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Three men and a woman accused of provoking hatred against city’s government and inciting people to not vote in next month’s legislative council election
Shweta SharmaFriday 21 November 2025 08:51 GMTComments
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Hong Kong has charged four people for sharing social media posts urging a public boycott of the upcoming “patriots only” legislative council election.
One of them was charged with sedition and the other three with engaging in illegal conduct on social media.
Lam Chung-ming, 68, was arrested on Tuesday for posting content that allegedly incited hatred against the city’s government and asked people to not cast their votes. He was charged with the national security crime of "seditious publication" after appearing before the West Kowloon Magistrates Courts on Thursday to face one count of “knowingly publishing publications that had a seditious intention”.
The other three, two men and a woman, were charged on suspicion of breaching Hong Kong’s election laws. They were identified as Wong Kin-kwok, 55, Lam Kin-sik, 66, and Bonney Ma, 61.
The charges against them carry a maximum penalty of three years in prison and a fine.
The Independent Commission Against Corruption, which oversees election legislation, said it strongly condemned “criminals who attempted to interfere with and undermine the current LegCo Election by circulating messages online to incite others not to vote”.
“The ICAC urges members of the public to strictly adhere to the law and distinguish the truth to avoid being fooled and exploited by lawbreakers,” it said in a statement.
The commission said it had also issued warrants against two other people, who were outside the city, for making the initial posts which are shared by three of the accused.
“The ICAC investigation revealed that Keung Ka-wai and Tong Wai-hung had published on their social media pages posts which incited others not to cast any votes in the 2025 LegCo Election,” the statement read.
“Subsequently, Wong reposted Keung’s post on his social media page, while Lam and Ma posted Tong’s post on their respective social media pages.”
The arrests came after the government launched a campaign urging the city’s residents to vote in the legislative council election in December.
This would be only the second such election since Beijing overhauled the city’s electoral system to ensure only those deemed “patriotic” could run.
File. Supporters of a district council elections candidate campaign in Hong Kong, China, on 24 November 2019 (Getty)In 2021, Hong Kong amended its electoral laws to put in place the controversial “patriots-only” system, two years after pro-democracy protests led to a crackdown on dissidents. The 2019 protests marked the most concerted challenge to Beijing’s control over the city since the former British colony was returned to China in 1997.
The new system drastically reduces the public’s ability to vote and increases the number of pro-Beijing lawmakers making decisions for the city.
The 2023 district council elections saw fewer than 1.2 million residents – 27.5 per cent of the electorate – vote.
In an effort to boost the turnout this time around, the government has decked the city in promotional material encouraging people to vote.
Authorities have extended train service hours on election days and some businesses have already promised a half-day to their employees to enable them to vote.
Hong Kong leader John Lee urged the public last month to fulfil their "civic responsibility".
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