". The DP only won seven directly elected seats this time out of the 30 available. It won nine out of the 24 directly elected seats available in 2000. Of the pro-government camp's 35 seats, 12 were directly elected with the remainder 23 from functional groups.
The voter turnout of 55.6% rose from the 43.6% (1.33 million people) in 2000 and 53.3% (1.49 million) in 1998.
[Â鶹´«Ã½ Weekly has featured interviews with Leung in issues GLW #362, #364 and #414, available at .]
From Â鶹´«Ã½ Weekly, September 22, 2004.
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