Hong Kong's new district council election will be held on December 10, which is also the first district election after the Hong Kong reform election system.With the promotional slogan floating on the street, coupled with the voices of volunteers and officials penetrating into the community calling for voting, the election atmosphere has become more and more enthusiastic recently.However, compared with the past, the new district council is very different in terms of composition and functions, and the future has attracted much attention from the outside world.
Stepping into November, the weather in Hong Kong began to cool down, but the streets and alleys in various districts fluttered.For several consecutive weekends, workers in many regions have set up street stations to actively come into contact with citizens and lively.
Luo Wen after the 80s is one of them.She often went to Kwun Tong District to communicate with residents.Luo Wen, who is an assistant legal manager in a company, has always cared about social affairs. In addition to work, he also likes to serve the community, including providing obligations to the citizens to provide obligations legal consultation, and the plan to participate in the SAR government.Life planning views, etc.
Kwun Tong belongs to the old district in Hong Kong and lives in a large number of grass -roots families, elders and new immigrants.Luo Wen pointed out in an interview with Lianhe Morning Post that there were many construction engineering accidents in the district this year, and a middle -aged brother who had intellectual problems suspected to be in the tragedy in the hunting family because no one took care of it.Although Hong Kong is an international developed city, many people still need help in the society, especially support from the legal field.
There is no political party background, Luo Wen, so he resolutely signed up for the election earlier to compete for the district meeting seat in the North District of Guantang.She said: "As the late Hong Kong singer Luo Wen's laser lyrics said: light heating is equal to fire. I hope that the neighborhood plus me can make the North District of Kwun Tong."
Hong Kong will hold a new district council election (referred to as district election) on December 10 this year. The two -week nomination period has ended on October 30.According to the list announced by the Hong Kong Government, 399 people in the current district were applied for the election.In terms of direct elections, all 44 constituencies are competing, with a total of 172 people competing for 88 seats.
Among them, the competition in the Northern Constitution of Kwun Tong was fierce, and four people snatched two seats, including two current district councilors.Luo Wen said that he is a political amateur, but the citizen's response is better than expected."Some neighborhoods asked me what the background it was, and I replied that it was an universal party. They said they would support me and hope to bring new weather to the community."
In Hong Kong, the District Council belongs to the local administrative consulting authority and is a regional organization at the region.In 1982, the Hong Kong and British government established district councils to divide Hong Kong into 18 districts. Each district has a district council. It consists of appointment and election district councilors to provide opinions on the government on daily affairs of citizens.Each district council has a term of four years.
According to Hong Kong laws, the district council has no real power.However, as the district council has continued to increase the proportion of elected members in the past 20 years, the function of the parliament has also increased, including the power of approved local small projects to approve.In addition, the district councilors have the right to run for the election committee, which can exert a certain influence on the chief executive election. Therefore, in recent years, it has also had increasing political power to become a political platform for major political parties.
In 2019, the unprecedented anti -repair storms in Hong Kong broke out, and the two political opinions of yellow and blue were fiercely opposed.At the end of the year, Hong Kong just held the district council election election. It was regarded by both parties as a duel and each mobilized. As a result, the voting rate was pushed to a historical high of 71.2%.17 are dominated by democracy.After the Democrats, the Democrats continued to use the district council to express their political remarks against the government.
After that, Beijing officials implemented the Hong Kong National Security Law through 2020, suppressing and banning behaviors that are considered to endanger national security. In 2021, Hong Kong's political system reform was implemented.Hong Kong "principle.Therefore, compared with the previous session, this year's Hong Kong District Council elections are very different.
First of all, this district selection is the first district election held after the Hong Kong reform election system.According to the district council reform plan released by the Hong Kong government on May 2, there will be 470 members of the new district council, and the direct election seats will be reduced from 452 to 88, accounting for less than 94%of the drama to less than 20%, and newThe 179 seats were added, and 176 seats in the regional committee appointed by the government chose a seat, plus 27 of course.In other words, the election component of the new district council has been greatly reduced compared to before.
The Hong Kong Government explained that this is to confuse the existing "vulnerability" from the system, and to prevent the district council from being "manipulated" by the "anti -China -China chaos" people.Therefore, in the new district selection, the process of district councilor also introduced the "qualification review" system for the first time to confirm that members meet the conditions of "the country of patriotic governance".In addition, the chairman of the District Council was also selected by the members of the parliament. It was renamed the Hong Kong government's civil affairs commissioner in the district to ensure that the new district council was dominated by administrative.
Secondly, the non -construction faction is completely missed in this election.In order to implement the "Patriotic Governing Hong Kong" principle, candidates for district councils must first obtain "three sessions" (the section committee committee, regional extinguishing crime committee and regional fire prevention committee) members nominated.Because most of the members of the "Three Meetings" are pro -built -by -facilities, the results include the traditional Democratic parties of the Democratic Party and the Civil Association. No members have been nominated enough this year, not even qualified to run.This is the first time that there have been no democratic participation in Hong Kong's regional election since the return of Hong Kong in 1997.
In addition to the Fanmin, some middle -aged political troupes, such as the democratic thinking founded by the executive committee member Tang Jiazhen, the new thinking founded by the Legislative Councilor Di Zhiyuan, and the real government round table created by the Legislative Councilor Tian Beichen, etc.Touch the wall.Among them, the democratic ideas and real government round tables were originally intended to have five or six people. In the end, only one person was nominated, and the new thinking was the whole army.The traditional parties of the political party and the Federation of Industry Federation of Industry and Industry have become big winners, and they can nominate the most people to run.
