The Central and Western District Council is the district council for the

Central and Western District The Central and Western District () located on northwestern part of Hong Kong Island is one of the 18 administrative districts of Hong Kong. It had a population of 243,266 in 2016. The district has the most educated residents with the secon ...

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China ( abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delt ...

. It is one of 18 such councils. The Central and Western District Council currently consists of 15 members, of which the district is divided into 15 constituencies, electing a total of 15 members. The last election was held on 24 November 2019.

History

The Central and Western District Council was established on 18 March 1982 under the name of the Central and Western District Board as the result of the colonial

Governor A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, ranking under the head of state and in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of state's official representative. Depending on the type of political ...

Murray MacLehose Crawford Murray MacLehose, Baron MacLehose of Beoch, (; 16 October 1917 – 27 May 2000), was a British politician, diplomat and the 25th Governor of Hong Kong, from 1971 to 1982. He was the longest-serving governor of the colony, with four ...

's District Administration Scheme reform. The District Board was partly elected with the ''ex-officio''

Urban Council The Urban Council (UrbCo) was a municipal council in Hong Kong responsible for municipal services on Hong Kong Island and in Kowloon (including New Kowloon). These services were provided by the council's executive arm, the Urban Servic ...

members, as well as members appointed by the Governor until 1994 when last Governor

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 ...

refrained from appointing any member. The Central and Western District Board became Central and Western Provisional District Board after the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) was established in 1997 with the appointment system being reintroduced by

Chief Executive A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...

Tung Chee-hwa Tung Chee-hwa (; born 7 July 1937) is a Hong Kong businessman and politician who served as the first Chief Executive of Hong Kong between 1997 and 2005, upon the transfer of sovereignty on 1 July. He is currently a vice-chairman of the Chin ...

. The Central and Western District Council was established on 1 January 2000 after the first District Council election in 1999. The council has become fully elected when the appointed seats were abolished in 2011 after the modified constitutional reform proposal was passed by the Legislative Council in 2010. The Central and Western Board was largely non-partisan in the 1980s. In the 1985 election, an electoral coalition of 12 incumbents based on personal network surrounding Vincent Ko Hon-chiu of the Hong Kong People's Association, later the board chairman, contested in the election, winning 10 seats in total. The board gradually divided into liberal and conservative blocs in the late 1980s and split into pro-democracy

United Democrats of Hong Kong The United Democrats of Hong Kong (; UDHK) was a short-lived political party in Hong Kong founded in 1990 as the united front of the liberal democracy forces in preparation of the 1991 first ever direct election for the Legislative Council of ...

(UDHK) and the conservative

Liberal Democratic Federation of Hong Kong The Liberal Democratic Federation of Hong Kong (, abbreviated 自民聯; LDF) was a pro-Beijing pro-business and conservative political party in Hong Kong. It was established in 1990, and was composed of mainly conservative businessmen and pr ...

(LDF) which were formed in 1990. The

Democratic Party Democratic Party most often refers to: *Democratic Party (United States) Democratic Party and similar terms may also refer to: Active parties Africa *Botswana Democratic Party *Democratic Party of Equatorial Guinea *Gabonese Democratic Party *Demo ...

, the merger of UDHK and

Meeting Point Meeting Point ( Chinese: 匯點) was a liberal political organisation and party in Hong Kong formed by a group of former student activists in the 1970s and intellectuals for the discussion for the Sino-British negotiation on the question of Hon ...

, took control of the board from 1994 to 1997 after the abolishment of the appointed seats. The Democratic majority was offset by the pro-Beijing camp when appointed seats were reintroduced in 1997. In the 2003 tide of democracy after the July 1 protest, the pro-democrats formed the

Central and Western Democratic Power Central and Western Democratic Power is a local political group in the Central and Western district of Hong Kong. It was convened by Kam Nai Wai, a member of Democratic Party and Central and Western District Councillor, and is mainly composed of ...

for the 2003 election and won seven seats, which saw pro-democrat Legislative Councillor

