Number of registered voters in Hong Kong falls for 3rd consecutive year
Hong Kong Free Press
The number of registered voters in Hong Kong has fallen for a third consecutive year to almost 4.21 million, according to provisional government figures published on Thursday.
According to the Registration and Electoral Office (REO), around 18,900 new registration applications were received for the geographical constituencies in the 2024 voter cycle, along with 138,000 applications from voters already registered to update their particulars. A total of 142,400 voters were provisionally removed from the electoral register.
“The records of about 29 900 and about 112 500 electors have been removed from the provisional register by entering on the omissions list due to death and as a result of other inquiry processes respectively,” a REO statement issued on Thursday said.
HKFP has reached out the the REO to enquire what was meant by “other enquiry processes.”
Overhauls to Hong Kong’s electoral system in recent years have reduced democratic representation in the city’s legislature and district administration.
After imposing a national security law in 2020 following months-long pro-democracy protests, Beijing took what it called “necessary steps to improve the electoral system” and remove “loopholes and deficiencies” in the existing system which had been revealed by “rioting and turbulence… in the Hong Kong society.”
In March 2021, China’s top legislature, the National People’s Congress, approved an overhaul of Hong Kong’s electoral system to ensure that the city was governed by “patriots.”
See also: How Beijing cracked down on Hong Kong’s elections
Under the overhaul, the number of directly elected seats in the Legislative Council’s (LegCo) geographical constituencies was slashed from 35 to 20, while the total number of seats rose from 70 to 90.
A vetting mechanism – which saw candidates subject to checks by the police National Security Department, the city’s national security committee and a separate reviewing committee – was also introduced to ensure that only “patriots” could be in the running to lead the city.
The existing Election Committee – an already powerful panel tasked with selecting the city’s leader – was expanded and further empowered to choose 40 of the legislature’s 90 seats. Its composition was altered so it became stacked with government appointees and organisations with mainland Chinese ties.
The changes effectively excluded what remained of Hong Kong’s pro-democracy camp – those who had not left or been detained under the security law – from the ballot when the city headed to the polls on December 19, 2021. Only one self-styled non-establishment candidate secured a seat and voter turnout was just 30.2 per cent, the lowest in the history of LegCo elections.
Local-level administration was also identified as in need of amending to ensure posts were held by those deemed patriotic. Last July, Hong Kong’s opposition-free legislature unanimously approved changes to the District Council electoral system that reduced the number of democratically elected seats on the local bodies from 452 to 88.
Candidates were required to receive nominations from government-appointed committees to run, resulting in the opposition being shut out from the race.
The District Council elections held last December saw a record-low turnout of 27.5 per cent – a significant drop from the 71.2 per cent recorded during the last District Council election held in 2019 amid the extradition bill protests.
Despite the drop in civic engagement, both elections were hailed as triumphs by local and Beijing officials, with China’s leader Xi Jinping saying the LegCo vote had been “held successfully.” Foreign ministers of the G7 group of nations, however, expressed “grave concern over the erosion of democratic elements” following the December 2021 election.
Hongkongers will return to the ballot box again in 2025 for the next LegCo election.
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