HK to hold weird fake-election ritual

On Sunday, members or representatives of various professional, social, cultural and other groups will be able to vote in Hong Kong’s exciting 2016 Election Committee Subsector Ordinary Elections. Participants in these ‘ordinary’ elections will select a pretty-much-largely-rigged portion of the Election Committee; the non-‘ordinary’ part of the exercise appoints the massively-utterly-rigged portion (such as delegates to rubber-stamp national political bodies). The total Election Committee will comprise 1,200 (minus any deceased or purged) people, who will take part in the make-believe election next March that confirms Beijing’s choice of Chief Executive.

Among the patriotic and shoe-shining castes, voting in – or running for – these EC Subsector (and, yes, Sub-subsector) elections is a more-or-less serious business. Some consider themselves flattered to be among the 200,000 or so electors (some of whom are humans, others being corporate bodies). Many pro-democrats, on the other hand,  have traditionally treated the charade with disdain. But some are putting effort into winning EC seats this time round, on the off-chance they can have some sort of meaningful or at least symbolic effect on the outcome (for example, by depriving Beijing’s anointed one of votes, to make a point). Beijing’s local agents are micro-managing loyalist campaigns and voting at sub-sub-subsector level accordingly.

Anyone unfortunate enough to be involved will have received a pile of instructions designed to lend the occasion a veneer of legitimacy…

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One interesting point: the relevant organ’s English-language address on the covering letter refers to ‘Kowloonbay’. Presumably a typo, though it could be an example of creeping Mainlandization – in line with Pinyin usage (‘Beijing’ rather than ‘Bei Jing’, or in this case ‘Jiulongwan’).

ec-ss-elec-posterThe materials contain extensive advice for wretches attending the vote-counting. This takes place at AsiaWorld-Expo out at the airport – which is appropriate: this will be the most vacuous and trivial pap-filled performance at the venue since Coldplay’s concert. The info-package presumes, not without good reason, that those attending the vote-count will probably come by chauffeur-driven car.

The whole EC-formation exercise – like the CE ‘election’ itself in March – will have no impact on who becomes the next Chief Executive. So far we have a joke ‘candidate’ in the form of Justice Woo (whose support of the ‘small house’ policy suggests New Territories mafia interests are using him to pressure Beijing). Ex-Security Secretary Regina Ip is in the midst of an embarrassingly desperate last-ditch attempt to reach the pinnacle in her career. Financial Secretary John Tsang was left looking stupid after his not-talking-to-naughty-lawmakers episode last week, which looks like a classic Liaison Office-invented stitch-up.

Pro-Beijing elder statesman Tsang Yok-sing is openly admitting that Beijing will be stage-managing everything from now on – including which loyalist(s) get(s) on the ballot, and of course who wins.

It is hard to imagine that the Chinese Communist Party’s top leaders will pick incumbent CY Leung – but impossible to imagine that they won’t.

On which cheerful note, I declare the weekend open.

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17 Responses to HK to hold weird fake-election ritual

  1. Cassowary says:

    There’s “stage managing” and then there’s “shoving your hand up a dead animal’s bum and using it as a meat puppet”. What Jasper Tsang describes is definitely the latter.

  2. And so on and so forth…(BL passim).

    The Pilger film was anathema to you as you have never in over a decade in any blog entry criticised Britain or the U.S. and A. Nevertheless the film did have a nice quote to ponder.

    ” In America the parties change but the policies stay the same. In China the Party stays the same and the policies change all the time.”

    Hurrah!

  3. LRE says:

    You do have to wonder about the whole thing, really. So many unanswered and unanswerable questions all hanging over one event: Why does Beijing bother with the whole charade? Who do they honestly think is fooled by this most thinly veiled bullshit? Why would anyone bother going all the way to Kowloon Bay to vote? What could anyone possibly hope to learn by watching the vote count? Why would anyone want the job of Chief Exonerative in the first place? It makes less sense than a chocolate hat.

