Posted on 11/23/2003 8:24:42 PM PST by Simmy2.5
Pro-democracy campaigners in Hong Kong have been celebrating significant gains in Sunday's local elections. The Democratic Party said it had won 93 of the 120 wards it contested.
The pro-Beijing Democratic Alliance for the Betterment of Hong Kong (DAB) said it had suffered a serious defeat in the poll that saw a massive turnout.
Voters turned out in droves to cast their ballot - the first major test of public opinion since massive anti-government protests last July.
Those protests were against new security laws which were then shelved.
The BBC Chris Hogg says Hong Kong's distict councils have few powers.
But he says the pro-democracy movement had called for a big turnout urging people to use the election as a means of expressing their discontent with the government of Tung Chee-hwa.
And a record one-million Hong Kong people voted - 44% of the electorate.
Clear message
Mr Tung, Hong Kong's chief executive, was hand-picked by China to run the former British colony after its return to Chinese sovereignty in 1997.
In the summer he was forced to back down on proposed new security legislation after hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets.
Calls for full democracy, including the direct election of the chief executive, have been growing since then.
Sunday's local elections were the first opportunity for the demonstrators to express their discontent via the ballot box.
The pro-Beijing parties, who have tried to distance themselves from the government's most unpopular policies, managed only to have 64 of their 206 candidates returned.
Several senior DAB party members who had been largely supportive of Tung Chee-hwa's government lost their seats.
The party's chairman said it was the worst showing for the DAB since it was formed 11 years ago.
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