KPMG is one of several big businesses in Hong Kong encouraging staff to vote in what the government is billing as a “patriots-only” election for the city’s legislature, as authorities worry about low turnout in the poll.
The Big Four auditing firm has offered staff an extra day off if they exercise their “privilege to vote” in the elections on Sunday for the Legislative Council, Hong Kong’s de facto parliament, according to an internal email seen by the Financial Times.
“Colleagues who have voted will be asked to complete a simple online application to indicate that they are eligible voters and have voted,” KPMG said in the email on Tuesday. KPMG did not respond to a request for comment.
The election will be the legislature’s first since the government introduced sweeping changes this year that barred most of Hong Kong’s pro-democracy politicians from running for office and subjected candidates to vetting for their political loyalty to China.
The legislative overhaul followed Beijing’s imposition of a national security law for Hong Kong last year to stamp out anti-government protests after unrest in the city in 2019.
But the removal of the pro-democracy politicians from the election has left local officials rushing to incentivise people in the politically divided city to cast their ballots, with voter turnout expected to hit an all-time low.
Two opinion polls this month reported that about 33 to 36 per cent of respondents did not plan to participate in the upcoming poll.
Critics have called the election a sham. Beijing cut the number of directly elected seats from 35 to 20, while only about 10 of the 153 candidates contesting the total of 90 seats have proclaimed themselves to be “democrats” or “independent”. Most opposition politicians have either fled overseas or were arrested after Beijing enacted the national security law.
Several influential Hong Kong billionaires and their children also demonstrated their support for the election this week. Some tycoons are nervous after they upset Beijing during the 2019 protests by not showing sufficient opposition to the pro-democracy movement, people familiar with mainland authorities have said.
Raymond Kwok, chair of property developer Sun Hung Kai Properties and a scion of Asia’s second-richest family, urged staff in an internal letter to “make good use of” their vote in Sunday’s poll. “I encourage all colleagues who are eligible voters . . . to vote,” he wrote.
Brian Li, co-chief executive of the Hong Kong-listed Bank of East Asia who is also a member of China’s top political advisory body, wrote in a newspaper column about “the importance of [the public] casting their vote and picking talent who love China, love Hong Kong”.
“The [business sector] has to show support . . . for the reformed electoral system,” said Lau Siu-kai, vice-chair of the Chinese Association of Hong Kong and Macau Studies, a semi-official Chinese think-tank in Beijing. “They don’t want to be perceived by Beijing or Hong Kong officials as giving insufficient affirmation.”
Last week, Xia Baolong, Beijing’s top bureaucrat overseeing Hong Kong, told the city’s public in a speech to vote for “patriots” and accused western governments that criticised the elections of “interference”.
The Hong Kong government has spent at least HK$6.8m (US$872,000) on full-page advertisements in more than a dozen local newspapers, telling voters to “cast your vote for Hong Kong — our home”.
Authorities have warned that calls by pro-democracy leaders for voters to flood Sunday’s election with blank ballots could also violate the national security law. At least 10 people, including a former student leader, have been arrested on suspicion of “inciting a boycott” of the polls.
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