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HONG KONG: Pro-democracy members of the Hong Kong legislature will resign “en masse” if Beijing takes steps to disqualify four of them for violating the city’s Basic Law, the bloc said on Monday (Nov. 9).
The threat came before a meeting of one of China’s top legislative bodies, with Hong Kong media reporting that it was considering disqualifying four of the city’s lawmakers for violating their oaths by disrupting the chamber.
“(What) the central government is trying to do with the people’s representatives in Hong Kong is totally ridiculous,” Wu Chi-wai, head of the Democratic Party, said at a press conference announcing the decision.
Hong Kong’s leader is elected by pro-Beijing committees, but half of the 70 seats in his legislature are directly elected, giving the city’s 7.5 million residents a rare chance to have their voices heard. at the polls.
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The inability of Hong Kongers to elect their leaders and all their legislators has been at the center of growing opposition to the Beijing government, including the huge and often violent protests that broke out last year.
Hong Kong’s field of democracy has come under sustained attack since Beijing imposed a comprehensive national security law in response to protests, including political disqualifications, arrests for social media posts and activists fleeing abroad.
China’s leaders have described the law as a “sword” hanging over the heads of its critics.
