Right to vote

As at 9 September 2012, a person has the right to vote in a Legislative Council election if he/she fulfils all of the below criteria :^[5]

• Hong Kong permanent resident (regardless of nationality),
• ordinarily resides in Hong Kong,
• holds a Hong Kong identity card or another identity document,
• has registered to vote on or before 16 May 2012,
• aged 18 or above on 25 July 2012,
• not a member of any armed forces nor found to be incapable under the Mental Health Ordinance (Cap. 136), by reason of mental incapacity, of managing and administering his/her property and affairs.

Right to stand

To stand as a candidate in a geographical constituency, a person must fulfil all of the below criteria:^[6]

• a Hong Kong permanent resident with Chinese citizenship,
• does not have any foreign citizenship nor the right of abode in any country outside China,
• aged 21 or above on the date of nomination,
• a registered voter on the date of nomination,
• has ordinarily resided in Hong Kong for the 3 years immediately preceding the date of nomination,
• not a member of any national, regional or municipal legislature, assembly or council of any place outside Hong Kong, other than a people's congress or people's consultative body of the People's Republic of China, whether established at the national or local level,
• not a member of any armed forces nor found to be incapable under the Mental Health Ordinance (Cap. 136), by reason of mental incapacity, of managing and administering his/her property and affairs,
• submits a nomination form to the returning officer on or before 31 July 2012.

Geographical constituencies

Under the constitutional reform package passed in 2010, this election saw LegCo increase its total size from 60 seats to 70 seats, half of which are geographical constituencies (GCs) and half functional constituencies (FCs). The GC seats are returned by universal suffrage, with the Kowloon West constituency once again returning five seats, while the Hong Kong Island, Kowloon East, and New Territories West constituencies each gain one new seat and New Territories East, the second largest constituency, gaining two extra seats.^[7] The election uses a system of party-list proportional representation, with seats allocated by the largest remainder method using the Hare quota as the quota for election.

Functional constituencies

While the electoral methods in the 30 'traditional' FC seats remain unchanged, the five new seats form a new constituency called the District Council, for which candidates may be nominated by the District councillors and are elected by all registered voters who are not in any 'traditional' FC,^[8] creating the largest constituency with a total of more than 3.2 million eligible electors.^[9] The vote counting system used is the same as that in the GCs: the party-list proportional representation with the largest remainder method and Hare quota.

New leadership under Leung Chun-ying

As Leung Chun-ying sworn in on 1 July, he sought a foothold in the Legislative Council against his defeated rival, Henry Tang.^[10] The Tang supporter for the Financial Services functional constituency, Chim Pui-chung, decided to withdraw his nomination for re-election on 27 July, while Christopher Cheung Wah-fung, who voted for CY Leung and was also a member of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, decided to run in the constituency.^[11]

Other Leung's supporters including Martin Liao Cheung-kong, Ng Leung-sing and Ma Fung-kwok also ran in other functional constituencies, replacing the original pro-Tang legislators Philip Wong, David Li and Timothy Fok.

On the day CY Leung assumed the Chief Executive, there were about 400,000 participants in the July 1 marches, the biggest anti-government rally in recent history.

Moral and National Education controversy

Moral and civic education was one of the four key tasks in the 2001 curriculum reform undertaken by the Education and Manpower Bureau (superseded by the Education Bureau in 2007), and its framework was revised by the Education Bureau in 2008. On 13 October 2010, Chief Executive Donald Tsang stated in the "Policy Address 2010–2011" that moral and national education would replace MCE to "strengthen national education". The government planned to introduce the new subject in primary schools in 2012 and secondary schools in 2013.

In July 2012, the "Civil Alliance Against the National Education" (民間反對國民教育科大聯盟) was formed. On 29 July 2012, 30 organisations protested in a march. According to the organisers, more than 90,000 protesters, including many parents with their children, participated in the march.^[12]

Members of the student activist group Scholarism (學民思潮) began their occupation of the Hong Kong government headquarters on 30 August 2012. Fifty members occupied the public park beneath the government offices, of which three began a hunger strike. The goal of the protest was, expressly, to force the government to retract its plans to introduce Moral and National Education as a compulsory subject. The initial planned length of the occupation was three days.^[13] On 3 September 2012 the Civil Alliance Against National Education announced that they would continue their occupation of the government headquarters indefinitely.^[14] On 7 September, up to 120,000 people attended a demonstration outside the government headquarters; police said there were 36,000 attendees at 9:30 pm.^[15][16][17]

Following opposition from the public, the government postponed the commencement of the subject by introducing a three-year trial run period, such that the schools were allowed to commence the latest in 2015.^[18]

Election results overall

Before election:

Change in composition:

More information Political affiliation, Geographical Constituencies ...

