Last week the demonstrators not only demanded political reform but also CY Leung's head. They also had threatened to siege and occupy Government HQ (the building) if their demands were not met by midnight yesterday.
Making this demand is exactly the thing which won't make it happen. Yesterday, a news clips of CY Leung making the National Day (1 Oct) speech was broadcast by CNTV. Usually only no. 1 tier Central Government's officials (Politburo, people to the rank of Xi Jinping) have this privilege. And the police was moving in equipments - tear gas, rubber bullets -- into the Government HQ as preparation.
Luckily the student / demonstration leaders issue an open letter late last night that political reform is their own agenda without mentioning CY Leung. The Vice Chancellors of our two most important universities also visited the demonstrators urging for coolness and a peaceful demonstration.
At 11:30 pm local time, the CE and Chief Secretary had a press conference. The CE also has sort of "promised" if the demonstrators do not try to break the police cordon for the Government HQ or use force, no force will be used on them (not exact wordings). It is worth to point out that since Sunday the police has not threaten force or indeed only show their face when necessary in demonstration points anywhere in the city. They had tried to avoid conflict, which has been crucial to avoid further escalations.
I'm thankful to whoever behind the scenes who helped last night happen and avoid the point of no return. Everything is still on knife edge but at least we jumped over one, for now.
ICheers for this mate. I appreciate the non-partisan analysis.
May I ask though, what kind of progress do the proposed 2017 elections represent exactly, in real terms?
From what I understand, in 2012, Hong Kong residents also voted to elect a nominating committee/election committee, except the election committee simply nominated a single candidate who became the Chief Executive. The difference this time appears to be that the nominating committee now nominates 2-3 nominees, at which point China ticks off on one of them?
Or is it the case that not everyone actually got to vote to elect an election committee in 2012? If so, who got to vote in 2012? Wikipedia figures suggest the voter turn out (whoever those voters were) was very low in 2012, except for the sectors that were pro-Beijing?
From the first 1997 to the most recent 2012 election, the CE was both nominated and elected by the Election Committee, an electoral college.
The EC now has 1200 pax and they are not by elected by popular vote. The EC is made up of 4 sectors broadly in the categories of commerce / industry; professionals; welfare / sports / culture etc; & political. Under them are "sub-sectors" and those of the First, Second, and Third Sectors are more or less equivalent to functional constituencies (FC) (introduced by the British, I think in late 1980s) in the Legislative Council.
Subsectors / FC is a combination of individual and corporate votes., e.g. a registered accountant will be able to vote in his / her Accountancy subsector; while my boss can also vote as the corporate nominated representative by virtue of his company's membership in one of the major chambers of commerce which is a designated subsector. Each individual can at most register and vote in one subsector / FC. Still only a very small percentage of HK people is able to vote for the subsectors / FC, and some people, ie multiple company owners, can "control" many votes.
Now there have been no firm proposals on any details of the "reform" yet. BUT, the broad direction is that the EC will reduce to a nominating body to put forward candidates for universal suffrage in 2017 CE Election. 2017 universal suffrage is set out by the National People's Congress Standing Committee back in 2004. Hence on this point, there is NO issue.
Of course the EC and how nominations are formed became the main point of contention. Other than that the EC could be expanded into 1600 pax (as window dressing as it can be), there is little detail.
The demonstrators said -- ok, EC can put forward their nominations but there should be least one candidate put forward by completely "democratic procedures" - "nomination by referendum", ie the whole citizenship to vote for nominations.
Beijing said NO. There is no framework or legal basis of referendum in China or Hong Kong's Basic Law. The bottom lines is, which they said today, they will not accept the possibility of having a candidate whom they see as anti-Beijing.
What have been overlooked however are the discussion on the reform to the election of Legislative Council, which of course the FC is the major point of grievance.
Expansion of the electorate of the FC is on the table of discussion -- including to allow ALL voters not only to register in the Geographical Constituencies but in a FC of their own industry: "one person two votes". There are still issues, major ones include the corporate vote and vast difference in the size of each FC (or subsector) (unequal of weight of each vote).
Since the subsectors are virtually equivalent to FC, the electorate reform of the EC can go the same direction to the FC. Indeed reform in how the EC is formed is on has been much indicated by the Chief Secretary (the official heading the constitutional development consultation).
Several key points to be noted:
- The CE, after election, has to be appointed by the Central People's Government (CPG) : One Country Two Systems!
- All changes to the election method of the CE must be passed by 2/3 of the votes of the Legislative Council, then submitted by the CE to the CPG for approval.
- All changes to the election method of the Legislative Council must be passed by 2/3 of the votes of the Legislative Council, then submitted by the CE to the CPG for report.
EDIT:
BBC -- why did it deliberately not report that the "student / demonstrator leaders" DID NOT INCLUDE CY Leung's resignation in their open letter yesterday that also "demand" "urge" etc etc for a meeting with Carrie Lam, the Chief Secretary? Instead they just head the top line with CT Leung refused to step down in the press conference after this development? Or have I missed anything???
BBC said "The Hong Kong Federation of Students (HKFS) said it would have a public meeting with Ms Lam, but insisted that Mr Leung should step down, saying he had "lost his integrity"." The latter has not been reported in HK today.
Indeed after last night, amomgst the "players", only the pro-democracy LegCo members continue to openly insist an impeach and C Y Leung's resignation. But these LegCo members were not in the front end of the demonstration. It is the students and public volunteers on the street who has been driving the whole thing.
EDIT 2:
Jesus, what are the overseas media trying to do?
The original Chinese statement of the Students Union said: "梁振英失信於民,已無管治威信。" = C Y Leung has "lied" to the people and lost the authority and trust of the people to govern.
The Union DELIBERATELY stopped short of repeating their demand for CY Leung to step down which is the important basis of re-opening talks and lowering tensions.