The election for the President of the Provisional Legislative Council took place on 25 January 1997 for members of the

Provisional Legislative Council of Hong Kong The Provisional Legislative Council (PLC) was the interim legislature of Hong Kong that operated from 1997 to 1998. The legislature was founded in Guangzhou and sat in Shenzhen from 1996 (with offices in Hong Kong) until the handover in 1997 an ...

to among themselves elect the President for the duration of the council.

Rita Fan Rita Fan Hsu Lai-tai (; ' Hsu; ''born'' Hsu Ching-li; born 20 September 1945) is a senior Hong Kong politician. She was the first President of the Hong Kong SAR Legislative Council from 1998 to 2008 and a member of the Standing Committee of ...

from the

pro-Beijing camp The pro-Beijing camp, pro-establishment camp, pro-government camp or pro-China camp refers to a political alignment in Hong Kong which generally supports the policies of the Beijing central government and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) t ...

defeated President of the colonial Legislative Council Andrew Wong and was elected.

Election

The election of the President through secret ballot was held during the first-ever meeting of the Provisional Legislative Council (PLC). The PLC was forced to meet in Shenzhen to remain outside the reach of Hong Kong law, as democracy groups called it illegal and threatened to take the PLC to court if its members try to gather in Hong Kong. The meeting was closed to the public, and journalists watched the proceedings on closed-circuit television. Rita Fan, a key player in committees overseeing the

handover In cellular telecommunications, handover, or handoff, is the process of transferring an ongoing call or data session from one channel connected to the core network to another channel. In satellite communications it is the process of transfe ...

with solid connections with women's groups and Beijing, beat the current Legislative Council president, Andrew Wong.

Results

Reaction

Chris Patten Christopher Francis Patten, Baron Patten of Barnes, (; born 12 May 1944) is a British politician who was the 28th and last Governor of Hong Kong from 1992 to 1997 and Chairman of the Conservative Party from 1990 to 1992. He was made a life pe ...

Governor of Hong Kong The governor of Hong Kong was the representative of the British Crown in Hong Kong from 1843 to 1997. In this capacity, the governor was president of the Executive Council and commander-in-chief of the British Forces Overseas Hong Kong. ...

, blasted the gathering as "a bad day for Hong Kong", and criticised the PLC for having "no legitimacy, no credibility and no authority in Hong Kong." Earlier calling the shadow legislature "a rather exotic debating society that meets on occasional Saturday mornings", Patten said he hopes "it will not embarrass Hong Kong too much". CNN described Hong Kong's democratic future "may have suffered a blow" following this election.

Pro-democracy camp The pro-democracy camp, also known as the pan-democracy camp, is a political alignment in Hong Kong that supports increased democracy, namely the universal suffrage of the Chief Executive and the Legislative Council as given by the Basic L ...

in Hong Kong also disapproved the election, with

Emily Lau Emily may refer to: * Emily (given name), including a list of people with the name Music * "Emily" (1964 song), title song by Johnny Mandel and Johnny Mercer to the film ''The Americanization of Emily'' * "Emily" (Dave Koz song), a 1990 song ...

from the Frontier believing Fan might politicise the presidency and "change the role of the president from speaker to a super leader of the body" for her strident stance.

Zhou Nan Zhou Nan () was a prominent Chinese politician and diplomat, and served as Director of the Xinhua News Agency in Hong Kong, Vice Minister of the People's Republic of China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and Ambassador to the United Nations. He wa ...

, China's de facto ambassador to Hong Kong, hailed Fan's election and suggested it would be a bad idea for the PLC to hold off until June before starting work on law-making. Zhou also claimed "now Hong Kong has a chance to create for itself a truly representative form of government."

References

{{Authority control Legislative Council of Hong Kong 1997 elections in China 1997 in Hong Kong President of the Hong Kong Legislative Council elections