A Hong Kong court is set to sentence 45 former opposition politicians and activists on Tuesday for conspiring to subvert state power through an unofficial legislative “primary” election four years ago, with dozens of residents queuing up for public gallery seats days in advance as police secured the area.
Authorities have stepped up security around the West Kowloon Law Courts Building since the weekend, setting up wedge barriers and cordoning off pathways as they get ready for the final act of the city’s largest and longest-running prosecution under the Beijing-decreed national security law.
The 45 were among 47 opposition figures who were jointly charged with conspiracy to commit subversion over an attempt to win a controlling majority in the Legislative Council through the 2020 primary in the hopes of forcing the government to give in to protesters’ demands by indiscriminately voting down its budgets.
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Thirty-one defendants, including former law professor Benny Tai Yiu-ting, the unofficial poll’s initiator, and three organisers, pleaded guilty to the charge before another 14 were convicted in May this year after a 118-day trial spanning 16 months.
A queue for seats in the public gallery snaked from a corner of the court building in Cheung Sha Wan as early as Saturday.
The Post found at least 26 people waiting in line on Monday morning, with dozens of empty seats believed to be marking spots. Some residents appeared to have waited outside overnight and had cardboard boxes filled with food and personal items.
An anti-riot armoured vehicle imported from mainland China, nicknamed “Saber-toothed Tiger”, was also parked on a strip of road near the premises.
Three High Court judges, all hand-picked by the city leader to hear national security cases, earlier found the primary to be part of a wider plot to “undermine, destroy or overthrow” the city government by creating a constitutional crisis after taking over the legislature.
They said the conspiracy, if successful, would have seriously interfered with, disrupted or undermined the government’s functioning due to the substantial harm to the “power and authority of the government and the chief executive”.
The court earlier cleared two of the 47, former district councillors Lawrence Lau Wai-chung and Lee Yue-shun, over a doubt on whether they had agreed to become part of the conspiracy.
The verdict in May drew praise from government authorities but triggered a fresh round of condemnation from the West over a perceived deterioration of fundamental freedoms and democratic principles.
Many of the 47, who include former veteran lawmakers and rising stars of the now-decimated opposition camp, have been detained since police commenced the high-profile prosecution on February 28, 2021.
The Beijing-imposed national security law stipulates a three-tier sentencing mechanism for subversion offences, with “principal offenders” liable to life imprisonment or at least 10 years behind bars.
Those deemed to have “actively” participated in the offence can be sentenced to between three and 10 years, whereas other participants can face a maximum of three years in jail, short-term detention or restrictions of movement.
Prosecutors have called for at least 10 years imprisonment for Tai for devising the primary, but his counsel urged the judges to sentence him to two years for his limited role in the scheme to bring down the government.
The judges refused the defence’s suggestion and said they would take into account his actions before the national security law’s implementation in June 2020 when deciding his sentence.
More from South China Morning Post:
- Hong Kong 47: sentencing hearing for 45 activists set for November 19
- Hong Kong 47: opposition activist says court a discredit to constitution in subversion case
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