Welcome back to HKFP Monitor. This week, as the nomination period for Hong Kong’s “patriots only” Legislative Council (LegCo) elections continues, former fencer Vivian Kong keeps everyone guessing: Will the 31-year-old Olympic medallist enter the race? Meanwhile, the government turned to civil servants to boost the turnout rate in the December 7 polls.
| WILL SHE, WON’T SHE?
Former fencer Vivian Kong, who retired from the sport shortly after clinching gold in women’s individual épée at the 2024 Paris Olympic Games, may formally enter the legislative race as early as Tuesday next week.
According to the Hong Kong Economic Journal (HKEJ), Kong, now an assistant external affairs manager at the Hong Kong Jockey Club, is eyeing a tourism constituency seat in LegCo. She may face heavyweight opponents like industry veteran Perry Yiu, who currently holds the seat.
Rumours of Kong’s interest in contesting the elections emerged last week. Citing unnamed sources in the political scene, the pro-establishment media darling was reportedly “encouraged” to run in the LegCo polls.
Nicknamed the “Smiling Queen of Fencing,” Kong was initially rumoured to run for a seat in the New Territories North constituency, one of the 20 publicly elected seats in LegCo. However, earlier this week, local media reported it was unlikely Kong would join the race due to her foreign citizenship and her “chance of winning.”
Kong, who followed her parents to Canada at the age of two and returned to the city after four years, does not meet the requirement to run in the geographical constituencies because she holds a foreign passport, the HKEJ reported.
The Basic Law, Hong Kong’s mini-constitution, stipulates that lawmakers elected in the geographical constituencies should not have the right of abode in a foreign country.
Kong was said to be willing to give up her foreign citizenship, and the Hong Kong government intervened to help with the procedure of renouncing her foreign passport. However, it could not be completed before the end of the nomination period on November 6.
Another consideration revolved around her chance of winning public votes, especially against opponents fielded by major political parties, such as the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong (DAB) and the Hong Kong Federation of Trade Unions (FTU).
“People see an Olympic champion as a ‘national treasure,’… No one wants to see her suffer a landslide defeat,” anonymous sources told the HKEJ.
But only days later, reports surfaced of Kong eyeing the tourism sector seat – one of 12 functional constituency spots that allow people with the right of abode in a foreign country to hold office.
As of Thursday, a total of 109 election hopefuls have secured enough nominations and formally entered the December 7 legislative race, which will elect the next 90 lawmakers in the 2025-28 term.
| GOV’T VOTING PUSH
The government has been pushing to encourage voting, especially among its own employees.
Chief Executive John Lee on Tuesday issued a letter to all government employees, urging them to lead by example and vote in the legislative elections.
In the letter, Lee said civil servants should vote to demonstrate their pledge to uphold the Basic Law and allegiance to Hong Kong.
The letter came after a Beijing loyalist expressed Beijing’s hopes to see a higher voter turnout in the December race. Lo Man-tuen, a former vice-chairman of the All-China Federation of Returned Overseas Chinese, wrote to Ming Pao on Monday and said the central government would like to see “voters actively exercise their democratic right and cast a responsible vote.”
Lo also said Hong Kong officials had visited Macau and learned from the casino hub, which saw a dismal 53 per cent turnout rate in the September legislative elections.
Asked by reporters on Tuesday, Lee acknowledged that his officials had talked to their counterparts in Macau regarding its election experience.
But Lee said his administration would not set a hard target for voter turnout on December 7. The financial hub’s last legislative race in 2021, the first after Beijing’s electoral overhaul that allowed only “patriots” to run, had only a 30.2 per cent voter turnout – a record low.
Hong Kong has roughly 170,000 civil servants. The city now has about 4.13 million registered voters – down from the historic peak of 4.47 million in 2021.
The efforts to get Kong to throw her hat in the ring are apparently linked to attempts to boost the low turnout rate, as the powers that be are betting on her fame as an Olympic gold medallist.
It is questionable, however, how much influence she will have now that the former fencer is more likely to run for a seat in the functional constituencies.
In the 90-strong LegCo, only 20 seats, which belong to the geographical constituencies, are publicly elected. The rest – 30 lawmakers in functional constituencies and 40 lawmakers from the Election Committee – are decided in small-circle elections.
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| STATE MEDIA MONITOR
Political duty: In lockstep with the Hong Kong leader, Beijing-backed dailies, Wen Wei Po and Ta Kung Pao, published editorials this week, urging civil servants to vote in the December legislative elections.
Lee’s letter to civil servants was cited by both Ta Kung Pao’s and Wen Wei Po’s editorials, published on Wednesday and Thursday, respectively. Both newspapers went further and said that civil servants would not breach the principle of “political neutrality” when voting.
Without naming names, they rubbished opinions arguing otherwise.
| SOCIAL MEDIA MONITOR
End game: YouTube reality-show sensation Trial & Error shut down last weekend, with fans expressing a profound sense of regret across social media platforms.
Trial & Error, founded by creative trio Neo Yau, Hui Yin, and So Chi-ho amid the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, ran its final livestream on Sunday, just a day ahead of its fifth anniversary. At one point, over 60,000 fans were watching the show concurrently, with many thanking the YouTube channel for making “genuine” and “heartfelt” video content for their entertainment over the past half a decade.
Trial & Error had announced the closure six months in advance. Over the past months, Yau said in different interviews with other YouTube channels in Hong Kong that the closure was due to his team members suffering from emotional burnout and facing a creative bottleneck.
One of the last videos published by Trial & Error is a reality show titled “Cuttlefish Game.” Named after the hugely popular South Korean Netflix drama Squid Game, it features 100 celebrities across different generations in Hong Kong. As of Friday, the two-part series has been viewed over five million times on YouTube.
| HKFP PHOTO OF THE WEEK
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