Legco elections: Benny Tai’s ‘35-plus’ strategy will take Hong Kong nowhere

The weekend primary election was part of his plan to coordinate the pan-democratic camp to maximise votes in the September poll
The aim is to win a simple majority in Legco, but the threat to weaponise this advantage is overstated. Playing a game of chicken with Beijing has never worked

Alice Wu

Published: 9:00am, 13 Jul 2020

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The nomination of candidates to run in the upcoming Legislative Council elections begins at the end of the week. Many people, from across political lines, expect the results of the September poll to be a game changer for Hong Kong – so much so that the pan-democratic primaries held over the past two days became not only the focus of political junkies, but also that of Erick Tsang Kwok-wai, the new secretary for constitutional and mainland affairs who has been in the job for less than three months.

Holding primary elections is the idea of co-founder of the Occupy Central movement, law professor Benny Tai Yiu-ting, who also co-organised the weekend event. It’s part of Tai’s “35-plus” campaign to win a majority in Legco.

Ahead of the primaries, Tsang warned that the “candidates” could be in breach of the new national security law as well as the city’s election laws.

Surely, winning a majority in the legislature constitutes no crime and, to be fair, Tsang didn’t say it would. What he did do was warn that pledging to vote down the government’s budget and paralyse the government may land primary candidates in trouble.

University of Hong Kong associate law professor Benny Tai Yiu-ting speaks to the media on June 9 about his plan to hold primary elections for the pro-democracy camp. Photo: Nora Tam

Why would Tai want to take a stab at coordinating the pan-democratic camp? Historically, pan-democrats have not been very good at working together in delivering the greatest good. The camp’s infighting, which was most destructive during “Mad Dog” Wong Yuk-man’s heyday in the legislature, resulted in unnecessary electoral losses.

Wong eventually suffered a humiliating defeat in 2016, losing his Legco seat as an incumbent to a novice, becoming a victim of his own narrow-minded and uncompromising politics.

But the seeds of disunity in the camp continued to grow beyond Wong’s exit from electoral politics and ultimately resulted in unexpected setbacks in the 2018 by-elections to fill vacancies left by pan-democratic lawmakers disqualified over improper oaths.

Tai’s “35-plus” plan is to capitalise on the votes that delivered the biggest victory of the pan-democratic camp in Hong Kong history last November, in the midst of an anti-government protest movement sparked by opposition to a proposed extradition law. The victory gave pan-democrats control of 17 of Hong Kong’s 18 district councils, obliterating the pro-establishment.

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Hong Kong’s pro-Beijing camp reeling after crushing defeat in district council elections

Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor admitted her part in bringing about her allies’ crushing defeat. The loss, she said, “has a direct relationship with the government”, acknowledging people’s “dissatisfaction with the government”. The opposition hopes to ride to victory again on the back of this public dissatisfaction.

It won’t be easy. The pan-democrats have no stronghold in the functional constituencies. And since the seats for geographical constituencies and the so-called “super seats” – five seats for district council representation in the functional constituency – are returned by proportional representation, the chance for a landslide victory come September is slim.

Further, the threat to vote down the budget, thereby forcing the chief executive to first disband the legislature to form a new one, then resign if the bill is still not passed by a new Legco, is not as simple as it sounds. Voting down a budget in the wake of the ravages of Covid-19 would be unwise.

Tai’s modus operandi so far has been to make threats in the hope he could scare Beijing into making concessions favourable to his cause. He did this with Occupy. His game of chicken took Hong Kong to the fateful day of August 31, 2014 when the National People’s Congress Standing Committee adopted a decision on Hong Kong’s electoral framework that has stunted our political development since. Neither Tai’s attempt to force Beijing’s hand nor his control over the movement turned out the way he had envisioned.

Tai’s strategy did not work then, and it’s not likely to work now. Playing a game of chicken with Beijing with the threat to veto the budget and cripple the government probably won’t end well for Tai.

Alice Wu is a political consultant and a former associate director of the Asia Pacific Media Network at UCLA

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