NPC Standing Committee’s Decision on the pace of Universal Suffrage in Hong Kong and the Way Forward

Mrs Anson Chan, Member of the Legislative Council, was the Foundation's guest speaker on 10 March 2008. Below is the text of her speech.

Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen. Last year when I decided to enter the electoral fray, I was not sure I knew what I was letting myself in for. But that's a topic that we can tackle another day if you wish. Thank you for the opportunity to speak with you today. It's always a pleasure to meet with friends of the Hong Kong Democratic Foundation and to have the opportunity to acknowledge the important contribution that the Foundation makes to the promotion of democracy and democratic values in Hong Kong.

My topic today is: the way forward in the light of the NPC Standing Committee's decision on the pace of universal suffrage in Hong Kong. Life is full of surprises but I think it also has its share of what I would describe, for want of a better word, as "non-surprises". I suppose the first non-surprise is the fact that I wasn't appointed to the Task Force set up under the Strategic Development Commission to consider how to move from where we are to achieving universal suffrage for the Chief Executive election in 2017 and election of members of the Legislature in 2020.

The second non-surprise is the fact that of the thirty members of the Task Force, only six are from the pan-democratic camp. The rest are what you could loosely describe as on the government side including I might add my opponent who was defeated in the by-election last year.

Let me first examine the NPC decision that was made on the 29th of December last year.

The encouraging and positive thing about that decision is the fact that at long last the SAR government and the Central government acknowledge that they cannot go on postponing indefinitely moving forward on universal suffrage. Therefore in order to balance the inevitable disappointment that we are not going to have universal suffrage in 2012, we have what is ostensibly a definite timetable, which is that Hong Kong people may have popular election of the CE in the year 2017 and may in the light of that have popular election of all 60 members of the legislature in the year 2020. But I don't think any of us should be under the illusion that those two dates are firm and already in our pockets because they are not. I personally think there's a long haul ahead.

If we look at this decision, I think there several conclusions and from that perhaps we can discuss what our priorities should be in the months and years ahead. Before I come to that, I draw your attention to what the government has said about moving forward. Everything that Mr Stephen Lam, the Constitutional Development Policy Secretary, has said suggests to me that the government is not going to make good on the CE's election promise that he would at long last bring about a final solution to the question of universal suffrage in his remaining five-year term. He is now making perhaps predictable noises that he is only concerned about what's going to happen in 2012 on the ground that he cannot possibly commit his successor to what might or might not happen after he steps down.

Mr Stephen Lam has made it clear that at the earliest there will not be a consultative document - presumably one hopes setting out options on the way forward - until the autumn of this year and possibly a bit later. He then went on to add that we have the next four years to discuss how we are going to move forward to achieving a package of proposals in 2012 which would pave the way for real democracy in 2017 and 2020 and not what I would describe as "managed democracy". So the government shows every inclination of playing this thing very very long.

Priorities for Task Force

What are the priorities for the Task Force? I don't know what the Task Force intends to do except this. It looks as if between now and June, the Task Force will only have 3 meetings. The members of the Task Force I understand have been told that one meeting will be devoted to threshing out possible options on election of the CE in 2012 and two meetings will be devoted to talking about functional constituencies and how one moves forward towards popular election of all 60 members of the Legislature. That hardly gives sufficient time to flash out what the principles should be much less the details of how one would move forward between now and the years 2012, 2016, 2017 and 2020. Exactly how the Task Force will proceed I don't know. So I can only say to you what I think the priorities should be.

The first priority is we have to discuss and agree a clear definition of universal suffrage. Everything that I have heard so far I does not fill me with a great deal of optimism that there is agreement about what one means by universal suffrage. But from my point of view and I hope you share this point of view, there really can only be one definition of universal suffrage and that is the definition that is enshrined in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which is "fair and equal", meaning the vote of one person must be the same as that of the other person. Every person has the right to stand for election and to be elected. This is the internationally accepted definition of universal suffrage. So that is the first thing we must do: agree a definition of universal suffrage.

The second priority I think is that we must somehow get agreement that the functional constituencies as they are constituted are inconsistent with the internationally accepted definition of universal suffrage and therefore must be phased out. So the question really is not whether functional constituencies should continue to exist but when and how they should be phased out. From this point of view, it is encouraging at least that even the leader of the Liberal Party, Mr James Tien, has conceded that functional constituencies should go. There seems to be a view emerging now that one should seriously consider phasing out functional constituencies. Whether that will actually be laid on the table and agreed, I don't know. So I think even on that score we are going to have a long debate ahead.

The third priority I think is that we must somehow widen the electorates, that is, the representativeness of functional constituencies. There seems to be two ways. The first way is to change the definition of corporate voting. Corporate voting at the moment gives a vote to a company not to individuals, which means that if somebody owns several companies, that person can actually manipulate and control several votes against the fact that some people have no vote. Some people have two votes or three votes and some people can have even more than three votes. As I have earlier in my core group report proposed, we should change the definition of corporate voting so that we give the vote at least to all members of the executive board, the management board or committee, etc. That would in one step widen the electorate from the current 200,000 to slightly over 400,000. So that's doubling the electorate size. That's something we should aim for.

The second way we can make functional constituencies more representative is, as I have also proposed in my core group report, to regroup the functional constituencies. At the moment we have 28. What I proposed is that we should consider possible combinations of regroupings so that you have a smaller number of groups and in this way widen the electorates and make them more representative. If we reach agreement on the package, I think it is important that it receives the approval and the support of all political parties in the legislature. Whatever we discuss and agree for 2012 must be in the context of a very clear roadmap for action in 2017 and 2020.

