Four Hong Kong lawmakers were stripped of their seats after their swearing-in oaths were ruled invalid by the High Court yesterday..
Four Hong Kong lawmakers were stripped of their seats after their swearing-in oaths were ruled invalid by the High Court yesterday.
Pro-democracy lawmakers Nathan Law, Lau Siu Lai, Edward Yiu and Leung Kwok Hung had altered their oaths at the swearing-in ceremony of the Legislative Council (Legco) on Oct 12 last year.
With two other lawmakers from the pro-democracy camp disqualified last year, the camp now has less than a third of the Legco’s 70 seats and has lost its veto-wielding bloc to overturn government decisions.
Mr Sixtus Baggio Leung and Ms Yau Wai Ching, from the pro-independence Youngspiration party, were disqualified for insulting China during the oath-taking ceremony. Their actions led China’s Parliament, the National People’s Congress (NPC) , to issue an interpretation of Article 104 of Hong Kong’s Basic Law, which stated that candidates would be disqualified if they changed the wording of their oath of office or failed to take it in a “solemn and sincere” manner.
At a press conference after the judgment yesterday, the pro- democracy camp slammed the central government for launching legal proceedings and accused it of using the law as a tool against politicians. “The NPC has, through the interpretation, rewritten the election results in September last year, ” said Mr Leung Kwok Hung, 61.
He had held a yellow umbrella as a symbol of the 2014 pro-democracy protest as he read his oath last year, while Ms Lau, 40, took long pauses.
