Cyd Ho

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Cyd Ho Sau Lan (Traditional Chinese: 何秀蘭; Simplified Chinese: 何秀兰; Cantonese IPA: /Hɔ4 Sɐʊ3 Lɑn4/; Pinyin: Hé Xiùlán, born 1954) was a full-time legislative councillor of Hong Kong's Legislative Council (LegCo), elected from the geographical constituency of New Territories East from 1998 to 2000 and Hong Kong Island from 2000 to 2004.  She is a founding member of The Frontier, a local pro-democracy political group and since 2006 founding councillor of the World Future Council. She is well-known for promoting universal suffrage, rule of law, human rights, and equal opportunity, as well as advancement in the interests of women, homosexuals and other minority groups.

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[edit] Background

Ho studied at the University of Waterloo, Canada. She worked in the textile trading industry from 1979 to 1995.

[edit] Career

In 1991, she helped Emily Lau Wai Hing during the election campaign, the first open direct election of the Legislative Council (LegCo) in colonial Hong Kong. In 1993, she founded the "United Ants"; with other pro-democracy political activisits. In 1995, she worked as an assistant to Margaret Ng Ngoi Yee, a lawmaker representing the legal profession in the LegCo.

In 1996, along with other political activists, she found The Frontier.

She was elected a legislative councillor for the geographical constituency of New Territories East in 1998 in the first LegCo election since the transition of sovereignty of Hong Kong from the UK back to China.  She was re-elected in the constituency of Hong Kong Island in 2000. She chaired bills committees such as the 2004 Education (Revised) Bill and the 2004 Examination Authority Bill, and was vice-chair of the panel on environmental affairs.

She was elected as a District Council member of the Central and Western district via the Kwun Lung (觀龍) constituency in November, 2003, beating veteran Ip Kwok Him of the DAB. She also supported members of other pro-democracy political groups such as Civic Act-up, which were also contesting seats in the Wanchai district council.

[edit] The 2004 Legco Election

In 2004, she, together with James To Kun Sun, Frederick Fung Kin Kee, Wong Sing Chi, Mak Kwok Fung, attempted to cross the border and meet Beijing officials at Shenzhen, to request for a faster pace of democratisation in Hong Kong.

In the Hong Kong Legislative Council election, 2004, Ho contested, together with Audrey Eu Yuet Mee, in the geographical constituency of Hong Kong Island. She was defeated by a slim margin (815 out of a total of about 350 000, or 0.23%) to her nearest DAB rival, Choy So-yuk.

Some have attributed the defeat to lack of proper planning of vote allocation among the pro-democratic camp candidates before the election. Others claim it was a betrayal by the Democractic Party, a political ally. Despite an original agreement to the slogan "1+1=4", the Democractic Party requested all supporters of the pan-democratic camp in the Hong Kong Island geographical constituency to vote for them, believing that the Democratic Party could secure a seat for their third candidate Lai Chi-Keung. In the end, Lai ended up a few hundred votes short of Cyd Ho, costing them both the chance for a seat. This ultimately benefitted Cyd Ho's DAB rival Choy So Yuk. A number of disgruntled voters of the pan-democratic camp demanded that the then-DP Chairman Yeung Sum and Founding Chairman Martin Lee Chu-ming step down as a result.

However, some others pointed out that Ho's support for legalizing gay marriage during the election campaign was a fatal blow, because her speech angered and alienated a significant number of voters.

[edit] Post-election

Besides staying as a key member of her political party the Frontier until 2006, she currently hosts her own radio programmes on two local radio stations: on RTHK every Tuesday evening (1700-2000 HKT), and on PRHK every Wednesday night (2200-2300 HKT).

In 2006, she quit the Frontier and became the chairperson of Human Rights Monitor in Hong Kong and the co-convener of Project Civil Referendum, a scheme to pilot and promote the idea of holding a referendum in Hong Kong.

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

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