Demand for democracy

HONG KONG – Braving sweltering summer temperatures, hundreds of thousands of pro-democracy demonstrators marched through the heart of Hong Kong on Thursday, demanding the right to elect their chief executive and all legislators through direct popular vote.

The protest, which drew people from all sections of the territory, including the young and old, parents with small children, students and pensioners, was the largest outpouring of pro-democracy sentiments since over half a million Hong Kong residents turned out a year ago. Organizers claimed that 530,000 took part Thursday, while police put the number at less than half that.

The demonstration constituted a direct challenge to a ruling by Beijing’s Communist Party leadership in April that rejected calls to elect the next chief executive by direct popular vote in 2007 and all 60 legislators through universal suffrage the following year.

Instead, Beijing provided no timetable for such elections and issued a vague statement that democratic reforms in Hong Kong could only proceed carefully and slowly.

In addition to the ruling’s content, legal experts viewed the manner of the Communist leadership’s intervention – one that effectively preempted public debate – as a serious blow to the autonomy granted Hong Kong at the time Britain handed over the territory to China in 1997. Under the formula known as “one country, two systems,” the territory is part of China but enjoys many democratic freedoms granted by its mini-constitution, known as the Basic Law.

The size of the demonstration almost certainly will provide additional momentum to democratic political groups as they prepare for elections to the territory’s 60-member Legislative Council next September.

Half the council will be elected by direct popular vote, while the rest will be selected by special interest groups, such as doctors, lawyers, educators and representatives of organized labor.