HONG KONG: Hong Kong’s oldest pro-democracy party has decided to disband, the group announced Sunday, after its members formally voted to dissolve the organisation and enter liquidation.
The Democratic Party was founded in 1994, near the end of British colonial rule, when Hong Kong’s leading liberal groups merged.
“Over these thirty years, we have taken part in and borne witness to the development and transformation of Hong Kong society, watching its systems and environment undergo one profound change after another,” the party said in a statement.
“Yet as the times have shifted, we now, with deep regret, must bring this chapter to a close,” it added.
At Sunday’s meeting, 117 out of 121 members voted to the group’s liquidation, with the remaining four votes being blank ballots, Lo Kin-hei, the party’s chair, told a news conference.
He said that it was a “collective decision” made by party members, adding that it is the best way forward for them.
“We are deeply grateful to all the citizens who have walked with the Democratic Party for the past 30 years,” Lo said.
The party’s end should spur the public to ask hard questions, Emily Lau, former chair of the party, told AFP earlier this year.
“I don’t understand why the Democratic Party would end up like this,” former party leader Emily Lau said to reporters when leaving the meeting Sunday.
“I think Beijing needs to provide an explanation,” she said. Lo said the disbandment was due to Hong Kong’s “political environment” but declined to provide details of the constraints the party was facing.
The Democratic Party’s top concern was determining how the city would eventually elect its own leader and lawmakers through universal suffrage under China’s “One Country, Two Systems” model.
It said in its manifesto that “as part of the Chinese citizenry, we have the rights and obligations to participate in and comment on the affairs of China”.
Following Hong Kong’s handover to China in 1997, the party became the most influential voice of opposition in the city’s legislature and led peaceful street demonstrations.
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