Summary of the 9 September 2012 Legislative Council of Hong Kong election results

		Political affiliation	Geographical Constituencies				Traditional Functional Constituencies				District Council (Second) FC			Total seats	±
			Votes	%	±pp	Seats	Votes	%	±pp	Seats	Votes	%	Seats
		DAB[table 1]	366,140	20.22	2.70	9	105	0.07	0.14	3	476,875	29.96	1	13	3
		FTU	127,857	7.06	1.36	3	-	-	-	2	246,196	15.47	1	6	2
		Liberal	48,702	2.69	1.64	1	1,076	0.76	2.58	4	-	-	-	5	2
		Economic Synergy	5,717	0.32	N/A	0	-	-	-	3	-	-	-	3	1
		NPP	68,097	3.76	N/A	2	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	2	1
		KWND	34,548	1.91	N/A	1	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1	0
		New Forum[table 2]	-	-	-	-	1,106	0.78	N/A	1	-	-	-	1	1
		FLU	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1	-	-	-	1	0
		Civil Force[table 1] [table 2]	23,988	1.32	N/A	0	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	0	0
		Third Force	16,767	0.93	N/A	0	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	0	0
		Pro-Beijing Independents	80,671	4.45	-	1	44,529	31.36	N/A	10	61,321	3.85	0	11	2
Total for pro-Beijing camp			772,487	42.66	2.91	17	46,816	32.97	1.91	24	784,392	49.28	2	43	6
		Civic	255,007	14.08	0.42	5	4,480	3.15	4.36	1	-	-	-	6	1
		Democratic	247,220	13.65	6.98	4	1,464	1.03	1.80	0	545,308	34.26	2	6	2
		Labour	112,140	6.19	N/A	3	9,078	6.39	N/A	1	-	-	-	4	1
		People Power	176,250	9.73	N/A	3	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	3	1
		LSD	87,997	4.86	5.26	1	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1	0
		NWSC	43,799	2.42	0.38	1	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1	0
		ADPL	30,634	1.69	1.10	0	-	-	-	-	262,172	16.47	1	1	0
		Neo Democrats	28,621	1.58	N/A	1	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	1	1
		PTU	-	-	-	-	46,535	32.77	1.80	1	-	-	-	1	0
		Democratic Alliance	2,896	0.16	N/A	0	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	0	0
		Independent democrats	33,988	1.87	-	0	26,892	18.94	N/A	3	-	-	-	3	-
Total for pan-democrats			1,018,552	56.24	3.26	18	88,449	62.28	1.66	6	807,480	50.73	3	27	4
		Non-aligned others	19,945	1.10	-	0	2,205	1.55	6.77	0	-	-	0	0	-
Total			1,810,984	100.00		35	142,011	100.00		30	1,591,872	100.00	5	70
Valid votes			1,810,984	98.49	0.93		142,011	93.97	1.59		1,591,872	95.16
Invalid votes			27,738	1.51	0.93		9,113	6.03	1.59		80,921	4.84
Vote cast / turnout			1,838,722	53.05	7.85		151,124	69.65	9.35		1,672,793	51.95
Registered voters			3,466,201	100.00	2.79		216,979	100.00	2.24		3,219,755	100.00

Close

Election results by Geographical Constituency

Votes gained by each party by districts

• Popular votes by District Council constituency. Red represents Pro-Beijing camp gained most votes and green the Pro-democracy camp. Pro-Beijing remained stronghold in the rural areas in Ha Tsuen, Pat Heung, Sai Kung District, Sha Tau Kok, Ta Kwu Ling and Lamma Island. Some urban areas in Mid-Levels, North Point, Chai Wan, Wong Tai Sin, Sau Mau Ping, Yau Tong and Shek Wai Kok showed more support for the Pro-Beijing camp. Pro-democracy camp grabbed majority of the votes in the rest areas.
• The election showed large swings in Mid-Levels areas in Hong Kong Island and New Territories West, particularly in Tsuen Wan, Tuen Mun, Kwai Tsing, Tin Shui Wai, and Tseung Kwan O in New Territories East, but the rural areas as well as urban areas in Sheung Shui, Tai Po, Sha Tin and Wong Tai Sin showed a small swing back to the pro-democrats.
• Results of the 2012 LegCo election geographical constituencies: the party with most votes in each District Council Constituency.
• Results of the 2012 LegCo election District Council (second) functional constituency.

Votes summary

Seats summary

Incumbents defeated

Twelve incumbents were not re-elected.

Geographical Constituencies (35 seats)

Voting system: Party-list proportional representation with largest remainder method and Hare quota.

District Council (Second) Functional Constituency (5 seats)

Voting system: Party-list proportional representation with largest remainder method and Hare quota.

Other Functional Constituencies (30 seats)

Voting systems: Different voting systems apply to different functional constituencies, namely for the Heung Yee Kuk, Agriculture and Fisheries, Insurance and Transport, the preferential elimination system of voting; and for the remaining 24 FCs used the first-past-the-post voting system.^[25]