Elderly community centres have used government subsidies to bus seniors to polling stations to help them cast their votes in Hong Kong’s “patriots-only” District Council elections, adding an official edge to a practice that has attracted controversy in previous election years.
On Sunday morning, about an hour after the ballots in the opposition-free race opened at 8.30 am, Lok Sin Tong Wan Lap Keung Neighbourhood Elderly Centre in Tsuen Wan sent 20 to 30 seniors to a polling station at Tsuen Wan Chiu Chow Public School.
The centre was among more than 190 elderly centres which had applied for a one-off government subsidy of HK$20,000 to provide special services to facilitate senior voters to cast their ballots on the election day.
Volunteers helped elderly voters get off the two 16-seat buses decorated with District Council election posters and check signs mimicking the tick electors would put on their ballot paper. They accompanied the elderly into the polling centre.
Mr Yu, one of the seniors who took the centre’s bus to the polling station, told HKFP after casting his ballot that the election day atmosphere was very “lively and vibrant.”
Yu said he had signed up to take the bus arranged by the centre because it was more convenient.
“The bus ride was very quick. We arrived at the polling station within minutes,” he said.
Travelling with the elderly voters on the bus was Secretary for Labour and Welfare Chris Sun, who said that the government had received subsidy applications from more than 90 per cent of elderly centres across the city.
Asked how did the government would ensure no campaigning activities would take place when the elderly voters were bussed to polling stations, the minster said the Social Welfare Department had issued clear guidelines to participating centres to remind them to “remain neutral.”
“The only thing they could do was to make it more convenient for seniors to vote. They must not affect the elderly citizens’ voting tendency,” he said.
Sun added the government would review the result of the one-off arrangement and decide whether to continue to offer such subsidies in the future.
In previous elections, local media have reported on controversial efforts to bus elderly residents to polling stations, alleging that they were instructed who to vote for.
As of 12.30pm, turnout stood at 11.6 per cent.
When Hong Kong’s government in May announced restrictive new arrangements for a “patriots-only” District Council election, officials played down the importance of voter turnout – saying it would not reflect the credibility of the vote – but in recent weeks there has been a concentrated effort to encourage Hongkongers to cast their ballots.
Earlier on Sunday, members of pro-democracy party the League of Social Democrats, were taken to a police station in Central after being intercepted by officers on their way to protest against the opposition-free race.
First ‘patriots-only’ District Council race
Plans to overhaul the District Council elections were unveiled in May 2023 to ensure only “patriots” were elected, following a pro-democracy landslide at the last polls in 2019.
The number of seats chosen democratically by the public were slashed from 452 to 88 – reducing the power of public votes to a fifth. The rest are to be chosen by the city’s leader and government-appointed committees.
Constituency boundaries were redrawn, the opposition were shut out, voting hours were slashed by an hour, and each local council is to be chaired by a government official, similar to colonial-era arrangements. All candidates undergo national security vetting to ensure patriotism.
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