  4. Slartiebartfast says:

    I see CY’s been told he has reached the end of the line…….

  5. Knownot says:

    I have read the HKFP report of Tsang Yok-sing’s article, with the English translation of some of it. There may be a cultural gap between him and me, between Chinese and English, but I think this cultured gentleman is being subtly ironic.

    Any unauthorised candidate should be punished! Any election committee member who doesn’t support Leung Chun-ying is unpatriotic! “All candidates [for the committee] must sign a confirmation form promising to vote according to central government’s orders!” My unsubtle exclamation marks show how subtle he is being. It is mockery through ironic exaggeration.

    But one of the things about irony is that some people get it, some don’t, and you can never be sure who’s right.

  6. Stephen says:

    I did predict some time ago that CY Leung would be giving the “for the sake of my family” speech and so he has. Beijing has decided that he’s just to toxic.

    So nice guy John takes the helm but will anything of substance change ? I think we saw the answer at Legco earlier this week.

  7. LRE says:

    Ooo unexpected extra bonus start to the weekend: CY has been told not to run — which I suppose means that we are soon be run by a Stalinist Kleptocra (the current government without CY).

  8. Knownot says:

    Blunt and grim
    Trailing clouds of strife
    CY seeks a quiet life.

    Dropping him
    The masters have decreed
    He isn’t now the man they need.

    But we know how
    He was undermined.
    They were in control behind.

    We’re waiting now
    With pity, doubt, and malice.
    Who will take the poisoned chalice?

  9. Joe Blow says:

    NO more 689 also means -fingers crossed- no more Rimsky Yuen, Paul Chan Mo-po ( no-mo), Lau Kong-wah or that traitor whore Christine Loh.

    What a lovely Christmas present !

    *you can almost hear the tapping on keyboards doing the updating of CVs in Tamar*

  10. LRE says:

    A little sympathy for the Devil in drunken retrospect:

    Nobody heard him, the dead man,
    But still he lay moaning:
    I was much further out than you thought
    And not waving but drowning.

    Poor chap, he always loved larking
    And now he’s dead
    It must have been too cold for him his heart gave way,
    They said.

    Oh, no no no, it was too cold always
    (Still the dead one lay moaning)
    I was much too far out all my life
    And not waving but drowning.

  11. Chinese Netizen says:

    Be careful what you hope for. You just might get it.

  12. HillnotPeak says:

    Akers-Jones, where is the other token gweilo, the German-Canadian-Chinese and still not a member of the Exco, Seman? Still dressing up for some awful party, I guess.

  13. PD says:

    So every CE to date has failed miserably: one must conclude that HK is ungovernable. Zhong-nan-hai will take away the toilet bucket and irregular water drip, tighten the screws one turn and display vials of smoking acid. And most locals will run away, their tails between their legs.

    CY has at least struggled through to date. I can’t see anyone else lasting half that long.

  14. Mary Melville says:

    Good news is we tax payers will be relieved of the $3m++ per annum being pocketed by Andrew Fung, the CE’s media man. In comparison the Youngspiration duo were a bargain.
    Talking of, why anyway are Legco members given so much dosh to furnish their offices? Surely its time to pull the rug on that one, standard fittings in all the offices to be passed on to the next incumbent, with perhaps a few thousand for a comfy sofa for those marathon sessions should be the way forward.

  15. Joe Blow says:

    I hope Mr. Peh of the ICAC -now Hong Kong’s least appreciated uniformed service- will also announce his resignation fairly soon, if necessary with a little push in his spineless back.

  16. Chinese Netizen says:

    HK is not ungovernable…it’s just that anyone worth their weight and might actually have some “grassroots cred” will NEVER even be given a sliver of hope to run.

    Gotta maintain that myth of HK having the freest economy in Asia and being the most business friendly. For the entrenched local oligarchs and money smuggling, CCP connected mainlanders, that is.

  17. JD says:

    They’ve been spelling it “Kowloonbay” since they renamed the place from HITEC to KITEC. See https://www.kitec.com.hk

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