Two more pan-democratic election candidates from the Civic Party and the Association for Democracy and People’s Livelihood (ADPL) suspended their campaigns on Friday evening.
Sumly Chan Yuen-sum of the Civic Party and Kalvin Ho Kai-ming from the ADPL are running in the District Council (Second) Functional Constituency.
Civic Party lawmaker Alan Leong Kah-kit said Sumly Chan dropped out of the race in order to block the pro-Beijing camp from winning three seats in the “super district council” sector.
Chan said the decision was made by him and his party together. He did not directly suggest who voters should vote for in his sector, but said voters should act in order to let the pan-democrats gain three seats in the sector, if not four. “My sacrifice is worth it,” he said.
Making way
Ho announced that he was dropping out of Sunday’s election on Facebook, calling for voters to support candidates who hold “similar stances and have a chance of winning [a seat].”
The latest opinion polls conducted by the University of Hong Kong’s Public Opinion Programme between August 21 and September 1 show that Chan would receive 5 per cent of the vote, and Ho 1 per cent, in the District Council (Second) Functional Constituency, which has five seats.
Polls currently suggest that pro-democracy candidates James To Kun-sun, Leung Yiu-chung and Roy Kwong Chun-yu will be elected respectively with 25%, 12% and 9% of the vote. Pro-establishment candidates Starry Lee Wai-king and Wong Kwok-hing are set to win the two remaining seats respectively with 24% and 12% of the vote.
The constituency was first introduced in 2012, and offers over 3 million voters a second ballot – in addition to the geographical constituencies elected by popular vote – to elect an incumbent district councillor into the Legislative Council.
It is the latest in a string of election campaign suspensions on Friday night. Hong Kong Island’s Paul Zimmerman and Andy Chui, along with the Labour Party’s Suzanne Wu also dropped out of the race to make way for other candidates with higher approval ratings.
The legislative election will take place on Sunday. Full candidates lists across districts and constituencies can be viewed here.