Let me explain why this is important. Some of you would recollect that the package that the government put forward in 2005 (which was in the event defeated because it failed to get 2/3 of LegCo's approval) essentially would have increased the number of functional constituencies whilst at the same time increasing the number of directly-elected seats. In my view if we have had a clear roadmap for what will happen in 2017 and 2020, it is possible and perhaps pragmatic to agree a package of proposals for 2012 that increases the number of functional constituencies. Why? Because you know that from 2020 at the latest all the functional constituencies would disappear. But if you do not indicate what the end game is, in other words, if we are kept in the dark about what will happen in 2017 and in 2020, it is actually very difficult to agree a set of proposals for 2012 which is inconsistent with the definition of "universal suffrage". So I think it is important for us to continue to press the government for a clear roadmap.

Fourthly, I think we must get the government to agree to abolish all appointed District Council seats. At present there are 102 appointed District Council seats. We already know that in the last district council election, the pan democrats suffered a huge defeat (worse than most of us predicted). If the government really wanted to encourage diverse views, it should use its power to appoint district council seats to include at least some pan democrats. But if you notice, there wasn't a single pan democrat. So the appointed seats help to consolidate the power of the pro-government parties. This is not a healthy development. We must try and aim for the abolition of all appointed district council seats.

As regards election of the Chief Executive, following my proposals on widening the representativeness and the electorate of the functional constituencies, I suggest that the same should apply to the four sub-sectors in the election committee for the Chief Executive. In this way, you widen the competition and therefore the representativeness.

At the moment the public doesn't understand what the real issues involved are. And the government doesn't seem inclined to enlighten the public on the essential ingredients of a package of proposals that would help us achieve genuine democracy. We are currently being steered forwards "managed democracy". What do I mean by that? We will not see genuine democracy until the government is comfortable that the DAB is in control, that whichever candidates are put forward for the CE will be candidates that Central government would accept, and that the DAB can more or less control the Legislative Council. That is what I call "managed democracy". So we must be aware of this risk and do what we can to prevent that. There would have to be more voices in the public domain who will speak out on the issues involved, and who will continue to fight for true democracy. Otherwise we will not get it in 2017 or 2020.

What needs to be done

One of the points that I've been trying to make for many months ever since I set up my core group is to underline the fact that universal suffrage - one man one vote - giving the vote to the people is the best way of ensuring good government, ensuring we have an open, accountable, transparent government that is truly responsive to community needs. It's not going to be easy to establish this link in the minds of the ordinary men in the street - particularly in the current circumstances when the economy is going strong and people are still feeling good and think on the whole this government is performing reasonably well. People don't make the connection between universal suffrage, popular votes and good governance. What we have now is a system where power is concentrated in the hands of the Chief Executive, with the ability to single handedly pick some 30 of the top posts within the Hong Kong government through the political appointment system. That is not a sustainable long-term model in terms of ensuring stability, check and balance and good governance.

We also need to make this government recognize that political parties have a role to play. If they are property nurtured, properly supported financially and adequately resourced, I think political parties can develop in a mature responsible way. We need to encourage better quality people to participate in the political process. At the moment political parties have no future. They can never aspire to be the ruling party and participate actively in formulating government policies.

For many months I have it very clear that I am adamantly opposed to the political appointment system and the enlargement of this system by giving the CE further powers to hand-pick deputy secretaries and political aides. I was very surprised that Mrs Regina Ip, writing in the South China Morning Post (I think about a week ago,) actually agreed with me. She said something to the effect that what could result is that "greenhorns", (referring to junior ministers,) would be looking over the shoulders and breathing down the necks of very experienced and seasoned civil servants and creating in that process a feeling of grievance and injustice. Well I just wish that Mrs Regina Ip had spoken up much more forcefully at the time when the government was seeking the necessary funds from the Finance Committee of the Legislative Council.

It's going to be very difficult to reverse this political appointment system. I hesitate to suggest a means of oversight because I am not sure whether that is the best way forward. But if we want to provide a check and balance against power, perhaps we should consider a model along the lines of the American system whereby nominees for top posts within the government actually have to seek the endorsement of Congress. Here, that would be the Legislative Council.

The way forward

To summarise, I suggest the following steps forward:

• Hold on fast to our principle of genuine democracy not "managed democracy".

• Continue to work very hard both within the Task Force (through hopefully the pan democrats representatives and outside) and outside the task force to secure a clear roadmap.

• Press for greater recognition of the role of political parties and greater support for political parties both by the government and by the private sector.

• Resist the ever-increasing consolidation of political power in the CE's office.

• Stimulate greater public debate of the issues and options involved.

It is with a view to this wider public debate that I agreed to speak to you today. I am discussing with the ProCommons group the setting up of what I would call Citizens' Strategic Development Committee to complement the government's efforts in stimulating further debate and consensus. We can do so through the internet, seminars, debates and meetings with groups. I am in no doubt myself that the government will not be carrying out a genuine consultation on the possible options. As with the green paper exercise, the government will go through the motions of seeking public consultation, whilst all the time working on its own model which it will disclose when the time is ripe. So we need greater public debate. The more voices there are within the community, the better chance we have of securing a set of proposals that would genuinely achieve universal suffrage in the year 2017 and 2020.

The above does not necessarily represent the views of the Foundation.
Reproduction of the article requires written permission from the author.

 by Anson Chan Fang On-sang