Hong Kong Student Group Tops Opinion Poll Amid Pro-Democracy Movement

Since Hong Kong's mass pro-democracy protests began on Sept. 28, the Hong Kong Federation of Students (HKFS) has emerged as the most popular political group in the semi-autonomous Chinese city, a new opinion poll has shown.

The University of Hong Kong's public opinion research center found that student group's role in the protests appears to have eclipsed that of the Occupy Central civil disobedience movement established earlier in the year to push for universal suffrage in the 2017 elections for the chief executive of the former British colony,

The HKFS, led by Occupy protest figureheads Alex Chow and Lester Shum, had previously never reached the top 12 rankings for recognition or popularity. Now, it is the best-known political group.

The poll also found that the popularity of every other political group has fallen since June.

The pan-democratic Civic, Democratic and Labour Parties fell nine points in the poll, while the pro-Beijing labor group the Federation of Trade Unions dropped more than eight points in the poll.

Meanwhile, the academic activist group Scholarism, led by Joshua Wong, now ranks as the fifth most popular political organization, according to the poll in which more than 1,000 respondents participated between Oct. 20 and 23,

Debating the future

Student leaders had debated Hong Kong's political future with government officials on live television on Oct. 21.

Last month, a study carried out by the Chinese University of Hong Kong found growing support for the pro-democracy movement.

But a smaller poll by the Hong Kong Polytechnic University found that 70 percent of people believe that those camped out at three protest sites on major highways should now leave.

Social policy researchers polled 554 people during the weekend, and found that while embattled chief executive Leung Chun-ying is still the main figure shouldering the blame for the political standoff, 70 percent of people believe the occupiers should withdraw.

Occupy protesters are still encamped on three main sites in the former British colony, but numbers have dwindled from a peak of hundreds of thousands after tear gas was deployed on Sept. 28, and especially since talks between protesters and the government reached an apparent stalemate last month.

Anti-Occupy protesters say they are gaining wider support among the general public, which has indicated that it wishes to see a return to business as usual.

Meanwhile, protesters face the possibility of forced eviction from their campsites, should police move to clear barricades from the highway following civil injunctions brought by the transportation industry.

Going to Beijing

The students confirmed on Tuesday that they planned to travel to Beijing on Saturday ahead of next week's Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) leadership summit in a bid to plead their case with Chinese officials.

Alex Chow told reporters it is still undecided who will go, and an announcement is expected on Thursday.

However, it is unclear whether the students will be allowed into mainland China, as officials have previously barred entry to activists and government critics.

Leung warned protesters on Tuesday not to ignore civil injunctions ordering the removal of barricades blocking highways near government headquarters in Admiralty, and in the busy shopping districts of Mong Kok and Causeway Bay, to be removed.

"Some people are saying that they can ignore these injunctions because they are a civil [not criminal] matter," Leung said. "But that is very dangerous, because huge sums of money are involved [in lost business]."

He said Hong Kong's standing as an international financial center could be damaged by the protests, although financial analysts have reported no damage to markets so far.

Staying the course

At the main Occupy site in Admiralty, protesters vowed to stay until they had achieved genuine universal suffrage, with public nomination of candidates in the 2017 elections.

China's parliament, the National People's Congress (NPC), announced on Aug. 31 that the next chief executive will be chosen by individual votes from Hong Kong's five million registered voters, but only from a shortlist approved by a pro-Beijing committee.

"Everyone has their own personal bottom line," an Occupy protester surnamed Chan told RFA on Tuesday. "We are very clear that what we are asking for is genuine universal suffrage."

"We are here not just for ourselves but also for the next generation; for the future," she said.

Hong Kong lawmaker Tam Yiu-chung, adviser to the NPC and chairman of the pro-China Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong, said he would use his position as a middleman to put the protesters' case to Beijing officials—if they retreat from the current Occupy sites.

But Chan said she had little trust in promises by officials to relay protesters' concerns to Beijing.

"The government promised that Hong Kong wouldn't change for 50 years [after the 1997 handover to Chinese rule] ... but they keep adding all sorts of unreasonable conditions to universal suffrage," she said.

"It's hard for me to trust this government or politicians now," Chan added.

A second student protester, also surnamed Chan, said he would consider leaving the site if the government made significant concessions to protesters' demands.

"But it would depend on the manner of our leaving, if the government wanted to use force or bring in the police to clear the area or not," he said.

"But we will only leave when the government shows a bit of sincerity when it comes to a dialogue, and then everyone can reach some kind of consensus," Chan said.

Reported by Dai Weisen for RFA's Cantonese Service, and by Yang Fan for the Mandarin Service. Translated and written in English by Luisetta Mudie.