The Conference for Electing Deputies of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (SAR) to the 10th National People's Congress (NPC) of China met here for the second session Monday to compile the list of candidates standing for the election.
The conference also announced the candidate list and biographies of the candidates, and issued a public services announcement on the progress of the election process.
According to the method of election which set forth the qualifications for a candidate, a person who wants to contest needs to be at least 18 years old and be a Hong Kong resident of Chinese citizenship.
He or she must also have obtained at least 10 nominations for his or her election registration to be effective and shall be elected by the secret ballot votes.
The candidates already obtained nominations from Nov. 4 to 18 in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR).
During the 15-day nomination period, a total of 99 Hong Kong residents obtained registration forms for running for the election. Seventy-eight of them have succeeded in completing the nomination procedures and returned their registration forms, together with 10 nominations or more. But one candidate returned the registration form without any nomination letter, and thereby falling short of the qualification as laid down in the method of election.
In total, 78 registrants have been confirmed by the Presidium of the Conference for Electing Deputies of the HKSAR to the 10th National People's Congress (NPC) to have met the requirements as stipulated in the method of election to become the official candidates.
As the number of candidates exceed 54, the presidium has decided to hold a preliminary round of election on Nov. 29 for the78 registrants -- the 54 candidates obtaining the larger number of votes will become the official candidates to enter the final round of election.
Spokesman for the presidium of the election conference Lee Cho Jat told reporters at a news conference after the conference session Monday that the enthusiastic registration by people of all walks of life in the Hong Kong community to vie for the seats shows they have given recognition to the election process which is open, fair and just.
Sources told Xinhua that election conference will hold the final and official round of election on Dec. 3 to elect the 36 deputies.
(Xinhua News Agency November 26, 2002)
