Hog Kong leader Carrie Lam has announced that the Sepetember 6 election for the city’s legislature would be postponed for a year, sayihng it it necessary amid the surge in covid-19 cases. The opposition has accused the government of using pandemic as an opportunity to stop people from voting.
Opposition was in the favour of elections as they hoped to obtain lead over the pro-democracy in September’s polls, capitalizing the rage over new security law enforced by China in Hong Kong that has attracted criticism from the likes of the US and UK.
The decision to delay the vote came after the government banned 12 pro-democracy candidates from running in the elections. This has led people to suspect whether the pandemic was the real reason of the postponement.
“Obviously the Chinese Communist Party is using Covid-19 as a cover up to stop Hong Kongers from voting against the governments and democrats’ potential majority win,” Avery Ng, secretary-general of the League of Social Democrats said.
On Friday, Chief Executive Carrie Lam said she would invoke emergency powers to postpone the elections, calling it the “most difficult decision I’ve made over the past seven months.”
“We have 3 million voters going out in one day across Hong Kong, such flow of people would cause high risk of infection,” Lam added. “This postponement is entirely made based on public safety reasons, there were no political considerations,” she said.
On 1 July 1997 sovereignty over the British colony of Hong Kong was formally transferred to China. Pro-democracy candidates had made a major unprecedented win in last year’s district council elections, winning 17 out of 18 councils.
Hong Kong is currently experiencing a spike in covid-19 infections and the city reported 121 fresh cases on Friday.
