Alice Wu

Opinion | Passing district council reforms brings down curtain on Hong Kong’s years of political drama

This political detox should be enough for the powers that be to feel more secure about the new electoral system: mechanisms are in place to ensure that this city’s public office holders on all levels are certified patriots

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A banner showing Kowloon City district councillor Starry Lee Wai-king, also the chair of the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong, is seen in To Kwa Wan on July 6. The Legislative Council voted unanimously on July 6 to cut the number of elected seats in district councils, a move meant to prevent opposition figures from repeating their landslide win in 2019. Photo: AFP

Alice Wu

Published: 8:15am, 10 Jul 2023

The District Councils (Amendment) Bill 2023 is set to be gazetted on July 10, bringing down the curtain on the meticulously orchestrated political system overhaul meant to bring the city’s electoral system in line with Beijing’s “patriots administering Hong Kong” governance principle.

In response to the social unrest that brought the city to a standstill in 2019, Beijing put its foot down starting in June 2020. It began with the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress passing the Hong Kong national security law.

Soon after, the NPC initiated amendments to the city’s electoral rules in selecting the chief executive and electing the Legislative Council. Although there was no mention of the revamping of district councils, it was the stripping of the district council seats in both the Election Committee and the Legislative Council that made it obvious the omission was intentional and the district councils will be politically ostracised.

District councillors were required to take oaths swearing allegiance to the government or be banned, and government figures put the brunt of the blame for the political turmoil and social unrest on district councils. It was an electoral deficiency that Beijing felt the need to step in and fix as it saw foreign interference and external forces taking hold of district-level politics and electing people to positions in the legislative and district councils to openly challenge the legitimacy of “one country, two systems”.

The response of the State Council’s Hong Kong and Macau Office to the unanimous passing of the District Councils (Amendment) Bill 2023 last Thursday reaffirmed this stance.

It said anti-China factions “made use of the loopholes in the system to enter district councils during the 2019 social unrest which severely disrupted the government’s work, challenged the bottom line of the ‘one country, two systems’ principle as well as threatened national security and Hong Kong’s stability.”