| HKSAR LegCo Election
I. Introduction
Under the Basic Law, the Legislative Council
is the legislature of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. The powers
and functions that the Legislative Council is to exercise are specified in Article
73 of the Basic Law. They include:
(a) to enact laws;
(b) to examine and approve budgets, taxation and public expenditure;
(c) to receive and debate the policy addresses of the Chief Executive;
(d) to raise questions on the work of the government;
(e) to debate issues concerning public interests; and
(f) to receive and handle complaints from Hong Kong residents.
II. Constitution of the Legislative Council
The composition of the first three terms of the Legislative Council is set out in the Basic Law. The composition of the fourth term Legislative Council is the same as that of the third term, i.e. 30 members were returned by geographical
constituencies, and the remaining 30 by functional constituencies. The fourth term
of office of the Legislative Council began on October 1, 2008. The term of office
is four years.
Regarding geographical constituency election, the territory
of Hong Kong is divided into five geographical constituencies, i.e. Hong Kong
Island, Kowloon West, Kowloon East, New Territories West and New Territories East.
Each constituency returns a specified number (on the basis of the size of population
residing in the constituency) of Legislative Council members. The list voting
system operating under the largest remainder formula applies in the geographical
constituency elections. This is a form of proportional representation, capable
of producing election results which reflect more accurately voter preferences.
Regarding functional constituency election, there are 28 functional constituencies
returning a total of 30 members. These functional constituencies represent sectors
which are substantial and important to the development of the community. Each
of the functional constituencies returned one member, with the exception of the
labour functional constituency which returned three. The first-past-the-post voting
system is used in the elections of the majority of functional constituencies.
III. The Fourth Term Legislative Council Elections
Elections
to the fourth term Legislative Council were held on 7 September 2008. A total
of 201 candidates signed up for the poll. Of these, 142 competed for the 30 geographical
constituency seats, and 45 for the 18 contested functional constituency seats. Fourteen candidates
were elected unopposed in 12 functional constituencies.
The public
participated actively in the elections. The number of voters who cast their votes
and the respective turnout rates are set out below:
i) Geographical constituencies
Number of voters: 1,524,249
Turnout Rate: 45.20%
ii)
Functional constituencies:
Number of voters: 126,819
Turnout
Rate: 59.76%
For more details on the Fourth Term Legislative Council Elections,
please click here
to visit the relevant website.
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