Hong Kong municipal election, 1952

Hong Kong municipal election, 1952

30 May 1952

Nominee Brook Bernacchi William Louey Party Reform KRA Popular vote 1,168 1,068 Percentage 17.83% 16.31%

Elected Members Brook Bernacchi William Louey

The 1952 Hong Kong Urban Council Election was held on 30 May 1952 for the 2 elected seats of the Urban Council of Hong Kong.

Overview

It was the first Urban Council election after the Second World War. Prior to the election, the former Governor Sir Mark Aitchison Young suggested a further constitutional reform by a new elected Municipal body replacing the Urban Council. The Young Plan was strongly opposed by the conservatives and the then Governor Sir Alexander Grantham. Instead, the Governor restored the election for two seats in the Urban Council which had existed before the war.

Some 3,368 men cast ballots, about one-third of the 9,700 registered electorates.

Brook Bernacchi of the Reform Club of Hong Kong and William Louey of the Kowloon Residents' Association were elected out of nine candidates.

Pro-Chinese Communist barrister Percy Chen was one of the candidates. He urged voters to treat the election as a referendum to press London for a further constitutional reform promised by Young. He ranked sixth of the nine candidates by getting 461 votes.

The other Reform Club candidate Woo Pak-Chuen lost the race by only 38 votes.^[1]

Urban Council Election 1952[2]
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Reform	Brook Bernacchi	1,168	17.84
	KRA	William Louey	1,068	16.31
	Reform	Woo Pak-Chuen	1,031	15.75
	Independent	Tso Tsun-on	1,017	15.53
	Independent	Peter Sin	866	13.23
	CRA	Percy Chen	461	7.04
	Independent	G. S. Kennedy-Skipton	386	5.89
	Independent	Kong Chi-Nai	307	4.69
	Independent	Daniel Chen	244	3.73
Turnout			3,368	35.0

Citations

1. Reform Club of Hong Kong (1949). Memorandum and articles of Association of the Reform Club of Hong Kong : incorporated the 20th day of January, 1949. Ts'o & Hodgson.
2. "Steady Stream Of Voters At Urban Council Election". China Mail. 30 May 1952.

References

Pepper, Suzanne (2008). Keeping Democracy at Bay:Hong Kong and the Challenge of Chinese Political Reform. Rowman & Littlefield.