Up to 45,000 join muted pro-democracy march in Hong Kong
(DPA)
HONG KONG – Thousands of people took part in a pro-democracy march in Hong Kong on Friday timed to coincide with the eighth anniversary of the former British colony’s return to Chinese rule.
Organizers say around 45,000 people gathered for the march from Victoria Park to the territory’s central government offices, but police estimated the turnout at only 17,000.
Either way, the crowd was only a fraction the size of the 500,000-plus who turned out on July 1 last year and in 2003 to take part in spectacular anti-government and pro-democracy marches.
An improving economy and the replacement of Tung Chee-hwa, the territory’s unpopular chief executive, with the more popular Donald Tsang appears to have dampened the appetite for street protests.
However, march organizers hailed the event as a success and pro-democracy legislator Emily Lau said it “sent out a clear message that Hong Kong people want democracy”.
“We will march every year,” she said. “People still want democracy for Hong Kong.”
A spokesman for the march organizers, Hong Kong’s Civil Human Rights Front, conceded that a lower turnout would represent a weaker message on Hong Kong peoples desire for universal suffrage.
But he added: “What is most important is to keep putting pressure on the government, otherwise the government will not make any political reform.”
An estimated 20,000 people took part in a rival carnival-style celebration organized by pro-China groups to celebrate the anniversary of Hong Kong’s return to Chinese sovereignty.
Protestors at Friday’s march were demanding universal suffrage in time for the next election of the next chief executive in 2007, followed by legislative elections the next year.
Currently, there is no public vote for the position of chief executive and only half of the territory’s 60 legislators are directly elected.
July 1 is a public holiday in Hong Kong, a densely populated city of 6.8 million, to commemorate the day in 1997 when 156 years of British colonial rule ended.
Yan Sham-Shackleton Online 