The election for the President of the First Legislative Council took place on 2 July 1998 for members of the

1st Legislative Council of Hong Kong First or 1st is the ordinal form of the number one (#1). First or 1st may also refer to: *World record, specifically the first instance of a particular achievement Arts and media Music * 1$T, American rapper, singer-songwriter, DJ, and reco ...

to among themselves elect the

President of the Legislative Council of Hong Kong The president of the Legislative Council is the presiding officer of the Legislative Council of Hong Kong. According to the Article 71 of the Hong Kong Basic Law, the president of the Legislative Council is elected by and from among Legislat ...

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 ...

, who presided over the provisional legislature, defeated pre-handover President Andrew Wong.

Proceedings

According to Article 71 of the

Hong Kong Basic Law The Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China is a national law of China that serves as the organic law for the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR). Comprising nine chapters, 160 ...

and Rule 4 of the Rules of Procedure of the Legislative Council, the President of the Legislative Council has to be a Chinese citizen of 40 years old or above, a permanent resident of Hong Kong with no right of abode in any foreign country, and has ordinarily resided in Hong Kong for not less than 20 years continuously. Following the taking of oath of office, members of the Council proceeded to elect a member to preside over the election of the President. Pan-democracy

Yeung Sum Yeung Sum (; born 22 November 1947 in Guangzhou) is a Hong Kong politician and academic. He served several terms as a Legislative Councillor and was the second chairman of the Democratic Party (DP), a pro-democracy political party in Hong ...

(

Dem DEM was the ISO 4217 currency code for the Deutsche Mark, former currency of Germany Computing * Digital elevation model, a digital representation of ground-surface topography or terrain ** .dem, a common extension for USGS DEM files * Discrete ...

) orally nominated pro-business

Edward Leong Edward Leong Che-hung (, born 23 April 1939, Hong Kong) was the non-official member of the Executive Council of Hong Kong. By training a physician, he graduated from Queen's College, Hong Kong, the University of Hong Kong as Bachelor of Me ...

(

Breakfast Breakfast is the first meal of the day usually eaten in the morning. The word in English refers to breaking the fasting period of the previous night.Anderson, Heather Arndt (2013)''Breakfast: A History'' AltaMira Press. Various "typical" or "t ...

), and seconded by

Ronald Arculli Ronald Joseph Arculli, GBM, GBS, CVO, OBE, JP (; born 2 January 1939 in Hong Kong) is former chairman of Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing, Non-official Members Convenor of the Executive Council of Hong Kong (Exco) and a senior partner at ...

(

Lib lib or Lib may refer to: Computing * Library (computing) ** .lib, a static library on Microsoft platforms ** , a directory on Unix-like systems * Lib-80, a Microsoft Library Manager tool; see Microsoft MACRO-80 People * Lib, one of two Jaredite ...

) and

Christine Loh Christine Loh Kung-wai, SBS, OBE, JP, Chevalier de l’Ordre National du Mérite (born 1 February 1956), is a former Hong Kong Legislative Councillor, founder and CEO of Civic Exchange, founder of the Citizens Party, and founder of Hong K ...

(

Citizens Citizenship is a "relationship between an individual and a state to which the individual owes allegiance and in turn is entitled to its protection". Each state determines the conditions under which it will recognize persons as its citizens, and ...

). Without other nominations, Leong then chaired the meetings as he accepted the nomination.

, the incumbent President of the council, was nominated by

Philip Wong Philip Wong Yu-hong, GBS (; 23 December 1938 – 6 June 2021) was a politician in Hong Kong who served as a member of the legislative council ( Functional constituencies, Commercial econd, a deputy to the National People's Congress and vice ...

, and seconded by 4 other pro-government members. Andrew Wong, who served as president in the colonial Council, was nominated by Edward Leong and seconded by 3 pro-democracy MPs.

Candidates

(

Independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independ ...

), President of the Provisional Legislative Council (1997–1998) :: Nominations –

Lau Wong-fat Lau Wong-fat, GBM, GBS, OBE, JP (; 15 October 1936 – 23 July 2017) was a Hong Kong businessman and politician. He had been the long-time chairman of the Rural Council, the most powerful organ representing the interests of the New Territo ...

(

), Ng Leung-sing (Breakfast),

Chim Pui-chung Chim Pui-chung (born 1946 in Chaozhou, Guangdong, China) was a member of the Legislative Council of Hong Kong (Legco), representing the financial services, Financial Services Functional constituency (Hong Kong), Functional Constituency. He is exec ...

, David Chu ( HKPA) * Andrew Wong (

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 ...

), former President of the Legislative Council (1995–1997) :: Nominations –

(Breakfast),

Margaret Ng Margaret Ng Ngoi-yee (; born 25 January 1948) is a politician, barrister, writer and columnist in Hong Kong. She was a member of the Legislative Council of Hong Kong from 1995 to 2012. Biography Before entering the legal profession, Margaret ...

Leung Yiu-chung Leung Yiu-chung (, born 19 May 1953) is a Hong Kong politician. He is a member of the pro-labour Neighbourhood and Worker's Service Centre, part of the pan-democracy camp, and a former long-time member of the Legislative Council of Hong Kong ...

( NWSC),

James To James To Kun-sun (; ; born 11 March 1963) is a Hong Kong lawyer and Democratic Party politician. From 1991 to 2020, To was a member of the Legislative Council of Hong Kong, representing the District Council (Second) constituency. In his fina ...

(Dem)

Results

Rita Fan was elected as the President and continued chairing Hong Kong's legislature. Previously divided in its choice, the

Liberal Party The Liberal Party is any of many political parties around the world. The meaning of ''liberal'' varies around the world, ranging from liberal conservatism on the right to social liberalism on the left. __TOC__ Active liberal parties This is a li ...

gave its 10 votes to Fan. Margaret Ng said with the Council represented by a legislator from the 800-strong Election Committee, "democratic forces seem to have been overcome by undemocratic ones". Lee Cheuk-yan (

Frontier A frontier is the political and geographical area near or beyond a boundary. A frontier can also be referred to as a "front". The term came from French in the 15th century, with the meaning "borderland"—the region of a country that fronts o ...

) claimed the new legislature will still be "haunted by the provisional legislature's ghosts". While Andrew Wong believed the selection of the President was based on party lines rather than suitability, Rita Fan dismissed criticism about her lack of a democratic mandate.

References

{{Authority control Legislative Council of Hong Kong 1998 Hong Kong legislative election 1998 elections in China 1998 in Hong Kong President of the Hong Kong Legislative Council elections