Govt to set up near-boundary polling stations at two schools near Sheung Shui station

The government will set up near-boundary polling stations at two schools close to Sheung Shui MTR station for the upcoming District Councils election on December 10. 

The two schools are Hong Kong Taoist Association Tang Hin Memorial Secondary School and Tung Wah Group of Hospitals Kap Yan Directors’ College. 

The arrangement is “to facilitate the electors living on the mainland to return to Hong Kong to cast their votes,” the government said on Tuesday. 

“The epidemic has now passed and the control points have resumed normal operations, and that all the control points are currently very busy in operation, hence there is not adequate space to set up polling stations,” the government also explained. 

To ensure the orderly implementation of this arrangement, all participating electors must be preregistered. 

Electors for the Hong Kong Island and Kowloon geographical constituencies will be allocated to vote at Hong Kong Taoist Association Tang Hin Memorial Secondary School, and electors for the New Territories geographical constituencies will be allocated to vote at Tung Wah Group of Hospitals Kap Yan Directors’ College. 

The maximum number of the registration quota for the near-boundary polling stations will be 38,000 and the quota will be allocated on a first-come first-serve basis. 

“Depending on the actual registration situation at the time, the government will exercise discretion to consider suitably increasing the quota if the turnout is very high,” it said. 

The Registration and Electoral Office will set up a dedicated online registration system and the registration period will be from 9 am on November 20 to 6 pm on December 5. 

The arrangement does not apply to District Committees constituency electors.

In addition, the government is mulling holding some extra-curricular activities for students over the school holiday that falls on the day after the district council elections, Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Erick Tsang Kwok-wai said. 

The suggestion came after pro-establishment politicians’ worries that the long weekend may affect the turnout rate of the election as parents could be taking their children on vacation.