Kenneth Lau
Tuesday, August 26, 2014
A Macau activist says a government decision to shut down an unofficial referendum on the grounds that it violated the personal data ordinance was an obvious act to suppress and violate human rights in the territory.
The former president of the New Macau Association Jason Chou Teng- hui said citizens had every right to collect personal data.
Chou said government use of the ordinance was illegal and that it was abusing its authority.
He plans to lodge an appeal against the government order.
A Hong Kong-based analyst agreed with Chou and said the closure of the unofficial polling booths adversely affected the image of Macau.
However, another analyst said the law in Macau prohibits pre-election popularity polls and the government was merely enforcing this order.
The public prosecutor decided at the weekend to investigate Chou, the organizer of Macau's unofficial referendum, on the grounds that he violated the personal data protection ordinance and for ignoring a warning from the government.
He and four other activists were arrested and the polling booths closed. They were released on Sunday night.
Chou said yesterday the booths would remain closed but his group will continue to conduct street promotions and the online voting will continue until Saturday.
Up to last night, 5,779 people had voted online on two questions about possible universal suffrage in the 2019 chief executive election.
Another organizer, Sulu Sou Ka-hou, the New Macau Association president, said they had collected voters' personal data to prevent repeat voting and to ensure accuracy of the poll.
The association would not delete the voters' personal data because it was equivalent to deleting public opinion and would be an insult to the voters.
Sou also revealed that the internet security company it hired had detected seven attacks from the mainland.
A spokesman for the Macau government said the legal system does not give citizens the right to to launch a "civil referendum." He said since the organizers did not stop collecting personal data after the warning from the government, the matter was turned over to the Judiciary.
The referendum was launched on Sunday by the Commission on Civil Referendum, which is an alliance formed by three concern groups Macau Conscience, Open Macau Society and Macao Youth Dynamics.
Political analyst Ivan Choy Chi- keung said the action will give people the impression that the government is suppressing free thought, which could be hugely damaging to Macau.
But Sonny Lo Shiu-hing, head of the Hong Kong Institute of Education's department of social sciences, disagreed as Macau laws prohibit anyone from disclosing the result of a public poll before the chief executive election day.
He believes the Macau democrats are testing the bottom line of the government.
http://www.thestandard.com.hk/news_detail.asp?pp_cat=11&art_id=148784&sid=42868056&con_type=1
