NG KANG-CHUNGkc.ng@scmp.com
PUBLISHED : Saturday, 25 July, 2015, 3:45am
UPDATED : Saturday, 25 July, 2015, 3:45am
Anything more than seven Legco seats would be a bonus, admits Andrew Leung. Photo: K. Y. Cheng
The head of the second biggest political group in the Legislative Council has indicated it plans to adopt a defensive strategy for next year's Legco election - focusing resources on retaining its seven seats.
Andrew Leung Kwan-yuen, chairman of the pro-establishment Business and Professionals Alliance for Hong Kong, also admitted his group had been weak in district work, which had hit its popularity at grass-roots level.
The alliance has seven lawmakers and 21 representatives of district councils.
Six of the seven lawmakers are from trade-based functional constituencies. Only Priscilla Leung Mei-fun is directly elected. She is also a Kowloon City district councillor.
"The most important is to keep the seven seats in the legislature," said Leung, a lawmaker for the industrial functional constituency. "If we can get more seats, that would be a bonus. In the long term, we have to nurture more political talent among our young members."
The admission also came on the back of the alliance suffering a blow following a farcical walkout attempt during the Legco vote on the government's political reform plan last month. Two of the key men in the debacle - Lau Wong-fat, of the Heung Yee Kuk constituency, and Jeffrey Lam Kin-fung, a commercial functional constituency lawmaker - are both from the alliance. Lau is honorary chairman and Lam is vice-chairman.
Lam initiated the walkout in the hope of denying the chamber a quorum to buy time for Lau to get there to vote. The tactic backfired with the pro-establishment camp giving a shameful eight votes to the package, and Lam offering a public apology.
"Lam reportedly angered many business chambers, which had wanted their representative in the legislature to vote yes for the electoral reform plan," said Dr Chung Kim-wah, a political scientist at Polytechnic University. "While it is not possible at this stage to predict what will happen in next year's legislative election, it is generally believed that it will be a tough battle for the alliance to keep their seats."
We have to nurture more political talent among our young members
ANDREW LEUNG, ALLIANCE CHAIRMAN
But Leung argued they should not be held responsible.
"With the blunder or not, this would not have any impact on the end result. The reform plan could not get passed because it lacked the two-thirds majority required, with the pan-democrats' rejection," he said.
Lau, 79, stepped down as kuk chairman last month, citing poor health. His son, Kenneth Lau Ip-keung, took over as head of the powerful rural body. But it is still unclear if the elder Lau will seek another term in the legislature.
Leung said: "Of course, we hope we can keep the [Heung Yee Kuk] seat. Kenneth is also a member of the alliance. We would be pleased if he is going to take over his father's seat in the Legco. But it is the kuk's affair."
While he declined to go further into details of the alliance's plans, Leung said he would encourage its district councillors to run again in the November polls.
"A political group that is afraid of taking part in direct elections will have no future."
Leung and Lam quit the Liberal Party in 2008 amid an internal power struggle and formed Economic Synergy in 2009. Lau later joined them. Three years later, Economic Synergy evolved into the alliance.
The alliance commands more Legco votes than the Federation of Trade Unions and the Democratic Party, both of which have six lawmakers.
The other alliance legislators are vice-chairman Lo Wai-kwok of the engineering functional constituency, another vice-chairman Christopher Cheung Wah-fung of the financial services functional constituency, and Abraham Razack of the real estate and construction functional constituency.
http://m.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/1843587/hong-kong-pro-establishment-group-goes-defense-keep-its
