DEMOCRATIC PARTY'S ELECTION STRATEGY

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 HONG KONG 001512

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

DEPT FOR EAP AND EAP/CM
NSC FOR DENNIS WILDER

E.O. 12958: DECL: 04/11/2031
TAGS: PGOV PHUM PINR PREL HK CH
SUBJECT: DEMOCRATIC PARTY'S ELECTION STRATEGY

Classified By: E/P Chief Simon Schuchat. Reasons: 1.4(b,d).


1. (C) Summary: On April 7, Consul General Cunningham met
with Lee Wing-tat, Democratic Party (DP) Chairman to review
the party's election strategy. Lee said he welcomed the
creation of the Civic Party and seemed pretty confident that
the pan-democrats could get the hundred plus Chief Executive
Election Committee members needed to nominate an opposition
candidate, although Beijing will work hard to prevent it.
The pan-democrats had no illusion that a democratic CE
candidate could win, but Lee contended that the DP could turn
the CE election into a "virtual election" and take advantage
of the opportunity to influence public opinion. (Separately,
the "Ming Pao" reported that the democrats could potentially
win 120 Election Committee seats.) The DP Chief also
confirmed that mainland representatives had offered bribes to
two DP members; the party will make this information public
later this month. End Summary.

Election Strategy
--------------


2. (C) On April 7, Consul General Cunningham met with Lee
Wing-tat, Democratic Party (DP) Chairman to review the
party's election strategy. Lee said he welcomed the creation
of the Civic Party and said that the two parties would work
well together. He and Civic Party lawmaker Ronny Tong were
working together to develop strategy and to prepare for the
next major political event -- the 2007 Chief Executive (CE)
election. Lee emphasized that the party's CE Election
Committee strategy was not yet public knowledge and
emphasized the sensitive nature of this information.
According to Lee, the DP and Civic Party needed to register
voters in the various constituencies now and lay the
groundwork for a campaign in the fall. Lee seemed pretty
confident they could get the hundred plus members needed to
nominate an opposition candidate but acknowledged that
Beijing will work hard to prevent that from happening.


3. (C) It was clear that the democratic CE candidate would
not be able to win the election, said Lee, but having a
candidate would force Tsang to debate a range of issues,
including democracy, political reform, a timetable for
universal suffrage, as well as social and economic issues.
The Chief Executive is expected to produce a new report on
political reform (presumably from the Commission on Strategic
Development) by the end of this year and will have to defend
it during the CE election campaign. The democrats will use
that debate to establish the DP as a party with an agenda and
platform that goes beyond democracy, but will also energize
the public again. With a good, articulate candidate (Lee
mentioned former Chief Secretary Anson Chan as an example but
just as quickly said he had no idea who might run),the DP
could turn the CE election into a "virtual election" because
the democratic candidate will have the chance to influence
public opinion. Tsang will not only have to respond to the
800 Election Committee members, but to public opinion as
well. Tsang will not want to combine selection by the
Election Committee with a poor performance in opinion polls
of the general public.


4. (SBU) On April 11, "Ming Pao" published a special
investigative report on the pan-democrats' strategy for the
September CE Election Committee elections. The newspaper
reported that the pan-democrats intended to stage a
large-scale campaign to encourage eligible voters to register
by the May 16 deadline. If the democrats fared well in the
social welfare, legal, medical, health services, higher
education, education and accountancy sub-sector elections and
if one included the 25 pro-democracy Legco members who are
automatically members of the Election Committee, the
pan-democrats could potentially have as many as 120 seats.
The "Ming Pao" noted that the pro-Beijing forces had been
instructed to counter the democrats' push by fielding their
own candidates and keeping the number of pro-democratic
Election Committee members below 100. (Note: The efforts of
the democrats to aggressively campaign for Election Committee
seats is in sharp contrast to their previous boycott of the
July 2000 Election Committee elections. At the time, they
argued that they did not want to participate in "small circle
elections." End Note.)

Some Coordination with the Civic Party
--------------


5. (C) Regarding other elections, Lee told the CG that he did
not expect DP and Civic Party candidates to compete for the
same pro-democracy votes in the District Council elections --
they would coordinate on where to run candidates in order to

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maximize their chances and strengths. The DP has an
established organization, which the Civic Party won't have,
added Lee. They would, however, be competing with each other
in the 2008 Legislative Council elections, since there were a
limited number of geographic constituency seats.

Relations with the Government and Factional Issues
-------------- --------------


6. (C) Lee said that he had no regrets at how things turned
out last fall, with the defeat of the Government's reform
package. He was now concentrating on deflecting attempts by
the press and pro-Beijing forces (and at times the Government
and especially Tsang) to paint the DP as an opposition party
only intent on obstruction. Lee pointed out that the DP had
had a good dialogue with Secretary for Finance Henry Tang on
the budget and ultimately supported the Government's budget.
The DP also worked well with York Chow, Secretary for Health,
Welfare, and Food, and other ministers. The relationship
with the CE was a bit different now, although they did talk.
Still, Lee thought that the Government would try to maximize
its support per issue, rather than relying on a fixed support
base from pro-Government parties such as the Democratic
Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong (DAB)
and the Liberal Party. Lee explained that the DP had
supported the HKG on the budget after some concessions by
Tang, and would support the Government on the construction of
Government headquarters at Tamar, albeit, with some
modifications. He noted that Tsang had mentioned three major
projects in his policy address last October: constitutional
reform, the West Kowloon Cultural District, and Tamar. Lee
said that since the first two projects were considered either
failed or stalled, getting support for the Tamar project was
very important to Tsang. He was sure that Beijing had told
the DAB to drop its opposition.


7. (C) The Consul General asked Lee if the negative attacks
in the media regarding contact between the USG and the DP or
the Civic Party were causing the parties any problems. He
replied no, that this type of speculation had been going on
for some time. Separately, Lee confirmed that mainland
representatives had offered bribes to two DP members. In mid
March (around the time of the Civic Party's official launch)
Lee revealed during a press conference that there had been a
mysterious increase in membership applications to the party
and possible bribe attempts. Lee assigned a taskforce to
investigate these allegations. It seemed likely, added Lee,
that others had been offered bribes and not reported it. The
party will be making this information public, with the
individuals involved, later this month. (Comment: There is
speculation that the internal probe is actually a battle
between Lee and another DP faction unhappy with Lee's
leadership of the party. End Comment)
Cunningham