Cyd Ho Cyd Ho Sau-lan () is a former member of the Legislative Council of Hong Kong (Legco) for the Hong Kong Island constituency. She is a founding member of the Labour Party, since December 2011, and currently holds the position of vice-chairwoma ...

defeating

Ip Kwok-him Ip Kwok-him, GBM, GBS, JP (; born 8 November 1951) is a former unofficial member of the Executive Council of Hong Kong, served between 2016 and 2022. He is also former member of the Legislative Council of Hong Kong for the District Council ...

of the

Democratic Alliance for the Betterment of Hong Kong The Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong (DAB) is a pro-Beijing conservative political party in Hong Kong. Chaired by Starry Lee and holding 13 Legislative Council seats, it is currently the largest party in the l ...

(DAB) in his long-held constituency of Kwun Lung. Democratic Party's

Kam Nai-wai Kam Nai-wai MH (; born 1960, Hong Kong) is a founding member of the Democratic Party, and was a former member of Central and Western District Council. He is also a former member of the Legislative Council of Hong Kong (Geographical constituency, ...

was able to take the chairmanship with the help of appointed member Wu Chor-nam. Kam's decision to co-operate with an appointed member sparked controversy which caused Kam to resign soon afterward. The Democratic Party remained the largest party in the council until the 2007 election when the DAB surpassed the Democratic Party in the number of seats for the first time. In the by-elections in 2017 for

Peak Peak or The Peak may refer to: Basic meanings Geology * Mountain peak ** Pyramidal peak, a mountaintop that has been sculpted by erosion to form a point Mathematics * Peak hour or rush hour, in traffic congestion * Peak (geometry), an (''n''-3)-di ...

and Tung Wah, the pro-Beijing and pro-democracy camps took each of the seats, giving the Democrats the same numbers of seat as the DAB, both commanding five seats. In the 2019 election amid the ongoing pro-democracy protests, the pro-democrats scored a historic landslide victory by taking 14 of the 15 seats, with DAB being completely wiped out from the council and its legislator

Cheung Kwok-kwan Horace Cheung Kwok-kwan, JP (, born 30 June 1974) is a Hong Kong solicitor and politician and the former vice-chairman of the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong (DAB), the largest pro-Beijing party in Hong Kong. ...

being ousted in

Sai Wan Sai Wan, also known as Western district, or simply Western, is an area in Hong Kong Island, Hong Kong that corresponds to Sai Ying Pun, Shek Tong Tsui, Belcher Bay and Kennedy Town. It formed part of the City of Victoria. West Point, a f ...

. The Democratic Party became the largest party with seven seats with

Cheng Lai-king Cheng Lai-king (, born 1959 or 1960) is a Hong Kong politician who served as District Councillor for the Castle Road constituency, and as former chairwoman of Central and Western District Council. She is a member of the Democratic Party and a ...

and

Victor Yeung Victor Yeung Ho-yin is a District Councillor for the Belcher (constituency), Belcher constituency. He is a former member of the Democratic Party (Hong Kong), Democractic Party of Hong Kong. In 2003 he was elected with 45.3% (1,937) of the vote. H ...

taking the chair and vice chair posts respectively.

Political control

Since 1982 political control of the council has been held by the following parties:

Political makeup

Current Map of Central and Western District Council

Elections An election is a formal group decision-making process by which a population chooses an individual or multiple individuals to hold public office. Elections have been the usual mechanism by which modern representative democracy has operate ...

are held every four years.

District result maps

File:1994DBelectionmapa.svg, 1994 File:1999DCelectionmapa.svg, 1999 File:2003DCelectionmapa.svg, 2003 File:2007DCelectionmapa.svg, 2007 File:2011DCelectionmapa.svg, 2011 File:Central and Western District Council 2015.svg, 2015 File:Central and Western District Council (2019).svg, 2019

Members represented

Starting from 1 January 2020:

Leadership

Chairs

Since 1985, the chairman is elected by all the members of the board:

Vice Chairs

Notes

References

External links

Official website
{{coord missing, Hong Kong Districts of Hong Kong District Councils of Hong Kong Central and Western District, Hong Kong