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CE's statement
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     In response to recent allegation that the concept of "civic nomination" had been raised during the drafting of the Basic Law, the Chief Executive, Mr Leung Chun-ying, issued the following statement:

     Yesterday (April 4) when I addressed the "Seminar for the 25th Anniversary of the Promulgation of the Basic Law", I pointed out that "during the drafting of the Basic Law, the 'consultation document' released in 1988 has listed five proposals on methods for selecting the Chief Executive. The two proposals of selecting the Chief Executive by universal suffrage have not mentioned 'civic nomination'."

     When the Basic Law was endorsed and promulgated on April 4, 1990, Article 45 reads: "The method for selecting the Chief Executive shall be specified in the light of the actual situation in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and in accordance with the principle of gradual and orderly progress. The ultimate aim is the selection of the Chief Executive by universal suffrage upon nomination by a broadly representative nominating committee in accordance with democratic procedures."

     If someone said the concept of "civic nomination" had been raised during the drafting of the Basic Law, this exactly illustrates that "civic nomination" and "nomination by a nominating committee" are totally different concepts. After comprehensive consultation by the Basic Law Drafting Committee, "nomination by a nominating committee" was eventually stated in the Basic Law. Hence for those who recently said that "nomination by a nominating committee" could be interpreted as "civic nomination", they are just "guessing and taking advantage of the literal meaning of words" and contravening the Basic Law.

     Last year, some members of the Legislative Council insisted that "civic nomination" was indispensable in selecting the Chief Executive by universal suffrage. If today these members insist on such saying, they know full well that they are contravening the Basic Law and are just creating problems. The result is they would take away the rights of Hong Kong people to select the Chief Executive by "one person, one vote" in 2017.

Ends/Sunday, April 5, 2015
Issued at HKT 19:38

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