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THE DEMOCRACY MOVEMENT IN HONG KONG
universal suffrage to reflect local opinions', while only 5 per cent said that the practice of democracy would cause social unrest and damage the capitalist system (the remaining 25 per cent had no comment on the issue). Further, in response to this statement about 60 per cent of the respondents opted for the election of the Chief Executive by universal suffrage, with only 16 per cent favouring the selection of the Chief Executive by an electoral college and only 4 per cent supporting his selection by an advisory group.
These results seemed to show strong support for the democracy movement. But the responses revealed views that were highly inconsistent, and little interest in or knowledge of the draft Basic Law. Only 32 per cent of the respondents showed concern about the draft Basic Law, while 42 per cent indicated no concern and 10 per cent were unaware even of the existence of the draft. Moreover, though 21 per cent of the respondents claimed to have read the draft Basic Law, only 1 per cent had gone through the complete draft. As the vast majority of the respondents did not have the necessary information to form a clear opinion, it is not surprising that their views were inconsistent.
Again, the survey indicated that 60 per cent of the respondents supported the conservative business community's proposal of nomination and election of the Chief Executive by an electoral college, while 58 per cent favoured the nomination of the candidates for the Chief Executive by the legislature and election by universal suffrage, as advocated by the democracy movement. Similarly, 63 per cent of the respondents supported the conservative business community's option of a legislature with half of the members elected by functional constituencies, a quarter by direct elections, and another quarter by the electoral college that would elect the Chief Executive, while 58 per cent of the respondents favoured the democracy movement's idea of a legislature with half its members directly elected, a quarter by functional bodies and a quarter by indirect election. The results showed quite clearly the community's lack of interest in the Basic Law, and this-until May 1989-has made mass mobilization by the democracy movement difficult.
Another survey published in September 1988 was even more revealing. This survey was held just before the elections in the Central and Western district and Southern district of Hong Kong Island. The poll indicated that 93 per cent of the respondents did not know the candidates of their constituency, and 97 per cent were unaware that Liu Lit-for represented their constituency in 1985-8.10
This political apathy has been the democracy movement's major difficulty in the later 1980s until May 1989. As long as it could not demonstrate that its position was backed by the majority of the community, its bargaining power remained limited. When the movement launched a petition in the summer of 1988, for instance, to demand the election of the Chief Executive of the Hong Kong SAR government on a one-man-one-vote basis with direct elections for at least half the seats in the legislature, the campaign workers discovered that while most people they approached supported the demands, many of them refused to sign, either because they believed the campaign was destined to be futile or because they were reluctant to provide their identities, which they understood would be presented to the Chinese authorities in Beijing. The self-censorship of the local media was reinforced by this political apathy as press, radio
10. Oriental Daily (the best-selling Chinese newspaper in Hong Kong), 22 Sept. 1988.