Hong Kong local elections, 2007

Hong Kong local elections, 2007

18 November 2007

All Elected Constituencies 405 (of the 534) seats in all 18 Districts Councils Turnout 38.83% 5.27pp   First party Second party Third party   Leader Tam Yiu-chung Albert Ho Lau Kong-wah Party DAB Democratic Civil Force Alliance Pro-Beijing Pan-democracy Pro-Beijing Last election 62 seats, 22.94% 95 seats, 21.27% 17 seats, 2.45% Seats won 115 59 18 Seat change 38 14 1 Popular vote 292,916 175,054 30,880 Percentage 25.73% 15.38% 2.71% Swing 2.79pp 5.90pp 0.26pp   Fourth party Fifth party Sixth party   Leader Frederick Fung James Tien Audrey Eu Party ADPL Liberal Civic Alliance Pan-democracy Pro-Beijing Pan-democracy Last election 25 seats, 5.07% 14 seats, 2.77% new party Seats won 17 14 8 Seat change 8 4 1 Popular vote 52,386 50,026 48,837 Percentage 4.60% 4.39% 4.29% Swing 0.46pp 1.63pp N/A

Map of the winning party by constituency

The 2007 Hong Kong District Council elections were held on 18 November 2007. Elections were held to all 18 districts of Hong Kong, returned 405 members from directly elected constituencies out of total 534 councils member. A total number of 886 candidates contesting in 364 seats, while 41 seats were uncontested. A total number of 1.4 million voters cast their ballots, consisting 38% of the electorate, significantly lower than the last elections in 2003. The pro-Beijing flagship party Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong (DAB) received the largest victory in its history, rebounding their loss from the 2003 with extra gain. The pan-democrats suffered a devastating loss.

Contesting parties

Parties

In September 2007, the pan-democrats announced their plan to field 289 candidates in the election, including 138 incumbents and 136 newcomers after a process of coordination initiated by the Power for Democracy under the banner of Democratic Coalition for DC Election. After the coordination, the number constituencies with more than one pro-democratic candidates reduced from 30 to 7. The pan-democrats demanded universal suffrage and abolition of the appointed seat in the District Councils as the election platform.^[1]

The Democratic Party, the flagship pro-democratic party fielded 114 candidates, Civic Party 41, Hong Kong Association for Democracy and People's Livelihood (ADPL) 38, League of Social Democrats 28, The Frontier 15, as well as Democratic Alliance, Civic Act-up, Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions (CTU), Neighbourhood and Worker's Service Centre (NWSC) and the others.^[1]

The Civic Party, derived from the Article 45 Concern Group established after the 2003 July 1 protests was a relatively new party without much resources and district network with only 7 incumbent district councillors. The party fielded around 42 candidates in constituencies where the pan-democrats had not contested with its new image to appeal to the voters. Another new founded League of Social Democrats fielded about 30 candidates in lower-income areas such as Wong Tai Sin, Kwun Tong and Tsuen Wan, seeking to appeal to the lower class voters.^[2]

The thinktank Savantas Policy Institute set up by former Secretary for Security Regina Ip also fielded four candidates with independent affiliation in the election, including two retired civil servant and a former administrative officer.^[2]

Candidates

A historic record of 917 nominations were received since the handover of Hong Kong. 39 of the 405 seats received only one nomination thus were returned uncontestedly, of which 12 of them were taken by the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong (DAB), 2 by Liberal Party and 1 by the Democratic Party.

Cyd Ho, the incumbent district councillor who beat DAB's Ip Kwok-him in his own constituency Kwun Lung in 2003, did not seek for re-election. Ip faced challenged by activist Ho Loy. Two Civic Party rising stars, barrister Tanya Chan and Tsang Kwok-fung challenged incumbent Peak district councillor Lam Man-kit of the Liberal Party and DAB legislator Li Kwok-ying in Tai Po Market. Priscilla Leung, a pro-Beijing assistant professor of law at the City University of Hong Kong also ran in the election, challenging Democrat Chan Ka-wai in Whampoa East.^[3]

Pre-election events

On 15 November, two days before the election, Ko Keung-wah, a village representative of Shung Ching San Tsuen in Yuen Long and an assistant to the Liberal Party candidate Philip Wong Pak-yan in Shap Pat Heung North and Lam Tim-fook in Shap Pat Heung South, was attacked. Ko got a finger on his right hand was chopped off and suffered at least four deep slice wounds to his back and one to his abdomen. Anti-triad officers said the attack might be linked with the election.^[4] On the election day, a triad member was spotted campaigning for an independent candidate in Shap Pat Heung North influential rural leader Leung Fuk-yuen.^[5]

Results

Note 1: The total seats of the District Councils are 534 including 27 ex-officio members (Rural Committee Chairmen in the New Territories), and 102 members appointed members by the Chief Executive of Hong Kong.
Note 2: Candidates ran under both DAB and FTU banners were all counted as DAB in this chart.

