Lord David Alton immediately causes a stir when he leaves the polling station in the Sha Tin district. It's a sunny Sunday afternoon in Hong Kong, 27 degrees, a weather for shorts and T-shirts, two little boys spooning up ice cream from paper cups. Alton, a British gentleman, wears a dark suit, gold cufflinks, a perfectly tied tie. Immediately a small crowd of people forms around him.
"We've visited a very well-run polling station here," says the 68-year-old in the television cameras and smartphones, the reporters and local residents in the air. "It shows us that democracy lives and thrives in Hong Kong."
Sunday is election day in the Chinese financial metropolis, for the first time since the beginning of the government-critical protests half a year ago, the Hong Kong may vote. You can choose from the district councils. Actually, these have little to say, they deal only with the daily small-small city such as noise protection or construction projects.
Pro-Beijing establishment versus pandemocratic camp
But this year, the district council elections are charged with a special significance. The whole of Hong Kong understands it as a plebiscite on the events of recent months. Pro-Beijing establishment candidates say every vote for them equals one vote against violent demonstrators. The so-called pandemocratic camp, on the other hand, hopes to give more weight to its demands with a good result, including an independent investigation of police violence and a general and free election of the head of government. 4.1 of the approximately seven million Hong Kong citizens have registered as voters, a record number.
Lord David Alton is a seasoned politician. He has denied seven parliamentary election campaigns, was elected in 1979 as the youngest member of the British lower house, served the liberals as Chief Whip (comparable to the post of Parliamentary Managing Director in Germany) and was appointed in 1997 for life in the aristocracy dominated upper house. But his mission in Hong Kong is something new for him too. "It's uplifting for me," he says. "I feel enthusiastic about how they organized it."
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District elections in Hong Kong: queues in front of polling stations"She," does not mean an international organization like the UN, which usually sends election observation missions similar to those in which Alton participates. It refers to an alliance of Hong Kong activists who has put this mission past the government. "Because the government has failed, the people now take responsibility," says Andy Li, chairman of the organizing committee.
Li, a haggard 29-year-old with rimless glasses, is a programmer in real life. He's been an activist only in his free time, since June 12, when the police first used tear gas against the demonstrators. The place where he talks on the eve of the election gives an idea of how much Hong Kong's activists have since become professional.
Queues in front of polling stations
Marko Djurica / REUTERS
From an extra rented hotel suite on the 37th floor, the view over Victoria Harbor overlooks the skyscrapers over on Hong Kong Island. On the coffee table is a professionally designed handout for the members of the mission. In addition to Alton, there is a Malaysian constitutional lawyer, a Slovakian NGO director or Lithuanian parliamentarians, most of them liberals or libertarians. Exaggerated sympathy for the government of Carrie Lam or even China, none of them suspicious.
Supporters around the world have tracked down and recruited them, and the Hong Kong activists have flown in. They funded the mission through crowdfunding. Their GoFundMe page shows that they have collected more than $ 1.8 million for this. As far as he knows, Li says this mission is the first of its kind.
Alton's group arrives in the district of Cheung Sha Wan on Sunday afternoon with their black motorcade. On the way there, an assistant has announced the intermediate status, at 15:30 clock had already chosen almost two million Hong Kong, almost twice as many as at this time in the last election in 2015. This corresponds to a turnout of over 47 percent.
Now it is just before 5 pm, and voters in Cheung Sha Wan are still standing in front of a community center converted into a polling station. Step by step things are progressing, an old man with a rollator tapping forward, a mother with a baby in front of her stomach, young men, looking at the cell phone. "Pretty good snake," says Alton. "It is amazing."
Government critics want to vote incognito
The organizer Andy Li hurries by, showing a photo on his smartphone, which has been sent to him by a fellow combatant from another district. You can see a man in front of a stack of rice packs, allegedly election gifts. "I would not over-dramatize that," says Alton. In Hong Kong, it is not uncommon for parties to hand over gifts to voters. But this year, something more sensitive than in previous elections.
On the messenger service Telegram, which is communicated by the protest movement, already circulated the day before instructions: goes immediately to select 7:30 clock, as soon as the polling stations open. Do not wear black T-shirts, so you do not recognize yourself as a government critic. Let the ink dry before you fold and insert your ballot paper.
But on this day, the relevant telegram channels remain quiet. Only isolated cases of alleged election influence are reported, a systematic pattern can not be read.
"People send a message"
This is also said by Jimmy Sham, a candidate of the pandemocratic camp, who starts in Cheung Sha Wan. Unknown hit the 32-year-olds in August with hammers together, at least since this attack, he is an icon of the protest movement. Alton's theme is Sham's case in the House of Lords, he's happy when they cross each other in Cheung Sha Wan.
Jimmy Sham is in the final stages of his election campaign, wearing a red T-shirt with his first name and slogan "Vote Them Out" selected. Whether he believes that the elections have been fair so far, Alton wants to know. "In this district yes," replies Sham. He could not comment on other constituencies.
At this time, the turnout is already over 52 percent - the polling stations have more than five hours open. "People send a message," says Alton. Which exactly, you will know, if the results are fixed. This is only expected for the coming Monday. But one thing, says Alton, is certain: "Certainly it's a message about the value of democracy."