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Hong Kong Chief Secretary Carrie Lam claimed that under the constraints of seats at the venue, only seven Legislative Councilors will be invited to the luncheon with visiting top Chinese mainland lawmaker.
Li Fei, the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress' Deputy Secretary-General and Basic Law Committee Chairman Li Fei, and the NPCSC Legislative Affairs Commission Vice-Chairperson and Basic Law Committee Vice-Chairperson Zhang Rongshun，arrived Hong Kong on Thursday for a three-day visit.
He is scheduled to have a luncheon on Friday, meeting seven local lawmakers, as well as a host of representatives from various sectors in the city. Two of the pan-democratic representatives are Civic Party's Ronny Tong and Dennis Kwok. The luncheon will be held at the Hong Kong Government House, the offical residency of the territory's Chief Executive.
Lam said on Thursday that due to the limitation of space of venue, it was impossible to invite the entire 70-people LegCo team to attend.
She said Li and Zhang came for the discussion of Basic Law and the city's political reform from a legal point of view. The NPCSC, mainland's top legislative body, has laid down good legal foundation for the universal suffrage for the Legislative Council members and the Chief Executive in 2016 and 2017. These must all move forward in line with the regulation of the Basic Law and the interpretation.
However, since the consultation for the universal suffrage are still at the preliminary level, the Hong Kong government will not put forward any concrete proposition on the electoral arrangements.
She added that the duo have long dabbled into the studies of Basic Law. They have also been actively taken part in the city's political development. Their visit and explanation to the statutes of law would be of paramount importance for the consultative work of political reform.
Tong, one of the invitees to the luncheon with Li and Zhang, said he was worried that Li will use his visit to crush the idea of civil nomination -- where voters have the right to nominate chief executive candidates. Speaking on a radio program, he said from Beijing's point of view, "the law was either black or white" and proposals such as civil nomination could not be implemented just because they had a lot of support. Tong hoped Li would listen to more views during his visit and would not just look at the electoral reform issue from a legal perspective, according to Hong Kong Standard.
Li is also set to meet Hong Kong's Chief Executive CY Leung, Secretary for Justice Rimsky Yuen, representatives from the Hong Kong Bar Association and Law Society during his visit.
