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JULY 21, 2000 VOL. 26 NO. 28 | SEARCH ASIAWEEK Election Selection Taking an unusually proprietorial attitude By TODD CROWELL and YULANDA CHUNG Hong Kong Billionaire Li Ka-shing is usually considered a behind-the-scenes kind of operator. But last week his picture was plastered all over the newspapers voting in a ballot for a special Hong Kong political body called the Election Committee (EC). Not only did Li senior win a seat, but so did his two sons Victor and Richard as well as several other executives associated with his companies. The results of the vote gave the Li family and close allies a "bloc" of 11 votes on the 800-member committee. Many of Hong Kong's other property tycoons decided it was their civic duty to serve too. Peter Woo Kwong-ching, who opposed Tung Chee-hwa in running for chief executive before the handover -- a selection made by the then-constituted EC -- did not stand, but he will have some friends on the committee if he wants to try again. His company group secured seven seats. Other owners of major Hong Kong property empires -- such as Hang Lung boss Ronnie Chan Chi-chung, Henderson Land's Lee Shau-kee and Thomas Kwok Ping-kwong of Sun Hung Kai -- also won. The voting was a necessary preliminary to the September polls for the local Legislative Council (Legco). Those elected July 9 will choose six of its 60 members (24 are directly elected and 30 chosen more or less by the same people who voted last week). More important, these same 800 electors will probably pick Hong Kong's next chief executive in 2002. Incumbent Tung has not publicly declared his intentions, but he is widely expected to run for a second five-year term. Indeed, in late June, Chinese President Jiang Zemin told a visiting group of Hong Kong movers and shakers in Beijing that "I hope the business community will back Tung Chee-hwa's administration" -- in effect an endorsement of a second term for him. Voting for the EC was by professional and industrial sectors. Thus Li got his 323 votes from the Real Estate and Construction sector. Much attention has been given the prominence of property tycoons on the EC. This is natural considering the criticism leveled against Tung as beholden to them. But the committee also has numerous members from sectors unhappy with government policies. They might give Tung a difficult time come re-election. And enough pro-democracy candidates were chosen to form their own voting bloc of about 100, sufficient to influence the selection of perhaps one Legco member and to nominate a candidate for chief executive. Some people argue that the committee elected last week is not the same one that will pick the next chief. Lau Siu-kai of the Chinese University speculates that confusion over its true function may have been the reason for the poor voter turnout: "It was so low that it won't give the leader any legitimacy." On the other hand, there is no reason to think that another election would throw up a different cast of characters. Whatever the composition of the EC, Tung cannot count on coasting to a second term unless he can arrest his falling approval numbers. Write to Asiaweek at mail@web.asiaweek.com
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