As Hong Kong prepares for Legco polls, a lesson from the lead-in-water scandal

While efforts to ensure competition in the election are welcome, a truly improved system would give lawmakers the political room to do the sort of work that exposed excessive levels of lead in water at a public estate in 2015

Alice Wu

Published: 6:45am, 8 Nov 2021

Why you can trust SCMP

The Legislative Council election feels a little surreal and we’re more than halfway into the nomination period, which ends this Friday. Only 15 applicants filed papers on the first day – less than half the number usually seen in previous Legco elections – and there are more seats up for grabs.

Beijing would reportedly like to see competition, and is adamant about not having walkovers. It’s just that the competition shouldn’t get too fierce – at least, not in the open.

But securing nominations is no walk in the park: former lawmaker Ronny Tong Ka-wah, now leader of Path of Democracy and a government adviser, has said securing nominations has been unexpectedly difficult.

Election Committee members have only one nomination to give and so the deliberation process and the political calculus involved are complex. Backing someone who may not, in the end, be able to secure enough nominations across the five sectors of the Election Committee would be a waste of their endorsement.

Worse, what if the aspiring candidate doesn’t get past the eligibility review committee? That would make nominators supporters of people who were deemed unfit to run – a blotch on their patriotic profile.

Those who wish to be part of the election – whether by running or nominating someone to run – have to navigate treacherous political terrain.

The “invisible hand” is very much being felt, and an extension of that invisible hand – the liaison office – has been, according to a Post report, hard at work micromanaging, aware that convincing enough people to contest the election is important.

Surely there must be more than a handful of acceptable and capable patriots to fill these seats? Otherwise, it will be ridiculous.

It is good that there is growing awareness of the need to pay attention to public perception. If the Legco election is to be billed as a showcase of the new and improved political system, it must be competitive. It’s important to acknowledge that healthy competition boosts performance.

04:21

How does Hong Kong select its government?

A news report caught my attention last week. Lead levels in the water supply of a Wan Chai commercial building were found to exceed the allowed limit. This is the first case identified since the government launched a comprehensive safety overhaul of the city’s drinking water in 2017. That overhaul was a result of the lead-in-water contamination scandal in 2015.

It’s worth taking a trip down memory lane because the 2015 exposé of high lead levels in the water in Kai Ching Estate in Kowloon City was met with such government buck-passing that the aftermath of the episode became equally outrageous.

A Democratic Party lawmaker conducted the initial investigation and publicised the findings, creating great inconvenience to the government at the time. However, the episode exposed the rot within the government and resulted in real change.

We ought to recognise that, besides the drama inside Legco and the rioting, once upon a time, the opposition – and the competition to win public support – did do some public good.

Uncovering the high levels of lead in building water pipes was one example. Still, opposition lawmakers failed to secure enough votes to invoke Legco’s special powers to investigate because the government had enough allies.

The commission of inquiry concluded after a year of investigating that the improper oversight of contractors and the material they used was a “collective failure” of numerous government departments; the report did not hold any particular individual or department responsible. That caused a political uproar.

Then Democratic Party lawmaker Helena Wong (right) talks to a resident of Kai Ching Estate, where the lead levels in tap water were found to exceed the recommended limits, in June 2016. Photo: Nora Tam

Image matters, but so does substance. A truly new and improved system would allow lawmakers to have the political room to do this sort of investigative work, and serve the public well.

This begins with allowing those who nominate and vote for candidates to the legislature to do so without making them read the tea leaves while being strapped into political straitjackets.

Alice Wu is a political consultant and a former associate director of the Asia Pacific Media Network at UCLA