In any case, as the registration period ends at the end of last month, the new district selection has now entered a new stage.What I saw in the past, accompanied by the promotional slogan floating on the street, coupled with the voices of the candidate team and officials in the community's call for voting, the entire election atmosphere became more and more enthusiastic.Many candidates have set up street stations to competition to enhance regional services.
The first selection of the first region caused three major attention
For the first district selection under the new selection of Hong Kong, there are generally three attention from the outside world.
The first is the question of how much voting.In the district council election held in November 2019, the voting rate was more than 70 %, setting the highest record in history.In 2021, the Legislative Council election was improved after the political system.The voting rate was only 30.2%.This district parliamentary election is the official milestone of Hong Kong's Ji and Xingxing. Its voting rate will reflect the recognition of the new system of Hong Kong people.
In order to make every effort to increase the voting rate, the Hong Kong Political Affairs and Mainland Affairs Bureau have been vigorously promoted in recent days, setting up mobile game booths, mobile promotional vehicles and exhibitions in multiple locations in Hong Kong, and explained and provided through interactive games, special explanations and provisionInformation, election of propaganda district councils.At the same time, many departments and heads of the Hong Kong Government and heads of departments have also actively set up leaflets, shooting short films, etc., and encouraged the public to vote enthusiastically.
However, many interviewed scholars are not optimistic about the voting rate of this year's district.Chen Weiqiang, a lecturer in Hong Kong University of Technology Hong Kong University of Technology, accepted a joint morning newspaper and pointed out that many celebrities were elected in the previous district council election, and then entered the Legislative Council through the District Council.Most candidates this year are newcomers, not political stars. In addition, this year's constituencies are much larger than before. Not every voter knows candidates, it is difficult to push the voting rate.
Chen Weiqiang said, even more, because the non -construction faction cannot enter the gate, this year's district selection will only be internally competitive.Although there are competition in each district, it is not fierce. He believes that there are only more than 20 % of the voting rate in the end.
Song Ligong, director of the Institute of Maizhen, Hong Kong, also pointed out in the United Morning Post that many young people around him said that he was not interested in this year's district selection and did not want to vote.If you want to try to estimate the voting rate of the district, he also agrees that he will be lower than the 30 % voting rate of the Legislative Council election.
Song Ligong said that if the voting rate is low, many Hong Kong people still do not agree with the new election system.Therefore, the Hong Kong Government has made every effort to encourage citizens to vote in different methods.But for Beijing officials, national security is the most important, and it may not be considered too much.
Song Ligong explained that the Hong Kong Government will legislate next year on the Basic Law. This law will have a greater impact than the Hong Kong National Security Law, and it may cause a rebound in Hong Kong society.Secondly, the United States will hold the presidential election next year.Recently, the U.S. government wants to repair it with China, but some parliamentarians have proposed sanctioning Hong Kong judges, law enforcement officials, and prosecutors, indicating that Hong Kong may become a topic for the year of US elections.Beijing officials are concerned that the United States will play the Hong Kong card again, so they simply eliminate democratic people to participate in district elections, so as to prevent some people from being successfully promoted to the parliament and make Hong Kong issues have room for hype.
Will the functions of the district council change greatly?
It is worth noting that the Hong Kong District Council has played a bridge role between the government and community residents for many years.As a representative of public opinion, district councilors, in addition to proposing to the official environment to improve the community environment, also assisted the neighborhood to solve the problem of daily life.The second concern of the outside world is whether the function of the district council will change greatly after the restructuring.
Song Ligong believes that the Hong Kong Government announced in the 2022 policy report that the "Care Team" was established in the 18th district of Hong Kong to unite community resources and strength, support government regional work and strengthen regional networks.Serve the role of the community.He believes that the district members will return to the role of purely consulting in the future and the functions of associating with affection to assist the government to propagate policies in the region and strive for citizens to support the government.
But Chen Weiqiang pointed out that in the past, district councilors also played the role of assisting the Hong Kong Government's "master regional pulse", assisting the government to collect the opinions of citizens in many ways, and reported to the official.Under the new district council system, the appointment and alive district members are both inclined to the government, and the general election districts of the direct election district may not be able to fully understand public opinion.How to master the real public opinion in the future will test the official work.
The third largest concern in Hong Kong society to this day is that the Democratic Party and the Civil Association, which expressed their intention to run, eat all closed doors in this district council election, so that the democratic school has always been unattended for the first time.Where the non -construction group will go in the future, it has become a hot topic for recent discussions in all walks of life.
As the Democratic Party of the largest party in the past, some insiders admitted that the party had long been psychologically prepared to get a nomination ticket to enter the gate, but knowing that it was difficult to go before the road, it was still recommended to play in order to test the new selection system to test the new selection system.Tolerance.How to struggle for survival is the real test of the Democratic Party.
Song Ligong believes that non -building people have been rejected outside the door because the national security field is the most important consideration in Beijing.However, he believes that the dissolution should not be the Democratic Party option. The Democratic Party should transform into a private pressure group, or try to maintain community services and serve the citizens outside the system to restart the future.
But Chen Weiqiang was pessimistic about the prospects of non -construction political groups.He pointed out that all democratic candidates such as the Democratic Party and the Democratic Association were out of order, which was expected.However, it is surprising that democratic ideas, new thinking, and real government can not be entered for elections. "There is no room for the middle school, let alone traditional democratic political groups.Stage, complete their historical tasks. "