Results by district

Vote summary

Votes, of total, by camp

  Pro-Beijing (53.98%)

  Pan-democrats (39.15%)

  Other (6.87%)

Seats, of total, by camp

  Pro-Beijing (67.41%)

  Pan-democrats (31.36%)

  Other (1.23%)

Seat summary

Overview

Without a major political issue like the last election in 2003, the voter turnout significantly dropped about six percentage point to only about 38%, although a total of 1.4 million voters cast their ballots, 80,000 more than the last elections. A total number of 886 candidates contesting in 364 seats, while 41 seats were without contest.^[6]

The Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong (DAB) received the largest victory in its history by winning 115 seats, nearly double than the 2003 results. The party vice-chairman Ip Kwok-him who lost to Cyd Ho in 2003 in his Kwun Lung constituency retook his seat by large margin.^[6] Kenny Lee Kwun-yee received a large number of votes in Tai Fat Hau, defeating pro-democratic candidate Ivy Chan Siu-ping of the Civic Act-up. Incumbent legislators Choy So-yuk, Li Kwok-ying and Wong Yung-kan all retained their seats in Kam Ping, Tai Po Market and Po Nga respectively.^[6]

The pan-democrats suffered a devastating defeat in the election. The Democratic Party was beaten in every region especially in Kowloon, losing almost half of the seats as compared to the 2003 elections. Veteran Chan Ka-wai in Whampoa East was ousted by Priscilla Leung, a pro-Beijing law scholar at the City University of Hong Kong backed by the Hong Kong Federation of Trade Unions (FTU). In Sheung Shun, incumbent Law Chun-ngai was defeated by Fu Pik-chun of the DAB by 1,220 votes. Former Democratic Party secretary Cheung Yin-tung also lost his seat in Wang King to DAB newcomer Yiu Kwok-wai by 1,321 to 1,684 votes.^[6]

The Civic Party failed to challenge the pro-Beijing candidates, winning only 8 seats out of 41 candidates. The party's rising star Yu Kwun-wai lost in a large margin to DAB's Bernard Chan in Ping Shek, while Civic legislator Mandy Tam lost her seat to Choi Luk-sing in Lung Sing.^[6] The Hong Kong Association for Democracy and People's Livelihood (ADPL) who had stronghold in Sham Shui Po also saw its candidate Leung Kam-tao lost his seat in Yau Yat Tsuen to pro-Beijing independent Jimmy Kwok Chun-wah. Richard Tsoi of the Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions (CTU) who took the seat in Fo Tan in 2003 failed to retain his seat, being beaten by Scarlet Pong Oi-lan of the New Century Forum.^[6]

Aftermath

In December 2007, Chief Executive Donald Tsang named 102 government-appointed Council members, of which all of them had pro-government background and one-fifth of them were members of the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong (DAB) and the Liberal Party. 15 of them were appointed for the third time.^[7] Tsang was criticised for not appointing a single member of the pan-democrats.^[8]

Footnotes

Elections and referendums in Hong Kong
Chief Executive elections	1996 2002 2005 2007 2012 2017
Election Committee elections	1998 2000 2002 2005 2006 2011 2016
Legislative elections	1985 1988 1991 1995 1996 1998 2000 2004 2008 2012 2016 2020 By-elections
Sanitary Board and municipal elections	1888 1891 1894 1899 1901 1903 1906 1909 1912 1914 1915 1916 1917 1919 1920 1922 1923 1924 1926 1927 1929 1930 1932 (May) 1932 (Nov) 1933 1935 1936 1937 1939 1940 1952 1953 1954 1955 1956 1957 1959 1961 1963 1965 1967 1969 1971 1973 1975 1977 1979 1981 1983 1986 1989 1991 1995
District Council elections	1982 1985 1988 1991 1994 1999 2003 2007 2011 2015 2019
NPC elections	1997 2002 2008 2012
Referendums	1896