A 51-year-old woman has received a suspended sentence over reposting an ex-politician’s call to boycott the “patriots-only” District Council Election last December.
Yeung Sze-wing on Monday pleaded guilty to breaching Hong Kong’s elections law before Magistrate Ivy Chui at the Eastern Magistrates’ Courts, according to local media reports.
Yeung, a clerk, shared a Facebook post by ousted district councillor Leos Lee on December 3 calling on residents to boycott the opposition-free race. She added a caption to her post telling people to write their names and identity card numbers on their ballot papers, which would render the vote invalid.
Lee, elected into the Sham Shui Po District Council in 2019 amid the extradition bill protests, was unseated in 2021 after he refused to take an oath pledging allegiance to Hong Kong and the Basic Law. His post stated that “as [a member of] the last term of publicly-elected councillor, I have the responsibility to call on everyone to refrain from participating in the upcoming district council election in any manner.”
The Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) had put Lee, who is now based in Taiwan, on a wanted list for allegedly breaching the election ordinance.
Chui heard during mitigation that Yeung had a clear record and had committed the offence out of ignorance. The defence told the court that Yeung was troubled by her arrest and had “deeply regretted her foolish actions.”
The defence added that Yeung had complied with authorities in admitting the facts, and that she had long supported her intellectually disabled brother and elderly father, and was a persistent church-goer and a volunteer.
Chui said Yeung’s attempt to influence the election was unacceptable, adding that “a fair election hinged on residents’ sincere voting.” But the magistrate accepted Yeung’s mitigation and recognised her early guilty plea.
She handed Yeung a two-month jail term, reduced from three months, suspended for two years, meaning Yeung will not serve the sentence unless she commits an offence within that period.
Electoral overhaul
Hong Kong criminalised calling for others to spoil or cast blank ballots in elections in 2021 as part of a Beijing-led overhaul of the city’s electoral system. Offenders face up to one year in prison and a HK$50,000 fine if the case is tried before a magistrate.
Last year’s District Council election was the first since an overhaul slashed democratically-elected seats and shut pro-democracy candidates out from the race.
It saw a record-low turnout of 27.54 per cent. Seven people were arrested over alleged calls to cast invalid ballots and suspected acts of interference.
Last Monday, a 38-year-old analyst programmer also received a suspended sentence for sharing a social media post which incited others not to vote. The ICAC also issued an arrest warrant for the post’s original creator Wong Sai-chak, a political commentator who now lives in Germany.
“The election ordinance has extraterritorial effect and applies to all conduct concerning an election, be it engaged in within Hong Kong or elsewhere,” the anti-graft watchdog said in a statement.
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